Catching up

Morning!  How are you?   I hope well and enjoying the holidays and not too caught up in the frenzy.  I know it can be a good time or a sad time or a just all kinds of time in between for people.  Crossing my fingers we can all find some peace during the season.

 

The end of the year is  birthday time here in PamKittyVille.  Bret and Frankie both have November birthdays, and this year we decided to revive the old tradition of going to Disneyland during the week between their birthdays, which back in the day held a convenient holiday and teacher work day.  

 

We started out the week heading to Universal Studios and spent a day there.  We hadn't been in years.  It was fun, although honestly those stinken escalators almost killed me.  Way too steep.  Had a chance to meet Hello Kitty, which was fun.  You can see it on Instagram here. 

 

Disneyland is my favorite though.  We had a blast in each part, California Adventure and Disneyland.  And most importantly my people did!

Christmas decorations were up, and they're always so pretty.  I fell in love with these colorful  garlands at the Rancho Del Zocalo. Everything at Disneyland is so over the top! 

 

It was lovely weather, no coats required!  ABC was in the park filming their Christmas Special and when Bret and Frankie went in after dinner they were able to see Gwen Stefani perform Feliz Navidad for the show. A fun end to the vacation for them. 

 

And now it's December in the blink of an eye. Yikes people, the time just flies by doesn't it.  Hope you're well. xop

Perfect 10 Quilts Blocks

Morning!  We have hit the last week of blocks here on the Perfect 10 Quilt's Book Quilt Along.  Back when I was first invited I thought that December sounded A LONG WAY OFF but of course all that time flew by.

 

This weeks blocks start off with Rainbow Sherbet.  There's two blocks here.   These blocks are biggies!  The book has a quilt for each block and I love the quilt made with these Rainbow Sherbet blocks.  You can check that out here.

The last block is Rocky Road.  Another big favorite of mine, the block and the candy.  This block is cute and has a lot of movement when used in  a quilt.

 

What a fun project this has been.  Next week I'll show you my finished quilt top.  THAT'S RIGHT I SAID FINISHED QUILT TOP!  Pretty shocking right?   What a fun project this has been. Thanks again to Barb from Me and My Sister for arranging for Moda to send me the their new Flower Sacks fabric.  It will be in stores February I believe. Thanks again to Fat Quarter Shop for asking me to join their quilt along and providing the book and ruler.  AND THANKS TO YOU for following along with me here! xop

Perfect 10 Quilts Book Sew Along

Hi there!  We're closing in on the last of the Perfect 10 Sampler blocks for the sew along!  This week is the cutest bowtie  aka Neapolitan Block.  These work up into the cutest quilt, which you can see here, or be used like we do in the sampler.  

Peaches and Cream is this weeks second block.  I love these fun Me and My Sister Flower Sack prints, they're so cheerful!

 

We only have one more set of blocks to go before we start sewing them together.  Have you kept up or are you in the catch up mode?  Believe it or not, I'm up to date which seems shocking for me!

 

I'll be watching for your blocks! xop

Grateful

Good morning friends!  Hope this finds you well. It's cool and crisp here on Thanksgiving morning here  in PamKittyVille. 

I just wanted to pop in here and tell you how grateful I am for your friendship. My life is richer for it.  Wishing you all a wonderful Thanksgiving day.  xop

Perfect 10 Again!

Good morning! Hope you're well! We're here again for another week of the Perfect 10 Quilts book quilt along!  I hope you're sewing along with us.  First up with this weeks triangle fun is Lemon Sorbet.   True story I tend to shy away from triangles but I'm having so much fun.  This block is fast and fun!

 

Mint Chocolate Chip is another great block.  I am in love with that white print, my favorite of these Flower Sack prints by Me and My Sister.  I love that this particular block can be made in two layouts, one looking like and 'x' and one like an 'o'.  It makes a great quilt!

 

 

I'm really enjoying this solid Robin's Egg blue background.  (Bella solid 9900 85 ) The Flower Sack quilts that Barb and Mary made are really great. Flora Fae is my favorite and you can see it here!

