Forest Quilt Along, and July Finish!

Over the week-end, I put the finishing binding on my Forest Quilt Along blocks / quilts!  As I mentioned in this post, it was also my July "A Lovely Year of Finishes" goal. I was hoping to make all 12 blocks, but life suddenly got really busy after 6 were made.  I hope to make at least a few extras in the months to come.

Since I only had 6, and love, love, love these blocks, I knew that I wanted to make something that I could put up on our walls, and look at every day.  I decided to split them all up to spread the love all over the house, and made 2 mini quilts, and 1 throw pillow.

As usual, the quilting part of theses was a lot of fun too.  Here's a few details:

Thanks again to Joanna, Julianna, and all of the other artists and wonderful hosts of this quilt along!

July Finish Goal

My A Lovely Year of Finishes goal for July is to make a project, or piece for the Forest Quilt Along finish link up.  I have until August to finish it.  I kind of stalled out after the first 6 blocks, but hope to eventually make a few more of these amazing blocks.

I knew almost from the start that I did NOT want to make a quilt out of these beauties.  They're something I want to look at every day, so I hope to make a small mini wall hanging quilt (or 2).  I may even make a pillow out of them for our couch.

WIP Wed, and June ALYoF Goal

Besides my various quilt alongs, I've decided that June will be the month that I try to sew all of my local swap blocks together into a quilt top or 2.

Over 6 months this past winter, several of us in town sewed up 12 of these 8 inch blocks each month, alternating with the black and white fabric to create a checkerboard quilt.  The center of each block is fussy cut fabrics.  I have 72 now, plus a few extras that I made.

I'm debating if I should about add a sashing to them.  Several of the fussy cut prints are very child-oriented, so I may also split off some to make into a kid quilt for either a niece or nephew or for Project Linus.  It's not only fun to look at wide variety of the center fabrics, but also all of the various black and white prints!!

I'm linking up at Freshly Pieced WIP Wed, and Fiber of All Sorts A Lovely Year of Finishes.  Come see what others are working on!

Scrap Attack Quilt Finish!!

Over the long holiday week-end, I was able to finish my Scrap Attack Quilt!  This quilt was started over a year ago as part of "Stitched in Color's" Scrap Attack Quilt Along.  I used it to tackle my batik scrap bin.  It's not only scrappy, but also a sampler of several block designs and quilting motifs. My camera really doesn't like the black and white contrast, so DH took a few shots at different exposures to "see" it.

The only thing that's not scrappy about it is the back!  Is that funny or what?  This fabric was a gift from one of my sister-in-laws who was cleaning out a basement, and let me go through her fabric before sending it to Goodwill!  Sweet!

As mentioned in the prior post, I tried to make up a few of my own quilting designs.  This "cells" design is my favorite!! I was finally able to use my Aurifil 40 weight thread for all of the quilting!  I love it, and my Janome handled it beautifully.  The top is all pieced with Aurifil 50 weight (as are most of my quilt tops).

Finally, I used a brilliant idea / tutorial that Melissa at Sew BitterSweet Designs recently shared.  I used the monogram feature on my Janome to stitch a label into the binding!  I LOVE this idea / technique!  I will for sure be using this in future quilts!!

I'm also linking up with Melissa and Shanna's A Lovely Year of Finishes for the month of May!  Come see what others have finished!