Barn Blog Hop AND A Giveaway

I am part of the Blog Hop for Julie Sefton's book Build A Barn.  And today is my day!  Actually, this is my WEEK!

If you build a real barn you do need a pattern of sorts, but you on these you just need an idea. Or a photo.  A photo helps a lot.

When I first came upon Julie she was working on her own barn quilt.  Before the book, before the idea, before the quilt show ribbons, it was just Julie working on her barns.  I was enthralled with the barns she was making and I began following her.  Every once in a while, I would ask if she was going to write  a book or do patterns.  She would always say, no.


I am so glad she finally changed her mind!

When she started writing the process work for the book, she asked several of her quilt friends (by then I had bugged her enough to be noticed!) to come together as the Secret Society of Barn Builders, affectionately called SSOBB.   And we had to keep it all a secret.  Ohhhhh.  Hard.

She would write and send us the notes  We made barns and proofed the notes.

Eventually, we all had barns.  And for some odd reason, I had two.  I thought we were supposed to do a barn for each of the process sessions she was sending.  Obviously I was mistaken because I was the ONLY one who ended up with TWO barns!

Duh!

Julie walks you through step by step, which I am woefully inadequate at doing on my own.  But it did make it easier to build my barns in the long run.

It also helps to have a picture or sketch.  Most of the SSOBBs had great photos of barns.  We don't have many great barns here in the south, especially in the city.  So I just worked from my mind and what I thought a barn should be.

My barn grew starting from doors, to roofs, to fields of green.





Here I was testing the roof line.



Barns definitely need those windmills and a pond to water the cows who live inside.

This is the final product.  Julie's amazing quilter Chris quilted the 13 little barns for us.

Our barns are now traveling to AQS quilt shows across the US right now. 


Did I mention there was a giveaway?

If you leave a comment talking about a barn you have a picture of, either in your mind or your photos, I will give you one entry to the winner's circle and one of Julie's autographed books.

  I will announce the winner on on Friday.

AND.........

If you stop in again this week and see the second barn I made, I will give you a SECOND entry!

And I have one more post for the Blog Hop this week where i will talk about other ways you can use the book.  Like my Cajun Camps.  You can get ANOTHER chance!

It is improvisation, you know!

Oh, and I expect all my friends to enter, I am watching you!!!!!

Hugs and Kisses Blog Hop Begins Today

It warms my HEART COCKLES to be included in this fabulously fun endeavor.  Let's have a HEART TO HEART talk about making baskets for Valentine's Day.

My HEART skipped a beat as we started off the very first day of the Hugs and Kisses Blog Hop with my own HEARTFUL creation for the project.  Well, the pattern is not specifically mine, but it is DEAR TO MY HEART and easy to make and you will (HEART) it.

I adapted this HEART HEALTHY tutorial from Pink (how appropriate)  Penguin for my baskets.  I have several in various fabrics holding lots of sewing supplies in my really really really messy sewing room.

Basket Tutorial

Of course, you know me, I have to have dogs involved in what I do.  So this piece of pricelessly HEART filled and gorgeous material came to me from a friend's travels.  Ann brought this to me all the way from Philadelphia   Poodles parade across the piece carrying HEARTS.  What can be better than HEART dogs at Valentine's Day?

This HEART STOPPING basket is pretty versatile   It carries all kinds of stuff, my knitting, for one.  It sure does look like I knit, huh?  Don't have HEART FAILURE now, I don't, LOL.  But I do see making socks in my future.

I had some HEART fabric left over and made this darling zip pouch.  I have a bunch of these guys, in all sizes.  They are HEARTY gifts for my girlfriends, or my {{HEART}}} family, whichever needs something to cheer up their JEARTS AND SOULS or fill in at a party HEART-Y!

From the BOTTOM OF MY HEART to Madame Samm for setting up this HEARTFELT Hop and to Jane at Jane's Fabrics for riding heard on all of us wild HEARTS!

And visit the rest of the HEARTY Bunch at:

Monday February 11th

Jane's Fabrics and Quilts

Sowing Stitches

The Fuzzy Hat Quilter

Quilts and Dogs

Ninis Patchwork

Mrs. Pickles Garden

Patchouli Moon Studio

Life in the Scrapatch

Meadowbrook

Wicked Blog Hop and a Costume Idea

The Wicked Blog Hop is going to be starting soon, you can find the schedule here:

Wicked Blog Hop

and the info for it on the side bar of my blog over there ----------->

(See that cute arrow?  Didn't think I was so computer literate, did you?)

I have a Wicked block coming out on Tuesday October 30.  I thought to find my Ami Simms Halloween quilt and show you that one, but I have searched and searched and searched to no avail.

