Teaching and Forgetting

Yesterday I spent the day at Quilt St. Geroge teaching some lovely ladies.   Sadly, I only remembered to take one picture all day before anything even stared.   I am totally blaming it on the cold medicine.  Yup, the cold is still hanging on.  Boo!!

I had a wonderful time teaching these ladies, and I think they really enjoyed the classes.  Everyone was very understanding of my slightly slower cold brain functions and  me losing my voice on and off.  It really didn't matter, because we were quilting, and quilting is fun!!!   We all had a great time and the ladies learned some great new techniques and tricks and that made my day ;)  I tell you what, sick and everything, Teaching is still one of my favorite parts of this whole quilting thing :)   I love it!!!
 

Terrific Tuesday Giveaway Day!!!

It's Terrific Tuesday Giveaway Day . . . let's have some fun :)

First, we need to announce the winner from last weeks Terrific Tuesday Giveaway!!   The winner of the Custom Bundle from The Intrepid Thread  is . . .   Number 113. . . Congrats apple blossom!!   I have emailed you :)

    

    

    

And on to today's

Today's Terrific Tuesday Giveaway is being sponsored by Green Fairy Quilts.  Along with sponsoring the giveaway, Green Fairy Quilts has currently a buy in bulk special going on!!!   These are some amazing deals!!  No coupon necessary :)  And Green Fairy Quilts ships free in the US and discounted to international.

And today's Terrific Tuesday Giveaway is for some fabulous basics, that I know we all need!!!  A Bella Solids White Jelly Roll and a Bella Solids White Layer Cake!!!!! 2 Pre-cuts for 1 lucky winner!!  Wow, that will speed up some background quilt making :)

  

      

You have two entry chances, the second being optional, and please leave a separate comment for each.  All Entries are welcome, including International Entries.  Please just be sure to leave an email address if you are a no-reply blogger ;)  

ENTRY 1 - Simply leave a comment that tells me what is your favorite color to use in the background of a quilt :)  

 ENTRY 2 - Show your Green Fairy Quilts love.   You can follow them on Bloglovin, Twitter, Pinterest, Facebook, or Instagram.  You can Sign up for their Newsletter which will ensure you catch all of their amazing sales, or you can visit the Shop and then share a favorite item ;)   Just be sure to leave a comment of how you showed your Green Fairy Quilt Love!!!

And that's it ;)  The giveaway will be open until next Tuesday, January 13th when I will announce a winner at the beginning of next weeks Terrific Tuesday Giveaway Post :)

Good Luck and Have a Happy Quilting Day!!!

Modern Building Blocks - The Little Guys

So remember back in November, when I decided I was going to make a Back to Nature version of Moda's  Modern Building Blocks pattern . . . and then in mid December when I finally cut out all the pieces for all 48 blocks.  Well things are finally starting to roll.  Over the Holiday, I kept sneaking off to my sewing room to make 1 or 2 more blocks.  Then Saturday, I pretty much had a Saturday Sew Day (which was so very awesome, as I only got to snatch bits and pieces of time throughout  December) and I managed to finish all 30 of the 6" blocks!!

I decided to start at block #48 and work my way back to block #1.  That way I would do all of these little baby 6" blocks first and not get hung up on some of the more complex ones at the end of the project.   And interestingly enough, I found some of the more complex ones to be my favorite ones to put together.  It really was great fun and getting 48 pieces to come together with lovely points in 6" just puts a smile on your face ;)  

Seriously, if you are on the fence about making one of these, they are so fun!!  I highly recommend doing all of the cutting first,  it is a bit tedious, but then you can just sew, sew, sew.   And no joke, these little blocks are addicting,  you really don't want to stop with just 1 block :)

And sadly, now that progress is going to come to a bit of a hult.  Because lucky me, I have caught quite the doozy of a cold.  I am hoping it won't last to much longer as I am teaching at Quilt St. George on Wednesday, which will be a little difficult if I feel like I am still swimming through the haze that is my brain right now ;)

So I best go climb back in bed and get some rest so I can be in tip top shape come Wednesday :)

Have a Happy Quilting Day :)   

Super Scrappy Triple Irish Chain - It's Finished!!!

Yippee!!!  It's all done and I love it!!!  I finished the binding late on December 31st, so this is my final finish of 2014!!!  The Super Scrappy Triple Irish Chain :)  That's 1936 little 2 1/2" squares all sewn together.   Now that is some scrappy goodness ;)

Clear back in August, I wrote up this tutorial for a Super Scrappy Triple Irish Chain Block and the amazing gals from the Beejeebers group each made me a block.   I love how each block is so very scrappy and represent quilts from all of my Bejeebers friends ;)  The ladies did such an amazing job on their blocks.