 

Ok hope you're off to a good start this week! xo

Movie Popcorn

Good morning!  How's your week going so far?  We're at the midpoint, it's down hill from here!

I had a lot of fun making this movie popcorn pillow for Bret's birthday this past Monday.  I  had finished the whole pillow top  over the weekend but, naturally, I  left the finishing up part to the last minute.  Honestly I'm the worst.  I just want to start projects then hand them off for finishing by a devoted assistant.   But I don't have a devoted assistant, so I put it off to the last minute and was practically stuffing the pillow form in to the pillow as Bret pulled in from work Monday night!

 

Finally a pillow that won't go into the pillow vault! Its on the sofa right now!  Bret is a huge fan of movie popcorn and we often drive down to the Vine for a bag. 

 

When I saw Gracey's block  pattern I knew it would be the perfect thing to make for Bret.  I pulled out some PKM favorites and it took no time to whip up.  I added borders making this 20 inches square and did some simple quilting in the ditch and there you go, done.  Well, almost.  This pillow has a simple envelope back, no fancy buttons to make it uncomfortable and regular binding to finish it off.  Easy.

 

You can find Gracey on Instagram here.  She's got lots of fun patterns.

 

Ok friends that's it for me! Hope you're having a good week! xo

Perfect 10 Week 5

Good morning friends!  It's another sweet treat for us this week on our Perfect 10 Quilts book blocks!  Yum!  First up is Dutch Chocolate! I love this block so much.  First off love that the half square triangles are  to be trimmed to the perfect size.  Triangles are often a challenge to me, especially now that my sewing room has transformed into the sewing dungeon with the seasonal change in light.  I feel like I need one of those old fashioned miners helmets. (sure I know, dramatic!) 

 

Might as well confess, I did face little challenge in one of the corners.  I don't know why  really, it's pretty straight forward, but first I thought it was one triangle then when I got that one out it was another and then pretty soon a quarter of the block was apart.  My brain just couldn't seem to get those all going in the right direction.  And there's nothing like picking out seams of blocks that went together  perfectly.  THE WORST.

 

French vanilla was a breeze after that.  This is a fun block, actually you make 4 for the sampler, all out of 4 prints.  Perfect block for a baby quilt or a quick make as a gift.  Or a gift for yourself.  I know how these things work! You can see the quilts made with these blocks here, lots of cute ideas! 

 

Ok, hope you're having a good week! xop

Perfect 10 Quilts!

Hi there! I'm back with this weeks Perfect 10 blocks.  More cheerful fabric from my Flower Sacks layer cake make my blocks happy! Also, candy. Hard to believe that we're in the 4th week of our quilt along.  Are you making blocks?

This week was Cookies and Cream and Cotton Candy. Yum.  Both blocks very fun to make.

Weird coincidence, I hadn't had cotton candy in years but when I was visiting Nanette, her daughter Jaime  brought home a bag of legit cotton candy from a store.  OMG I didn't know they made such a thing.  Of course I searched all over once I was at home and found the only version we had, which was kind of a smooshed version.  I made a little cone out of paper for my photo but it looked clumpy and weird, so when I found the cotton candy gum I upgraded my photo. 

 

Still, my heart wasn't in it for the gum, so here's the real cotton candy. I commit to my theme people. (#wierdo)

 

Hey did you see that Barb and Mary have a new ruler out ? It's the Double Wide Dresden 4 patch template.  SO CLEVER.  You can read about it here on their blog. I confess I don't always get around to keeping up with blogs but that cute table runner caught my eye.  LOVE IT. 

 

Ok, hope you're sewing along.  See you next week.    I'm working on my Swell Christmas quilt  and really making some progress.  Lots of pinning so it's slow going. Maybe I'll have an update! Hope you're well ! xo 

Mushroomville

Hey there!  What's new with you?  I've just been doodling around in my sewing room today and decided take a little breather and make something fun.  Maybe some of you who follow on Instagram remember that I made a little mushroom (pattern available here) after seeing Helen Phillips cute mushroom.  Doesn't Helen have a lovely way about everything? My mushroom was less than inspiring. 

