A Quilt Exhibit by Bonnie J. Smith

I work at the University of Michigan.  

Yesterday a friend told me about a really cool quilt exhibit there.  

We walked over to the building to see it and thought you might enjoy the quilts too.

My kids were all swimmers.  

My son stopped after a few years, but both my girls swam through high school.  

The younger one swam at Michigan State for a year too. 

 My husband and I were YMCA and USA swimming officials for over 10 years.  

Needless to say, swimming was a major part of our lives for a long time.  

These quilts were fantastic.  

I hope you enjoy them as much as I did.

I took a photo of one of the signs, as pictured here, but not all of them.

This one reminded me of practice lanes!

I hope you enjoyed the show here as much as I enjoyed sharing it with you all.

Happy sewing!

~XOP~

Look at That Face!

I finished the first top portion of one of the trivets.  Isn't she great??

Definitely a WIP at this point.  Stay tuned.  Don't forget to go over to 52 Quilters and visit!

Linking up with Let's Bee Social.

~XOP~

A Quick Post

Don't forget to come and visit me at the 52 Quilters blog this week.  

Most of my posts will be over there.  

Last night I was working on a trivet to go with the oven mitts

 I made for the bridal shower next weekend.  

I was playing with my fabrics and thought I would share.  

Pop over to 52 Quilter's tomorrow to see what I ended up choosing.

Here are the two faces together.

Happy sewing!

~XOP~

Some More Finishes

I have managed to finish up a few more things for the upcoming bridal shower.  

I had decided that I wanted to make 4 embroidered towels, some oven mitts 

and an etched baking dish. 

 I finished the oven mitts and the 4 towels.  

I could not be happier with how these turned out!  

The oven mitts are adorable too.

I think I want to make some of those paper pieced trivets that I made one Christmas, to go with these.

I will need to look for some embroidery for the centers.  

Maybe some anthropomorphized veggies?  Maybe more dishes?  

I'm not sure just yet.

If I have time I would love to make a set of coasters to match these mitts.

Oh those faces!

Have a great weekend and a heads up that I will be taking over the 52 quilters Instagram/Blog and Twitter next week, so if you follow them please stop in and say HI to me!

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts

Have a great weekend!

~XOP~

WIP Wednesday

I have several things going right now.  

I'm working on some bridal shower gifts and 

trying to get my The Splendid Sampler blocks caught up.  

I spent a lot of time on this paper pieced block on Saturday 

(when I should have been in the garden weeding)

I think the resultant block turned out well though!

Hubby and son were out fishing on Saturday and since he does most of the cooking I decided to cook.  I made some chicken pot pie. 

 I use broccoli as my kids don't like peas.  

Kicker is that they are no longer at home and hubby likes peas better, but I love the broccoli!  

I decided to embroider some "Kitchy" kitchen towels for the bridal shower as part of my gift.  

I did get this one teapot finished, but have 3 more to do.  

There are black stripes down each side of the towels. 

 Their kitchen theme seemed to be black and white, so I thought these would be fun!

I also madea pair of oven mitts.  I love that the dots have faces!

I lined the mitts with white polka dots on black, so cute!

I also got the last round of my bee blocks finished.  So I guess that is not a WIP but the bee is a constant WIP!

Now I just need time to finish the embroidery on the last towels.

Quilt Fox Face quilt for the next baby.

Assemble the Little Birdie quilt and get that quilted.

Just a few balls in the air.

Linking to Let's Bee Social

~XOP~

Friday Finish and First Q2 Finish

I had an older UFO lurking in my closet that I put on several "finish" lists. 

 I listed it in the APQ UFO Challenge and in the Q2 of the Finish Along. 

 I will link up with Crazy Mom Quilts Finish it up Friday too.  

Whew!  

It feels GREAT to have a finish!!

Many years ago, I joined a swap of pumpkin blocks. 

 If I remember correctly, the pattern was a Bunny Hill pattern (apparently it is no longer available) called When the Frost is on the Pumpkin, but it was so long ago!  

We had to make a certain number of pumpkins from the pattern and send them to our hostess. 

 She exchanged them all and send us the same number back. 

 I put them together as soon as they came back and even got the back made. 

 I made the binding and handed it off to my quilter.  

No rush, I told her.  

Several years later she gave it back to me (I had forgotten about it) and 

I machine sewed on the binding.  

Then it sat for another few months.  

This month I decided was the month to get it finished.  

 This was taken when the binding was machine sewn on but not turned.

Hallie, guardian of the pumpkin patch!

Here is my pumpkin patch in all it's glory.

Close up of some of the pumpkins in the patch.

I chose to use some fall flannel that I had in my stash for the back of this beauty.  I love those cats!

I have listed this in my ETSY shop  if you are interested.  

I am hoping to have a few more finishes this month also.  

Have a happy, stitchy weekend!

~XOP~

A Little Birdie Told Me

I have no idea where my new birdie fixation has come from.  

Honestly, you all know I am really more of a cat person.  

I was working on my The Splendid Sampler blocks when the seagull block came up. 

