Three by Three Swap Sign-ups Closed

Wow, that was quite impressive! We have 50 swappers plus 10 on the waiting list in case someone drops out, so sign-ups are now closed.

I will let everyone know whether they made it or not. Swap details will be sent out before Monday.

Don't forget: tomorrow is Geese in the Forest Day!

Three by Three

I had a little posting boo-boo, but here's the real one!

OK people. I think I have most of the swap details sorted out.
What I don't mention here will be sent to swappers once sign-ups are complete.

Since a nine-patch is three squares by three squares, I thought we'd call this the "three by three" swap.



To keep me from going crazy I'm limiting this swap to 50 swappers. I will host another swap in the future if you don't get to sign up for this one.
International swappers are welcome.

"Truly Scrappy" won by quite a large margin.

PLEASE READ the following bit carefully before signing up!

We're making 6" finished blocks.
To make a decent sized quilt, we will each need at least 32 blocks, which I thought would be a little much for one month, so this is going to be a two month swap.
If you sign up you commit to sending 16 blocks in Month 1 and 16 blocks in Month 2.
If there is interest, I'll add a third month, giving you 48 blocks.

Block rules:
1. Use only two fabrics per block.
2. Fabrics should be "mediums" or "darks". No "lights" please.
3. The blocks you send can either be all the same or all different or a combination. (All the same would be the quickest because you can strip piece, but if you have scraps you want to get rid of, you can make different blocks as long as you only have two different fabrics in each block.)
4. Use only first quality quilter's cottons, i.e. fabric you bought at a quilt store. (Wal-Mart and Joann's fabric is not good.)
5. Choose your fabrics with care. Your blocks should be blocks you would like to receive.

Swap Rules - Month 1:
1. Send me 16 blocks postmarked no later than May 31st, 2009.
2. Include a self addressed envelope for me to send your swap blocks back to you.
3. You will be required to pay the return postage. I will send details once you're signed up.

Swap Rules - Month 2:
1. Send me 16 blocks postmarked no later than June 31st, 2009. It will be summer time here in the U.S., so it may be good to be pro-active on this.
2. Include a self addressed envelope for me to send your swap blocks back to you.
3. You will be required to pay the return postage.

To sign up:
Send me an email at twiddletails{at}gmail{dot}com.
You're welcome to comment over here, but that won't count as your sign-up.
Sign-ups are first come, first served.

Bella Bella!

The ever growing collection of Moda Bella Solids in the store.
I LOVE Bella Solids!
I would love to make a quilt completely (or mostly) out of solids.


From top to bottom:
Earth
Chocolate
Black
Christmas Red
Christmas Green
Kelly
Dill
Lime
Yellow
Tea Rose
Orange
Robin's Egg
Bright Sky

(The 16-year old is going for his driving test today. Wish me luck...)

Yes, I'm a pain

I'm still on the nine-patch swap thing. I want us to love our blocks.

The majority vote on the previous poll was:
two fabrics, all blocks the same, and mostly white.

But now I'm thinking maybe we should go truly scrappy (kind of). We'll still do only two fabrics per block.

Nine patch quilt by thethreadunwound on Flickr.

There's a new poll in the sidebar.

I will post swap details on Thursday, I promise!

If you didn't win...

...a prize in Amy's Bloggers Quilt Festival giveaway, you can go grab yourself some Woodland Bloom fabric in the store.
It's 25% off right now.



In other news, I'm still working hard on figuring out the details of the nine patch swap.
I spent the whole glorious weekend in the garden, which means that a lot of house cleaning has to happen this morning before anything else.

Nine Patch Testing

There was a lot of interest in a nine patch swap, so I'm trying to figure out the logistics and details.
I made three little blocks this morning, just grabbing fabrics from the scrap bin too see what I might get in a swap and how it would turn out.
The light is awful this morning so excuse the dullness.
This would involve using "mostly whites" and darks.

It doesn't look like much with only three blocks, but I think it would be very pretty.
Step back a little from your screen and you'll get a better idea of the bigger picture.
Note that the center block is different from the other two.

Another option would be to go totally scrappy, but then you won't be able to do strip piecing and we're going to need quite a few blocks to be able to make a quilt.
I played with some layouts in EQ5.


To make this an interactive project I put a poll in the sidebar. You should check up to 3 options.
Questions are:
1. Totally scrappy OR only two fabrics per block?
2. All blocks the same (as in the examples above) OR alternating positions of the lights and darks as in my sample blocks?
3. Mostly white OR solid white (which would involve everyone having to use exactly the same fabric for the white)?
If you have any other ideas or opinions, please leave a comment.
Thanks!

My favorite new blogger (and maybe a swap?)

I discovered the Red Pepper Quilts blog through the Bloggers Quilt Festival. I just have to share because she is very, very inspirational.

This was her entry:

Here's the quilt she posted today:

Go visit and add her to your reader. I think it's going to be worth it.