I will tell you this interesting fact, the Truth Bomb came out this morning and says to me:  You are important, very important.  And just when I was feeling NOT so important.  And I found it it was true!  Carrie emailed me with a sewing problem.  She wanted to make a Grey Lady Ghost costume and didn't  understand what they were telling her to do.  You basically take grey or silvery tulle and make a rectangle the size of you but wide .  Sew it to another rectangle on two sides to make an open ended tube.  And use a grey or silver ribbon to sew a gathering stitch 3 inches down from the top.  That creates a poof of tulle ruffle around your face hiding your neck. The tulle drapes over your shoulders and down to the floor.  You cut out a slit for the arms.

The costume is completed by wearing a pair of grey leotards with the feet cut out and the crotch split for your head.  (Buy NEW ones for this, LOL)  And another pair for your legs.

The best part is to get some grey face paint and a doily.  Place the doily over your face and paint through the holes!  Is that not cool?

And I shall leave you with my personal favorite Vampire!  Barnabas Collins!

glen:  isn't he deliciously sexy?  And rich!

What a Day!

79 Comments and 198 views.  What a day yesterday's post was!  It was wonderful hearing from everyone and having all those wonderful comments.  I am going to try to get to everyone this week and personally thank each one for stopping by!

Monday was a bit exacting.  My mother has begun to have seizures.  They are small in scope but coming pretty quickly together   They started, of course, when I was on retreat.  So Frank had to go to the nursing home in my stead on Sunday.  It exhausts her and she sleeps between them.  They feel they have the ability to control them. The Dr. comes this week to see her.

The Retreat?  Oh, yes, the Retreat.  It was wonderful and so productive  I got THREE, count them THREE tops completely done.

The Saints:




Parenthetical Kit from Red Stick Shop



I will save the Southwest for tomorrow to show you the progression of the borders.  Pretty cool.

Here are some other highlights:

Alice and her lamp.  Don't you love that lamp.  I think she should have taken it home with her, she just looked so good in its lightfall.  She certainly had the most elegant table in the place!

This is Julie the New Girl.  She put together a drawer in her scrap chest and made this wonderful quilt!  She has some talent to put all those pieces together and make it look like a unified quilt.



There were two gals putting together table toppers for a charity project they are involved in.  The Tribeca Luncheon will offer handmade items for sale.  I would estimate they put 9 or 12 toppers together for the group.  All were lovely enough to sit on my tables!

And she had enough time to put several hundred cats together for a City Cat Quilt!

AND work on a dog round robin.  She was making tiny paw prints  for her border.  I love it.  I wanted to steal it.  I think she may be missing her dog when she gets home to unpack.


Tommy was handquilting.  Impressive, nice tiny stitches, beautifully even lines.  I was truly envious of her patience and stable fingers.

 Miss Thelma quietly worked on her incredible bargello quilt.  Can you imagine how beautiful this will be when she finishes it?  She does the most amazing work, she does.  And is quiet as a mouse.  Maybe that is my problem, I am not so quiet.

Caroline now has 6 of these babies together   I love how the fabrics play so well with each other.  They come together like glue, a mishmash, yet a definite pattern.  Love it.

you don't have to quilt when you come to a quilting retreat either!  This crochet afghan was completed here and another one in reds was started.  Last year we had a beader with us.  She did wonderful creations.

Jackie worked so hard on cutting, sewing and squaring things up.  And it all paid off with beautifully perfect blocks.  Not like mine, which are decidedly wonky.....but on purpose.......can I say that with a straight face?

The wonderful lady who cooked for us all weekend was making this cathedral window quilt.  She got excited last year after seeing all our quilts and us working on them, she started her own!

That is a sampling of what people were doing.  And I didn't even mention the food.  I don't fit into any of my pants anymore. Ann brought the cookies we all wanted though.  They were simply the Lemon Newtons from the Figgy Newton people, but totally different.  Made from whole wheat, lightly sweetened, and full of lemon rind for flavoring.  If you want a good cookie, that will keep you on your diet, try that one.

I loved every minute of my stay in the Retreat Center in Norwood.  Can't wait till next year, gals!

glen

Leaf Me Alone!

