Your Makes / A Fantastic Cushion Project

I would like to share with you a project made by a friend recently that was inspired by my Hello Spring! Cushion pattern. Heather over at Crafting... (one of my favorite blogs and bloggers!) just made a bunch of gorgeous throw pillows for her living room using several different designs all in Sweetwater Reunion. 

Courtesy of Heather at Crafting...

Heather tells me that she was inspired by my pattern to adapt the flying geese chevrons to fit a slightly smaller throw pillow. I just love the way the design works with a completely new take on the fabrics and colors. I adore those little pendants especially! 

Courtesy of Heather at Crafting...

Heather did such a fantastic job creating a cohesive and fun set of pillows with some beautiful piecing too. Make sure to stop by her blog to check out the rest of the throw pillows (they are equally amazing!) and say hi. :)

I also wanted to say a special thank you to everyone who voted for me in the Bernina We All Sew Competition. I didn't make it to round two (drat!), ;) but I feel incredibly supported by all of you who voted for my pillow. Thank you so much! :)

SMS Giveaway Winner!

Thank you to everyone who commented and put their names in the hat for my SMS Giveaway Day prize! The response was so amazing and I have really enjoyed getting to read about all of your favorite fabric collections! I just wanted to also especially say welcome and thanks to my followers, both new and old established (thanks Charlotte for the suggested wording change!). ;) I really enjoy getting the chance to share my creative world with you and I am very thankful that you also enjoy reading about it!

I have consulted my crystal ball (i.e. random.org) and the winner of the giveaway prize is:

Who said:

Thanks Margaret! I have e-mailed you. :) 

Have a wonderful weekend and Happy Memorial Day to all of my U.S. friends!

WIP Wednesday / Vote For Me! :)

Looking for the giveaway? Head over here.

First of all, thanks so much for the amazing response to my giveaway! I am so glad that I had the chance to participate in SMS Giveaway Day this spring and share my little piece of the web with you. I have been reading each of your comments and making notes about all of the fantastic fabric collections you love and recommend (some seriously good ones I might add!). I hope to have the chance to respond to each of your lovely comments, but with so many, I may not be able to get to everyone before the end of the draw. Thank you so much though for taking the time to comment and for stopping by!

Now, from the name of this post you can probably guess what my exciting news is about. :) Do you happen to remember this pillow?

Oh, you mean the one I have only shown you about a thousand times. ;) Well I entered it into one last competition, this time in the Bernina We All Sew Challenge. Voting has started this week, and I am not going to even play coy or pretend that I don't really hope to win ($1000 towards a new sewing machine! I can totally use that!), so if you have a chance, please swing by and vote for me. Voting is open through May 27th and is happening on the Bernina Facebook page (there is an app that allows you to vote). You can search for my project under the name "Hoot" to make it easier to find. :) Thank you 1000 times over for your support and for patiently listening to my shameless self-promotion! Now on with the show!

In addition to participating in all of the giveaway fun that has been going on around blogland this week, I have also been cutting charms like a fiend and voting for my favorite quilts from the Blogger's Quilt Festival (you can check out all of the quilts here, mine is #249).

I also did just a little bit of sewing, mainly making some more scrap hexies for a future quilt project that is brewing in my head and sewing three of the four quadrants of my string block for the March Craftsy BOM. I know I am woefully behind, but hopefully I will be caught up soon!

My biggest accomplishment this week was getting the last of the Mystery Charm Swap charms cut and sorted into neat little piles. Here is a sneak peek of the packs, all bundled and ready to go to their new homes. I should have them sent by the end of this week, so be on the lookout for an e-mail from me all of you Mystery Charm Swappers. :)

I also wanted to let you guys know that this is the first week of the Let's Get Acquainted Summer Bloghop, being hosted by Plum and June. There are four fantastic blogs being featured this week, and I hope you'll have the opportunity to stop by and say hi. :)

May 22
Kelsey from Kelsey Sews
Erin from Billy Button Designs

May 24
Nik from Bold Goods
Alyssa from Pile O Fabric


And finally, here is this weeks stats. Thanks again Lee for hosting!

