One of the classes I took at sewing summit (I swear, someday my posts will no long refer to the sewing summit) was Improv Piecing by Jess of Urban Patchwork. What a fun class! I was really bummed when the hour was up and it was time to move on, but I did manage to finish up this little block.

I hate the colors. And that is my own fault, because Jess did send us a note suggesting that we bring our own scraps as most of the available scrap packs were brown and pink. I was so stressed out though, that I decided I would just make do with whatever was available. Truthfully, there were a lot more pink scraps in the bag, but I ditched them and only let the solid salmon color in because I didn’t have enough color. Not that I hate pink, because I don’t. But I just am not crazy about pink and brown/tans together. I think I feel like it’s way over done or something.

See that green lattice print on the upper right side? That was a “gift” from Rachel of Red Bird Quilts on Saturday morning as we were all sitting around at 0-dark-thirty in the morning drinking coffee and mooning over her scraps. I admired that fabric and she just handed me a piece of it. I threw it into the mix because there was not enough green in my scrap pack. It’s not exactly the same shades of green, but it’s probably my favorite part of the whole block.

After class was over I almost dropped the remainder of my scraps back on the scraps table, but at the last second decided to shove my block in the baggie with the leftovers and put the whole thing in my bag. I’m really glad I did, because I decided to turn that block into a little pouch and it was nice to have some matching scraps for the back. The green on this side is a scrap left from the yo-yo quilt. I quite like it.

You can just barely see the inside which is a simple brown and white polka dot from my scraps. I can’t even remember what I used that fabric for.

I quilted each side with straight lines on either side of each seam, and the original block got trimmed a bit so that the big brown stripe crosses the whole front.

Like I said, I’m not crazy about the colors, but I like the pouch as a whole. What should I do with it? Does anyone want it? Ok, enough questions. Leave me a comment and tell me what you think.

 

When I first saw Sue Zipkin’s Gone Haunting fabric in green I knew I had to have a pair of pajama pants made from it. Then Alexis saw it, too, and wanted a pair. But she preferred the black and white version. Then Chris pouted because he wanted some new comfy pants. So, heck, while I was at it I whipped up a pair for the baby in orange. You don’t want to know how much I spent on fabric for pajamas.

They’re all made from different patterns or lack thereof — ahem, mine… I tried to use a pattern, but skin tight green cotton pants with skull & crossbones on them are rather, well…. deadly. You can’t really see in these pictures, but my pants are so hacked up. I had to add a strip of fabric down the outsides of both legs. I also had to figure out what the heck was wrong that was making the front waistband ride up a la Urkel, but the back side droop like a plumber’s pants. Obviously I had a near miss, but they did finally work out for me.

Making the pants themselves wasn’t such a chore (I actually had mine done in time for Sewing Summit). But getting the pictures taken took a good two weeks. Everyone enjoys their pants and because of that it was impossible to have them all clean at the same time. Actually, in this picture, Sean’s pants are rather covered in apple butter. But what are you gonna do? Toddlers. Humph.

 

So at the Sewing Summit, in the swag bags, we got a tiny little plastic zipper bag with 9 three inch squares of fabric from beebolt. The idea is to make a block, send it in, and at the next summit the resulting quilt will be auctioned off with all proceeds going to Project Linus.

What fun! I knew I wanted the block to be perfect (because have you seen some of the work these ladies do?), and I’d heard that paper piecing would make it so… So I tried it. No, it didn’t work the first time. I’m not that lucky. I had to pick the first quarter of the block out about 3 times before I finally got it right. And they weren’t kidding, it really works fabulously! I never could have gotten all those points to line up in the center without cutting any of them off.

The only question I have is, if everyone participates, that’s like what? 200+ 8.5 inch blocks? That’s gonna be an awfully big quilt. So I wonder if they are going to just choose a few, or if they’ll make multiple quilts. Obviously not everyone will participate, I’m sure that was anticipated, but still…

On the other hand, if they make one giant quilt, think of what an awesome living room couch pillow fort that would make!

I can’t believe it has been nearly a week since I left for the Sewing Summit. It was such a nice weekend. If nothing else, it was two consecutive days of NO children whining and just plain me time. Amy and Erin did such an amazing job pulling the whole conference together. Everything from the sewing room to the choices of classes (and their speakers!) was just perfect. I learned lots and got very inspired to start even more projects.

I also really enjoyed meeting some of the writers for blogs I follow, as well as lots of other nice ladies whose blogs I’d not heard of before. My RSS feed reader is going to be jam packed as soon as I get through the stack of cards I brought home. Just a few of the great women I met: Faith, her sister Rachel, Kathleen, another Rachel, Jessica, Amanda, Darci, Chris, Tracey and her mom, DianeĀ and the list goes on! (I apologize if I don’t have your blog linked… send me an email or leave a comment and I will fix that.)

Classes: I really enjoyed every class I took. I learned something new in all of them. First up was improv piecing with Jess followed by Free Motion Quilting with Allison. These two classes alone were enough to have me itching to get home to all my UFOs. But wait, there’s more! After lunch was a class on Creative Fabric Selection (aka, color!) by Jeni where we all got free Kona Color Cards! Such an amazing gift. Finally on Saturday, the most inspiring and most talked about class: Marvelous Mini Quilts taught by (yet another) Amanda. On Sunday I took a couple of classes that I hoped would help me with blogging. The first was a photography class taught by Vanessa… the best tidbit from that class was the whole skit about how to make your thighs not touch in a photo… You had to be there, it was hysterical. And finally, one last class on blogging and social media that just spoke to the geek in me by Dana.

For all the fun it was, I had a few low points. I’m not really the kind of person who is comfortable breaking into a group of people to join the conversation, so I spent some time on the outside of the rooms just people watching, especially at the opening mixer. I was also excessively tired that night, so I was kind of out of it anyway. I did have dinner at the Red Iguana 2 with Kathleen (who I spent a lot of time with) and a bunch of people who shared my love of mole. I was the instigator of this outing, and one of the drivers, and I managed to get us lost in downtown Salt Lake City. Yeah, that was the last time I drove.

Saturday morning was a much better time. The lobby wasn’t overcrowded with sewists at 5:30 in the morning, and so I had a chance to introduce myself to Faith and her sister. They are so sweet and such fun to talk to. I decided after breakfast to really push myself to introduce myself to other people in the room and not cling to one set of women. I think I was fairly successful, but still felt a bit of an outsider even into the evening. It also didn’t help that I was constantly running up to my room to pump for the baby. Next year that will NOT be an issue.

Yep, you heard me. I’m so excited for next year already. I’ve spent waaay too much time pouring over all the photos on the Flicker group since I got back. And reading all of the recaps of the weekend. I was hesitant to post because I really did not take many photos. (The one at the top is a view out my hotel room.) I regret that now, but again, I’m not the kind of person who feels comfortable asking for others to take photos with me. Call me weird… I do.

All in all, it was a successful venture… even if I’m already missing the baby free restful nights.