A Little Crazy

I kind of ran off the rails trying to lay out this quilt.  At one point I had 14 different layouts, all slightly different.  I've whittled it down to six.  It's amazing that the same pattern with five colors can come up with so many different looks.

The top left box is the first layout, which I liked.  But compared to some of these others?  Right now the two left-most layouts are my favorite.  At this point, I need to walk away for a bit, then come back and see what grabs me.  I had no idea I'd go so wild and crazy over this quilt!  

I Like Thursday: White and Blue and Gold

Welcome to I Like Thursday, where we share some of the good things that happened during the week.  

I like that we got snow (even better - the power stayed on!).  I haven't had a chance to play in it, but I've at least gone out for a walk to enjoy the beautiful trees.  Alas, it may rain by the time I get up and ruin the fluffiness.  Enjoy it while I can.

I'm really hoping enough snow will remain to go skiing - maybe this weekend?

Project Quilting 14.2: Wavy Pink Pillow

I finished my second challenge of Project Quilting with plenty of time to spare... but then had trouble finding good light to photograph it for my post!  This week's theme was Pink Tint:  the project need to be inspired by the color pink.  I dug through my stash and found more pink than I thought I had.  The first thing that popped into my head was wavy strings.  I kept coming back to that every time I tried to think of some other pattern to do.  I swung between a quilted post card or another pillow case (since I still have all of last season's mug rugs).  My fabric drawer is rather packed, so I picked the pillow to use up more fabric.

Initially I thought I'd contrast the pink with some black.  I though all pink would be overwhelming.  But as the piecing progressed I decided to make the entire pillow pink.  I added in a bit of red, just for some interest (the kitties are pink!). 

I Like Thursday: A Bit of Quilting

Welcome back to I Like Thursday, where I join up with LeeAnna and friends to share the good things of the week. 

I like that I finally started cutting pieces for the next baby quilt, although it's on hold while I find some more fabric.  In the meantime, I'm working on the next Project Quilting challenge.  I decided to make another pillow.  The front is pieced and quilted - I just need to pick a color for the binding:

Pink, red or black?  I'm starting to lean away from the black.  If I do pink binding, it would be red back and vice versa if I do red binding.  I'm hoping to bind it later today, so I need to pick soon!

It's a Start

There's one more baby quilt in my project backlog.  After a lot of straight-line piecing, I felt the need for another curved pattern.  I had seen Flowering Snowball pop up in other quilters' blogs and decided to try it out.  It's one of those fun patterns that change depending on what you focus on.  I found a template and sized it down for a 9" finished block (so I could have more blocks to work with).

My living room floor had been covered with all sorts of fabric for the better part of two weeks as I contemplated what I wanted the quilt to look like.  I wanted scrappy and colorful.  But I couldn't decide - did I want to focus on the circles?  the Xs?  Then I found Deb's Flowering Snowball.  That quilt was seven blocks square and mine would only be five, but it was still enough to make a mandala-like pattern, which appealed to me.

Yay for Hay!

Dakin foster guinea pigs, Bleu and Provolone, are still hanging out with us.  They've been getting along quite well for a pair of young boars.  Bleu wants to be bossy every so often and ousts Provolone from a favorite cozy or chases him away from the hay rack (which is why there are two separate places to eat hay in the cage).  

Generally, though, things are peaceful.  The boys don't like to be separated.  They're pretty good at sharing and will often be at the pellet bowl or hay rack together.  The often nap close together.

They've been with us long enough to learn the routines, including when we're most likely to bring treats from the kitchen.  Provolone has a sing-song wheek and has also mastered the very pitiful you-haven't-fed-me-in-days wheek.  He's the one that speaks up first.  Bleu's squeaking, when he decides to speak up, is much more straight forward and demanding.  

Provolone still does not like to be touched in the cage.  He's fine when he's picked up and held.  I'm not sure if this attitude will change as he gets older.  He may just not like humans.  Bleu is the opposite - he likes scritches around his shoulders and generally is okay at being touched and picked up.  He's first to come to the edge of the cage for treats.

I Like Thursday: Winter Lull

Not a lot to share this week with everyone at I Like Thursday.  I spent a chunk of the week with online research - nothing fancy to show about that.  Otherwise, this week was first time in ages that I've had a few moments to myself.  It's quite nice.  

The guinea pig fosters from Dakin shelter continue to entertain us.  Bleu gets so excited every morning when I fill the pellet bowl and add new hay.  He bounces and zooms and doesn't want to settle down.

Project Quilting 14.1: Dresden Plate Pillow

Project Quilting is here again!  I've enjoyed participating in the last two years of challenges.  It's a series of one-week projects, creating whatever comes to mind with no worries on how it turns out.  My creativity seems to work best when given small parameters or when using stuff I have on hand.

This week's challenge was The First One.  For me, that meant trying a new pattern or technique.  I dug through and rejected several paper pieced patterns before I hit upon my Dresden plate ruler.  I bought this at Swanson's more than two years ago, because who can pass up a $4 quilting ruler?  It was brand new - still had the protective paper on it.  Using it would be a first!  Then I decided the quilt needed to be one color.  I discarded all my blues and reds to pick brown (beige/cream is a brown, right?).  I never know what fabric is going to speak up.  Excellent.  I've covered both the words first and one.

I Like Thursday: A New Year

My first like of the week is that I caught up with everything (even if it's only briefly).  I spent New Year's weekend with time on my hands. How nice! 

Bleu is showing off his (and Provolone's) favorite way of sitting in the hammock.  Is it comfortable? or ist it because he can commandeer both the hammock and the cuddle cup.  Piggy pigs are piggy!

The Cheese Boys

Our current foster guinea pigs from Dakin Humane are named Provolone and Bleu - the Cheese Boys.  We've had them for three weeks now.  They've been rather shy until Christmas.  Everyone peered in the cage and asked, "Is there only one pig?"  Nope - there's two of them!

But after the festivities, the boys decided life wasn't so bad here.  They even said hi to my mother while she was here.  Blue has been lounging around in the open.  Provolone hasn't been trying to hide under the cuddle cup all the time.

Sea Glass

Sea Glass is done and gifted!  It came out as lovely as I had imagined when I first picked the pattern and fabrics.

I really enjoyed piecing this one together, based on the Squareburst pattern from 13 Spools.  I sized down the original blocks to be 9" finished, so the quilt is a little under 45" square. 

My quilting stash is small, so I was amazed that I pulled all these ocean and sea glass colors.  The whole quilt is from fabrics I had on hand (and extras from another recent pastel finish).