Donuts {Finished Quilt}

Writing about this quilt makes me hungry! I took this quilt top with me to Michigan in August and my mom did some simple meandering on her mid-arm. It's so nice to have this finished!

The grey thread that my mom used has a slight variegation to it which gives another fun dimension to this quilt!

I love looking at this quilt and thinking about where some of the scraps originated! The fish print in the dusty blue block below came from a scrap bag I bought on vacation in Amish country last October.

For the backing, I picked a teal dot extra wide backing fabric. My mom also trimmed the quilt and bound it for me using the same backing fabric.

It's nice to have a few quilts with a slightly more manly feel to them!

And unlike Wednesday when I was fighting the wind with my Quarter Cabin quilt, the weather was cooperative today and I wasn't worried about my quilt blowing away!

Once again, a huge thank you goes to Amanda Jean of Crazy Mom Quilts for including this amazing quilt in your book! I am so happy to have another quilt finished for this year!

Quilt Stats:
Name: Sea Glass Donuts
Pattern: Donuts (the size of your head!) from No Scrap Left Behind by Amanda Jean Nyberg
Size: 90" x 66"
Fabrics: Scraps and Kona Shadow
Quilting: Meandering by my mom
Started: November 2017
Finished: November 2018

Sharing at Brag about your Beauties and Finish it up Friday!

Quarter Cabins {Finished Quilt}

With just a little time to spare, my November Island Batik Ambassador project is finished!

This quilt top ended up being a little over 50" square, so it was the perfect size to try out the Hobbs Wool batting that came in my summer IB Ambassador goody box!

Here's the jewel-toned beauty -- I had to fight some nasty wind to get these pictures today!

As an Island Batik Ambassador, I am provided with samples of various lines of Island Batik fabrics to use and share with you, as well as thread and batting samples!

This was my first time quilting with a batting that is 100% wool. The fluffiness intimidated me a little bit! I decided that it would be best to do a medium scale meander for this quilt -- a motif with which I have a lot of confidence! I used a grey Aurifil thread to do the quilting and purchased some grey flannel for the backing.

One thing I will say about this batting -- I'm not sure if I can attribute it entirely to the content, batting size, or the way that the batting is folded (not rolled!) -- the folds in the batting smoothed out much quicker than the typical cotton or cotton-poly blend. It gives this quilt a beautiful "puff" too!

I bound this quilt completely by machine using the purple checkerboard fabric. I used a purple Aurifil thread to do the final topstitching.

Now the quilt is finished and (probably) ready to be gifted! I have a number of people that will be receiving quilts for Christmas, but I need to decide who gets which quilt!

Quilt Stats:

Name: Quarter Cabins
Size: 51" square
Fabrics: Spirit Rhythm collection from IB plus checkerboard fabrics for setting triangles and binding
Quilting: simple meander in grey Aurifil
Future: Gift quilt!
Started: October 2018
Finished: November 2018

Sharing at Let's Bee Social and Needle and Thread Thursdsay! And Finish it up Friday, too!

Good Fortune {Clue #1} + Double Delight {Finished Top}

Despite the fact that I had to work on Black Friday (boo!) I was able to take a half day, complete a bunch of errands, and get all of the sewing done on Clue #1 for the Good Fortune Mystery Quilt!

For this clue we eased ourselves in a little bit with simple four patches made with our background fabric and our red fabric -- since the only color I changed was replacing orange with aqua, nearly all of my units will be the same as Bonnie's examples.

I used approximately 16 different red fabrics for these four patches, some of them are technically Christmas fabrics but for the most part they are small enough that it won't be entirely obvious. I also used two red patriotic fabrics that were left over from my Uncle Sam wall hanging all the way back in 2013! There are also fabrics from my Christmas Twirls MBS quilt, my Blitzen Basketcase quilt, the tree skirt that I made for my mother-in-law, my Jingle Bell Rock MBS quilt, and a few projects that I've done with Benartex for their Sew in Love with Fabric blog!

For now, I am still planning to use just one background fabric. If there comes a clue where I find that it would be helpful to have multiple background fabrics, I might add in one or two for just those clues but keep my ditsy dot as my main background.

Since I was able to get Clue #1 finished before I even went out for groceries on Saturday, I decided that it was high time to finally put the borders on my Double Delight quilt! I had finished the rest of the top all the way back in June and picked out the border fabric in October and even cut the borders for this quilt when I cut the borders for my Drift Away quilt! Double Delight is an older mystery quilt pattern on Bonnie's site.

As you might be able to tell in the photos, my side borders are skinnier than my top and bottom borders. This way the quilt had a little more length since I tend to make mostly twin-sized and queen-sized quilts when I go big, rather than full-sized quilts. My quilt is now a lovely twin sized at 70" x 88".