 

Joanna from Fig Tree Quilts sent me her cute pattern for Mushroomville and I've just finally made it... SEW CUTE.  That cute little frill under the cap covers a multitude of sewing sins if you know what I mean.  Her pattern calls for a piece of wool, which I didn't have on hand, so I fused to pieces of green fabric together and  used that instead.

 

I like how it turned out. Thanks for sending me your pattern Joanna!  What a great treat!

 

Hope you're having a fun day !  It feels like fall today and I'm enjoying it, we're due for some warmer weather again next week.  Seriously hard to imagine we're almost to November!

 

xop

Perfect 10 Quilts Week 3

Morning friends! Can't believe we're already 3 weeks into the Perfect 10 Quilts sew along! This week's blocks are fun, first cup.. I mean first up... is the Coffee Block.  You make two of them and they're fast! I love using the blue background so my white prints pop.  That print there is a favorite. 

 

This line, Flower Sacks, has a lot of tone on tone prints, I really like this swirly one.  It's a nice resting spot for your eye between the prints, but also has some movement to it.  And it's just fun so there's that. Cookie Dough is a fun block, and if you join 4 segments together you get a nice block, you can check out this kit for an example.

 

The kit is made using Sherri and Chelsi's new line Walkabout which is coming soon.

 

Of friends, hope you are well! xop

Perfect 10 Tuesday

Good morning!  We're back at it today with Fat Quarter Shop Perfect 10 Quilts. This week we have two of  the Buttered Pecan Block and one Coconut block. 

 

I love both of these bocks, especially the Coconut block.  Also, why did I pay so little attention when people talked about how delicious coconut chips were?  OMG! DO NOT even ask me how many bags I've had since this photo. 

 

Here's a great video on using the Perfect 10 ruler.  About half way in Kimberly shows you how to square up your half square triangles using the ruler.  So handy! You'll love it for all the triangles coming your way!

 

Are you sewing along? These blocks are pretty fast to  make up, I really had fun.  Of course those cute Me and My Sister fabrics make everything cheerful!  Have a fun day friends! xo

 

Perfect 10 Quilts Sew Along

Morning friends!  Today is the first day of Fat Quarter Shop's Perfect 10 Quilts Quiltalong.  I'm so happy to be participating.  All you need is the Perfect 10 Quilts book and accompanying ruler . Grab a layer cake and some background and you're practically sewing already.

When I was looking around at layer cakes I couldn't stop thinking about the wonderful quilt that I saw Barb making on Instagram. I loved the Robin's Egg Blue background (Moda Bella Solid 9900 85) and how the prints, all the prints, popped against it. Flower Sacks isn't available yet, but Barb hooked me up and Moda sent me the fabrics.  I can't thank them enough for the chance to sew on something fresh and new.  Fat Quarter Shop sent the book and ruler, and I've been sewing up a storm. It's been a while since I did any sew alongs and it's good to have a deadline, it keeps me on track.  I've missed that. 

 

 

For the quilt along we'll be sewing a sampler from the blocks in the book.  You can head over to the Jolly Jabber here and download the fabric requirements and check out the sampler. There's a pdf for the sampler, but you'll need the book for the instructions. 

Meet Banana, it's a fast and fun block to get started.  No tough decisions, just one layer cake square and background pieces. 

 

And here's Birthday Cake.  Every week on Tuesday we'll stitch and share two new blocks.  You can see all the blocks using the hastags #perfect10Tuesday, #perfect10quiltsbook. 

Here's who's sewing along with us!

Cynthia of Dream Quilt Create

Gina of Thread Grafitti

Greg of Grey Dogwood Studio

Heidi of Buttons and Butterflies

Jennie of Porch Swing Quilts

Kim of Persimon Dreams

Melanie of A Bit of Scrap Stuff

Sinta of Pink Pincushion

Sondra of Out of the Blue Quilts

 

Hope you decide to join us!  See you over on Instagram! xo

Apple Season

Morning friends! Happy Friday!  I've unpacked all my sewing stuff and have been busily stitching away.  I'm working on a sew-along, preparing my blocks and getting my photographs. The gloomy overcast weather along with the time of the year makes pictures a challenge, my house turns into a dungeon.  But really even at the best of times photos challenge me.  There are so many great photographers in our sewing community !

