Watercolor Dragon Quilt

I learned the burden of making backing mistakes this week. A separate, but no less grievous error than my Gingerbread Lane Swoon quilt left me with the same issue of a wrinkle in the backing of my quilt. I decided to build character and take out all of the stitches in the top three rows to fix my mistake. I knew that facing the consequences of my actions (not making sure the backing is being rolled evenly when the fabric is twice as large as the quilt) would prevent me from making this mistake again. It will. I spent more time taking out stitches than I did cutting out the fabric, sewing, stitching detail, and long arming (all version) of this quilt. LESSON LEARNED. The clamshell pantograph is absolutely unforgiving. 

Here is the final, completed version. It doesn't show up here but there is handstitching (sashiko) on all of the white borders, and around the binding, with ombre purple thread. 

 

Dragon Dreams Quilt

 I used a quilt kit from Riley Blake's Faraway Kingdom to make the basic dragon, and purchased additional coordinating fabric to increase the size by adding an inner and outer border. The quilt ended up being 50"x60", which is perfect to take to school and let the kids sit on while reading. I used a longarm pattern called Scrolling Filigree. It's a lot cuter in person. This one didn't photograph super well. I am working on another version now using darker fabrics. 

Mini Fairytales Quilt

 My mom's quilt shop sells half-packs, which are 5 1/2 yard fabrics that can be used to make a simple quilt. They have 12 patterns from Sassy Sunflower Quilts to choose from that come free with purchase. On my last visit I got several packs, including one using Small Things- Fairytales by Lewis & Irene and the pattern called "Spin Me Round". They are so cute! I wanted to make a small quilt for my classroom that kids can sit on during our independent reading stamina building time. The quilt size is 50"x57" which is perfect. I was home alone when I finished it so don't have my professional holder (haha) so here it what it looks like from the back of my couch. Easy to do in an afternoon. I used a basic stipple to quilt on my longarm, which might become my new favorite. 

You can see some of the characters. I added the solid pearl fabric so I could use the dark blue from the kit for the binding. The project takes about a half-yard of each. I used the pearl solid on the back as well. 

My New Favorite Bright Tula Pink Quilt!

 I used another pack of half-yard fabric (plus one fat quarter bc I messed up the border piece and happened to have an extra of that fabric) and the absolute cutest fabric from Tula Pink to make this quilt. Once again, I used a pattern from Sassy Sunflower Quilts.

I can't get over the colors. These pictures do it absolutely no justice at all. It's so cute! 

The bunnies!!! 

And here's what it looked like before quilting:

Small Ocean Quilt

My goal over Christmas break was to learn some shortcuts on my longarm to make quilting more fun and give me a better quality end product. This one uses ocean fabrics from a half-yard pack I picked up at my mom's local quilt store, and the absolute perfect backing I found at my local store. I purchased a huge prostitcher design for this one. It's so cute and I learned a lot!

Here's a bit of a close up. It's SO cute! 

Animal Animal half-yard quilt

 Shopping with my mom over Thanksgiving, we went into her local quilt store where they had half-yard packs of fabric that came with a quilt pattern. I knew I had some kid gifts to make for Christmas, so I picked up four of them to try it out. I should've went ahead and purchased backing fabric at the time, but that is a weakness of mine, thinking I'll go back and choose later. 

Anyway, here is a cute pattern (all of them are from Sassy Sunflower Quilts) using Animal Animal fabric from Ruby Star Society. 

Here it is before quilting. I chose a half-circle pattern. 

The Little Ghost Who Was a Quilt

I found the cutest book called, "The Little Ghost Who Was a Quilt" by Riel Nason and wanted to make a mini quilt for my 2nd grade classroom kids to snuggle up with while reading the book. I went ahead and made 2 more for the other teachers I work with. 

 

I knew I wanted blues and whites patchwork fabric, and finally splurged and got a new fat quarter bundle from Moda called Nantucket Summer by Camille Roskelley. I pulled out all of the fabrics I wanted and made 2 quilts with 6" squares and 1 with 4.5" squares. I also bought a few yards of their beautiful blue floral, called Lake Blue Somerset, and white, Nantucket Summer Cream Sail, for the backings. 

It was fun laying out the fabrics in a way that showcases the special fabrics inspired by the book.

Each quilt measures right at a yard, so they're not big, just enough to sit on, or for a kid to wrap around their shoulders. 

Unlike the book and several patterns I saw online, I didn't want a black appliqué ghost face in the center of mine, so instead I quilted it on my longarm with ghosts. You can see in the photo below they're subtle enough to not scream "Halloween" but still so, so cute! 

I-Spy Book

 I saw a cute idea on TikTok to make an I-Spy fabric book for my nephew. I ordered a longarm machine to make my quilts finish professionally, so while I wait for that I thought this would be a fun little project.

I ordered some mixed fabric from Etsy and put the pages together using fusible interfacing. I added too many pages, making it hard to "bind," but I think it turned out cute. I used my fabric printer to personalize the cover and a directions page. 

Baby Quilt

 My sister-in-law had a baby and we couldn't attend the shower, so we sent her a personalized quilt! I used a layer cake (10" squares) from Riley Black and cut using directions from a video I saw on TikTok. Before finishing with a diagonal quilting design, I embroidered the baby's name in the bottom corner. So precious! 

Tula Pink Baby Quilt

 I was at my local quilt shop a few days ago and found this beautiful roll of Tula Pink fabric! I decided to use a pattern I've seen often of sewing all of the 2.5 inch strips together, and cutting and flipping a part in the middle. It's so cute! I quilted it with black diagonal stripes. It's so, so cute.

Scrap Patchwork Quilt

 Here's a quilt I made to keep at school. One of our vocabulary books next week is patchwork, so I thought I would make a quilt using lots of my scraps of fabric leftover from other projects to show kids how little bits can be put together to make something new. I like it because I can remember other projects I made when I see those bits of fabric. 

Baby Blanket

I was finally able to dive into another quilting project which is something I've been looking forward to since the last quilt-top I made during our last snowstorm. This is a Jelly Roll Jam quilt I made using jelly roll strips from Hobby Lobby. I wasn't sure what the fabric looked like when I bought it, but it's cute!