New Projects
- Hexi Molecule Quilt

Ongoing Projects
- Craftsy BOM (March & May)

Completed Tops Awaiting Quilting
- Parterre Jardin (Prince Charming) Quilt
- Made in Cherry (Echo) quilt
- Rainbow Pop bow-tie blocks quilt
- Sunglow in Loulouthi quilt

No Progress
- None

This Week's Stats
Completed projects - 0
New projects - 1
Currently in progress - 6

Featured Today At Craft Foxes

Looking for the giveaway? Head over here.

I just wanted to take a quick moment to let you guys know that I am being featured this week at Craft Foxes as part of their ongoing Handmade Conversations series on their blog. I was so excited to be asked to be a part of this series, which features people involved in the craft, food, and fashion industries. My blog has been a wonderful creative outlet for me and allowed me the opportunity to meet so many amazingly talented crafters. I feel very fortunate to be able to share my work with you here!

My Sewing Space

If you get a chance, and would like to take a break from entering all the fabulous giveaways, stop by and check out my interview. 

Help with Numbered Comments in Blogger

Looking for the giveaway? Head over here.

Last night, when I was getting ready for Giveaway Day by writing up my blog post, I noticed that my numbered comments javascript code was out of commission. With some of the new updates to the way comments are handled in Blogger--mainly the change to threaded comments which allows readers the option to reply directly to a comment--the older code was no longer working. I did some digging around and even contacted a blogging friend who had gotten her numbered comments straightened out (thanks Amy!) and was able to figure out a way to add the numbers back in just in time. Thankfully, I will now not be counting each and every comment to find the winner! Whew!

I thought that since I probably wasn't the only one having issues with this (especially during this particular time of year) ;), that a quick blog post about how I fixed the problem might be helpful for those of you who use the blogger platform and are having giveaways this week. Here's what I did:

I followed along with this forum post, provided by a very helpful contributor, that outlined how to change to numbered comments using a simple piece of CSS. No more digging around through your template code, yay!

Go to Template Designer - then Advanced - Add CSS - paste the following code into the box and press enter after the last character of the last line - make sure to Apply to Blog before closing.

.comment-thread ol { counter-reset: contarcomentarios; } .comment-thread ol ol { counter-reset: contarbis; } .comment-header:before { content: counter(contarcomentarios,decimal)"."; counter-increment: contarcomentarios; float: left; padding-right: 4px; }

Check the comments on a previous blog post and they should look something like this:

See where I circled the numbers? Easy huh? :) I hope this helps anybody who may be experiencing the same  issues with their comments. Good luck with your giveaways!

Giveaway Day / Spring 2012

Hello and welcome! For those of you stopping by for the first time through Sew Mama Sew's Giveaway Day, my name is Jenelle. Echinops & Aster is my creative blog where I share my sewing, hand stitching, and quilting adventures. Since I am totally a visual person (and I'm guessing quite a few of you are as well), I decided to put together a mosaic of some of my favorite projects from this year so far:

As you can see, I love bright colors and modern designs, and around here you will find plenty of that! I hope after the dust settles from Giveaway Day (giveaway week really!); that you will have a chance to stop in again, maybe get a cup of your favorite beverage, and check out a few posts and projects. But in the meantime, lets get to the fun at hand! Today I am giving away a prize that's both handmade and full of fabric goodness. :)

The handmade portion is a boxy pouch and pincushion set. The pouch features an OOP Anna Maria Horner fabric on the outside from the Chocolate Lollipop Collection. It's fully lined with a light green Kona Cotton solid and sewn so that there are no exposed seams inside (yay!). The pincushion, made in Soul Blossoms by Amy Butler, is decorated with some simple embroidery and a couple of vintage buttons from my collection.

I am also including four fat quarters from my stash in some spring-appropriate fresh, fun colors. There is a cute birdie print from Wrenly, a Michael Miller green and white polk dot, a little Riley Blake solids in Pear, and a FQ of the pink pearl bracelet print from Hello Pilgrim.

