Rose Prairie Quilts and Farm

Merry Christmas to you all and yes I know it's a little early for that but not if you are going to be participating in Quilting Tutorials blog Quilt Show. I would like to tell you about my entry. I first seen this book when on my anniversary trip, I went to a quilt shop near where we were staying and fell in love with it.     Ruby Red Dots: Fanciful Circle-Inspired Designs  Sheri Howard (Author) I have a passion for applique and knew I had to make this one.  I do not believe this quilt is represented as a Chistmas quilt but the colors to me just scream Christmas. So here is mine, it is a large quilt (fits my king size bed) which is hand appliqued, machine pieced and hand quilted. I appologize for my picture, the quilt stand I have is missing a piece and I was unable to use it. So it's a floor shot. It's now time to vote for Viewer's Choice.  You will need to go here and leave a comment with your favorite quilt ( hopefully mine # 6

Now that the rushing around for Christmas is over I took time to look at my blog and realized that I had not finish telling how to go about getting the border on the Christmas Plaid String Quilt. I was going to change my quilt so I didn't finish it, so I put it off to the side to worked on things for Christmas. One thing led the another but here's where I owe an apology for leaving anyone who was working on theirs and had to finish on their own. The pattern called for an inner border of 1.5" and outer border 4.5" Looks good but I had a lot of end pieces left from cutting the triangles from strip sets, you will/or would of also. So I thought instead of adding more to my scrap pile (which if you remember)  is huge. I decided I would cut from my leftovers the  4.5" pieces for the outer border.  Like so. This is my pile of end pieces So I trimmed the end off and then measured 4.5' and cut. But the one on the end did not quite make i

Today it's time to make the sashing and the setting squares. We'll use the light fabric that has been cut in 1.5" strips and various 1.5" strips of the plaids.  Sew 10 strip sets of light-dark-light combination.  For the setting squares. you will need to sew 1 1/2 ( one and one half) strip sets  dark - light - dark.  When strips are sewn, press the seams toward the dark. This way when it comes to the nine- patch the pieces will snuggle up to each other nicely. Need to cut 38 segement in 9 1/2" length for sashing. From each strip set you will get 4- 9 1/2" segments plus some extra. This extra piece will be part of the nine-patch Cut 15 - 1 .5" segments of light-dark-light and 30 1.5" segments of the dark-light-dark. Make 15 nine-patch setting square.  TA-DA nine-patches Tomorrow I will not be able to do much in the sewing room so I will not be able to work on this but I try to get  some time to putting

I wish I could say I'm as devoted as those protestor in the parks. I have only been able to get a couple hours a day since its started. But tomorrow I have the whole day free to set aside for my sewing room. So how are you doing on occuping your sewing room? Today I was able to get my strips sewn together. You will need to make 12 strip sets. The strip set need to be at least 7" wide but try not to get any larger than 8'. If you do there will be way too much waste. So between 7" - 7 1/2" is ideal.  After you get all your sets made you'll need to press. I press the seams in one direction.  Now I will firmly suggest, if you don't already, that is to starch your strips. It keeps your fabric stable, no stretching. Which is important because of the way the set are cut, the outside edge are on bias but like I said starching eliminates any problems.   There are all kinds on the market and as you can see I have a good number of them.

OK here goes, my first attempt at giving instructions on making a quilt from start to finish. I have to say that  I am not very savoy on the computer and  having this blog has really widen my horizons, so this will not be high tech like some others are. But I think it will work.  I said yesterday that I had already cut my fabric into strips but at the bottom of this container I had found some  flat pieces. Now I would like to throw in a suggestion here, you know that phrase " do as I say and not as do " this is a good example. See how I  just shoved all my strips in the box, DON'T DO . For a very obvious reason (that I didn't get) the fabric wrinkles badly. DUH !! I had to spend sewing time today pressing all my strips. I had read Bonnie Hunter blog the other day about storing strips and how she decided that Ziploc were a good way to store them, fold them a couple of times so they fit and just leave the top half zipped. You know I will remember that next t

I had seen  Occupy Your Sewing Room  a few weeks ago and had meant to put her button up. Barbara at Cat Patches  had thought this up and I figure since I've been trying to get caught up on some BOM's and Christmas presents I would join in. This way I can get two things done at the same time. So if you want to do the same, take a peek at what Barbara has plan. I will be taking time out during the week to show some of what I get done. I will also be showing the making of the Christmas String Quilt from start to finish starting tomorrow, so please check back. I'll give you a peek of what I'm planning, but before I do I need to explain a thing or two. I had purchased most of the fabric and received the pattern from Sager Creek Quilt Shop  a couple of years ago and with my exceptional speed , I'm just now getting to it. But I did, a few months ago, cut my fabric into strips, so I do not have whole pieces to show you, just strips (lots of strips). If I had known I w