 I don't know about you but even though most birds are beautiful 

I can't help but think of these birds as rats with wings.  

They are the biggest beggars!  

Since my quilt will have a more retro feel to it, I decided to just draft my own birds. 

 This is the resulting block. 

 I posted this on Facebook and someone actually enlarged and printed it off and 

asked if they could make my birds! 

 LOL.  

As you all know there are 4 babies in my circle of family and friends being born this month.  

I have finished one quilt and have the second one basted but 

the next one was totally unplanned and last minute! 

 I have a couple of baby quilt patterns that I have been dying to make. 

 I hauled one out for this baby.  She is not due for a few months so I figure I have time.

I am only making the 4 blocks. 

 I plan to sash them with yellow stars as the corner stones and then frame the whole quilt in prairie points in lavender and yellow with a white outer border. 

 Or that's what I think I want to do.  As always I will have to let the quilt tell me what it wants.

Pattern is called Feathers and is by Lydia Nelson.

Here are my 4 birdies.  You can't see it in these photos but the white has birds on it too.

I am loving breaking out of my normal comfort zone for something like this!

I am trying to decide if I want to embroider a label.

If I do that means I can't finish the quilt until after the baby is born.

They know her name but I won't know the birthdate.

That means waiting to do the quilting.

Decisions, decisions!

Getting ready for the bridal shower too.

I have ordered the fabric for the oven mitts.

I bought the glass etching liquid last night for the casserole dish.

I decided to try that instead of paint.

I will take photos so you can see how it goes.

I ordered the dish towels that I want to embroider.

Looks like I will be doing the embroidery soon since the shower is the beginning of May!!

Linking up with Let's Bee Social

What are you working on?

~XOP~

My Wild Weekend

What a crazy weekend we had at my house this past weekend!  

On Saturday night my husband got a bad nose bleed and it would not stop. 

 I won't go into gross detail but we ended up at urgent care on Sunday

 followed by the ER on Monday.  

I think we finally got things under control but there will be a trip to the ENT tomorrow. 

 He is not on blood thinners nor is his BP high, so not sure what the deal is, but it seems like we have finally stopped the bleeding, for now.

I did manage to get a few things done over the weekend and some of the Splendid Sampler blocks were on my "to do" list.  

Here are my blocks that I have not shown so far.

Changed the bear into a cat (of course)

Back stitched and left off the crochet hook

Wow, this was a lot of little pieces

Loved this star

This block was seagulls.  I just did not want to put seagulls in my quilt so I drew these birds.

I think I will make a pattern up with them, what do you think?

These bunnies were a bonus block and I love how they turned out!

I was pretty happy with this one also.

I am still 2 blocks behind, but I hope to catch up this week. 

 It is challenging to make 2 blocks per week.  

It doesn't sound like much but you can get behind rather quickly.

  I also have my 2 bee blocks to make and various and sundry shower gifts to begin on.

I had a new great niece born on Saturday and have a chenille blanket and a quilt ready for her.  Another great niece/nephew due in May.

  I have that baby's chenille blanket finished and the quilt is ready for me to quilt.

I have to get cracking on the wedding shower gifts.  

I ordered the most hilarious fabric to make oven mitts with today.  

Hoping it comes soon!

  It seems the colors for the kitchen are black and white 

so I found this fabric by Cotton and Steel to use.

  I am going to try to embroider some dish towels and then use glass paint to paint the bottom of a Pyrex casserole dish with their last name on it. 

 Those will be the shower gifts.  Their quilt goes to the quilter tomorrow.

Baby shower at the end of the month, I have the chenille blanket finished.  

I started a quilt for them this weekend.  It is a girl so that makes it easier to choose a pattern.  

What are you working on?

~XOP~

Q2 Finish Along 2016: Proposed Finishes

I decided to make this list a mix of things I have to get finished for deadlines and also some old projects that need to be finished up.

1-First up is the wedding quilt that I need for the August wedding.  

The top and the back are made.  

It needs to go to the quilter and then it will need to be bound. 

 Here is the label that is on the back.  

I embroidered it and then incorporated it right into the back!

2-Fox Face:  This quilt is a carry over from last quarter. 

 It is all basted and just needs to be quilted and bound.  This one needs to be finished soon!

3-Baby Birds quilt.  This is one for one of the impending babies. 

 I managed to get a few birds finished, but need to decide how to put it together.

4-Bridal shower gifts.  

 Two Oven mitts, an etched casserole dish, 2 dish towels and maybe 2 more pot holders, or coasters.  The theme is black and white so those will be the colors.  

They will be along the lines of the ones I made for my niece, Ashley's wedding shower.

5-Bind the pumpkin quilt.  That's all this quilt needs.

6-Thadd's sports quilt. 

 I only have fabric, I have not started sewing much together yet. 

 All the sports teams in the Detroit area, including some of the college teams.  

Those are my proposed finishes for Q2 of the finish along.  

You can link up your list here, if you want to join in.

Have a Happy weekend of sewing or doing whatever makes YOU happy!

~XOP~