Blogger's Quilt Festival - Goldfish Quilt

For this year's Fall Blogger's Quilt Festival, I wanted to share my newly-finished Goldfish Quilt.

Front:


Back:


While this quilt's design is nothing to shout about, what makes this quilt special is that it came together with other people's help.

My friend, Leigh, learned of my love for Heather Ross' Goldfish in Bags fabric at the end of last year. Since I came onto the quilting scene well after the fabric was out of print, I didn't have any. Leigh was amazing and swapped some of her other Heather Ross fabric to get me a fat quarter of these little fishies! Totally blew me away!



I wanted to make the most of the fabric so I fussy cut the fish and framed them in white and blue and orange fabric.



For the border, I used a stripe fabric from the same Lightning Bugs and Other Mysteries line that I won in a giveaway from Rae earlier in the year.

It's nice to have this quilt finally done.

Sewing Update

So, I've been more of a slacker with this blog than I thought I'd be after getting over the sick part of being pregnant. I've been sewing, but I just haven't made the time to take pictures of anything. I want to blame it on the cruddy weather we had up through Sunday (thanks, Mother Nature, for sending me not only rain on my birthday last week, but snow too!), but I know it's just my laziness winning out.

I finished the quilt top and backing for my Far Far Away 2 Kitchen Windows bed quilt. After much anxiety, I decided to send it out for quilting. I've never been willing to spend money on long-arm quilting since I figured I have the means to quilt myself, but this quilt is huge (between a king and a queen) and I knew I'd kill my back if I tried to baste it and quilt it myself. (A bad back plus no support due to an ever-expanding belly equals a lot of back pain.) So, I searched around and found a lady near my inlaws who is quilting it for me for a pretty good price. I should get it back next week. Once I get it bound and washed up, I'll post pictures of it.

While that quilt has been at the quilter's, I started item #3 on my 2011 quilty to-do list: my Goldfish quilt.



I had already fussy cut 20 goldfish out, and then I added a little bit of white around each fish. Then I used 3" strips of orange and blue fabrics to create each block. The sashing is Kona stone. I plan to add an additional border of the orange and blue stripes fabric from Heather Ross' Lightning Bugs and Other Mysteries line to make it big enough for a lap quilt.





Several people have asked if I was making this quilt for our baby. That wasn't initially what I had in mind, but I have some more fish that I can use to make a baby-size version of this quilt...if I can keep some sewing momentum going through the summer.

Pillow Talk Swap 4 Pillow Received

I was so happy when this package came in the mail on Saturday. Ecstatic, really. I was squealing and shrieking like a little girl. Seriously. My partner was Mari (ZewNice on Flickr). She's from Norway, so you know she has to be super cool. (Plus, my paternal grandmother's family is Norwegian, so I think having Mari as my partner was meant to be!)



Look at these fishies! I cannot tell you how much I love these fishies!



And look at these vans! Aren't they adorable?!



Along with the pillow, Mari sent me a few other goodies.



She made me this cute little zippered clutch/pouch that I'll be storing my needles, embroidery floss, and small crochet hooks in from now on.



When I peeked inside the clutch and saw that Mari had included some of the goldfish fabric, I started freaking out! See, I didn't care much about fabric back when this fabric was in print. I have looked for it now and then online, but the price tag always kept me from buying some of it myself. When I saw that Mari was kind enough to include some, I was thrilled! And, I've already planned out a quilt using these little guys. I can't wait to get started on it come January!



Thanks again, Mari. This was such a fun swap to participate in. Mari really nailed me with this pillow. I love love love it!