Kermit the Frog quilt

I made a quilt for my first son's 1st birthday, so I couldn't not make my second son one too...even though neither of them will remember said first birthdays!

The difference is that this quilt was made almost entirely from stash materials, I only had to buy a little bit of  navy and green leaf-print fleece, maybe a yard and a half or so, to cover the entire back.

Everything else I already had; Kermit quilting cotton from the thrift store, a jelly roll by a brand called Stripz purchased on clearance from WalMart, and Kermit fleece I only bought because because my dream Muppet fleece was out of stock.

This Muppet quilt ended up long and narrow, just like my string-bean shaped baby-- kind of in-between toddler and twin sized.

I still hate how much static electricity fleece generates, but I'm starting to warm to it because I find it so darn easy to work with.

The top is just a random, er, "design" I came up with (I just sewed strips and slashed here and there until it resembled a rectangle). There is no batting, but I decided this will be my last quilt that I do that.

For the quilting I did double random lines, my first time trying random line quilting. Also my first time using spray basting and I am a total convert! In fact, I'm thinking of going back and re-doing my two other most recent quilts to eliminate puckering...

 

Vintage sheet quilt

I finally finished a vintage sheet quilt I've been working on for ages!

Not a whole lot to say about it. It was my first *major* machine quilting project and likely my last until/unless I get a different a different machine. I've been quilting a long time, but up until now, I've mostly been hand-tying. There's some puckers and some other problems, but it's not a gift, so I'm cool with it.

Now, my base model Singer did pretty well the quilting on this Queen-sized quilt, but I just kind of feel like I was *abusing* her with this job. Plus, I like hand-tying just fine. (Speaking of abusing my machine, I need to do some maintenance on her.)

So, I like it, but I'm done with sewing vintage sheets for a while. I like 100% cotton for quilts.

Did you notice the YouTube video at the top of this post? My last post had one too. Clearly, I have a problem blogging often, and I thank you for following me despite that. Videos, on the other hand...I used to be a TV reporter. I'm used to tight deadlines, and can turn around several videos in a single day, if I want to.

The name of my channel is Spool School, and I'll be posting sewing and quilting videos, craft tutorials, quality DIYs (as in, making stuff that has a purpose, not useless crap), some home DIYs and maybe even furniture makeovers and home improvement projects. I'm looking for some other YouTube crafters to follow, so let me know if you're on there too! And I mean real crafters. All I'm seeing so far are young girls making junk just to make "DIY videos", which seems to be one of the more popular genres, just behind make-up and beauty. We're talking bedazzled flip-flops here, folks. Yikes.

Sewing project: bandanna pillows

These pillows have a zipper opening at the bottom, unlike my previous bandanna pillow (pictured below), which had a split opening on the back. I think next time I'll return to the split opening. I also just stitched around the edged as opposed to the bias tape edge on the previous one. One thing I did again was interface the bandannas first; they're just too flimsy not to!

The smaller brown one is not a bandanna, in case you haven't guessed. I quilted it to tie the color scheme in the other two pillows together.

Sewing project: quilted potholders

If you're looking for DIY gift ideas, potholders are a great option!

To mkae this Christmas gift, I Googled "potholder tutorial" and found absolutely tons of them. So many that I became somewhat overwhelmed and decided to just kind of wing it. So I'm not going to link a particular tutorial, but believe me, they're out there.

But to be honest, you don't really need a tutorial if you've ever made a quilt. I had the basic idea of how to make a potholder, I just needed to know how much batting to put in the middle. I also liked looking at all the tutorials (especially if you Google it as an image search) just for inspiration.

So, all I needed to buy for this project was 100% cotton batting. Polyester will melt. I used three layers of the cotton. Some people use some kind of batting (I forget the name) with a metal content for the middle layer, but I wanted mine to remain microwaveable.

This was my first time trying the "stacked blocks/bricks/books/bolts" block. I totally recommend making potholders for experimenting with different quilt blocks! It's also a simple way for some scrap busting.

