Clearing the Decks

Or better known as clearing the table! Every so often the rush of customer quilts slows down enough that I am able to quilt my own quilts and the past couple of weeks I have been doing just that :)

Here are a few that have been done so far...

 

I call this "Pure Mood Swings", Pure is the name of the fabric line used and Mood Swings is the name of the quilt pattern.

 

I quilted a panto called Turbalance (2)

 

This one is the Bonnie Hunter's 2014 Fall Mystery quilt called Grand Illusion 

 

I chose the panto Slick for this one

 

This one was the very first mystery Bonnie Hunter did on her Blog called Carolina Crossroads the pattern can now be found in her Scraps and Shirttails book 1

 

I quilted a panto called Starletts on it

 

This quilt was another Mystery quilt of Bonnie Hunter called Orange Crush

 

I chose a panto called Sweet Indigo on it

 

If you quilt it you need to bind it...these are the bindings I have prepped for the quilts I have been quilting

 

these need the bindings machine stitched to the top of the quilts

 

then they will sit until I get around to hand stitching the binding down to the back of the quilts

 

This is all that there is left of my own stuff that have been piling up for years waiting to be quilted.

All there is left to do is 7 lap quilts and the rest are table runners or mini quilts.  Hoping to finish these off in the next couple of weeks!!! 

Meet Ares, and UFO Update

 

Ares is the new Grand-puppy :) he is a red husky puppy with one green eye and one blue eye.

 

He belongs to my daughter Rachel and her boyfriend Zach.

 

Until he is a little older we need to keep Hosa (our other daughter's dog) separated from him because Hosa plays too rough with him and has sent Ares yelping in fear.

 

He loves his toys!

 

and he howls when his momma goes to work and I need to keep an eye on him. 

 

Anyways, besides the new puppy I had to cut some more hexagons to work on my 1/2" hexie project. I still don't know how large it will end up being, whether it will be a lap quilt or a king sized bed quilt. I guess I will just keep plugging along on it until I get tired of working on it and what ever size it will be, will be.

 

Back in November, while I was waiting for the Grand Illusion Mystery quilt to start, I started Bonnie Hunter's Carolina Crossroads Quilt (It was her very first mystery she did on her blog). Nothing helps get you in the mood for working on one of Bonnie's mysteries than working on one of her patterns. I now have the center completely pieced together all that is left to do before quilting it, is to add the inner and outer borders to it or just 1 more day of working on it.    

 

This is one block from the Grand Illusion Mystery quilt.

 

Last but not least is this little project...OK, I know that this was not part of my UFOs (the other 3 are though) and in my defense, well....I was in the mood to work on something for Valentines Day

 

So I pulled red, cream, pink and white fabrics from my stash and started to play. I just took it off my longarm yesterday...it turned out so cute! but since it's a valentine quilt I thought that I would save the final reveal for Feb. 14. 

Grand Illusion Fall Mystery Quilt

I bet you thought that I fell off the face of the earth, LOL! But I have been very busy since I last posted, I had a re-grand opening of my business Gecko Quilts. I have been in business for over 9 years now and it was time to upgrade my longarm set up. I computerized my longarm and upgraded to a 14ft long table!!!

Yes it is SWEET!!!! So even though I haven't posted in over a month on my Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt doesn't mean I haven't been working on it. In fact the nice thing about having my longarm computerized is that I am now able to sew my own quilt tops/ projects while I am working on quilting customer quilts! I have always said I wished there were more time in a day to get it all done and well 2015 is off to a good start because of the upgrade to my business. OK, so you're wondering just how far did I get done on the mystery....

 

It's all pieced!!! I like it, the colors remind me of spring and Easter. So now it will wait for another week until I can fit it into my longarm schedule (I am trying to quilt my own quilts on the weekends in between customer quilts that are being quilted during the week). I will update this post later with a quilted pic of the quilt and what design I end up choosing for it. But until then please go to Quiltville and see the progress that others have been making on their mystery quilts.   

