Cross post - an update

Just in case anyone is still landing here - I thought I'd cross post an update.
Read more here.. Applewood Quilts.

BIG NEWS!

Announcing....  Applewood Quilts Etc. real presence on the web!

I took the plunge and now have my own domain & site for my sewing!

Table Projects

Back during the summer, my darling husband took me on a road-trip up to visit +Keepsake Quilting. It is a day trip from here and I usually get to go at least once or twice a year.  I especially love the bargain outlet and usually manage to find some great deals.
This year among my treasures was a package of remnant odd cut strips- all in blues, tans, and creams.  They were not uniform in size, but pretty close, so I decided that some table toppers would be a great use for them.  I created two, a rectangle and a square.  Not in any pattern really just making it up as I went along.  I added borders from my stash and ordered a nice brown print from +Missouri Star Quilt Company  to use on the back.

Quilted them both on my frame with my Janome 1600 and my favorite King Tut thread (Sands of Time - variegated creams) from +Superior Threads.

Most often there is at least one cat asleep on top of these and sometimes a rather large pile of books from the kids as well. I have to get my blog worthy photos quick around here.

Blessings on your sewing journey~

New and Improved Sewing Room

This is cross-posted from my regular blog here.
It continues to be proven how very blessed I am as Steve's wife.  He designed and built a fabulous addition to my sewing space over the last few days.
It went from this:

To this:

Which then allowed me to make it like this:

Which means that what once looked like this:

Now looks like this:

Almost every bit of fabric I have is now organized on this massive shelf wall along with space underneath for notions (zippers, trims, etc), shelves for current projects in process, and even a floor cubby for one or more cats to nap in while they keep me company.  All the shelves are adjustable too! 

My husband loves me so!

A Mug Rug

I've been seeing lots of clever quilty mug rugs or snack mats on Pinterest and thought it would be a perfect little gift.  Especially as my dear friend Lisa has a birthday this coming weekend.

Since I'm really awful with surprises I gave it to her earlier this week so it is safe to post some photos.

Paper pieced mugs with fussy cuts for the sheep centers.  Finished about 9" square.  All cotton fabrics.  It made her happy and she sent me this photo the other day.

A Block of the Month Project

I've never done a block of the month project from the web before, but stumbled on this one that begins this month and thought I'd give it a try.



I will post updates as I work on this new project!

Happy Sewing!

 

For Our Kitchen

Steve has encouraged me lately to have some fun with what I work on and wanted me to make a wall-hanging for our house.  So I opted to do something to hang in the kitchen and really wanted to make it country-homey looking.
Out of my head I decided to combine a few different elements to work on some skills at the same time.  I dug around the web and found some things I liked and created a rough 9-block plan in my mind. From Forest Quilting I used a paper piecing pattern for my 4 corner blocks.
Paper piecing can be tedious and fussy, but this worked up pretty easily and I was very pleased with the results.

Then I decided to make an applique block for the center and wanted it to be simple but fitting to our home, so again I turned to the web to find a simple line drawing to use for a template.
I used the freezer paper method to hold things together while I appliqued the apple, leaf & stem and then removed the paper. Nothing fancy, but since I don't do much applique, I was pleased with my efforts.

For my last 4 blocks I wanted to go with a sampler look of traditional pieced blocks and found a few ideas at Quilter's Cache as well as just some standards of the quilty world.

These are what I came up with:

Now for the fun part!  Jess helped me plan the layout and I sashed everything together with a green allover print.

Trying to decide how to quilt it was a challenge as I didn't have much in the way of small scale pantographs to use but I did find one free leaf vine pattern that was just slightly larger than my sashing width.  I like the way it came out sort of overlapping into the edges of the blocks.

Steve hung it in the kitchen for me and I snapped this quick photo with my phone (which is why the lighting and angle is a bit wonky).

All cotton fabrics from my scrap bag and stash, machine pieced, quilted with King Tut thread on my Janome 1600P and New Joy frame. Each block is 6" finished.

Happy sewing!