To enter:

1.) Since Quilt Market just ended, leave me a comment letting me know your favorite fabric collection at the moment or what you are looking forward to being released. I am really excited for Anna Maria Horner's new line Field Study. :)

For a bonus entry:

2.) Blog followers new and old get a second entry! Just leave me a second comment letting me know you follow me.

The giveaway will be open until May 25 at 5 p.m. PST. A winner will be selected by random draw. I will e-mail the winner by May 27th at the latest, so make sure your contact info is linked to your account or include your e-mail address in your comment so that I can get in touch with you. Thanks for stopping by and good luck!

Blogger's Quilt Festival Spring 2012 / Just Wing It

Amy from Amy's Creative Side is hosting the Blogger's Quilt Festival again. This is my first time participating in the festival as an "exhibitor", so thanks for stopping by! Today I would like to share with you a quilt that really started it all for me. For my regular readers, this will probably be just a tad familiar since this quilt took me a little less than a year to finish, during which time I documented and shared my entire process. 

Just Wing It (Embroidery 101) Quilt -front-

Just Wing It (Embroidery 101) Quilt -back-

I started this large throw-size quilt last summer as part of Jennie and Clara's Embroidery 101 Stitch and Quilt Along over at Clover and Violet. The focus of the QAL was to learn how to embroider while making a quilt using simple blocks, each meant to frame a hand stitched design. I approached this QAL sort of backwards though. While I had already finished lots of needlework projects prior to this, I was completely new to quilting and wanted to find a way to get my feet wet while also bringing my embroidery skills into the project. 

 

I ended up designing and hand stitching each of the 12 unique embroidered blocks in my quilt, while also really taking the time to learn how to cut and piece accurately during the process of making the top. It then took me a little longer after finishing the top to get comfortable with quilting such a large project (60" x 80") on my small domestic sewing machine, but in the end, I'm glad I just went ahead and jumped in. 

Finished Quilt Top

I ended up using simple straight line quilting to echo the shape of the concentric boxes created by the individual blocks on the front. In order to work with the bulk of the quilt on my smaller machine, I quilted all of the vertical lines first and then the horizontal ones, breaking the thread at each of the corners of the boxes.

 

For the backing, I chose to do a stripe of scrappy strips at the top using some left over prints. I paired that with some larger strips of some smaller print fabrics from the same collection. The larger aqua colored piece, which reads as a solid in the photos, is actually a subtle mini-stripe print, also from Just Wing It.

For the binding, I used another mini-stripe print, this time in tomato red. I like the way the red adds a subtle pop of color to the outer frame of the quilt, especially against the white sashing.

I am also linking up today with Katie for the Handmade Parade:

Sunny Days, Some Recent Features, and A New Linky Party

Today was gloriously sunny and warm, just the perfect kind of day to do some fabric shop hopping! While indulging in a bit (ok more than a bit!) of retail therapy, I also had the chance to get together with Sunni to make the ever important delivery of some 28 yards of lovely dotty-goodness. :) You see, over the weekend (which was also equally summery) I had the chance to pick up all of the fabric that Sunni and I ordered from Pink Chalk Fabrics for the Mystery Charm Swaps. Kathy was so sweet to meet me at the studio on a sunny Saturday, especially right before quilt market! I had the chance to chat with her a bit while also checking out the amazing shelves containing bolts and bolts of fabric and kona cottons for miles. It was impressive. :) Afterwards, my husband and I also had the opportunity to explore a few fun things while on Bainbridge Island (where Pink Chalk is located) including touring an organic distillery and eating lunch at a cool little diner.

 

This week, my blog and a couple recent projects have also been featured in few places. Yesterday the cool gals over at Stumbles and Stitches shared a list of some of the great blogs written by participants in the Feather Your Nest Contest. My embroidered owl pillow actually made the top 10 for the judged prize in this contest, and while I didn't win overall, I had a blast participating and getting to meet some new creative folks! You can read about some of the other participants and their blogs here.