I cut all three layers of batting, my backs or bottoms, and my two quilt blocks to be slightly larger than 8" by 8". I don't remember how long I cut the handle/hook thingy.

To construct these two potholders, I basically made an inside-out quilt sandwich and stitched around the edge. Then turned it right side out, then stitched around the edge again, then did some different quilting in rainbow thread. It worked OK, but I think next time I make potholders, I'll use bias-bound edges instead.

So, super-quick and easy, and a great last-minute DIY gift idea. I'm even planning on making some for my own kitchen.

Project: quilted Christmas stockings

I wanted our family Christmas stockings to be similar without being "matchy-matchy", so I decided to quilt them in different color schemes and using different techniques.
Haha, my stocking (in the middle) looks like it belongs on the foot of some wonky-footed giant. Guess I need to get in there and poke those seams out a little better.

It was also a fun chance to try some quilt blocks I'd never done: my husband's is just scrappy quilting, mine is wonky log cabin, and my son's is my first applique with his name spelled in a quilt block. (Yeah, my obsession with personalizing things isn't going away any time soon.)

 
The Thrasher Magazine t-shirt in the center goes back to the first year my husband and I were together. He asked me to order him a Thrasher watch (we were so young he didn't have a credit or ATM card yet!) from their website. When I was placing the order, I saw this men's t-shirt on clearance for something like $3 or $4! I can't resist a deal, so I bought it for myself.

Well, when the order arrived, my then-boyfriend claimed the shirt for himself, wore it long enough to get a couple of holes in the belly-button area, and guess what... that's when I got it back. I've since been wearing it for years as a pajama top (our baby loved staring at it when he was just a few months old), and decided a few months ago it was high time I stuck this raggedy thing in the upcycle pile.

When I decided to make my husband a red Christmas stocking, it was the perfect time to upcycle the t-shirt. The rest of the fabric on his is just random stuff from the scrap drawer.


My stocking is just random scraps from the scrap drawer. It was my first go at wonky log cabin blocks, which is currently my favorite block! I was trying to make mine predominantly pink.


Argh, this picture is the only one I took of my son's solo, and it's out of focus. I chose to make his mostly blue, and didn't have a lot of blue in the scrap drawer, so I reluctantly bought some blue fat quarters from JoAnn. I also bought a puppy-themed bundle I happened to see, as I'd already decided to make his stocking dog themed.

I free-hand drew the dog applique pieces on the applique interfacing I'd purchased, and, although you can tell on the stocking that it's my first applique attempt, I'm happy with how it turned out and will try appliqueing some more in the future.

Final thoughts: I used this Design Sponge pattern for the shape but made up my own directions. Each stocking is lined with the same quilting cotton (a silly bird-print tropical fabric). I stitch all three stockings and their linings around the edges, then stitched the linings to their stockings around the upper edge, leaving a hole to turn. Once they were turned, I topstitched around the edges.

Fun! Have you made stockings? I'd love to see them!

Thomas the Tank Engine Toddler Stack and Slash Quilt

Are you sick of seeing Thomas the Train here yet? Because I've got more...

But today is my son's first birthday, so I promise we're almost done!

Also done: his first birthday quilt.

There are loads of mistakes, but it IS my first quilt in a good 15-20 years, AND my first one all by my lonesome (without my Grandma's help). I'll get better... hopefully.

There are six "stacked and slashed" fat quarters, with the seventh FQ providing sashing in between each row of two. It's a combo of tied with red yarn and machine quilted.

Thomas & Friends Stack & Slash Toddler Quilt
Materials: Thomas & Friends FQ Bundle ($7 - WalMart); pillow ticking, yarn, and red fabrics all from my Grandma; extra Thomas fabric from for the border; batting (~$7 - Jo-Ann sale)
Total cost: Under $20, but we all know quilts cost waayyy more to make than just the materials!