Between blocks yesterday, I decided to make a cute apple.  Nanette had seen Sharon Holland's cute apple pattern and I had to make it.  Of course I forgot I had some cute faux  leather for the stem and instead used ribbon.  Dang. Now I need to make another. The little  leather cord really makes it.  Also I didn't have any green felt that I liked for the leaf, so I fused two pieces of green together and cut out the leaf shape with my pinking shears.  I have used that technique before, I really like it.   

 

This seemed to be the perfect time to get my Dutch Label Company labels out and stitch one on.  The little coffee cup was perfect as I imagine using this with a cup of coffee or tea.  It would  make an adorable gift, right? 

 

You could tuck this in a cellophane bag with the paper tags to close it.  Super cute.  You could throw in a couple of caramels  like a caramel apple! Nanette included caramels and homemade dried apples with her pumpkins and it was an adorable fall gift.

 

Hope you have a happy weekend!  xop

Fall in Love

Hi there friends!  How are you?  I'm home from my trip to see Nanette and her family.  We had a lot of fun, chatting, sewing, going on outings, hanging out with her people, I LOVE IT.

 

We had our usual farewell brunch on Sunday at Cucina in Salt Lake City.  Usually it's Nanette, Dave, her husband, and I, but this time Jaime and Natalie joined us.  The food is great and they make an amazing cup of coffee.  It was a wonderful time.

 

 

I love that it was cooler while I was there, fall in full swing.  No snow though, it's the first time I've been to Utah where I haven't seen or been in snow at some point in the trip.  The weather was so pleasant.  I'm back home to some warm weather and it's unseasonably humid.  GROSS.  And no fresh apples to pluck straight from the trees.  I would have brought some home but you can't get back into CA with produce. 

 

We had a great time sewing.  I worked on my Christmas project but we took a break and made some pumpkin mats for gifts.  This required a couple of trips to quilt shops, I needed some oranges and we needed a bit of wool for the leaves.  We drew our own pumpkins and leaves, so there's no pattern.  It was a lot of fun. 

 

Came home to my Sew Stitching Happy  box.  I have never ordered  a curated box before.  I fell in love with the cute calendar fabric and HAD TO HAVE IT.  It was just my good fortune that the box had a cute collection of fabric and notions that made it perfect to order. That little bag has a spool of thread and who doesn't need more thread?  Anyway Cassie has a cute shop, I follow her on Instagram.

 

I hope you're all well.  I'm looking forward to a fun project coming up soon! I'm feeling that happy sewing vibe right now.  How about you?  Have fun friends. xop

 

 

 

 

Rambling

Morning from my own home! My mother-in-law is doing great  and she kicked me to the curb! She's ready to get back to her normal life and I'm happy to be home with Bret.  I've missed my sewing, even when I'm not sewing, I like sitting in my sewing room and looking at my stuff.  I'm sure she missed doing stuff without me checking on her every 5 minutes!  It was a fun time though, and I'll miss it!

 

I've been thinking a lot about my stash of fabric.  Not just my pkm stash but all the fabrics I have and still love.  I am considering  a small project and made a quick fabric pull.  Not sure if any or all of these will show up in my project or really, even if I'll actually make it but it was fun.  I really enjoy quilts made with fabric that is pulled from many different lines. 

 

I'm working on a quilt from an old 2002  For the Love of Quilting Magazine, named Wild Irish Rose.  I originally made it in 30's fabric and always wished I had made the flower centers with connector triangles, so this time I cut some squares for that.  I think these will turn out well, the little corners won't line up to the pieced squares, so no pressure there, we'll see if my grand plan works when I begin to stitch it all together.

 

My fabric inspiration is Urban Chiks Swell Christmas.  Kristyne made  my quilt inspiration (see it here on Instagram) and you recognize my kit making style. This project is using strip sets so there's lots of units that I have ready to assemble.  I have one more strip set to cut and that's ready for some power sewing.  I'm glad I saved the magazine, I really like the way that the project was organized. 

