I spent a lot of time being a mini swap avoider.  I just didn't get the appeal.  I would join fabric swaps and block bees, but why would I want a mini?  (It's not like I enjoy quilts and have an abundance of blank walls in my house.)

That was until I saw all the awesome things that were being made during the second round of the Schnitzel and Boo swap.  Seriously, every single mini was awesome and I wanted them all.  But it was too late for that swap, and while I was being sad, the IG Mini Swap started up.  I signed up immediately!


After a stressful wait, I finally got my partner's info.  I was a little bummed, because she wasn't one of those super active Instagrammers.  I worried that I wouldn't have enough to go on, but I started pulling together some ideas.


My partner liked aqua and gold, triangles, asymmetry, and her website looked very clean and modern.  So I pulled all of my gold and aqua fabrics, added some gray for good measure.  I went with a cream for a background color, because the white just looked to harsh.

I sketched out a doodle of this, then cut triangles out of paper that were the size that I wanted.  I laid that triangle on the fabric and cut 1/4 inch past the paper triangle, stitched them together in rows and was shocked that it seemed to work.  There are a few spots where I lost triangle sides, but I'm quite pleased with how it turned out.


I bought some heavier gold and aqua thread with the plan that I would background quilt in white and then do some hand stitching in color, but once I had the mini basted, I just didn't like that idea anymore.  Instead, I went with wavy lines over the whole thing, mostly with the white, but with stripes of the gold and aqua threads here and there.   When I was done, I realized it was wind blowing over mountains!  Aw!


Now this mini has a home on the wall in my partner's sewing space.  It perfectly matches her wall, and it looks very happy there.

Linking up with Amanda Jean for Finish It Up Friday and Val for TGIFF!

I have totally fallen in love with needle turn applique.  I've always loved a good hand stitching project, and these projects have turned out a lot easier to do than I thought and I can stitch shapes that I like without having to deal with machine sewing curves.


Our guild (Seacoast Modern!!) had a mini swap with another guild.  The theme was a "Sense of Place" which completely threw me for a long time.  I seriously would try to figure out what I would make, brain would turn to mush, and I'd avoid thinking about it with a different project.

Then, I bought a copy of Savor Each Stitch by Carolyn Friedlander.  I was completely hooked by this book; great projects, a good read, and pretty colors.  So I tried to see if one of the minis in the book would apply to the swap challenge.  One of the best thing about the seacoast is the beach, and one of my kids' favorite things to do is find pretty shells, rocks, or sea glass, and Aerial Grove kind of reminded me of pebbles lined up on the beach.


So I pulled a rainbow of scraps and started stitching them down to my "sand" fabric.  I had thought to put them upright as a center column with blue ocean to the right and green grass to the left, but it just looked to busy, so blue ocean won.  I used lighter colors close to the sand to get a waves crashing effect.   Then I quilted it all over with a wave pattern.

This finish was right down to the wire.  I was a day late mailing out too waiting on the address, but I used that time to finish up the mug rug, so I probably would have been late anyway.



For the UR Here Mug Swap on Flickr, we were supposed to buy our local mug and send it with a goodie to our partners.  I signed up, and made some calls to see if anyone had our New Hampshire mug in stock.  Know what?  New Hampshire doesn't have a mug!!

I was bummed, and I'm sure Rhode Island is probably in the same boat too.  We're little, people can't find us on the map, and we don't make a big fuss about ourselves, but we're cool too!

So I decided to make this mug rug to put a little NH flair in the package.  The Old Man on the Mountain was huge while I was growing up.  We'd always take a drive up to see him, especially when the leaves changed.  But the face collapsed a few years ago.  Very sad.  But he's still on all our license plates and our quarters!!  And now he's on my mug rug.

And I couldn't forget our state motto, "Live Free or Die."  Probably one of the best things about our state.  We're little, but badass!


It's all packed up with some yummy biscotti.  Wondering what to do with that cheap poly batting?  Perfect packing material!


Hope my partner enjoys her box of goodies!

Linking up with Amanda Jean for Finish It Up Friday!

 My birthday was this past weekend, so I didn't do much sewing.  But, I received a lot of quilty and sewing stuff by coincidence, which is kind of like birthday presents that the universe arranged.  Whatever, it made me happy.


At the Seacoast Modern Quilt Guild meeting, we got our Riley Blake fat quarters for the MQG Challenge.  I've been staring at them and not getting any great ideas.  So I guess I'll just stare some more.