WOW!  It finally got here, my day for the Leafs Me Happy Blog Hop.  It seemed so exciting when I signed up for it.  Leaves, all leaves!  And I do so love leaves.
My leaf is called Leaf Me Alone and was done as part of a group two years ago.  I chose a pattern and they all made me their interpretation of my suggestion.  The leaves I got back were WILD!  I put them together in a quilt top a year ago and there they sit, beside my quilting machine ready to be quilted.  Soon......yes, soon.
After you have finished looking at my tutorial on making my leaves, you can check out the other wonderful fellow participants at:
Leafs me Happy with Cherry from Cherry Blossoms Studio is our cheerleader
Monday 8
Feathered Nest Studio
Grandmama's Stories
From This to That
Little Mama Hen
Quilt Monster in my Closet
Kathy
in stitches & seams
Buzzing and Bumbling
Nunu's Quilt World
Quilts And Dogs
Briarside Lane
I have a curved piece tutorial for you. Most people are terrified of curves but they are really easy if you give them an open minded try. And if you don’t do well the first time, just toss it, no quilt police will know!
Get over your fears and try something new! It took me three or four leaves to get any good at the process, so don’t think I am really special! You will probably do better than I did because you are more patient and a slower sewist than I am! I do things fast and fearlessly.
I created a quilt with curved pieced green leaves from blocks I taught as part of a block swap several years ago.  I love its randomness and will get it quilted one day!     
Here’s what you do.
Go find yourself some scraps of fall leaf colors! You can toss in just a few accent colors too maybe. And let’s try some curves.
Gather up your fall colors. You will need a neutral background for this leafy challenge. Neutral-ness is up to you, however! I used muslin square about 14 inches by 14 inches.
Let me say up front, this is not a precise piecing type block. Sometimes you don't really know how large the block or the leaf  will end up to be. Think Buggy Barn technique. I have a French Curve and find it easy to shape and use as a cutting template. If you use this to cut with be aware that your fingers have no protection, so use a cutting glove or don’t cut close to the curve. Don’t cut yet, keep reading.
I found that large pieces and gentle curves are easier to work with than smaller ones at first. Start out with your leaf fabrics and sew them together to get a nice bit of fabric.  Cut a leaf shape about 12 or so inches long. Make the curve gentle. Gentle curves are so easy to work with when you are learning. You can get fancy-dancy later. Cut the leaf in half. Either curvy or straight. I did my first two straight. Hunt in your scraps to find the leaf's spine. Sew it together --- oops! No thread in the machine!
Oh no, I was so excited I got ahead of myself, I didn't make the veins! If you want veins, take a leaf side and whack off a piece across the half in a straight line. Add a zinger piece to the bottom of your leaf segment. Sew. Do it again. Maybe even again! Trim the leaf half so it can be sewn back to the first piece. You should now have your leaf with veins. OK, let’s put it into a neutral background.
Choose a fabric to be the leaf stem.  i used a 2 1/2 inch strip of a dark color to set it apart so it could be seen.  Black would also be good here, or a dark brown.

Add the stem to the two leaf sides and join, to make a whole leaf.  
 

The background should be larger than you want the final block to be, I  made mine about 14 inches. Lay the background right side up and  place the leaf right side up on top of the background where the leaf will end up. This is where a French curve or a flexible curve will work but I just use a ruler edge.

I carefully move the edge of the ruler along the edge of the leaf keeping the rotary blade against the ruler while I cut the same  exact curve in the background as in the leaf. 














Make a couple of registration marks by placing a pin at a recognizable point on both the leaf and the background.
Fold the leaf back over the background so the right sides are together at the registration point. Pin. Some people use hundreds of pins, some use just a few strategic pins and some don't use any. Sew slowly making sure fabric edges meet.
I put a few pins at strategic points and use a tweezers to hold the two pieces even as I sew.  Sew with the background on top and be careful not to stretch  the bias.  Move only a few stitches at a time and adjust the fabric edges often.  If you work carefully here your curve will be perfect!
 
Open out and press and you have it half done. See!  It actually works! 




Do the same for the other side making sure your first cut for the curve has both the background and  the leaf right side up.  (Smile, check it again to make sure!)



You will have to sew the two remaining open seams by folding the background over on itself and sewing away from the block to the outside edge.  You can add stems or branches if this block will be connected to a “tree”. 

Press. Trim to the desired size and Voila! You have a leaf! These are so fun!
With curved piecing, your leaf will be beautiful! Try some small leaves, fat leaves, skinny leaves or some really odd leaves! They are soooooo addicting
I hope this was enlightening. If you have any questions, please let me know. It I wasn’t clear enough about the curve piecing you can find a number of tutorials on the internet using the various techniques.
And I have the perfect words for the bottom of the quilt! LEAF ME ALONE!
Don’t cha just love it???!!!
Now you should visit my Leaf Buddies and see the leaves they have prepared for you.
Monday 8
Feathered Nest Studio
Grandmama's Stories
From This to That
Little Mama Hen
Quilt Monster in my Closet
Kathyin stitches & seams
Buzzing and Bumbling
Nunu's Quilt World
Quilts And Dogs
Briarside Lane