Feathers, chickens, and eggs for a Friday finish

What came first? Feathers or the chicken?

Green string star, 36 by 36

machine pieced and quilted

Both, at least when it comes to finished baby quilts at my house.

This string star has been in progress for several weeks

and now it is entirely quilted and bound.

This is the back, using up a half metre piece and some solids.

I like how the print hides the quilting, but I'm not so keen on the quilting stitches

in the solid bits.

Chicken and Egg II

42 by 50

hand appliqued, machine pieced and quilted

And here's the chicken-- and eggs.

If this looks familiar, it's because this is the second quilt

from the same fabrics and idea.

The other one is living with a cute baby up the street from me.

This one will be donated to a worthy cause as part of the

Year of the Baby quilt challenge my guild is doing.

I'm linking up with Amanda at Finish It Up Fridays.

Tuesday Feathers

Yesterday's flimsy quilted today.

A quilt for an alert baby

My oldest child was one of those really alert babies who didn't want to miss a thing

 (which really means he didn't sleep much during his first year.)

And which also means I didn't have much time for myself.

Remembering those years, I made a quilt for an alert baby.

37.5 by 37.5 inches

This quilt top has lots going on for a not-sleepy baby:

narrow strings of many fabrics, finishing at 3/4 inch ,

including brights and black and whites,

a bright kelly green background,

and colourful dots in a black background.

And if that wide-awake baby doesn't have enough to look it,

that baby can learn the primary colours

and count the dots on the back.

Read the story behind this quilt over at the String Thing Along blog.

And my alert baby?

He's now thoughtful, intelligent 18-year-old man

about to graduate high school and start university.

And he still doesn't need much sleep!

I'm linking up to Design Wall Monday over at Patchwork Times.

Meandering into a good place

Inspired by online free motion tutorials, I tried some simple squiggles

and more complicated meandering.

To say it nicely: I suck at meandering.

Not one to throw fabric away, I cut an eight inch square from the meandering fiasco

and covered it with strips from the scrap bin

cut a piece of old towel to size

and quilted the whole thing onto a dark backing

and then bound it with leftover binding.

Now instead of ugly meandering

I have another potholder for my kitchen.

Here's another layout of the string star.

The strings are 3/4 inch wide finished, and the blocks finish at 5 inches.

String star on the wall

I made another set of HST and now I'm auditioning them for placement.

Originally I had planned to make the star float in green and then add borders.

Now I'm wondering if this double star effect is better.

I'm planning on making this baby quilt size.

I'm linking up to Judy's design wall Mondays.