Secret Garden Quilt Update

Hi everyone!

This weekend has given me the time to make huge progress on my Secret Garden quilt top (first post here).  I’ve finished sewing and cutting up my blocks to size.  I even remembered to take a few photos as I was going through the process.  🙂

I then spent time (and I mean a lot of time…) arranging all my quilt blocks just right on my living room floor.  I think I’m a little obsessive about my need to have everything in the right place, but I have to say I’m super happy with the result!  JS thought I was crazy as I would switch two pieces, stand back and look for a minute, before moving things around again… and again… and again…  Lol, you get the idea!

I’m glad it’s not any bigger though, because as you can see, my quilt top takes pretty much my entire living room floor…  I have no idea how I’m going to be able to make a quilt sandwich…  Most of the rooms in our home is carpeted, and the few that aren’t are definitely not big enough…  Any ideas???

For now, I’m off to start sewing my blocks into rows, and my rows into my first finished quilt top!  Can’t wait to show you!  🙂

 

Been A While… Time For An Update!

Hi everyone,

I’m sorry I haven’t written anything in over a month, but what a month it has been!  I was gone for a whole 3 weeks, for work, to visit family, and for JS’ brother’s wedding.  It was a great time but talk about hectic!  By the end I couldn’t wait to get home to our relaxing apartment… and I was super excited to open up a special package from Craftsy which had been delivered while I was away!  I waited soo patiently, and this is what I got!

I joined Amy Gibson’s Secret Garden Quilt-Along on Craftsy and ordered the quilt kit which is made up of two layer cakes in Amy Butler’s new fabric collection, Belle and some Kona Cotton in Snow.  I love the fabrics, bold and whimsical with awesome pops of colour!

As this new quilt pattern is much simpler than the other Craftsy course I’ve been working on (posts here, here, and here), I’ve decided to do this one first, which will help me practise my 1/4″ seams – which I still seem to have problems with :S – and making my corners meet.

As I started cutting and putting the quilt blocks together, I noticed that not all of the layer cakes squares are the 10″ x 10″ they’re supposed to be.  Some are close, others are about a 1/4″ off.  Is this normal??  I’ve never bought pre-cuts before and it seems odd that they didn’t arrive as advertised.  Regardless, I decided to continue with them and I didn’t resize them for fear of changing the overall dimensions of the quilt and messing up the other pieces in the quilt.  Do you think I should have?  I’ve been pinning my blocks and some are a little hard to line up, but hopefully it’ll all work out in the end 🙂

How have your summer’s been?  Any adventures, sewing or otherwise?  I’d love to hear about them!