Yesterday my hexi blocks from the Craftsy BOM were also featured on the Craftsy Quilting Club Facebook page. There is a whole community of quilters who stay connected there and share tips and encouragement along with some great quilting related links. I was glad to discover this page recently and also be featured!

Finally, my embroidered owl pillow was featured today, this time on the &Stitches blog. I was so excited to win a copy of the latest &Stitches e-zine after submitting my owl embroidery to their Flickr group. I love handwork, and &Stitches is great digital magazine that offers lots of tips and discussion around hand stitching, including a few free patterns in each issue. I am looking forward to stitching up a couple of my favorites soon.

Speaking of hand stitching, I also wanted to let you guys know about a great new linky party that starts this week. Katie, at There and Back, will be hosting a weekly Friday party, called the Handmade Parade, that will focus on celebrating handmade projects of all kinds. Here's what Katie has to say:

Lately in blogland I've seen more and more people embracing some type of hand stitching. Whether, it's quilting, applique, piecing or embroidery, there's a lot of it out there! At times it feels like those of us who hand stitch are stitching away in some dark corner of the internet where no one pays us much attention. I want to change all that by giving hand stitchers a place to find each other and show off what they've been working on! Who better to appreciate all your hand work than other hand stitchers?

I am so excited to be able to participate in this party and have a place to link up my embroidery and English-paper pieced endeavors! The first linky is this Friday, May 18th. You can swing by Katie's blog here for more info.

A Few Things...

Today I have kind of a random post, with snippets of all kinds of things that I would like to share with you guys. This is sort of my end of the week round-up. ;)

Yesterday I whisked my May Stash Bee block off to the post office to begin it's trek across the country to Jamie Lee. This was a really quick, spontaneous block to make; just what I needed this week. This block was based off of a quilt design from Block Party by Alissa Haight Carlton and Kristen Lejnieks. The quilt is called Falling to Pieces and was designed by Ashley Newcomb of Film in the Fridge. I loved working with all of the different purple fabrics and the wonky HSTs, even if I did have to rip out a few seams before getting the "correct" amount of wonkiness down. ;)

This week I also joined a new swap, Round 2 of the Denyse Schimdt Charm Swap. Each round has 56 participants, so it's a been a very popular idea to say the least! It's been so popular that I am wondering if there will be a round 3? (Make sure to let Jill know if you would be interested!)

I am really looking forward to get a small amount of a bunch of Denyse Schmidt prints, including some from collections I don't have. I have already selected my fabric from my stash and decided to go with this print from Hope Valley. It's called Four Square in New Day.

Speaking of charm swaps, tomorrow I will be taking a leisurely ferry ride across Elliot Bay to go pick up all of the fabric Sunni and I ordered for the Mystery Charm Swaps at Pink Chalk Fabrics. I am pretty excited to see all of it together, plus steal a sneak-peek inside Pink Chalk central! The fabric goodness will be overwhelming I'm sure. :) I am also bringing reinforcements (my wonderful husband) to help with the lifting, because surely that much fabric will be quite heavy! Charm cutting will commence immediately, so for those of you who are patiently waiting for your charms to arrive, I will be getting them ready for you soon. Pink Chalk is also celebrating its four year anniversary! They are currently having a special on shipping and doing some fun goody bags with each order! The festivities will last through Monday May 14th, so make sure to stop by this weekend and have a look. :)

I have also been pulling fabrics together to begin the process of designing a new quilt. This quilt is going to be a wedding present for my brother and his lovely fiancee who are getting married next fall. I am pretty sure of what they would like individually in terms of colors and prints. My brother would probably say he'd like something subdued in color and masculine, while I am pretty sure his fiancee would chose something brighter with a slightly higher purple content. ;) Collectively, I am not sure which direction they would go towards, so I am leaving it up to them to choose between the following four bundles:

I have also had some tremendous luck recently! The last bundle I actually just won through a giveaway from Fat Quarter Shop over at Miss Print. I am so excited to put these fabrics to good use (perhaps even in this particular quilt). Thanks Kaye and the FQS for your generosity!

