I have my first finish of 2015!!!!

Hi everyone,

I'm so excited to share with you my finished Summer Dresden Quilt.

These blocks were made for me by the ladies in the Maple Leaf Bee on Flickr. I cut out all the blades for the Dresden blocks using my GO! Cutter then asked the ladies to sew them up for me. 

I hand quilted with big stitches and crochet cotton in pink and white.  I'm so glad to have it done. It makes a nice lap quilt. 

I hope you like it!

Hugs

Ariane 

Finally done with all my "Maple Leaf Bee 2" blocks

Here are Vivian blocks. 

These are so cute!!!

And then I made Brenda's Blocks.

I really like these too.

I like the fact that these are great scrap busting blocks.

Especially your little scraps.

I still have more blocks to make for another one of my bees.

I will try to get those done later today.

Edited to add: I have found a few GO! Baby giveaways.
Here they are:

In Color Order - ends Friday, Sept 9th

Quilt it - ends Sept 14th

Hugs

My April Bee Blocks

I had fun working on my April Bee Blocks.

These are the blocks I made for Valerie.

These are for the Maple Leaf Bee.

This is the block for Donna.

This is for the Sew Modern Bee.

I've also made some progress on my Carpenter Star quilt, but I don't have a picture to share yet.

I made one of my maple leaf blocks too, for the Canadian Quilt of Valor that Cara is organizing.

I just have two more blocks to make.

I will share them when they are all done.

I have to work nights tonight and tomorrow night.

Wishing you a good day.

Hugs

Finally getting some sewing done...

Wow! It's been over two weeks since my last post. I've been so busy.

My kids were in a school play last week and we have been running like crazy with everything going on.

With working, and fund raising, bake sales, basketball, air cadets, play practices and performances, house cleaning....well a bit of house cleaning anyways. It's been crazy busy. My house is such a mess right now. Oh well, I'll get to it eventually. 

Yesterday, I finally got a chance to do some sewing.

I finished making the center of my mini jelly filled quilt top.

I just need to add the border.

This was all made from my stash.

It's a bright quilt.

I think it will be great for a little boy.

It will make a great play mat as it is bigger then I thought it would be.

I loved this pattern and will definitely make it again.

The pattern is Pint Size by Thimble blossoms.

There are two baby quilt patterns included in the pattern. Love that!!!

I used my 1.5 inch die and my GO! Cutter to cut the strips. It went so fast.

I also made a little table top flimsy using some of my scraps that I cut with the value die that camewith my GO! cutter. Red and Blue are my favorite colors. Once I have this one done, I will put it on my mantle.

This morning, I finished my March blocks for Felicity in the Maple Leaf Bee.

I know I'm really behind.

I've been a bit overwhelmed with everything going on.

I could barely keep track of where I was supposed to be. Luckily, I didn't forget to pick the kids up anywhere. Things are slowing down now a bit. Yeah!!! 

Anyways, I'll try to blog more now that things are a bit more quiet.

I do work night shift tonight and tomorrow.

But, I'll try to get some hand stitching done!!!

Hugs

Three blocks for Nicole!!

Sew....after resting a bit this morning,

I decided to finish Nicole's December block for the Maple Leaf Bee 1.

This was a fun block to make.

I really hope that she likes how I placed the fabric.

 Maple Leaf Bee 1 ended in December.

I decided to join the Maple Leaf Bee 2.

This time it's just 6 of us and we make 2 blocks each month.

February is the first month and Nicole is the first to go.

She wanted some Drunk Love style Log Cabin blocks.

I haven't done this block before.

I had fun with it, and will definitely do it again.

Here are the two blocks I made for that.

I hope Nicole likes them.

They were mailed off today.

Now, I just have to finish my January blocks for the Sew Modern Bee and I will be all caught up again.

I hope to work on those tonight.

Hugs





Just a quick post!

Hi Everyone!!!

This is just a quick little post to share the block I received from Brenda.

This is the block she made for me for the Maple Leaf Bee.

I love it!!!

I know this is going to be a gorgeous quilt when I get all the blocks back.

Here it is.



Well, that's all folks.

I'm exhausted.

Can't......wait.....to.....hit....my.......pillow!

Yaaaawwwwwwwwwnnnnnnnn!

Goodnight!

Ariane

November is my month for the Maple Leaf Bee!

Hi everyone,

I joined the Maple Leaf Bee in August, when one of the other members had to drop out.

 I volunteered to take her place.

So, my month came fast and I had to decide what to ask the girls to make.

I wanted it to be a stash busting project, and a modern project.

So, I took out a bunch of my modern fabric and started cutting.

I decided to use my GO! Dresden Die since I love it so much.

I cut out all the petals for the girls.

I used 20 different fabrics, in aqua's, pinks,  and greens.

This is the test block that I made.

I thought I would do a little tutorial for the girls, in case they had never made a dresden block before.

Here it is.

First you want to fold the petal right side together at the wide end and stitch it across.

As you can see above, just chain stitch all the petals. It goes pretty quick this way.

Once you have all the tops stitched, then cut them apart and trim the point to about an eighth of an inch from the seam you just made. This just helps in turning the tip of the petal.

Turn all the petal tips right side out. You may have to use a tool to get the tip out all the way. I used the tip of my scissor just to push it out a bit. Then, iron the tips of the petals. I have the petals all layed out the way I want to sew them. See below:

Now, I will start to sew the petals together in pairs. You can chain stitch them to make it quicker.

I use my 1/4 inch foot to sew the petals together. I started sewing from the edge of the petals. I find that this makes for a nicer finish. You just match up the top corners of both petals and start stitching. Once all your pairs are sewn together, you want to iron the seam open.

Once all your pair seams are ironed, keep sewing the pairs together, and ironing your seams open, until you have your dresden sewn together as below.

This is what the back should look like.

Now, you can see that mine isn't perfect. Just do your best when sewing them together.

It's time to get the circle ready for the middle. I cut a five inch circle of fabric using the GO! Circle die and included a 4 inch cardstock circle cut using the GO! Dresden die circle, to help you turn the edges for the circle.

I like to stitch this with the sewing machine. So, set your stitch length to the longest setting and with your 1/4 inch foot, start stitching all around the circle as shown below.

You are going to leave the starting and ending threads long enough so that you can sinch the fabric around the cardstock circle.

See how I sinched the fabric around the cardstock. Now you want to iron it well on both sides. I used a bit of spray starch on it before I removed the cardstock circle.

See how nice the edges are turned, and it's a perfect circle.

You now want to sew this circle onto your dresden using a blanket stitch or zigzag.

Once you have it sewn on you can pin your dresden to your background fabric and stitch it on using a blanket stitch or a zigzag stitch.

And you are done.

Isn't is nice?

Well, I hope this little tutorial is helpful.

Wishing all of you a Happy Hallowe'en.

Hugs

Ariane

Some bee blocks that are overdue!!!

Hi everyone!!!

Tonight I finally got all my Bee blocks done.

They are late.

But they are done.

Now I will be back on track again.

So, here they are.

These star blocks are for Tong in the Sew Modern Bee. I just love these. They are so whimsical. I love the soft colors. Just so pretty!

These blocks are for Sharon for the Maple Leaf Bee. I hope she likes them. They are simple, but I really like them.

 The fabric is just gorgeous!!

These are huge 15 inch blocks for Katrina for the Maple Leaf Bee. These were way out of my comfort zone. But I enjoyed making them. I hope that she likes them. They came together really quick.

So, three sets of blocks that are completely different. It was fun to work on them.

Tomorrow, I hope to work on a few more projects.

Until then.....

Hugs

Ariane