 

Organization is key when you're working on a longer term project.. there's lots of things here that look similar but are used in different spots.  Mine are all in different little bags (saved from fabric orders!) and they correspond to each step. I hate it when I've set a project aside then have to do some quilt forensics to figure out what needs doing next. 

 

That's what doing with me.  We've had some California fall weather in the 70s but this week it will soar  back up to the 90s in what hopefully with be the end of the summer heat.  HOPEFULLY.

 

Ok, that's it for me friends, what's doing with you?  xop

That Quirky Feeling

Hi friends, how are you?  We're enjoying some delightful weather this week, in the 70s!  Yesterday morning it was in late 40s when I got up.  Definitely fall weather. Chatting with my mother-in-law, we can hardly believe it's already halfway through September for pete's sake.  What a year it's been for us. 

One of the things I've been thinking about lately is how back in the day we'd drive for hours to check out quilt shops and see what was new.  You couldn't see everything under the sun on the internet like you can now, so you'd have to drive all over.    We'd somehow get wind of a new quilt shop opening and we'd make a plan of visiting it as soon as it opened, and hitting all the shops along the way.  USING PAPER MAPS! Sometimes MapQuest or whatever mapping software was available at the time.  Martingale put out books featuring quilt shops and I loved it.  I dreamed of visiting places.  Plan trips around shops, it was a cool thing. 

 

Now it doesn't seem like people do that quite as much. Or maybe it's just me?  But one shop I've wanted to see for a while is Temecula Quilt Company. I'd seen those cute little ruler boxes with their name on them.  My friend Joyce told me about their sew alongs on the blog, and just the photos.. well they're captivating! 

 

All this brings me to the one of the latest e-books that Martingale shared with me, Temecula Quilt Company Quirky Little Quilts.  If you like sweet little quilts get ready to fall in love.   So many adorable projects, it brings me back to my Civil War reproduction days. 

All these photos are from Martingale.  I picked my two favorites to share with you, but you can go check out the rest of the quilts here.  I love this flower shape, this quilt is Petite Posies.  I know it's an old block from way-back-when and that's exactly why I like it.  I still feel drawn to these quilts even though I mainly sew with the brighter PMK palette.  And really wouldn't all quilts work in whatever colors you picked?

My absolute favorite in the book is T is for Temecula.  I love that block and I love the way Sheryl has used the changing background colors to give this a little extra sparkle.

The whole book is totally charming.  Lots of photographs of vignette's which I LOVE.  It makes the book so special to me,  pretty to look at even if you don't stitch a quilt.  Entertainment while reading and then later while sewing.  Double the fun.  

 

I'll confess it only makes me want to visit the shop more!!!  I hope you take a minute to check out the book over on the Martingale site. The pictures are yummy! Happy browsing and happy sewing friends! xop

Dutch Label Shop

Hi there friends! I'm back home for a few hours working  (broken record alert) on getting my sewing room put back together  (and pretending I'm not searching for that seam tape.) Is any of it surprising, nope . 

 

Earlier this year Abby at Dutch Label Shop contacted me asking if I'd like to try out some of their labels. I wasn't able to do it at the time but Abby contacted me again recently and  I was happy to be able to say yes, I'd love to give them a try.  I was  in love with the look of the ribbons and tags after checking out Helen's post about them. 

 

I ordered two kinds of sew on labels, and some hang tags.  They have a lot of little designs to use on your tags, and I couldn't resist the coffee cup and button, and the cherry was perfect for the hang tags.  I like the idea of tying the paper tags onto small projects or including them in with gifts.  I just used some seam tape on them, but Helen used some raffia and some bakers twine which was delightful. I'm using one of mine as a bookmark so I can enjoy it daily.  I'm looking forward to a project to stitch one on, maybe on my next visit home!

 

I hope you get a chance to check out the labels!!!  Thanks again  Dutch Label Shop for offering  me the chance to order them!