And since we are on the subject of giveaways...Sew Mama Sew's twice a year extravaganza--known simply as Giveaway Day--is coming up and I have been racking my brain to figure out the perfect giveaway prize. I have a few ideas in mind, but you'll have to wait until May 21st to find out exactly what it will be. :) Here are the possible categories:

• Handmade for the Home (quilts, hot pads, pillows, etc.)
• Handmade Bags
• Handmade Baby + Kid Items
• Sewing + Craft Supplies (fabric, patterns, buttons, trims, yarn, etc.)
• Handmade Accessories (hats, scarves, belts, adult clothes, etc.)

Check out the link to find out more information about the event and how you can participate. 

Finished: Traveling Gnome Sewing Kit

I have been feeling much better the last couple days (thanks for your good wishes!), so I took the opportunity to put the finishing touches on my travel sewing kit for the Clover and Violet Summertime Adventures Series. Not only was this a fun, quick project to sew; it also makes for a completely cute and well organized sewing kit. I love all of the custom details from the specialized pockets (check out the shaped one for the scissors!) to the thread spool strap and the little felt pin book. The best part is that I can swap in and out tools and project pieces based on whether I am doing embroidery or English paper-piecing. I foresee this kit getting a lot of use this summer. 

 

I followed along with Amy's Travel Sewing Kit tutorial that she posted last fall on her blog Lots of Pink Here. I have had this tutorial bookmarked for a while now and was really glad to finally have a reason deadline to motivate me to sew one. ;) I found the instructions to be very well written and the actual organization of the sewing kit components to be pretty intuitive, especially with all of the custom details as I previously mentioned. I did make a couple modifications, mainly sewing a thinner thread strap to make it easier to swap out spools, along with lengthening the outer strap so that I could tie a bow on the front of the kit when closed rather than on the side.

I used a couple of really fun prints from the new Better Gnomes and Gardens collection by Heather DuPont as my main inspiration for this project. I paired them with a basic muslin, a yellow floral print, and a green gingham that I picked up at my LQS recently, the West Seattle Fabric Company. When I was purchasing my fabric, I got to talking with Monica (the nicest shop owner ever!) about how much this line--and especially the prints I chose--fondly remind us of 1970's kitchen wallpaper. The retro-goodness of it all makes me pretty happy to say the least. :)

I would also like to take a moment to say thanks to both Ginny and Mareenchen for honoring my blog with the Liebster Award recently! Here is a list of my Liebster award picks from when I first received the award from Katie. Ginny, who blogs at Fish Creek Studio, is also a fellow member of the Craftsy BOM and posted about her fantastic hexi blocks here. She is also working on a retro flowers quilt with some seriously gorgeous fabrics. Mareenchen blogs at Aquamareen Crafting and just finished these adorable matching baby and toddler quilts. This is such a genius idea and so perfect for siblings. :) Thanks ladies!

April Hexies / Craftsy BOM

Do you remember these?
      


Well over the weekend they turned into these:

Hexi Stripe Block in Summersault, Wildwood, Lotus, and Kona Cerise

Hexi Molecule Block in Summersault, Wildwood, Prince Charming, and Kona Cerise

I was really happy to finish my April blocks for the Craftsy BOM this weekend since I am a little behind schedule. I've been feeling kind of "off" for the past week and finally this weekend it caught up with me big-time. The good thing about hexies though, is that you can sew them from start to finish while laying on the couch under a big quilt. :) Unfortunately the couch wasn't the best position from which to tackle my March and May blocks or the travel sewing kit that I am planning on making for the Clover and Violet Summertime Adventures Series. I am hoping that by tomorrow I will be feeling well enough to finish sewing the kit and not miss the Monday linky party. 

Anyways, for this month, Amy--our fearless leader extraordinaire--challenged everyone in the Craftsy BOM course to come up with their own hexy design. I decided for my block to keep things more abstract and use a variety of hexi sizes to make a more free-form design. When I finished, my husband said that he thought the block looked like some kind of molecule, and you know what, I agree! So this is my hexi molecule block. :)

Linked up with: