Ribbons! Ribbons! Ribbons! at the County Fair

The little "Simply Woven" quilt took second place at the County Fair this year!  For someone who rarely wins anything, to say that I'm super happy is an understatement.  I really need to come up with a new name for it though, as "Simply Woven" is really the name of the pattern.  No matter what I end up calling it, I really do like how this one turned out so I think I'll keep it to brighten up the sewing room wall. 

I also entered "Ribbon Candy" in the Christmas category, which took second and my oldest son's patriotic bed quilt in the Red, White and Blue category.  His quilt took first place!  We were really happy with that win until we got his quilt home and found two holes in it that weren't there when I turned it in to the fair coordinators.  :-( The damage really stole the happiness away.  I don't have much experience mending quilts, but he loves it so much that not fixing it is really not an option.   

The remodeling of the two largest bedrooms is now complete after 6 weeks of work.  Eagle1 helped me with our son's room but I had to work on the master bedroom alone due to his work schedule.  To be finished with them is such a relief, not only because of the stress of having the house in disarray, but because I really missed having time to work on fun things. 

This week I'm working on a stroller quilt for a baby shower in Illinois.  I think I mentioned in an earlier post that my friend Kay bought a quilt for a pregnant friend a few months ago. 

The new mommy was very happy with her gift and Kay asked me to make another quilt for her other friend who is going to have a baby boy in a few months.  For me, the biggest compliment for my work is when someone offers to buy one of them.  :-)

I can pick fabric for little girls all day long, but when it comes to boys, my brain goes numb.  Trying to balance the need for masculinity while savoring the fun of a new baby is a challenge.  Hopefully, I did okay with the puppy dog fabric and coordinates I chose for this one.  I used the Double Slice Layer Cake Quilt pattern from Missouri Star Quilt Co. for this quilt.  The little blue "star" in the middle of the quilt is just me being quirky.  I'm about halfway done with hand quilting it with brown perle cotton thread in large stitches. 

My friend Beth celebrated a birthday recently.  It just so happened that she invited our family to join hers for their annual trip to the water park in Old Forge this year, right around the same time as her birthday, so I thought it would be fun to make her a big beach bag!  Her Mom told me she really likes all shades of blue, so I used that as a starting point.  The bottom of the bag is upcycled denim from a pair of jeans that my son outgrew after one wearing.  Some of the patches are denim, too.  I tried to find something in my stash that was bright and cheery and found the pretty yellow print in the bottom of a box packed for the move.  From there, it was easy to pick colors to go along and in less than a day, a new bag was born.  I never could find the right lighting for a good picture of this one, (I never take good photos!), but this will have to do. 

That's about it for now.  Until next time...Happy Stitching!