The border fabric came from the clearance at my LQS -- it's a Downton Abbey print from 2014, but it has the perfect shades of red, pink, and a tiny bit of chartreuse!

This quilt is now ready for quilting. This might be one that I send out to have a lovely large pantograph done on it to keep the tiny piecing front and center!

Sharing at Bonnie's Monday Mystery Link-up and Linky Tuesday!

Celebrate {Black Friday Sale + Pattern Premiere}

It's that time of year!

All of our Honey, Bunny, and Doll PDF patterns are 20% off until 11/26/18!

We do not do sales very often on our patterns, so this is the time to take advantage of this deal! It even applies to our paper pieced patterns -- Starbursts and Christine's Kitchen -- with the 20% off discount, they are under $10!

We also have selected sample items available with free shipping!

Today is also a big day because the full pattern version of our most recent quilt along, Blocked Rainbow, is now available!

The full pattern contains directions for a throw sized quilt and a twin sized quilt, along with diagrams for each block and a large setting diagram. This pattern is perfect for a beginner quilter's class or shorter QAL with your guild or shop! It's available on both Craftsy and Etsy. 

The pattern cover has my original throw sized quilt featured; here's my twin sized version done in Island Batiks and black solid. I have this quilt back from the quilter and it will be finished very soon!

Thank you for being wonderful friends, followers, and customers for over seven years! The quilting community is just so wonderful and I hope that you have a wonderful Friday doing whatever makes your heart sing!

Good Fortune {My Fabric Choices}

For many, Black Friday means shopping, stampedes, and sales. For many quilters, it is the kick off of Bonnie Hunter's annual mystery quilt! This year the quilt is called "Good Fortune" and the colors are inspired by Bonnie's recent trip to China.

Bonnie's color palette has orange as the main color, with red, blue, and green as the accent colors. All of her colors are rich and saturated. If you remember back to my version of On Ringo Lake from last year, I actually used orange (and a lot of it!) in that quilt.

I definitely didn't have enough orange in my scraps to use as my main color in my version of Good Fortune. What to do? I considered trying to find a totally different color scheme to use like I did last year but there wasn't anything that really jumped out at me. Instead, I decided to find a color I could just simply swap out for the orange and this is where I landed:

Despite the fact that I used aqua in ORL last year, Drift Away, Donuts, AND my Magnolia mystery quilt, I still have scads and scads of aqua scraps! My goal is to keep my blues dark and my aquas light so that if the two colors end up next to one another that there will still be a lot of contrast between the two.

My fabrics will be very scrappy for the red, blue, and aqua, but I only have one background fabric (the creamy white dot) and one green fabric. I have a lot of this particular green left -- it was used in the piecing and backing of my Green in Blue quilt. I originally had 5 yards of the fabric and what I have left should be plenty for my planned half-size version of Good Fortune. I might need to get a little bit more of the white dot print for the background, but since it's a current fabric, I should have no issues getting more of it.

There have been some hints that it will be better for the background fabric to be scrappy -- or at the very least, use multiple fabrics. I am on the fence about this and will see what the clues have us do. I am wondering if there will be something like the neutral border on En Provence in this quilt. (Not an affiliate link!)

I am still planning to be at work all or most of the day Friday, but one of our LQS will have open sewing on Friday, so I am considering working a half day and heading over to the LQS in the afternoon.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

More Bits and Pieces {Scrappy Sewing}

To follow up from my scrappy table runners from last week, here are the scrappy placemats that I made!

My first set of placemats is also Christmas-y, with various greens and the large scale box print in Christmas colors that I used on the back of my Fire Pit Christmas quilt.

For the backing, I had a red tonal print in my stash that I had originally planned to use but I had to stop at my LQS on Saturday anyways, so I picked up a yard of this fun holiday animal print on clearance to use for the backing of these placemats. I did a loop-and-stars filler for the quilting in red Aurifil thread. I also used the same box print to make bias binding for each mat.

The second set of placemats is made from the remainder of the layer cake that I had originally used to make a Valentine's Day themed table runner. I used my Bunny Patch placemats tutorial to cut the layer cake squares into pieces for the pieced "backing" and the 6-patch "front". I did the quilting in red Aurifil thread and did a swirl-and-hearts motif. The binding is a dark red tonal print with gold metallic accents from my stash.

I ultimately decided to skip the applique addition on these since the prints speak for themselves!

My church ladies were SO excited to get some additional items donated for the craft table. Quite a few of them are also quilters and sewists, but they were rather impressed with my FMQ skills!

I'm hoping that I can continue to make a few more items between now and mid-December to add to the table, provided these ones sell! And of course, I hope that the place mats and table runners find good homes!

Happy Monday! Voting closes tomorrow in the Tips and Tutorials festival, so vote for your favorites to win one of the sponsored prizes!