And then my blocks sat for a while, because I decided I wanted this to be a big 88" x 88" quilt and that meant I needed to make a few more blocks.   Finally, come December, I got to cutting and piecing and made those blocks.  Once the blocks were made, the quilt went together in a snap.  I am so glad I didn't wait any longer, because I just love this quilt!!!  

When it came time to quilt it, I decided I wanted to do something that added to the wonderful traditional nature of this design.  So I quilted arches on the four sides of each square.  It was so perfect and very easy as the gridwork was already done with the patchwork.  It was super fun to quilt, and I love the way it really adds to the quilt ;)   I debated about whether to use white, grey, or yellow thread as all looked great, so in the end I decided to use #517, Limone, as soft yellow So Fine Superior Thread, because I just don't use yellow that often and changing it up is always fun.  And it looks awesome ;)  

And just for fun to show you how much it has snowed here lately.   It is awfully hard to want to take pictures of your quilt outside when you know you have to wade through this ;)  But it looks kind of fun all on the white powder, and I love that you can really see that fun scrappy binding in this pic ;)  

So now, it's time to just cuddle up in front of the fire with my final finish from 2014 :)  A huge thank you to the ladies of the Beejeebers Bee for helping me make this quilt ;)  I really do love it oh so much.   So much, that you might find we make this block again this year but in different colors ;)

If you want to make your own Super Scrappy Triple Irish Chain, you can find the Block Tutorial Here.  I added a few instructions at the end to help with putting the quilt top together ;)  If you do make one, I would love to see it.  You can add it to my Flickr Group here, or email me a picture at happyquiltingmelissa@gmail.com ;)

 Thanks for popping in today.  I hope you all had a Happy New Year and you have a very Happy Quilting Weekend!!!

Linking this finish up to Sarah's and Amanda's ;)

2014 - It's A Wrap

Once again, it's time to roll up one year and get ready for a new one.  I just love this day!!!  What a wonderful opportunity to step back and see all that you have done in a year and then get super excited for all that the new year will hold ;)  So, let's get to it, some 2014 pics and some 2015 goals ;)

2014 was the year of the Quilt for me :) Oh my goodness, I had a lot of fun making quilts this year!!    I love Quilting!!   I love the fabrics, I love the designing, I love the cutting, piecing, and quilting!!!  I love it all!!!   And on a side note, I have to say, I was a little blown away when I put this little mosaic together.  You don't realize just how much you have creating until you stop and put it all together ;) If I can get the binding put on my Super Scrappy Irish Chain today that is one more finish to add to 2014 :)   And see that little question mark at the bottom, that represents some secret finishes that I still can't share.  Yup, the year of the Quilt ;)

And I also had some quilty/sewing project finishes this year ;)  I can't tell you how excited I was this Christmas to have our new matching family stockings.  They have been on the "to do" list for years and years so they were a particular happy finish for me this year ;)

And you can't forget bee blocks!!  I absolutely love the 2 bees I am in.  I love the opportunity to try new blocks, stretch my skills, and most of all, make wonderful friends with the ladies in the groups.

And those 3 little mosaics pretty much are a quick Round Up of my Happy Quilting 2014 :)  I wish my sewing machine had one of those internal timers that said how many hours I was stitching this year, that would be cool to know.  I guess I can safely say, A Lot :)  You can see more details about all of the quilts in my Quilt Archive Tab at the top of the page including links to any tutorials ;)

And now, It's time to look forward to 2015!!!

Last year at this time I printed off 4 goals that hung in my sewing room and served as a constant daily reminder of what I wanted to accomplish creatively in 2014 ;)

This will be my printout out for 2015 :)

1 -  Push Your Creative Comfort Zone
2 -  Share The Ongoing Process
3 -  Pause And See Your Journey
4 -  Say Yes While Being Mom

These probably only make sense to me but there is so much thought crammed into each little statement.  Seriously, I could write a page on each of these little 4 things and everything that goes into them and what I want to accomplish with them :)  These are a great little summary of all those thoughts.   I look forward to these 4 little lines guiding me in my 2015 Creative Journey!!

And Before I Wrap This Up . . . I can't ever say it enough.  Thank You!!!!   Thank You to each of you who make Happy Quilting a part of your day!!!  Thank you for your kind comments, pictures, sweet emails and constant words of encouragement.  They mean the world to me!!    I can not being to explain how it makes me grin from ear to ear to see how Happy Quilting continues to grow and touch people's creative lives.  Thank You!!!


So here's to 2015, May it bring us all lots and lots of  Happy Quilting!!!!!!