DJYota's Crafty Endeavors

The time has come to work on layering those completed quilt tops. I read a blog post a while back where the author posted a picture of her completed quilt tops folded on hangers in a closet.  What a great idea!  It also served as a perspective check for me...she had a closet FULL of completed quilt tops.  Mine fit on the back of the quilt room door right now, so what I felt was an unreasonable number of quilts queued up and waiting for the layering process is not as bad as I thought. Anyhow, my husband was leaving town for a few days and encouraged me to use the time to really get busy with the layering.  Challenge accepted. While I sometimes baste with thread and needle, these pins speed up the process and do a decent job of keeping the layers connected.  I was lucky to pick up a few extra packages at Joann's Fabrics with the 50% off discount, but, of course, they are available through Amazon as well:   https://www.amazon...

In 2018 I joined Pat Sloan's quilt-along "Let's Go Camping".  I had just come across some cool camping prints, I was enjoying our family's camping experiences so was in the right mindset for the focus, and I figured it would be a bit of a quilting challenge for me. When I finished the final stitch on the quilt top yesterday and laid out the top in all its glory, I decided to forgive myself for finishing it so long after the quilt-along's 2018 deadline. This journey started in January 2018.  The best part of committing to a quilt along was that it forced me out of my comfort zone.  I tried new blocks I would never have chosen otherwise, and I definitely learned some new quilting skills.  It also got me thinking about time management with quilting projects. This was the first block for the quilt.  Pat Sloan was kind and started us off with a pretty easy block pattern.  My regret with this block is that the top section of the center camping f...

It all started with that Kingfisher Quilt Along with Tales of Cloth over a year ago.  My first venture into the land of hand stitching fabric into quilt blocks.  I am totally hooked on EPP at this point, especially, these days, with Lucy Boston's Patchwork of the Crosses. Instead of fussy cutting the fabric, I decided to go with vibrant colors in dots and swirls and geometric shapes, with a bit of floral in the mix.  The majority of the fabrics I am working with come from the wonderful Kaffe Fassett. Before I finally started my journey of a million tiny stitches, I spent hours cutting out the paper templates.  There is a great template here:  https://docs.google.com/file/d/0BxzYngpp7KWYUEtMSkJTczZSNEk/preview?pref=2&pli=1 Then the fabric collection, cutting, and basting to the papers.  It's been time consuming, but also immensely relaxing.  I love the fact that I can work on it just a few minutes at a time or for hours on...

In my quilting life, this seemed like a pretty important milestone.  I just completed my first Patchwork of the Cross block!  My husband saw it setting on the table and asked, "So how many more?"  Only 29 to go!   When I told him that, my brain flashed forward to the stitching journey ahead.  Every quilt project captures phases of my life.   I think of the socks I knitted that were so connected to memories of my son's swimming and soccer days, or the hexies I basted during road/camping trips.  This chapter of EPP will definitely be attached to quite a few running competition memories as my kid heads into his high school cross country adventure. I have a metal pencil box that has been functioning as my on-the-go EPP work station. The challenge is in actually finishing an EPP project!  I have been pretty distracted by all the potential projects and have been dabbling with one little design at a time.  The only one I am close...