 

 

Sew Dreams

Hello friends! I don't know about you, but when I can't sew I do the next best thing and pull out some quilt books to look at and dream about sewing.  Martingale has very kindly shared some  new release e-books with me and the first one that caught my eye was Barb and Mary's new Easy Layer-Cake Quilts 2 book.  I'm a huge fan of those sisters, Barb and I are  #superfriends  It's probably good we have some geography between us, we're a couple of  troublemakers! 

 

Easy Layer-Cake Quilts 2 has a lot of really cute cheerful projects in it. Around the Block caught my eye, I love the confetti feeling of it.  The instructions are great and I like the method they use to put this quilt together.  To me it's an easy to make without a design wall quilt, which I love.  Perfect to sit and stitch with friends, no thinking allowed!

 

If you're feeling fall, Flipping Out is super cute.  It's a big quilt requiring 2 layer cakes and a jelly roll, and is a nice bed sized quilt. 

 

I'm always happy to share new books that I fall in love with, but I'm extra-happy to share books written by friends you admire!  Congratulations Barb and Mary on another great fun book!

Asking for a friend

Hi there friends.  I'm home for the afternoon to catch up on things around here.  My mother-in-law is doing well, thank you to all who checked on us!

 

ANYWAY.... people, as per usual I'm looking for things I can't find.  I have a half used spool of vintage Hug Snug seam binding that I needed for a quick project.  CAN NOT FIND IT.  There are few things that have a regular place here, and this tape is one of them.  AND IT'S NOT THERE. It's not even there the second or third time I looked! Which sad to say often happens.

 

 

I have torn the place apart looking for it. At one point I even lost my phone along the way and spent another 10 minutes backtracking my trail looking for it. The saddest part of this story is, I have a fresh new spool and I can totally cut off the pieces I need and move along with my life, and eventually I did it, but I still feel like I need to search for the other spool.

 

Sigh.  Well it's not like I haven't moved on for the most part. I mean I'm still me.

 

I almost have everything is checked off my list of things to do here. Hope you're doing well.  I love keeping up with you guys that are on Instagram.  I'm not doing much but hey did you see I did some hand sewing?  Kind of crazy for me but I loved it!  Elise sent me some of her Dilly Flower papers to try and I thought it was so fun. I have been inspired by her photos.. check out her IG feed here.

 

Ok that's it.  I'm just about over looking for lost stuff for today.  I haven't had a chance to put my room back together yet, one last inspection to go before everything can get put away.  I know my tape will show up then!  Miss you guys! xo

P. S. Cross your fingers it's not with the tailor's ham!

Pass the cough drops

Hi there friends! how are you? I've been coughing up a storm, not sure if I've caught whatever Bret has or I'm just having problems with the smoke in the air, but cough cough cough is all I do.  It's a toss up considering all the smoke in the air from the fires buring away in California. 

In the meantime I've tackled another Moda Blockheads 2 block.  I may or may not have been influence by my ironing board!

 

Lots of triangles in this block by Lynne from Kansas Troubles.  My triangle piecing isn't that great, but I made my little half square triangle blocks and got out my Clearly  Perfect Slotted Trimmers  from Kari and trimmed them up. Holy cow my segments went together perfectly with no nudging or pulling and I felt like I was winning at life.

I've tried all kinds of methods and tools but this one is my favorite.  I'm just not the piecer I used to be and honestly I was never that great.  I've had to use a lot of gentle persuasion over the years to make things line up.  This time, all good.  Of course I did get a little prideful and the last corner unit I attached had to be talked into working out which goes to show me I ought not get too full of myself.  Pride and all that!

 

My blocks are looking like a jumbled mess, not sure how I like the combos I have going. Everyone's blocks all look so good together, mine look like they have an identity crisis going on.

 

Oh well. Whatever, it's all in fun right? I have spent some time thinking about how to handle the three blocks I haven't done yet and how I can use them to make these make sense.  Or maybe I'll slam them all together and just say hey, what the heck. Or maybe I'll get distracted by something else and WHO KNOWS WHAT CAN HAPPEN.

 

So that's it.  Happy weekend people! Stay safe friends! xop