WIP - Sara's Star

My friend Sara got married a few weeks ago, so of course I decided (after the wedding had already occurred, mind you!) that she and her new hubby needed a quilt.

Here's my progress thus far:

 Fabric choices - white, some Kona gray, green and blue, and tone-on-tone blue and gray prints.

 Molly likes helping me lay out the bits. It's a big star!

All pieced together.

Because I am rubbish at maths (as my British friends would say?), I ended up with enough fabric to make TWO roughly 80x80 quilt tops... so here's the heir and the spare, so to speak, both all put together.

I decided I didn't like it as a square, so I added a red border to two sides. (Don't these stars look neat on point, by the way? Maybe I'll have to figure out how to make one - the extra? - that way!)

 The quilt, all sandwiched and pinned...this is Wrench's favorite part. She LOVES snuggling up on unfinished quilts, much to the chagrin of my sewing machine! (I'm careful to use a lint roller first, if there's a ton of furries).

I've gotten about half of the quilting done on it so far. I've decided to keep it simple, with stitch-in-the-ditch and I'll add some extra here and there before I call it done. I think I want it to feel more like a comforter than something heavily quilted...also I'm lazy, so that works for that, too!

Old Navy Sample Share - Tees and Tanks

Through the website Crowdtap, every so often I get the chance to try out free stuff from my favorite place to buy clothes - Old Navy! The best part about these opportunities, called Sample Shares, are that I get to take a friend along for free stuff, too! In the past, my friend Tamera and I have gotten to try out a free summer outfit and even these awesome winter coats. I've also gotten (but not blogged about) skinny jeans. Other shares have included fitness gear and dresses.

This time, though, the Sample Share was for Old Navy's new tees and tanks. I was super excited about this one because, well, pretty much my whole dresser is full of Old Navy basics like these. The coupons were good for two tops (any combo of tees and tanks) with the eligible product numbers listed on the coupons and the letter that came with them.

Those little product numbers were awfully tricky. Yes, they were on the price tags on every item, but they were awfully small (I circled it in red using MS Paint so that you could see it!). After hunting around the store for a while, we were able to locate most - but not all! - of the eligible shirts.

The ones that were the most appealing to us were the Soft Vintage tees, which come in both crew neck and v-neck styles. We really liked the impressive array of colors and, true to their name, these tees are really soft!

Unfortunately, the tees are also really thin. It quickly became clear to both of us that Old Navy's goal is to get everyone who comes in to buy a "top" part of an outfit to actually buy two shirts to fulfill the same need.

Without even trying to get a photo of how thin the shirts were, you can tell from Tamera holding up this tee that they're pretty thin - definitely not the sort of thing that you'd be comfortable wearing to the office *without* another layer underneath! (Look how well it matched the little yellow bubbles on her skirt, though, without even trying! Too cute!). She went with the crew neck vintage tee in a very pretty shade of blue, and I got a dark purple one.

The other top we both ended up getting was the Jersey-Stretch Tank. Made out of a thicker sort of material than Old Navy tanks usually are, these are clearly the shirts that Old Navy intends for us to wear under their new, super-thin tees. They're also very soft, but the thing I liked most about mine is the length!

The purple long sleeve I'm wearing in this picture isn't short on me or anything - it comes down to my hips, easily - but the tank is much longer, which makes it much more appealing for layering than most of the other Old Navy tanks that I've purchased in the past. The cute teal color that I got doesn't seem to be available on their website anymore, but your local store may carry it. ;)

Of course, nothing free ever comes without a catch, right? Old Navy hadn't gotten the coupons correctly entered into their system by the time T and I went for our tees - when the cashiers scanned the coupons, they came up as being for free dresses, even though the tees we were getting were definitely ones that were listed on the coupons! Thankfully the staff was able to override the coupon and give us the tees for free anyway - always great customer service when I take these coupons to the Old Navy here in Chico, CA :) 

Overall I definitely had fun with this sample share! It was a bit disappointing that, during the Crowdtap discussion, Old Navy asked us for our opinions on a larger variety of shirts than we were actually able to purchase with the coupons - I was really looking forward to checking out the new Fitted Racerback Tanks, which look like they'd be great for the gym but at a much lower price than Old Navy's activewear line.

Thank you, Old Navy and Crowdtap, for the chance to score free gear! :)

sorry

I've been absent for a while, sorry about that. I never, ever get sick - hubby got swine flu while that was going around and I didn't even get the sniffles. I haven't been notably sick since sometime in high school.

Until this week.

I took my first sick day off of work last Friday after only making it in for a half-day on Thursday. I left early yesterday. Some crazy sinus infection that's now turned into a barking cough.

Bleck.

The lamest part is that I had all that free time and didn't get ANY sewing done. My brain's been foggy from not sleeping well. I did, however, watch two and a half seasons of Mad Men. Mmmm.

Anyway, hopefully your regularly scheduled programming will return shortly.

