selina quilts: 2024

Thursday, July 25, 2024

Fishy

Welcome to the last stop on the Smelly Fish Hop

A sweet way to start if you ask me.

Last months HOP, For The Birds, was as always, full of great talents sharing wonderful ideas to add to our to do lists. I had an idea for this months hop but one of last months ideas from Daryl of Patchouli Moon Studio jumped to the top of my idea list for this HOP.

In her post she showed several of the purses she makes for the SEW POWERFUL PURSE PROJECT. I looked into the link she provided and decided to give a try to one of these bags.

After making the first bag with fabric I had on hand I decided I would make a couple more if I made a JoAnn's run to find some fishy based fabric.

The bag pattern that this organization requires is very nice and very simple to do. It has 2 pockets and no zipper. They are also addicting. I've got 10 done to date. I took them with me to 2 different meetings for show and tell and had several members ask for the link.

I also went to a mini retreat and had a couple of members make them for this group and a few just wanting this easy breezy pattern.

My original idea was to make a set of Zipper Pouches using designs by Minki Kim based on her panel by Riley Blake. Since I got as far as getting the fishy fabric for them, that turned into my mini retreat project.

I must have been in purse making mode this month because once I got the fabric for the Sew Powerful purses I had enough left over to make one zip type for my sister.

Now onto the Fishy block from my Polaroid quilt. There was only 1 fish related block. Good thing it was cute.

Well now that I've shared all my smelly fish with you I would like to extend my thanks to Carol for another fun idea for us to stretch our quilting imaginations.

I hope you have stopped by to visit all of the smelly fish presented this week. Just in case here is the list of where you can find any you may have missed.

JULY 22

JULY 23

Patchouli Moon Studio

Words & Stitches

Quilted Snail

Quilting Between The Rails

JULY 24

Elizabeth Coughlin Designs

JULY 25

Thanks for stopping by, hope to see you again next month

Monday, June 17, 2024

FOR THE BIRDS - BLOG HOP

Tweet, tweet to Joan for organizing another thought provoking hop. I thought Birds sounded fun and relatively simple. Fun, yes, but by my own creatively which got out of hand not so simple.

Lets begin with my bird of choice

Yes he is an American Eagle. I live in The Villages, Fl with about 150,000 other Adults. We are very heavy into supporting our many veterans around here. The local American Legion is the largest in the world.

The local chapter of HONOR FLIGHT sends 4 flights with about 64 Vets on each flight to Washington, DC each year and 1 Virtual flight. All for Vets from this area.

Each Vet receives a patriotic themed quilt. Several different organizations make the quilts including the Quilt Guild of The Villages of which I'm a member. While any patriotic themed quilt is appreciated many of the vets prefer a quilt that is Branch Specific. The panel I was asked to work on was for the Navy with THE BIRD. Such great timing.

I had an idea of what I wanted to do with this panel. I'm old school so I took out my graph paper and markers and set to it. My thoughts started with 3 maybe 4 stars across the top. Somehow I ended up with 20 stars surrounding the panel. So I now had my plan and headed out on vacation.

The problem was that I kinda forgot that this quilt was to be finished for this hop, Honor Flight doesn't need it until September. It didn't kick in until Joan started sending participant notes to us.

Thankfully I really do my best work under pressure. I started working on it Friday morning and finished it this morning (Sunday). The friendship stars took a lot longer than I planned on. I really hate trimming up HST's.

I love how it is coming out. I still need to do the final sew down of the binding and want to add a bit more quilting but if I had to gift it tomorrow I could.

Next up are the birds on my polaroid quilt. I am getting a lot of milage out of that quilt. Amazing how diverse it is.

Hope to see you all next month.

I am including the full list of this Hops participants. If you haven't visited them yet please do you will be so happy you did.

June 17

MooseStashQuilting

Karrin’s Crazy World

Quilting Between the Rails

Selina Quilts

Quilt Doodle Designs

June 18

Homespun Hannah's Blog

June 19

Patchouli Moon Studio

June 20

Tuesday, May 21, 2024

On The Road Again - Blog Hop

Hi, Thanks for stopping by on your Road Trip, full of stops along the way to visit with many of your quilty friends.

This months goal is to make something that will get us from one spot to another anyway possible.

