Be Free Bees: addition for Ann
Oh my goodness! I found this in the depths and wanted to share it. It has been YEARS since I have done this project. Really, years. It was a “free form” quilt bee called Around the Bend and Across the Pond and started through the Old Red Barn Co. group on Flickr.
It works like this: each person in the group send out a starter piece to the next person in the group. Since this is a free form bee, we were to add whatever we wanted to and then pass it on to the next person. Ann’s quilt looked like this when it came to me:
I added a section to the bottom with an assortment of wonky stars in various sizes and colors.
I felt there was already a lot of color saturation in the quilt, so I kept a good portion of the background white, but switched it up with a couple of the stars to break up the white.
At this particular time, I actually ended up with three of the quilts at my house. Ann’s was ready to mail out, as was the one in the bottom of this photo. One of our members had to leave for personal reasons, so I kept the previous quilt and did a second addition. The third one is the one I had just received and would add to next. Fun to see the three of them together like this!
Sierra’s moustache shirt
It’s time to clear out the saved posts in my drafts and show them up here. I hope to get back to posting a little more regularly after a long hiatus. Even though I made this shirt last spring, now is the perfect time to revisit it. Sierra had mustache day in school last week, but insisted that she didn’t want to wear a mustache. No problem, child, you have a mustache shirt!
The shirt is store bought, and I made it using a freezer paper stencil. I found an image that I liked and printed it off. I transferred the image to freezer paper and cut it out. I ironed the freezer paper onto the shirt where I wanted the image to be.
With the image in place, I used a stiff brush to apply fabric paint inside my stencil. In this case, I went for an ombre effect, so with each mustache, I added a little more white to my black fabric paint.
When the fabric paint had dried, I went over with a layer of glitter because … glitter!
The shirt turned out well, and the girl is happy with it!
Caramel mug rug
I continue to be amazed by the kindness and friendship I find in the online quilting community.
This winter, a friend posted a photo on Instagram of some caramels she was making. I left a comment about sharing with me, and then she messaged me and asked for my address. A few days later, I got a package in the mail filled with homemade caramels. They were delicious!
In return, I made this caramel candy mug rug. It was a quick little project, and a good chance for me to practice a little bit of free motion quilting as well. I did a little lava flow quilting in the background (my 3-year-old saw it and said “worms!”) with some pebbles in the candy.
The back is just a bright bit of happy flower fabric. I like that you can see the candy shape from the quilting.
I did a quick machine sewn binding with the edge plate on my walking foot.
And then it was off in the mail. I really should make a mug rug for myself. I’ve sent plenty to others, but they are a great little project to have a fun bit of handmade goodness in your life everyday.