Remembering

If you look at my feets under my sewing table (formerly known as my dining room table), this is usually what you'll see.

If you read my blog, you'll see the title "Hope Sewing is Genetic."

Yes, the two are linked together, and I'm going somewhere with this, I promise!

My blog title refers to my grandmother, who was an expert in all things crafty, it seemed - she sewed tiny Barbie clothes and clothes for me as a child; everyone in my family has an afghan she made; she tried to teach me crochet and counted cross-stitch when I was a kid, but I didn't quite have the patience for it yet. Check out photos of a sweater and the afghans that she made me here.

My grandfather had his own sorts of crafts, too - he did all kinds of woodworking, including making very detailed dollhouses for the ladies of the family, and later would do all kinds of painting (I see another blog post in all these things, don't worry).

Anyway, back to my blog. When I started looking for a hobby a year and a half or so ago, I decided on sewing because, well, I've got such a great family history of doing it, and hopefully it's written on my genes.

Now the slippers (we're coming back around!).

My grandmother wore slippers like this. My dad wears them, too. I saw them at Target not long after I started quilting and knew I had to have them...for sewing in. I do wear them at other times, but I almost always wear them when I sew (except when it's 100 degrees out over the summer, because, well, the fuzz is a little hot n' sweaty then!).

So there ya go. Another little sewing quirk. Do you have any of those? Perhaps a chant you perform before starting a new free-motion quilting project, or a totem that has to be nearby when you start on HSTs? ;)

Fugly winner!

Alright alright, I told myself that I'd wait until noon Pacific time to draw the winner, but, um, I'm impatient and pretty excited to find out who won and where I'm sending this stuff!

Winner of the fugly fabric:

Is lucky number 7, Kathy, who blogs at Kathy's Quilting Blog!

And winner of the Fabric Painting book is #15, Kristi, who blogs at My Ponderings, rambling, and other various thoughts!

Congratulations, ladies! I'll be emailing you for your addresses shortly. Thank you so much to everyone who entered and wow am I excited to have so many new followers! I look forward to doing another giveaway at 100! ;)

Finish-a-long progress

I've made a bunch of progress and finished up three of the items on my Q1 finish-a-long list! I posted one f hte finishes the other day - it was the first quilt I sold. :)

Here is another of the ones I've finished for the finish-a-long. I started it sometime last fall and it was supposed to be done for Christmas.

Christmas, February 10th, they're pretty close. Who's counting?

It's a child sized ticker tape quilt - full of boy things like dinosaurs, puppies, elephants, lions, and a few trucks thrown in for good measure. For information on how to make a ticker tape quilt, check out Rachel's Bottled Rainbows project at Stitched in Color. (Check out her blog anyway, since it's pretty awesome).

Detail of the front and back. The back is all dinosaurs and snakes and turtles - icky boy things. ;)

A close up of some of the bits I used. I bought a box of scraps off Etsy that really helped with this. I probably have enough to make another one like this.

I think that every quilt comes with a lesson. The lesson from this one? When making a ticker tape quilt like this (one that doesn't really require too much precision), use safety pins instead of straight pins to keep the "ticker tapes" on while you're sewing them on! I was stuck with a LOT of pins while working on this one!

We delivered this to our friend Kerra and her youngest boy yesterday. I gave her another quilt for Christmas, for her youngest daughter. She has two more little ones to go (the next one's already on my UFO/WIP list for the finish-a-long, too - whoops!), plus one for her of course (which is already done!).

I hope everyone is having a productive weekend, too! :)

Edited 3/29/12: This is my first of three finishes for the Finish-A-Long hosted by Quilter in the Gap! :D First quarter to-do list can be viewed here.

WIP Wednesday - fugly edition

(linking up with Freshly Pieced for W.i.P Wednesday)

In honor of the Fugly Fabric Giveaway hosted by Charm About You (click here to find MY offerings!) I decided to whip out my fugly WIPs.

No, I don't ever intend to finish them. Don't worry.

Up first is, literally, a mishmash of all the ugliest fabrics that came in a fat quarter lot (which I got ridiculously cheap, I can't imagine why!?!?) on eBay. Note my terrible attempts at HSTs, back when I didn't realize that using an iron that was too hot would screw up fabric and before I knew what squaring up a HST was.

Keep in mind, also, that this was started about a year ago! What a long way I've come (I hope, anyway). Overall it's roughly, um...lap sized. If you have a lap that needs to be covered by something fugly.

Don't those fruits look delicious? Not. Also note my failure to follow my own made up pattern.

Then there's this. I'm not sure what it is. It's maybe a bit bigger than mini sized, and this was fabric from a lot of 3" charm squares, also from eBay. Not sure what I was thinking here, either, but I do like some of the combinations...

Like the one on the left here. The one on the right? Chunks of dalmations and cat bodies. No idea.

Just to reassure you, no,  I have no intention of finishing either of them...though I'm not sure what I will do. They're sort of quilt tops, and they definitely demonstrate my learning process! Any ideas what i should do??