Over the years I have done many such pieces, including quilts full of trains and planes. And yes, I even included transportation on my polaroid quilt. If you have been following my posts you know that I have been referencing the various blocks in that quilt over the last couple of months. There are 30 misc blocks in total in that quilt and references will be showing up several more times this year. Here are 2 more blocks from it that depict transportation

I didn't have a real idea of what I would be doing for this event until I passed some bicycle fabric in a quilt store I was visiting with a friend. Her idea to stop but I ended up buying the fabric and she got a good laugh cause she walked out empty handed.

I just wanted to whip up a simple lap quilt. I picked out a pattern and took the fabric to a sew day with my quilt guild buddies so I could cut on wonderful high tables. Only one problem. You know what happens when you meet up with a bunch of nice people and start to chat when you should be concentrating ......... yeah nothing good.

This is the basic top I was aiming for.

This is what I ended up with as cut left overs

I apparently cut twice as much as I needed. So now I'm caught with a brain cramp that can't figure out if I want to make a second lap quilt or a larger throw size. I just can't decide and until I do it remains a UFO or 2.

Well that left me with no new finished project for this hop and I can't have that. So to backtrack a bit, I love making embroidered table toppers using these 15 inch chargers.

I've found them at Target, Walmart and Dollar Tree for about $2.00 a piece. Less at Dollar Tree. They make a very pretty quick gift for any occasion. I made the apples for me and the Christmas trees for a friend.

On Mothers Day we went to friends for dinner and I made one for "the mom" with wild flowers but forgot to take a picture. Her husband loved it and jokingly asked why I didn't make one for him. Ta Da the new idea I needed for this hop.

I use Creative Fabrica for lots of my design ideas across all of my different crafting endeavors. When I looked for Embroidery/Cars I found designs for "Muscle Cars on Mylar". Perfect since he's into cars. I only had one issue, I have no idea what they meant by Mylar and neither did the gals working at JoAnns. The end result is to have a light stitch over shiny Mylar. I improvised and used silver faux leather.

It's not exactly what it is supposed to looked like but he won't know that and I wouldn't either if I hadn't blown up the pattern image on my computer. The cars do actually look much shinier with bright sun, too bright to get a picture.

He'll love it and since he has declared himself as the unofficial godfather to my dogs he'll receive it for Fathers Day.

Thanks so much Carol for planning this months adventure.

Thanks to all of my guests for stopping by on your travels and please add all of these other travelers to your triptik. See the list below.

Until next time, travel safely.

MAY 20

MAY 21

Kathy's Kwilts and More

MAY 22

MAY 23

Tuesday, April 23, 2024

Our Challenge for this Month - April Showers

This months challenge, April Showers, has so many paths that could be traveled. Thanks for the challenge Joan. Over the years I have done several pieces that fall under the "Showers" Umbrella (tee-hee)

I designed this Mug Rug several years ago for another hop. I just love the fabric with the rain drops and my little ducks in the puddle.

January's White Rabbit hop included a block from a polaroid quilt that hangs in my powder room. That quilt also includes these 2 showery blocks where I used a scrap of rain drop fabric in one of them.

Back in 2017 I took a class with a friend at a local quilt shop where we took apart a boring black umbrella. We then took fabric of our choice and covered it with iron on vinyl and used the original fabric to make a pattern and ta da we made it into a new personalized umbrella,

Sadly I have never used my umbrella for fear of ruining it. So Silly.

OK time for this months hop submission.

Using a Baby Shower instead of a Rain Shower I made 3 baby blankets using Jenny Doans, Self Binding Baby Blanket, You Tube video from several years ago.

I am a member of the Big Cypress Chapter of the Quilt Guild of the Villages. Each chapter supports several different charities. One of our chapters Charities is Children's Home Society, Once each year we throw a "Baby Shower" for the group and our gifts range from diapers, toys, baby clothes, books etc. etc. etc. and baby quilts and other items we make.

So last month at our groups mini retreat I knocked out these 3 Self Binders for the Baby SHOWER. They are really quick and easy to make.

Thanks Joan for yet another fun challenge. It has brought out the creative talents of so many of us and we so appreciate what you and Carol do for us each month.

Here is the list of all of the participants for this go round. Stop by and see where they took this idea and let them know what you think of their beautiful work.

Here is the schedule.

Monday April 22

MooseStashQuilting

Words&Stitches

Quilting Gail
Quilt Doodle Designs

Kathy's Kwilts and More

Tuesday April 23

Wednesday April 24

Quilted Snail

Ms P Designs USA

Days Filled With Joy

Quilting Between the Rails (Facebook)

Bumbleberry Stitches

Thursday April 25

Tuesday, March 19, 2024

Give It A Whirl - March Blog Hop

As soon as I saw the title of this months hop I knew where I wanted to start a project. I wanted to make a child's quilt using this whirly gig 3D block. I have no idea if that is it's real name but its working today.