And I won that little pack of Aurifil from a giveaway on a fellow guilder's blog, During Quiet Time.  I've been using a spool of hot pink Aurifil that I received in the gift bag at QuiltCon and love the super bright colors.  I top stitch with it, even though it's not top stitch weight because color is so vivid.   And now I have a bunch more colors to use.  Thanks Amy!


We also had a great demonstration of all the fun stuff you can do with some of the Thermoweb products.  And of course we came home with a bunch too.  I've been using the fusible fleece in my bags, and can't wait to try the other fusibles with some applique.


And I took home two more Quilts for Boston to quilt.  These are so much fun to do, because the squares are all different and the Boston Modern Quilt Guild packages up everything you'll need, so I don't have to cut batting, piece the backing, or sew together the binding.  And, they included these cute labels in this round, so now I have to figure out how you attach that.


Last, but not least, my package arrived from the Fat Quarter Blender Swap!  I forgot what colors I said I needed, but these are perfect.  I was eyeing the number and chick prints on the Flickr page and was hoping it was coming to me.  And the goodies that I got with it are awesome.  I can never have too many zippers, and that ruler is frosted and the dash marks are really skinny!  I hate the chunky dashes on some of my current rulers because then you have to remember whether you're measuring from the center or edge of the dash, and then things turn out just off enough to make you frustrated.  Thanks Partner!!

Just finished up this little Starbucks cup sleeve.  I really am cutting it down to the wire on my last two swaps of the month.  I think because there's one thing to swap, then ANY goodie you want to add, there are just too many possibilities and my brain just wants to make all the things!

This one is for the UR Here Starbucks Mug Swap on Flickr.  Perfect timing, because we just broke our Starbucks mug, so we only have one giant mug left.  The rest are those little tea cups that you get with a dish set, and they really don't cut it when I need coffee in the morning.



But I did at least finish this today.  I even planned ahead and made sure to have a cup model for the sleeve.   Starbucks might have a faulty drive thru speaker, because I swear I said I just wanted a cup, but they heard PUMPKIN SPICE!!! OMG!!!  Oh well, I made sure to drink all that latte so nothing could possibly spill on the sleeve, because I'm a good and cautious person.


Oh, and that book?  Found by accident at a community yard sale last weekend.  For $1, I just bought it without looking inside, but it's pretty magical.  It's everything I usually end up Googling when I make clothes (plus things I didn't even know about) all printed back in 1977!  There's so much good info in here, but also "How to Sew Shag" and "How to Make Foam Furniture for Your Rec Room!"  Amazing find!

Linking up with Live a Colorful Life for Really Random Thursday and Kelly over at My Quilt Infatuation for Needle and Thread Thursday and Flamingo Toes for Think Pink Sunday!

 So here's a post all about blocks I've sewn and given away!  It's kind of the most nerve-wracking thing I've done.  I want to make everything perfect, because the person receiving them is going to see the backside.  They'll know if your scant 1/4 inch is really a true 1/4 inch. Oh, the scandal!

But you do never know if the person who gets it will like your color choices, the layout, or the style.  And once you've put that much work into a block, you don't want them to just cast it aside or have to rework the seams.  Really, the only thing to do is just make sure you like it.

So far these are the blocks I've received from my Sew Pieceful swap on Flickr. I asked for turquoise, olive, and hot pink/magenta on a white background. I think they came out great.


They're hard colors to have people match, not like orange or red, so I was prepared with an open mind.  Individually, there are off colors, but when you put them all together, it works!  I might add some white sashing in the end to make them look more cohesive.

Fingers crossed that I win this swap; I'm liking how the other stars I've seen have turned out.  I might make a couple more to increase my odds!

Finished up my blocks for a swap I joined on Flickr.  It was my first swap, so I was a bit nervous about the time commitment, but it looks like so much fun when other people do it.

This one might be my favorite, probably because they're totally my colors!

The way this one works is that you pick some colors, and send it out to the Flickr-verse and you get paired up with five other people who send you colors.  Then you choose a block pattern to make and make it five times in the colors that the other people have chosen, and just send it on to them.

This is supposed to be low-volume.  The fabrics low separately, but I think their volumes have added up to too loud.  We'll see.

Love that it's super quick, since you don't have to wait for other people to send you their fabrics, or learn how to make a bunch of different blocks.  And, with this group you can jump in for a month or jump out for a month, depending on how crazy life is.



This was my mosaic for the group to use.  I've been wanting to make myself a quilt from these colors for a while, but selfish sewing always tends to get shoved to the bottom of the to-do list.  But, this was the perfect opportunity to use this, and I can't wait to see the blocks all together in person.