Man, having a social life really cuts into my quilting time :P

Hello again! Yes, I'm back. I know it's been a while but I'm sure my readers can forgive me, right? Lately I've had an upswing in the ol' social life, and wouldn't you know it, that tends to cut into the quilting time just a wee bit. That being said, my roommate just moved out and headed back to the east coast. It's a real bummer, but I suppose it was pretty inevitable. So for close to the past month she's had a friend from VA here to visit and they took a road trip, and had to get all packed and leave. She just left on Wednesday. Plus, on a brighter note, my time is also getting tied up by a new guy in my life, which isn't a bad thing at all! He's a smart, sweet, good looking guy who fire fights and appreciates quilts. I think I'll keep him :-)

So on a related note, what have I been working on? Well, a few weeks ago my boyfriend was asking (knowing I'm an avid quilter) where he can buy a cheap bed quilt. I was waiting for him to just ask me to make one so I told him a few places and told him, "...but you know you're dating a quilter, right?" I finally was just like, "do you want me to just make you one?" We all know what the answer to that question was! I asked him what he wanted, and bless his heart he told me to pick something I liked and he'd be happy with whatever I made. But you know how it is when you make a quilt for someone; you don't think about what you want, you think about what you think they'd want, which is exactly what I did. Granted, I've been looking for an excuse to use the focus fabric I chose for months now, so I was happy I could finally use it somewhere. It's not been without its frustrations in terms of assembly (oh holy crap!) but I'm really pleased wht the colors....it's just a matter of getting them distributed well which has been, to this point, easier said than done.

Great basic quilts that are perfect for toying with color

I chose to do a quilt out of the City Quilts book, basically a quilt set on point with a bunch of multicolored snowball blocks with a square in the middle. They look almost like donuts, but the books says they were inspired by the Houston, TX roadways (what, empty?). I think I'll stick with the donut theme, thanks.

But his quilt is done up in rust, orange, brown, burgundy, ice blue and teal. When you see the focus fabric, it makes more sense than just listing the colors. The focus fabric is what you'll see in the setting triangles.

Here's the quilt I chose. I have to say, I do NOT like their version of it at all. I'm not partial to quilts using all solids (they're pretty, but not my thing) and I don't care for how they blocked the colors...but the best part about quilting is you can do whatever you want. To the right is my focus fabric. The picture doesn't do it justie, it's a really beautiful batik with teal and ice blue running through the rust.

Color choice part 1. The blue isn't as intense as shown here, and the focus piece is third from the bottom. After this and the following picture was taken, I realized I didn't pick enough fabric and had to go stask diving at mom's house for a few other pieces I didn't have at home.

And here are the others. At the top, of course, a firefighter has to have a wood print (duh) and then the bottom southwest print is going to be the border (which isn't called for in the book).

The beginning of what has got to be the most frustrating experince I've had yet in color placement. Ho-ly crap.

More blocks

The colors have moved around some since this was taken, but hey, progress.

Aaaaand assembly has begun, where I learned that I may have stretched the bejesus out of parts of the blocks, necessitating the use of nothing less than 30,000 pins. lol. Okaaay maybe not that many but good grief they don't want to go together cleanly.



Well, i was going to keep it's progress a secret from John so he would be totally shocked and awed when he saw it done, but I was too excited and showed him a picture anyway. He loves it so far, which makes me happy. My goal for today is to get the rest of the inside of the quilt top pieced, by which I mean all of the blocks, and then while he's away this weekend, get the borders put on and call Frances to quilt this thing for me. I want to have this thing done by Valentine's Day so I can give it to him then, but we'll see.

Anyway, after all the flooding that's been going on around here, I hope everyone has been safe and dry!