Frogs, and Turtles, and Birds, Oh My!

Almost all caught up with the Elephant Parade Quilt Along! Lorna at Sew Fresh Quilts has designed this cute quilt and I couldn't help but gather fabric and join.

So cute!

The frog block came together pretty quickly...Just need eyes on this guy!

Blind ribbit

The turtle went together just as quickly...except something was wrong...

What's with all the extra fabric on the top piece?

I kept looking and looking and couldn't figure out what I had done wrong. I was JUST about to trim down the block so the top piece fit the bottom...when I moved something to grab my rotary cutter and saw the tail section. Phew! Disaster averted!

Sooo much better! :)

I got the frog and turtle put together in one Maggie nap (45 minutes). Yay, me!

I tackled the birds the after I put Maggie down for the night. I thought I was being careful with the instructions, but clearly something went wrong.

I'm not exactly sure how I'm gonna fix these guys. I have to ponder that and let you know later.

Lorna posted the instructions for the flowers on Sunday, so that is what I will be working on this week. Check those out here. Linking up with the Let's Bee Social linky party!

More to come,

Baby Elephants!

These are the baby elephants from Sew Fresh Quilt's Elephant Parade. I have been running behind with this quilt along, and honestly, I didn't think that I would get these little guys done in time for today's link ups. Working late into last night and finishing this morning, these babies turned out so cute!

They are NOT perfect. There are some wonky bits. I think that it gives them character!  :)

I continued to group my cut pieces together for each block. I like how this organizes all the bits and I am not constantly looking for pieces.

For the left-facing babies

The Good

I feel that, overall, my piecing was much better with these little guys.

They look good from a distance, don't they?

A little closer...

This seam makes me happy!

The Bad

I'm not a perfect piecer and that is okay. I ended up with some pieced sections that looked a little curved...weird!

A little wonky in places

The Ugly

Sometimes, my seams are waaaay off. I'm not really sure why. Possible reasons: inaccurate cutting, fatique (just go to bed, already!), sewing on a diagonal (I don't seem to do this well), and , of course, a combination of all three!

A little left side wonk

Yikes!!

Anyway, Mamas and babies are done.  Moving on to the frog, turtle and birds. I think I can get these done for next week. Then I'll be almost caught up! YAY, me!

Linking up with Let's Bee Social by Sew Fresh Quilts and WIP Wednesday by Freshly Pieced.

More to come,

Mama Elephants - Done!

I am so impressed with myself!  :) I have finished the large elephant from the Elephant Parade Quilt Along from Sew Fresh Quilts. I am calling them the mama elephants.

I started with this:

Pieces for mama elephants picked out and waiting...

And ended up with this:

5 Mama elephants waiting for their babies

I am finding this to be a real learning experience. I have been really careful with cutting and piecing, and my blocks have come put pretty good. A few of things worth noting are,

1) When the instructions call for you to do something different than you normally do, say for example, pressing seams open instead of to the dark, pay extra attention to make sure you do. I had to go back and repress a few seams when I realized that I had pressed them incorrectly. As I got to putting together the sections of the block, I was glad that I went back and repressed.

2) If piecing multiple blocks at the same time, and there is a directional difference...PAY ATTENTION!!  As you can see above, all my mama elephants are facing the same direction. I realized that issue after I had pieced together the far left section of the block. I didn't want to pick everything out, so they will stay that way, but lesson learned.

All left facing trunks.Oops!

3) Finger pressing before using your iron can help prevent some burnt fingers. There were a couple of close calls, but no burns.

4) I am not a very fast piecer...And that is okay. It took me about 3 hours and 10 minutes to go from pieces sorted to finished block. That seems slow to me. Maybe it is not...I really don't have anything to compare it to.

Mama Elephant

Next up, the babies! Today, I am linking up with Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday and Sew Fresh Quilts for the Let's Bee Social Linky Party.

More to come,

Mustang Race

Look at what I found at my LQS! Beautiful Cotton + Steel fabrics in Mustang. Michelle also had a little grab bag of threads that just happened to match, so I had to grab one, of course. Thank you, Simcoe Sew & Quilt! 

I went in looking for a jelly roll. I had watched a Missouri Star Quilt Co. tutorial on YouTube the night before, and thought that it might be my best chance of getting a quilt top finished!  :) This is the tutorial I watched: Jelly Roll Race!

I didn't have a recipient in mind for this quilt, because I wasn't quite sure what I was going to find at the store. When I found the new Cotton + Steel lines, I targeted a quilt for a little girl who is due at the beginning of March.

The video says that the quilt top will come together in 45 minutes to an hour.  This was not so true for me, but I think that I am on the slow side.  In total, it took me 2 hours to put this quilt top together, 3 separate times while Maggie slept . I am pretty happy with that, and I feel like I accomplished something.

Sewing strips together

Strippy goodness

A quick run down of how to jelly roll race:
1. Unroll the jelly roll and sew the strips to each other consecutively so it forms one big strip, with right sides together.  (The tutorial shows a diagonal join, but I'm not so good at those, so I joined them with a straight seam.)
2. When the long strip is done, fold it on itself so the ends are together and sew down the long side. When you get to the end, cut the loop open and you have a 2 row strip that is half the size of the original strip.
3. Keep folding the strip on itself until you get to 32 rows (5 times).
There, you are done! Easy peasy, grilled cheesy.

Here is what mine looked like:

I didn't like the big chunk of aqua that was plunked in the middle. So, I unstitched between the middle of the aqua, and sewed the two pieces back together with the aqua separated.  This is what it looks like now:

A little better, but to be honest, I'm not loving it. I'm not sure what I am going to put on the back, but I'm thinking either pink or aqua minky.  Off to the fabric store to see what they have.

More to come,







P.S. I've linked up with Sew Fresh Quilt for Let's Bee Social...first link up ever!!