This little nine-patch quilt as well as a nine-patch I saw at my quilt group meeting last night made me want a nine-patch quilt.
Would anyone be interested in a nine-patch swap?
I found some wonderful scrappy nine-patch inspiration on Flickr:

1. mom's quilt, 2. nine patch quilt, 3. Amy Butler Charm Quilt, 4. autumnal 9-patch quilt top finished., 5. Funky Nine Patch Quilt, 6. mom's quilt, 7. Working Hands, 8. scrappy nine patch star, 9. Nine-Patch Baby Quilt for Natalie, 10. 9 Patch Lap Quilt, 11. Nine Patch Party Quilt 2007, 12. Nine Patch Quilt, 13. Quilts in the Park, 14. Clair's Quilt, 15. DSC07608, 16. challenge fabric nine patch
I was thinking that, to tie the blocks together somewhat, we could have half the squares in each nine-patch be white or mainly white and the others just scrappy.
What d'ya think?

Last Chance

Wow, thank you so much for the wonderful response to the Spring Fling pattern! I'm truly flattered.

Today I'm working on a tutorial I've had many, many requests for. Stay tuned.

And just a reminder that today is the last day to get 20% off all Park Slope fabric.

Spring Fling

This one has been in the works since the end of 2008 and is finally done.
I quilted it in two and a half hours on Thursday.

It's definitely a Spring to Finish project.

And the newest twiddletails pattern.
Back in August 2008 I made this quilt.

It was totaly improvisational and I loved it. I really wanted to turn it into a pattern but each block was completely different and that would be an issue.
So I played around with ideas a little and came up with the new one which, although it looks random, really isn't.

Remember that back I was working on?

I'm giddishly (is that a word?) happy with this pattern!
It's in the store right now.

Quilting bee (and ants)

I did a little bit of bee (or is that ant?) sewing yesterday.

Amy's quilt for the SewConnected 3 bee is a picnic quilt and she sent the cutest ant and picnic blanket fabrics, with some solid-ish ones thrown in. She mentioned that she liked applique, so I figured I'd throw some in there.

Hope you like it Amy!

Applique detail (I really did not want this to come off in the wash...):

(If you'd like to see the cute blocks others have made, do visit the Flickr group.)

My Quilt Festival Entry

As soon as I signed up for the Bloggers Quilt Festival, I knew which quilt I would enter in the show.

Way back in March 2008 I was a "pattern quilter". All my quilts were made by buying a pattern, then fabric, and making a quilt.

Until this one.

After a year in the wonderfully inspirational Land of Blog, I was ready to go out on a limb. It was scary. What if I wasted all this fabric and hated the result?
But I jumped in anyway.
I cut into my precious fabric.

I made a few blocks.

And then some more.
The "Winging It" quilt was born. The quilt that gave me the freedom to play with fabric with (somewhat) wild abandon.




Since then I've made many more improvisational quilts, some if which have turned into patterns of their very own.

Ready, Set, Quilt

Dust bunnies cleared. Check.

Bobbins loaded. Check.

Shiny new needle. Check.

Embroidery foot on. Check.

New spool of thread. Check.

Let's go!

By 8am...

...I had an entire quilt basted and ready to go!

I knew that if I didn't get this done first thing this morning it wasn't going to happen. Like Monday. And yesterday.
Now I have dishes to wash, beds to make,...
But I REALLY want to quilt this!
(Edited to add: This is the latest pattern I'm working on. As soon as the quilt is done and I can take a photo, it'll be available in the store and on Etsy.)

A Quilt Festival (and a question)

Amy over at parkcitygirl is organizing an online quilt festival for those of us who don't get to go to Quilt Market.

There will be prizes!
I'm donating some fabric from the store for the giveaway.

This brings me to the question:
If you were to win one of Amy's fabric giveaways, which fabric(s) from the store would you love to receive?

Busy

I'm still here.
I'm in the middle of getting the Rainbow Jane kits ready to go out. When that happens tomorrow, the week is wide open. I'm looking forward to some fun sewing and hopefully completing a project or two.
In the mean time I thought I'd put a smile on your face with this little bit of fun that recently arrived.

(More info here)

Spring to Finish

Most of you probably already know about this (I'm about four days behind in my blog reading), but Jacquie is hosting a challenge to finish UFO's before April 30th.

Goodness knows, I need this.

Sunday(uhm, Monday) Stash

Yes, a little late once again.
I managed to get my hands on these wonderful black and white batiks at our quilt guild meeting on Thursday. Maybe they will help me make something for the Black and White Quilt Challenge.

And, in other news, I actually finished a quilt back! Yay me!

Feigned disinterest

I did sew a teenie little bit yesterday. Today is filled with errands, so I thought I'd share with you how excited those boys were to visit a college campus on Tuesday.

(Actually, I think they were more interested than their attitudes portrayed.)

Geese in the Forest Month 3

Yes, it's that time again!

Block 3: Triple Tree

You only have to make 10 of these.

Find the pattern here. (It's a PDF file, so you'll need Adobe Reader to open it.)
The .PDF file for Block 2's pattern is now available in the store for $1.

You can find all the details regarding this Block of the Month over here.