 

Grand Illusion Clue 2 & 3

It's been kinda crazy around here lately, with Christmas prep, The Grand Re-Opening of Gecko Quilts prep for January (more about that in another blog post), and of course Bonnie Hunter's Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt. I didn't link up last week, but I am this week so here are a few pics of where I am...

 

I did finish clue 2 just in time for the release of clue 3 last Friday. Here are all the units so far.

 

 Here is what is remaining of my fabrics after clue 2 was done. I originally started off using method #3 for the double diamonds unit (which is the way I always do this 1/2 unit which Bonnie has used before in her designs. But some of mine were coming out a bit wonky so I tried a different method (rectangles, and the 1/2 sq triangles with the dog ears cut off). Worked a lot better for me and even though I was not able to get the bonus triangles that I would have if using method 3, I did manage to get some scrap triangles for my crumb stash. 

 

 Here is my crumb stash, separated into two bins, one for neutrals and one for color. 

 

 

 What am I planning to do with these crumbs you might be wondering- well I am making the wild and goosey blocks Bonnie Hunter designed for her Quiltmaker Addicted to Scraps column.

 

 

 So with clue 2 behind me, here is my strips cut for clue 3 (the 2X4 units). I was able to get 10 units pieced on Friday. I really like the way these are turning out...love the color combo.   

 

 

 This is all of the fabric I have left now...the pinks are all gone, my neutrals are all gone except for a strip or 2 very little green left, a little more of the black...so I am thinking the renaming piecing of units will be with the yellow and the aquas. I will have the rest of clue 3 finished before Friday's release of clue 4...can't wait to see what is next! But in the mean time check out some of the progress that the others are making on the Grand Illusion mystery HERE 

Grand Illusion Clue 1...

is done!

Finally, with just a few hours to spare before the 2nd clue is released on Friday 12/5/14. 

I was all ready for this mystery to get started on Black Friday, but thanks to my eldest daughter, I caught her cold Thanksgiving night. I woke up Friday morning all stuffed and congested :( All I was able to achieve that day was to cut out my 1/2 sq triangles. On Saturday still under the weather but was able to cut out the 2 1/2" squares, but still no sewing. The kids however coaxed me into getting the Christmas decorations out and the trees up but not decorated. On Sunday still not feeling well, I did managed to sew some of the 1/2 sq triangles and decorate 2 of the Christmas trees. This was not how I had my weekend planned...I was hoping to have all of my pieces cut out on Friday and a test block done, Saturday I was hoping to have ALL of the house decorated for Christmas, so I would be able to sew on Sunday and finish clue 1 so I could post first thing on Monday and link up HERE 

So even though my Thanksgiving weekend did not go as planned I did managed to finish this clue and at link before the next one came out. Oh and I do feel much better today so after I post this, I need to finish decorating the house for Christmas. I am finding it hard to believe that Christmas is only 3 weeks away!!!! So much to do and my days are disappearing faster and faster. Time to get to decorating-  

Are You Ready...

For Bonnie Hunter's 2014 Fall Mystery?

The first clue gets released in 3 weeks, and the mystery quilt's name is "Grand Illusion". You can click on the Grand Illusion badge (on the left side of my blog) and it will take you to Bonnie's blog where you can find out all the info you need (such as fabric colors she used, fabric requirements, and the finished quilt size) if you want to follow along as well.

I did last years "Celtic Solstice" mystery, I made a queen size one that I gave to friends and then I made the smaller size one to keep for me. I also plan on doing this years. My fabrics that I will be using is pictured above. I am using the same color pallet that Bonnie used, very pretty and it reminds me of spring. I plan on doing at least some of the units that are called for each week when the clues are released. I also will be joining in on the "linky party Mondays" that Bonnie has on her blog every Monday following each clue.

So what do you say? Are you in? It will be a lot of fun!!!!!