August 2013 – Quilting my way through life!

I moseyed over to my favorite flea market last week to mark the first day of school.

It’s usually what I do when there’s a ringing in my ears because the house is just too darn quiet!

Ever get that?

I know, I had lots to catch up on and lots more to do, but…

some things just can’t be helped!

I hadn’t been there in over a month, not exactly sure just how long really.

Well, I came out with just a few treasures, least of which a new bed!

I didn’t even know I needed a bed.

That’s my favorite part of going to flea markets, and tag sales.

I never know what I need until I see it!!!

Well this bed could practically fit into my back pocket.

Instantly I knew I would have to make a quilt for it.

Actually as soon as I saw it on the shelf I knew that I had the perfect idea of a quilt for it.

I already had these:

Ordinarily these would go right to the trash as soon as I trimmed them from the flying geese units, but for some reason after I had a neat little pile of them I got the idea that maybe this is the quilt that I will actually make something with those snippets.

The eternal optimist.

So, as I trimmed each flying geese unit for this particular quilt last week, I put all the little pairs of triangles into a baggie.

Last night I emptied that baggie and started sewing.

Girl on a mission.

Some of them could have been trimmed a bit straighter, a bit larger…

That’s an inch grid marked there, so they’re pretty small to say the least!

This morning I cut them apart then pressed them open.

It was hard to do, but I ignored the inconsistencies of sizes.

I did not square them up.

That was tough, but I knew if they were trimmed perfectly square I would have to throw a lot of them away.

I wanted this to be as large as possible

and literally scraps from making the original quilt.

I next sewed all the tiny half square triangles together,

added a border,

did some quilting,

then slipped a selvage tag into the edge before finishing the binding.

At 8″ x 10″ I’m pretty sure it’s the quickest I’ve ever hand stitched a binding in place.

Now I must get back to work!

Until next time,

Susan

My Life, Susan Marth fabric collection, Suzn Quilts Vintage Play fabric collection, Vintage Children quilt fabrics collection

Introducing “Vintage Play.” My first Fabric Collection!

August 13, 2013August 13, 2013 suznquilts

At the beginning of the year I told you here that 2013 was going to be a fun year for me

and not just because 13 is my favorite number!

Along with new patterns & books and traveling to new & exciting places,

I’ve designed my first fabric collection!

It’s called “Vintage Play” and it is being produced by Red Rooster Fabrics.

(cute little handmade truck was found in an antique store while we were in Astoria, OR this spring after quilt market)

It has taken a year to get where we are with the collection.

The folks at Red Rooster have been great to work with!

My yardage to create samples came a couple of weeks ago.

It’s not every day that I receive packages from Korea.

Pretty exciting happening…

This is where they first landed on my garage floor.

I called my mom and told her she needed to come down. She hopped in her car without even knowing why she should come…better than Christmas morning!

I made the first sample in record time,

These are all the pieces for the top.

My quilter stayed up all night to quilt it so it could be shipped to New York for photography. Tamara, you’re awesome, thanks!!!

The collection has 19 pieces and I used all but one for the quilt.

Fun!

The free pattern will be available to shops later this month.

I can’t wait for you to see it.

This is where they now reside as I take turns cutting pieces off of each one to make my new pattern samples.

Neat & tidy, just like soldiers.

Wait until I get pressed for time, they won’t look so neat & tidy then…

These are the pieces for sample #2.

The blocks are sewn, and waiting for borders to appear,

but for now they must wait.

School starts Thursday and I have more important things to attend to.

Come Thursday morning when the bus pulls away though,

I’m all about “Vintage Play!”

Until next time,

Susan

My Life, Rocky Mountain Sew Expo Denver, Suzn Quilts Patterns, Vendor at trade show

Where have I been and what have I been doing?

August 5, 2013 suznquilts

Well, let me tell you…

First of all it’s summer.

Need I say more?

Our house seems to have a revolving door.

As one leaves another is coming home. I never know how many to cook for. If I cook for three, there will be five, and vice versa.

I’m constantly shopping for food, yet there’s “never anything to eat around here.”

David’s garden is supplying lots of tomatoes, my personal favorite! There are also cucumbers, black berries, green beans, zucchini (yuk!) and we’ll eventually have pumpkins, cantaloupe & watermelon.

Our trip to the Rocky Mountain Sewing Expo in Colorado was fantastic.

We met so many nice people.

If you’re one of them, thanks for coming out to see us!

My Cobblestone Courtyard class was great.

Liz, Joan, Birdie, Opal & Nancy,

thanks for being so prepared for the class and for being such good participants.

It’s been almost four weeks. Are those quilts done yet?

Don’t make me come back there!!!

(Actually I’d love to!)

Booth set-up was a breeze with my helpers…

OK, it took all afternoon & most of the evening.

By the end of the night all we wanted was Chinese food delivered to our room,

but I think the booth looked great!

We were able to display so many quilts.

The Merchandise Mart in Denver was very nice & so was the staff of Rusty Barn Shows.

Daisy Baby Buggy captured many hearts..

Pumpkins in the Patch & Bunnies in the Grass were popular too.

We sold lots of my Ginger Bliss pattern.

I explained my Quilt-as-you-go technique at least a million times!

And of course, my “A Pretty Package” quilt pattern was our best-seller for the week!

Have you made one yet?

If you haven’t, you should. Everyone else is making one!

We met so many nice people offering advice of where we should go and what we should see while we were in Colorado.

One evening we drove to St. Mary’s glacier

then ate at Beau Jo’s Pizza in Idaho Springs.

Fantastic pizza!

The next night we drove to Mount Evans.

At 14,265 feet, it is the highest paved road in North America.

Also, according to Clare, one of the scariest roads in North America..

It was getting pretty late for dinner that night so we decided if we could make it to Beau Jo’s in time we would eat there again.

We ended up eating there three times!!!

We weren’t sure with the wildfires & then mud slides what might hinder the rest of our sightseeing.

We were able to go up Pike’s Peak on the cog Railway.

That was fun and interesting too.

I used the panoramic option on my phone for this photo. How cool is that? I’m impressed that I remembered to use that setting while we were there and not a couple of days later…

Spectacular view from 14, 110 ft.

We also saw the Garden of the gods close by.

The last day we ventured over to Breckenridge to eat at Daylight Donuts!

Have you had their donuts?

Worth the trip!