It's about time I blogged again, eh?

Beuller? Beuller? Anyone out there?

I can't believe four months have passed since my last post. Well, I guess I'm not surprised. 2014 was a crazy year for me. I started grad school, got laid off, found a job, had a parent pass away, had another child start school, and ended the baby stage in our family. I still managed to make things, but the documenting part fell by the way side. I'm not sure I'll be any good at blogging this year, but I do hope to keep track of my projects better throughout the year. Here's my first attempt at catching up.

After seeing Angela's Arkansas Crossroads quilt she made out of Denyse Schmidt's Chicopee line, I knew I had to use my DS Florence fabric to make one of my own. I pieced the top several months back using Florence, coordinating solids, and Kona white.

Once it was all put together though, it didn't quite feel like "me" so I let it sit for a while. As Christmas neared and I hunkered down to finish gifts, I realized that this quilt was begging to be given to my son's teacher. My son is high functioning autistic and has attended a specialized school for the last two years. He's been blessed with a saint of a teacher and I wanted her to know how much we love and appreciate her. What better way to say that than with a quilt?

I really love how the quilting worked out with this one. In the main patchwork blocks, I quilted fairly tight meandering loops. Then, in the white sections, I quilted squiggly lines. The texture it created is so fun, and you can see it pretty well from the back.

The scrappy binding is made up from several pieces of leftover binding strips from other projects that coordinated well with the colors in the quilt itself. (I love it when things work out that way!)

My son delivered the quilt to his teacher's house, who leaves only a couple blocks away. She was touched by the gift and he said he was glad to have made her feel happy. And I was very happy to hear him say that.

WIP Wed 8/13/14: The one with all the quilt top beginnings

Now that I'm back into the swing of sewing again, I want to try harder to blog. I have a tendency to post things to Instagram because it's so quick and easy, but I forget that my blog serves as a sewing journal so I can document all the things I make. Needless to say, these pics are all from my IG feed (@pitterputterstitch). 

Let's get on with the WIP part of this post, eh?

Flower Box

I bought this V & Co pattern, which I really love, and then pulled together a group of navy, teal, and peach fabrics. For the background, I picked this Moda Bella teak, and I'm not sure I love it. In fact, I think I may not like it. I'm debating between recutting my background fabric using a lighter neutral or just pushing through and finishing the blocks as is.

Arkansas Florence Crossroads

This was such a fast top to put together. I used Denyse Schmidt's Florence with coordinating solids for the main blocks and Le Creme dots for the background. I plan to make another one of these soon.

New Star

This paper pieced star is called the New Star and I got the pattern from Quilter's Cache. The Salt Lake Modern Quilt Guild is making a charity quilt using paper pieced stars and this color scheme. When I made this block, I forgot to use the designated solid background, so lucky me, I get to keep this one. It'll turn into a pillow eventually.

Neon Plus

In an effort to make a quilt for everyone in my family, I started on this neon plus quilt for my niece, Chamy. She's 19 and loves neon. When my dad was sick, she spent a lot of time at my parents' house tackling projects that needed to be done. She even refinished my parents' 11x40 foot deck! She's awesomesauce so I wanted to make her a quilt right away.

Wee Wander Pink and Orange

When Sarah Jane's Wee Wander line came out, I bought a fat quarter bundle of the whole line. This is such a sweet collection and I wanted to make coordinating quilts for my two girls. I played around with layouts and really liked this one, but The Middle has a mind of her own and convinced me to change it up. I'll post the final layout when I can take real pictures with my camera.

Wee Wander Blue and Green

For The Baby's quilt, I made a variety of patchwork blocks. I've since sashed them all in a cream solid and then I'll add a border around each block with green and blue solids.

Strips

I haven't made a small-strip striped quilt before. I pulled a focal fabric and then grabbed blues, reds, oranges, and greens to go with it. I pressed and trimmed all these blocks last night and settled on the final layout. I'll piece the top tonight. That'll put me at five quilt tops to baste, quilt, and bind. Not bad for a month's worth of sewing.