Sharing at Oh Scrap, Linky Tuesday and Brag About Your Beauties!

Bits and Pieces {Scrappy Sewing}

Today I had been planning to share a bigger finish however a deluge of snow and ice interfered with my picture taking intentions! Hopefully next week I will have *multiple* finishes to show off. Instead, I have two small project finishes!

My church's ladies group is doing a craft table to raise money for service projects and I decided that I could easily make some table runners and place mats using scraps and some long-languishing yardage in my stash. This was a quick and easy way to whittle down some scrap piles of fabric and batting before we start planning our January move in earnest.

The first table runner I made is red, white, and green fabric and I used my rail fence table runner tutorial, but I used fewer blocks for a shorter runner. The backing is a gold and white snowflake print and I quilted swirls in white thread. I had enough of the red paisley print for the binding too.

For the second table runner, I used the scraps left over from my Summer Solstice quilt and added in the mauve zig zag fabric that I also used for the backing and the binding. I quilted this one with a leafy meander. This top is just 4" squares.

I also started two sets of placemats which aren't quite finished yet -- more finishes for next week, I hope! These sorts of small projects are perfect for the novelty fabrics that have been hanging around in my stash for a while.

Have a happy Friday! Sharing at Brag about your Beauties!

Drift Away {Bordered}

At the same time that I worked on my Breezy Blooms quilt, I added the black sashing strips to the top of my Drift Away quilt. The suggestion to add a skinny black sashing before adding a print border was given by quite a few of you and you were definitely right!

And then it sat, because I just wasn't sure what to use for the final border. I finally got the border fabric at the beginning of October. (Only, like, two months later. You can tell it's been a long time since I worked on this project because I was watching baseball in the photo above!)

The blue fabric on the right is what I picked up for the border, the other fabric is for my Double Delight quilt. When I did the math originally, I thought that I could squeak by with just a yard, but when it came time to make the decision at the cutting counter, I ended up getting a yard and a quarter.

And a good thing I did! Instead of cutting width of fabric strips, I decided that it would be better to cut length of fabric strips. With 45" long strips, I only needed two strips per side -- had I cut width of fabric strips, my two final sides would have been *just* too long and would have needed an additional seam and chunk of fabric. I am ALL about eliminating unnecessary seams, ladies and gents -- this is one of those occasions where it pays to take the extra time to do the math and plan ahead of time!

Here's the finished quilt top! My schedule and the weather has been uncooperative for outdoor pictures.

I am very happy I went with a more blue fabric to highlight the darker blues mixed into the quilt, which is mainly aquas.

(I'm also sort of happy that the leftover border fabric is the exact right shade for my planned color scheme for this year's Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt, Good Fortune. That's a post for another day, though!)

My parents were in town visiting this weekend, so I decided to send this quilt, along with my now-completed Border Quilt top, back with them to be long arm quilted or quilted on my mom's mid-arm, if she feels so inclined. This quilt will end up with a teal dot extra wide backing and the Border quilt top will be backed with its tan-gold counterpart.

As a reminder, the pattern for Drift Away is by Melissa Corry of Happy Quilting. I followed her directions to make the 80" quilt and then added 1.5" black strips for the inner border and 4.5" blue strips for the outer border. My finished quilt will be 90" square which is a good queen sized bed quilt.

Happy Tuesday! Sharing at Linky Tuesday and Let's Bee Social!

Yesterday was also the first day of the semi-annual Tips and Tutorials Festival! Honey, Bunny, and Doll is one of the sponsors and I have also linked up three of my own tutorials:
Chit Chat Placemats
Easy Rail Fence Tablerunner
Fancy Flying Geese Units

Cozy Cabins {Quilt Top}

As an Island Batik Ambassador, I am provided with samples of various lines of Island Batik fabrics to use and share with you!

Log cabin month rolls on for the Ambassadors! Make sure to check out the Island Batik Facebook page to see what the other Ambassadors have been making!

My quick and easy blocks were so quick and easy that I forgot to take a picture of all of them before I put them into the quilt top!

These blocks...

...(and a few more just like them) became this quilt top!

My original plan was a 5 block by 5 block quilt that would be square set but that would have only been about 45" square. I decided that putting it on point and using the checkerboard batik in teal as the setting triangles would help the quilt "grow" slightly. This fabric looks great with the other geometric-inspired prints.

I did cut my setting triangles slightly larger than necessary to make it easier to square up the quilt and now the quilt is about 52" square. While my options might be slightly more limited, I am going to try to find some 60" wide fabric to use for backing.

This weekend will likely be a non-sewing weekend with family in town but it will be a nice break from how busy we've been in the last few weeks! Have a wonderful weekend!

Cozy Cabins {Log Cabin Quilts with Island Batik}

As an Island Batik Ambassador, I am provided with samples of various lines of Island Batik fabrics to use and share with you!

