Quilters are awesome.

Sometimes it's easy to forget what wonderful, caring people quilters can be, but this week, I was reminded anew. Life has been rough for me since Christmas, and I try to leave that sort of baggage at home so that LTQ is a happy place to come, but I failed and finally ended up venting to a fellow quilter (who always brightens my day) and Karen (one of my employees). Both were very understanding, supportive, and just having them listen to me made me feel soooooo much better. I felt so lucky that I could do that, and not be judged or mocked or have my feelings brushed off. Then that very same quilter brought me a wonderful gift bag on Thursday and I was so touched. She just wanted me to feel better and went out of her way to help me. I can't even begin to express how much better that kindness made me feel.
It's that kind of caring and thought that I think brings so many quilters together. Quilters take care of each other, listen, and lend a shoulder to cry on, or an ear to vent to, and it really, really makes a difference in my life, and for a lot of other quilters too. So here's a great big hug and a thank you, not just to my guardian angel quilter, but to all of you, who have made my job so full of joy, creativity, caring, and compassion. I feel really blessed to be a part of such a great community.
Thank you all, and happy quilting!

I AM a rock star!

So, the other day, this young gal comes in and she stops dead when she sees me and says, "Are you Lil?" To which I responded, "Well, I'm Lily..." wondering why this poor young woman looked so stunned, and then she asked if I made a quilt (my blue poppy one block wonder) and I replied yes and she said, with great enthusiasm, "You are a ROCK STAR!" Which is of course an awesome compliment, but not one I hear a whole lot in the quilt business, so we had a good laugh at the time. So thanks, if you're out there reading this...
But anyway, then I was long-arming yesterday on a local high school student's quilt with this fantastic neon orange Brytes thread (bling bling) and after I got it done, all I could think was, "I am a rock star!"
So here it is:
There's the whole quilt, which she did an awesome job with, and is obviously a girl after my own heart...Here's some detail of my freehand "ricky-doodles" (thanks, Ricky Tims!):
All in all, I did really feel like a rock star after this quilt, and I never would have even had that thought without that girl coming in here.
Happy rock-star quilting!

Sleepy sheep

The week after President's Day sale can sometimes be a little quiet. It's been more lively than I expected, but Karen and I got into trouble nonetheless. Big Fork Bay has this adorable pattern "Heavenly Sheep" that we thought we could improve slightly. How you ask? With minkee. How else? We decided to make all the adorable little sheep and the stars and moon with different colors of minkee.
Not finished yet, but getting there:
It's two sheep (maybe three, we're thinking of adding another) and a border short of being finished. Here are some of the individual little sheepies.
Checked minkee sheepy.
Dot minkee sheepy.
Rosette minkee sheepy. They're so cute, I can't wait to get their little faces all stitched out.
Happy quilting!

Pushing my quilting limits

It's not much of an accomplishment, but I made a quick table runner with my scraps from a layer cake quilt I made a while ago (from "The Sweet Life", for inquiring minds). What took me the most time was designing the quilting pattern that *hopefully* I will be able to quilt without making it look too terrible.
Here's the top:

Here's the quilting designs all marked and ready to be stitched with water-soluble thread.

The designs are very very intricate, which given the nature of the table runner is slightly absurd, but I cranked that puppy out in 15 minutes so I could practice some wild quilting on it. Practice probably won't make this little quilter perfect, but improvements are getting more and more visible with every project.
I've already stitched one out in water-soluble thread and it went surprisingly well. I also have something interesting planned for the back...So with any luck, pictures of that on Friday.
Happy quilting!

Nothing but working and binding.

Well quilters, I've failed at my Friday appointment, but not because I forgot this time. Yesterday I came in to work at 8:00am. I'll be honest, I am NOT a morning person, so this was a big accomplishment for me. I'm a night owl...Anyway, I have a huge pile of quilts that I'm quilting for the local high school students from last semester and I'm really trying to get them done so the poor kids can have their quilts back. So I finished one I'd been working on before the shop opened.
Well, the minute my doors opened, I didn't have a chance to do much besides help people. I didn't even get the poor girl called so she could come get her quilt. We had tons of people getting their last day V-day presents, but we also had the pre-President's Day Sale pre-cutting rush. So, I was here until 7:00PM at night cutting fabric.
It was also me and Erik's fifth anniversary (we started dating on a Friday the 13th, too) so I had to go to dinner. So alas, no blogging.
In any case, all I've been doing anyway is hand-stitching binding. Booooring.
Anyway,
Happy quilting!

Georgin' it...

I've been working on a quilt for my friend's wedding (which was an unnamed number of years ago...) The top has been finished for over a year, I just haven't had a chance to quilt it. So finally I decided that I would do it on George instead of the longarm because I like freemotion and I don't get to do it as often as I'd like.
So...I chose a rather dense pattern without realizing it. I'm doing swirls, but almost every single element gets retraced, so it's like quilting the whole thing twice. I have little flowers scattered throughout too. I'm about one third done, so it'll still be a while, but here it is.
The swirls (done, shockingly with Brytes).
The flowers. You can sort of see that the fabric is all pretty floral. It's a jelly roll quilt done with Moda's Wildflower line that came out last spring, I think.
Happy to be getting some quilting done, however little.
Happy quilting!

Come Tuesday...

Hopefully I'll be back on the ball. Sorry folks. My dad has been staying with us every week night for over a month, and I just don't get to sew with a houseguest and when I don't sew, I don't feel like I have anything to show for myself, and I forget to blog. So, my apologies. I promise I'll get back on my blogging game and have pictures and everything.
Happy quilting, hope you guys are getting to quilt more than me.

Brain dead.

Hi all, apparently I was not meant to be a blogger because sometimes I just space it out. We had a hoppin' day yesterday, with long-arm lessons, lots of quilters, and George getting a good workout. I'll try to get some pictures up later this week of some Georging I've been doing.
Happy quilting for now, more later.