I have had an idea that's been rolling around my brain for a couple of weeks and I decided that today I will put it into action. I need to be more aware of the blessings in my life and the good things that God gives me. I want to regularly remember them, so I decided to make Thankful Thursday. Every Thursday, I will write a blog post about things that I am thankful for. There may be repeats each week, but I will try to be more aware of things during the week that are something I am thankful for. If you want to join me in this endeavor, let me know, and I can create links to those who make Thankful Thursday posts. If nobody else joins me, that's ok too, I'm doing it for my own spiritual health.
I made this quilt for my sister, Leanne, back in 2007. It was my second quilt that I've made. I really enjoyed shopping for the fabrics and making it have a scrappy look.
The binding is just leftover pieces joined together. Love it!
It was also my first attempt at free motion quilting. I stippled in the white sashing and made up a leafy design diagonally throughout the nine-patch blocks.
Oh the crinkly goodness of quilts! It was for her birthday, although I completed it a couple months late. At least she loves it!!!
And I called it Polyphonic Purple because she loves big words and music, and, of course, it's purple! I hope Leanne will enjoy it for many years to come. Its a lap quilt and it lives on her couch in her new home. Yay! 
Here is the quilt that I made for my mom's birthday in September. I was only about a week late in finishing it, and then another week went by while I waited for a day to photograph it.
I gave you a sneak peak of it earlier, but here it is in all it's glory! I think it measures about 60" x 72". At least it did before quilting and washing.
I used a wide variety of pink, cream, blue and green florals. Mostly large roses, but other flowers too and a cupcake print. It was just too cute to resist. I bound it with a diagonal stripe that had pink, cream, blue and green in it. How perfect.
My inspiration was from a patchwork tablecloth in Kaffe Fasset's Glorious Color. I added a different border for a challenge. I try to learn something new for each quilt that I make. This time I made diagonal pieced squares and triangles.
Well, the nights aren't hot anymore, and summer is pretty much over, but I finished this in the summer. Its for those hot nights, when you don't want a duvet, but still want to be covered.
I made this for myself and finished it back in August. I just didn't get around to taking pictures of it until recently. I went to the park down the street one afternoon and had a lot of fun having a photo shoot with some quilts.
Unfortunately the colours didn't show up exactly the way the are, but the bright sunlight was too nice to resist. I tried hanging it on a fence, but it was too windy and the quilt kept blowing towards me.
I used the pattern from a Fons and Porter magazine that I picked up at a second hand book store a few years ago. I knew I wanted to make this quilt for myself since then! I love the colours and the batiks were fabulous to work with. They don't ravel as much as some other cottons.
I like how the back was pieced and the label is a miniature star from the front pattern. The free motion quilting was fun and pretty quick to do. I think it took me about 4 hours total. Its my new favourite way to quilt.
Well, I have a couple of works-in-progress (WIP).... I am working on a quilt that has a deadline coming up pretty quick. I've been working on it for a couple hours today. It has a border that I haven't tried before, and I am liking the way that it looks.
I am having some inner conflict about liking this quilt or not. Some days I like it and others I don't. I think it depends on the lighting. It is all floral and the colours are a little more toned down than I usually choose. It sometimes seems too busy. I really like the design though, so hopefully when all is said and done, I like it. It isn't for me to keep though, so it really only matters if the recipient likes it!
This is another project I started recently. I was procrastinating a bit from doing the floral quilt. I had bought some pre-cut scraps from a quilt shop and I decided to just start sewing them together without a plan!
Ahh! That's hard for me to do. I usually draw everything out in advance so that I get maximum usage of fabric. I've posted here three different layouts that I am trying. I'm sure that there are other options too. I can cut up the long rectangular blocks to rearrange as well.
Which of the three do you like the best? Or do you have another suggestion on what to do? I found a little bit of fabric at home that coordinates that I can use to fill in a few spaces if needed. Let me know what you think and I'll keep you updated with what I do.
Yesterday I made some delicious apricot jam. My friend Lillie brought over some apricots that she picked from a neighbour's tree. She didn't have time to use them up, what with family reunions and packing to move.
They were so small and delicious! I had to quickly make them into jam before you-know-who ate them all up. He already had eaten 14 since the day before. It doesn't matter if you say that he will enjoy the end product even more...
I found a fantastic recipe online for this jam and it doesn't require pectin or boiling jars in hot water once they are filled. That's a great thing for me, since I don't really have any canning equipment. I just bought these jars at the grocery store. I didn't really have a big enough pot to cook the jam in either. As you can see, I had to use two pots at first, when the jam started boiling over!
Let me just warn you if you want to make jam too, it makes a really big, sticky mess in your kitchen. The jam was splatting all over the place when it was cooking, including my arms, clothes and feet. Ow! Its really burning hot! And the recommendation about getting a wide funnel to put the jam in the jars? Great advice. I think I'll follow it next time.
I ended up with five 500 ml jars full of delicious jam, and a little extra kept in a container in the fridge. And instead of adding the little kernel inside each jar, I added a smidgen of almond extract to the whole batch after boiling it. Almond and apricot pair really well. In the end I also had a few apricots left over so I made some muffins, but I found that recipe online and it wasn't very good. Too bad!