Finished Scrap EPP Flower Pillow

There are times when I'd rather hand sew than sit in front of my sewing machine. The downside to the flexibility of that is that I sometimes just end up with these random blocks that I don't have any use for. This is one of those blocks.

Earlier in the year, my friend, Marci, put together a fundraiser for her coworker so she could get a cochlear implant. I offered a prize for donations. Not only was this a good cause, but I wanted to get motivated to finish something.

The lucky winner was really patient with me because when she won the drawing, I was in the midst of finals for grad school. She was sweet enough to let me know I could take my time. Unfortunately, right after finals is when my dad had his stroke and then passed away. I didn't have a lot of sewing mojo for a while after he passed, but I finally finished this pillow the other night and got it sent off in the mail.



I had sewn the flower using English paper piecing and then appliqued it onto some crosshatch fabric. I needed to enlarge things a bit so it'd fit a 20" pillow form so I added a border using the same colors I used in the block.

For the backing, I chose some flannel pieces that were leftover from a previous project and pieced an orange stripe through one of the sets. I opted for no binding and no quilting on this one as well as an envelope style closure instead of a zipper.

Finished Garden Fence Quilt

A few years back, I gave my mom a bundle of fabric for Christmas. I had finished my dad's quilt, but hadn't gotten far (or done anything really) on my mom's quilt. Several years have passed and I finally got around to finishing up and gifting her the quilt.

I used Lost and Found by My Mind's Eye for Riley Blake and the original Garden Fence tutorial from Hyacinth Quilt Designs. (I used the revised Garden Fence block for my dad's quilt.) This quilt uses 35 blocks that finish at 12 inches. I then added to narrow borders in a red Moda grunge fabric and then added an ivory border to make the quilt a bit bigger.



The backing is a gray flat sheet from Target. I used a gray bias plaid binding.

My friend, Kayli, did the quilting for me. She used various floral motifs from the prints on the front.

I especially like the double flowers she free-handed.

In the thin red border, she quilted these swirls.

And the outer border is made up of piano key quilting. You can also see a bit of the binding in this pic.

In addition to the quilt, I made a few pillowcases using this awesome tutorial, which is my go-to for pillowcase-making.

It felt so good to finally finish this project. And I think my mom was happy to have something new to go in her newly remodeled bedroom.

Farewell, Dad...until we meet again.

Saying I've had a rough last month and a half would be an understatement. I lost my dad.

As a child, I scratched "Dad" into the surface of my dad's jewelry box.
I found it in a drawer on Sunday; I had all but forgotten about it.

He had a stroke on May 1, ironically the first day of stroke awareness month. After a few weeks of gradual decline, my dad's health turned critical and we knew he wouldn't be around much longer. He was placed on hospice and passed away early in the morning on June 8. I was able to be there and I'm so glad I got to spend these last few weeks with him.

As the weeks passed, it became increasingly more difficult for my dad to
talk, so he did a lot of hand-holding.

All six of us kids (I'm the baby), my mom, and my dad.

We buried him a week ago today.

While I had prepared myself for his passing, I didn't realize I would feel like this after his death. The ache I have for his loss is terribly poignant and strikes at odd moments throughout the day: in a work meeting, watching TV, reading a book to my daughter, singing bedtime songs. I miss my dad so much it hurts.

My parents would have celebrated their 52nd wedding anniversary in August. My dad would have turned 75 in September.

Despite the crushing weight of mourning for him, I know I will see my dad again. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. I'm a Mormon. Because of that, I know that life continues beyond the grave. That belief certainly doesn't take away or lessen the pain here and now of not having my dad physically on earth, but it is incredibly comforting to know death is not the end.

For his birthday last year, I made him this mini quilt. He always sung the Lionel Richie song when he called me on the phone. I took the mini quilt home last week and hung it on the wall by my bed. I will be turning it into a pillow so I can hold and squeeze it when I'm feeling low.

I sewed a little bit on Monday and it felt like the first time in a really long time. It's amazing how things you love drop down on the priority list when the things you love the most are in jeopardy. Sewing is therapeutic for me though so I hope to get back into the swing of things in the coming days and weeks.