Way in the back of my brain I thought I had made this block before but couldn't find any evidence of it. I did find a quilt with a 3D bow tie block which I'm guessing is what was floating around in my head. Problem was figuring out how to make the 3D pin wheel version.

I did find a few versions on Pinterest and went from there to a wonderful quilt top.

The block was really easy and quick to make. I wanted to make all the whirly gig parts from dotted fabrics. I was able to find all of the fabric for this quilt in my stash.

I now have a new mental issue ( for about a week now), how do I quilt this without loosing the 3D effect. I am writing this the evening before I'm due to post. I have the finished top and

a sandwiched quilt but not a finished quilt.

When I realized this morning that I didn't have a finished project I decided I had to at least whip up a completed mug rug from the left overs.

Well a 3D whirly mug rug is not a safe piece of quilting to place a full mug or glass on, just a tad wobbly.

So I turned it into one very ginormous pin cushion. It's a 8.5 inch square that's about 4.5 inches high. Well if nothing else I have Given This Hop A Whirl and had a whole lot of giggles.

Well I am now heading to my quilting space to give this one more shot. I will add the photo of how far I got before I go to bed / or hit the publish button.

9:30 PM 3/18 Well the best laid plans..... I thought I'd start the quilting process by filling a couple of bobbins and starting a new spool of thread. Somewhere along the line I hit something and my machine just didnt want any part of me. Turned the machine on and off about 4 times and rethreaded it 3 or 4 times and nothing. One last time 45 minutes after starting and it ran beautifully but by then I was done.

Oh well it happens to all of us at one time or another and we get up tomorrow and start again.

Thanks to Carol for coming up with this great idea for a Hop. I know I will be loving this piece by weeks end.

I am adding a full list of the participants in this hop so you can see how the rest of our creative minds are working. Hope to see you next month and maybe, just maybe I'll sneak in a picture of this finish in that post.

Have a great month and for those who celebrate, Have a Happy Easter.

MARCH 18

Thank you for stopping by!

Wednesday, February 21, 2024

It Moose Be Love

Welcome to my stop on the Love Train. When I first saw the title to this hop I went out and hunted down a couple of sweet Moose ideas. I found some machine embroidery patterns and some machine applique ideas. Great, since I had good ideas I could just add the Hop to my to do list.

A couple of weeks ago I was prepping to go to a meeting and went on a hunt for a pouch to carry some stuff. You know, search through the hundreds of pouches we have all made over the years to test ideas and fabric and construction.

This is what I found. Can you see that great fabric. Cute little moose heads. Now my brain starts asking questions like wouldn't this fabric be better for the hop than the other stuff i hadn't started yet, why did you have that fabric and is any of that left in your stash somewhere, where would you have stuck it, reds, browns, Christmas, novelty.

Well the answer to some of those questions can be seen in the following pictures. like this one. I found just over a yard in the novelty drawer.

One of my issues was to find things to make with it without cutting the fabric into tiny pieces and obliterating the Moose.

This past couple of years I have been making the kind of gifts that you take to a friends for dinner or to greet a new neighbor or go to someone's new home, So that's where I started.

I was given a drying mat for a gift a couple of years ago and love it, It's a piece of Bosal between 2 pieces of cotton and quilted. I use mine daily and it machine washes beautifully.

When I started to make them as gifts I generally add a dish towel trimmed with the same fabric.

Depending on the occasion I will add a couple of bowl cozies, some times with matching bowls and sometimes not.

My latest addition to this goodie basket are jar openers, fabric backed with the non slip rubber stuff used in cabinets.

They work really well at grabbing the lid as well as holding the bottle or can itself.

They are amazing and can be made in any size and shape. I had a couple of scraps left from the previous items and that' s pretty much what determined the size of this pair

The last of the pieces I pulled together for this hop is this gift card. I took the Hop logo and removed the dates in Cricut Design Space. Printed it and stuck it to a base card. I will eventually type up care and use instructions for inside the card for the items in the basket.

I hope you have enjoyed your visit here and have picked up some ideas for very simple but very useful items for your home or as a gift.

I hope you have been following along on the hop so far and that you will be continuing to the last of our talented group. For your convenience I have included the entire list below,

Monday February 19

Elizabeth Coughlin Designs

Tuesday February 20

A Quiltery-For the Love of Geese