Our theme for November is log cabin blocks! Log cabin blocks are a ubiquitous quilt component from antique quilts to modern quilts! I created a new Log Cabin Pinterest board while I was thinking about what to make for this challenge.

I found that I was frequently drawn to what many people call "quarter log cabin" blocks and so I decided that I would use this as my design inspiration for this challenge.

When looking through my Island Batik fabric stash, I decided to pull out my 10" stacker of Spirit Rhythm fabric for this project. For my project, I wanted something simpler and also something that would efficiently use my layer cake squares.

I did quite a bit of math (which is the fun part for me!) and found that I could easily make 25 9.5" quarter log cabin blocks from this stacker (Island Batik stackers have 42 10" squares, FYI) with a little bit of wiggle room for miscuts, just in case. When I did the math, trying to cut for 30 blocks was *very* tight and had no room for mistakes, so I figured going with a 25 block quilt was the best route.

To do the cutting, I sorted my 10" squares into three piles -- one pile for the center squares, one pile for the first round of logs, and one pile for the outer round of logs for the blocks.

One block requires:
One (1) 4.5" square for the center of the block (color A)
One (1) 3" x 4.5" rectangle for the first round (color B)
One (1) 3" x 7" rectangle for the first round (color B)
One (1) 3" x 7" rectangle for the second round (color C)
One (1) 3" x 9.5" rectangle for the second round round (color C)

I put together a quick diagram on how I cut the parts from my 10" squares while wasting as little fabric as possible.

In the color B square and the first color C square, I had a little bit of extra fabric that wasn't quite 3" wide due to trimming. From those scraps, I cut all of that extra fabric into 2.5" squares for a future project.

Here's my fabrics all cut:

Here are my first few blocks:

Now I'll be working on getting the rest of the blocks done and then putting the top together. This will tentatively be a Christmas/"thank you for being an amazing friend for over 10 years" gift!

Sharing with Main Crush Monday!

Brutal Honesty {November 2018}

This year has gone by entirely too fast! Tomorrow I'm off to see Anastasia at the Kennedy Center (!!!) and next weekend my parents will be here visiting. The holiday busyness has already begun!

My goal for this month was to focus on finishes and that sort of happened -- I am moving WIPs closer to the finish line, but I still have a lot of quilts that need quilted, gifted, and/or sold!

Quilting in progress/taken to be long arm quilted:
1. Blocked Rainbow Quilt -- This was long arm quilted!
2. Donuts quilt -- My mom quilted this for me!

Both of these quilts will be coming back to me next week when my mom comes to visit.

Completed tops:
3. Magnolia Mystery QAL -- No progress
4. Breezy Blooms C2C Bee -- No progress

Tops partially finished:
5. Double Delight -- The mulberry fabric is for the border of  Double Delight.
6. Drift Away Scrap Quilt -- The blue fabric will be used for the border of Drift Away.

7. Bonnie and Camille C2C Bee Quilt -- No progress
8. Romantic Garden Quilt -- No progress
9. Monthly Wall Hangings -- No progress
10. Pineapple Stash Bee Blocks -- No progress

(This section needs some work!)

Just blocks and units:
11. Sew Kitschy Blocks -- No progress
12. Cubicle Quilts -- No progress
13. Happy Houses blocks -- No progress
14. Birthstone blocks -- No progress
15. Radiant Jewel Quilt -- I am done with my stars and I'm ready to start working on the pieced border.

Quilt alongs and long term projects:
16. Monthly Island Batik Ambassador projects -- Our October theme was paper piecing and I made a new version of our Christine's Kitchen pattern! Our theme for November is log cabin blocks!

17. The Border Quilt QAL: I believe that I am now done with my quilt top! I added the round of sawtooth stars at the beginning of the month and added the round of friendship stars at the end of the month.

This month is another month for focusing on finishes. I'd like to finish a few tops and send them back with my mom to be quilted either by her or by long arm.

If you or someone you love is interested in purchasing a quilt that you've seen on Little Bunny Quilts, please email me (littlebunnyquilts@gmail.com) because I am willing to part with many of the quilts I have made in the last two years. It is not cost-effective for me to list everything that I'm willing to sell on Etsy with their current listing fee structure. Click on the "Finished Quilts" tab above to see finished items.

In quilty blogland, the Fall 2018 edition of the Tips and Tutorials Festival starts on November 12th! Hosted again by Meadow Mist Designs and Quilting JetGirl, the link-up festival has prizes and is sure to be a great way to share your knowledge and learn from others! Here's the schedule:

Tips and Tutorials Schedule
Monday, November 12 – Submissions Open
Friday, November 16 – Submissions Close
Saturday, November 17 – Voting Opens
Tuesday, November 20 – Voting Closes
Monday, November 26 – Winners Announced