Starling Crib Bedding

When Doug and Vanessa found out they were having a little girl, I had asked Vanessa what colors her nursery were going to be and if she had any fabrics she liked.  She emailed me four or five fabrics, with Alexander Henry's "Starling" fabric being one of them.  She also had told me that of all of them, the "Starling" fabric was her favorite.  As you may remember, before I found out I was having Jack, this same fabric had been my favorite, but in a different colorway.  I couldn't believe that we had liked the same fabric and I was really excited to make a quilt using it.  I ordered the fabric right away, fearing it would be gone if I hesitated since it is an older print.  I started looking at quilt patterns, then thought, I wonder how Vanessa is going to incorporate this into her bedding?  I wondered if she was going to have someone make it for her, then I thought that I would offer to make the bedding for her.  I told her that if she bought the fabric, I would sew it for her.  She jumped at the offer.  I gulped and realized how many sewing hours I had agreed too, but was also excited because I was finally sewing for a GIRL.  When we went on our vacation together in June, we picked our fabrics.  I finally got down to sewing this week and I am thrilled with how the bedding turned out.  I can't wait to ship it to her.  

While I have been sewing this bedding, I have also been developing a pattern on how to make it.  It is in the early rough stages, but this was a good run through to make sure everything was accurate.  I have a page of scribbles, notes, and revisions, but hopefully I'll get it together soon.  If I ever sew another crib bedding set, I'll be really happy that I made this pattern.  Trying to discern my scribbles from last time was rather difficult.  

Renegade Craft Fair

This weekend, Kate and I went to the Renegade Craft Fair in L.A. We had so much fun together. As we rode the Metro Link to the Fair, we started noticing all the "crafty" looking people boarding the train.



Sure enough, when we got to our stop, all of "these" people got off along with us.



I saw a sea of TOMS clad people and handmade goodies. We were overwhelmed with how amazing each crafters' booth was. Some artisans also created there own pop up tent covers. Amazing.



We looked at several rows of goods before getting hungry and then decided to take a break and visit the food trucks and the beverage booth. We got potstickers and a Dos Equis and found a nice shade tree for lunch.



After lunch, we went back to shopping. I wish I had an unlimited budget, but alas, I did not. I bought the fat quarters in the picture.



I also got this super cute head band from a vendor named Bobby Soxie. They are on Etsy.



Last, I bought this print from an artist names Jen Skelley who also has an Etsy shop. I really liked her work. Another vendor I really liked was named Ilee Papergoods. I think they have a website too.

Kate and I had a great weekend together and have already been talking about going to the craft fair again in December. Let me know if you want to come along and Christmas shop!

Free Motion Quilting

This week I took a free motion quilting (FMQ) class at Strawberry Patches. I really like the teacher and I had very enthusiastic classmates. I really enjoyed spending an entire day on my hobby. I have to say that FMQ is a lot harder than I thought it would be. I thought that since it was with a machine, it would be easy like sewing lines. Wrong! Once the feed dogs on the machine were dropped, I was completely in charge of the stitch length and speed by how quickly I moved my hands and the speed of the machine. It was like rubbing my stomach and patting my head. I did improve as the day went on but it will take some time to build my confidence enough to FMQ an entire quilt.




This is the sampler square we started with. Each square was a different technique we were supposed to work on.


Next, we had to work on a cheater panel (I had to ask what that was and I found out it's a pre-printed panel that looks like a pieced quilt). I bought mine at Hancock and I chose something I didn't care about since it was practice.


My instructor helped me figure out different patterns to try. I was glad for the variety of technique practice this panel offered.



Here is the back where you can really see all the stitching. It was a lot of fun to learn and I would really recommend this class to anyone interested. I still feel like I have a long way to go, but I'll have a lot of fun practicing.

Finished Unfurnished Quilt

I finished my quilt and I love it! After I finished quilting it, I had to pick a fabric to bind it. After thinking about all the possibilities I settled on the black and white dot fabric. The problem was I bought the the dot fabric as a remnant and didn't save the selvedge so I no idea what it was. I went to Strawberry Patches and explained the situation. Amanda told me that they hadn't had that fabric in a long time but she thought it was Windham's American Vintage line. I went home and googled it only to discover that it was out of print. Finally I searched quiltshops.com and found it at a little shop in the midwest. I was so relieved. I'm so happy with that choice for the binding.




Lastly, I toyed around with the leftover fabrics for pillow shams and here is what I came up with.


Now on to the next project.