60 yards of Ruffles!

While the EPP quilt (and a few others) are moving along, my older daughter is turning 4 tomorrow!
Since she is a girliest girl I know, I decided to make her a pink, pink, fluffy pettiskirt.
I'm following this tutorial by Ashley to make the skirt below:

To start off I ruffled 60 yards of light pink ruffles. OK, it was 60 yards to start with, now it's around 30.
I'm hoping to continue tomorrow and maybe finish it next week.
Here are the ruffles (it took a good 2 hours to make them and the bobbin was very, very hot when I stopped to wind some thread!)

UPDATE: Here is the finished result:great fun!

EPP progress

These are the first 2 stars, joined, bordered in black Kona cotton.
I'm thinking to alternate dark and light, with random color placement.
I don't really have an exact count of the stars, diamond, strips, etc. I've cut, so this is more of a make it up as you go quilt.
I will need at least 90 blocks for the quilt size I want. Only 88 more to go.

EPP star moving along and I need help deciding on a background

The problem with English Paper Piecing (besides being ridiculously addictive) is that once you run out of foundation paper pieces you're stuck. (Well, not really, because I can always print and cut more, but who wants to deal with a thousand little pieces of paper?)
Now that I have 10 stars ready, I need to decide on a background in order to start joining them
And that's where you come in.
See pictures of backgrounds below and PLEASE vote in the poll, so I can cut and piece!

fabric covered magazine holders

This is a  very easy project to do with your kids on a hot (or rainy, or snowy) afternoon.
I find that my children are more likely to use an organizer that they made, tucking away their coloring pages, clippings and other stuff kids save and store :)



If you decide you want a sturdier holder, you can use 2 boxes (fit one inside the other) or you can use a purchased magazine file like this:

Materials:
~ empty cereal box
~ fabric
~ glue (Elmers glue is fine, but clear water soluble glue would've been much better)
~ brush or foam brush for applying glue
~ hot glue gun
~ label maker - this is optional, but great for labeling your holders

Each one of my kids were offered to choose fabric they liked.
I cut the fabric down to size of each box - our boxes were 4 different sizes.
Some fabrics were too light and the colors on the box showed through, for these, we just glued some white printer paper to the box before applying the fabric.

Mark the cereal box, making the slanted edge approximately 3-4 inches high from the box bottom on one side. Hot glue the fabric to the box, overlapping the edges. I kept one selvage intact and made sure that the unfinished edge was tucked and hot-glued under the selvage.
Trim and fold the top fabric edges inside the box. Don't worry about gluing the fabric down all around, just a few drops of hot-glue will do.
Make a paste of equal parts of water and glue.
This was my kids favorite part:
Cover the entire box with glue mixture, brushing it on in a thin layer, making sure there are no streaks, and the glue mixture goes on clear. Don;t forget to do the top inside as well, to secure the fabric to the inside of the box.
Put it away to dry.
When dry, make a label of your choice. Enjoy!


And this one is mine:

a new quilting adventure!

In my spare time, while holding the baby I do what all mothers of infants do...surf the web.
This is how I came across the "60° Diamond EPP Quilt-Along".
Translation:  English Paper Piecing 60 degree Diamond-Star along - how is that for a mouthfull?
That's it - a new obsession crafty interest was born, which in short can be described as: sewing many small pieces of fabric onto a diamond shaped paper template, connecting 6 diamond fabric templates together to make a star, removing the basting thread, connecting the stars to make a quilt.
When my oldest son saw the size of my first star - he said, "Wow, it will take months to make this quilt"
I smiled and said " Nope, years!"

These are my 2 first ever EPP stars. The ones that followed looked much, much better.

a finished baby quilt

I finally have a finished quilt to post!
This is a "scrap quilt" mentioned here made from the leftover fabric from the "wavy" quilt, still unfinished (waiting for some Kaufman Prisma Batik in Lilac for the border).
Luckily for me, I had a baby girl and the girls will be sharing a room in the future, with matching quilts!

Started: May 2011
Completed: July 2011
Fabric used:
~ Lila Tueller Eden in Lilac
~ Kona Solids White
~Kaufman Prism in Lilac

Machine pieced and quilted on
Bernina Activa 230PE

Quilting: all over free motion spiral swirls

4 Quilt Tops

I currently have 4!, yes, 4 quilt tops that need to be "sandwiched" and quilted.
Why?
#1 -not enough batting for all of them (more is on the way)
#2 - baby quilt - I can't finish this one before finishing big siter's quilt, which I can not do, due to reason #1
#3 - not enough room to quilt the borders on the "couch throw" quilt - 72"
#4 - needs to be quilted with monofilament thread -not my favorite

So, while I wait for the batting, what do I do?
Plan a new quilt, of course!

This one is based on 
Quilts On The Double: Dozens of Easy Strip-Pieced Designs

I love the concept: easy strip pieced, triangle cut quilts. One set of strips creates 2 similar (in color and composition), but not identical quilts.

Perfect for siblings sharing a room.

Fabric groups I'm using are dark grey, charcoals and black; second group is blues. With Kona Coal as an accent color.

Details to follow

About quilt tops and finished quilts

I haven't updated in a while..
My latest completed project was a ...baby.
Now that she is almost 5 month old I can get back into serious quilting, sewing, knitting.
New baby means new baby quilt of course! Lucky for me it's a girl and I have leftover fabric from Eden "Wavy" quilt.
Here are some pictures of quilt in progress.

It's a simple strip - pieced quilt with white sashing and borders.