Farmer's Wife Sampler blocks

Hello to all my new followers who found my blog through Blogathon Canada! If you read my profile on the Sew Sisters site, you may have seen that I'm a self-described incurable procrastinator. Case in point: I received this great fabric from fellow British Columbian Barb in July and have only started making her blocks now! Back in the summer, I arranged a private swap with Barb because she's working on a Farmer's Wife Sampler Quilt and needed a few extra blocks and I'm still looking for blocks for my Fab Bee neutrals quilt (whoops, just realized I haven't blogged about that one!). 

I received a package of orange, grey and blue fabric and set to neatly cutting it up (after I located a copy of the book through an interlibrary loan! Note to Vancouverites: the Vancouver Public Library now has a copy of this book due to my request for purchase. You're welcome!). I was so proud of myself for neatly organizing all the fabric I'd need for each block into carefully labelled baggies. And there they sat for four months, patiently waiting for me to finish my even-more-overdue Fab Bee blocks and my quilts for the Northwest Quilting Expo.

Now that I've started making the blocks, I don't want to stop! They're just 6.5" unfinished and they're so cute! So far I've made my first snowball block:

And a HST-filled beauty called Whirlpool. I think I must be a slow piecer cause even with the pre-cut fabric, it took me an hour and twenty-five minutes to sew up this block. I had fun doing it!

Added bonus: my rotary cutter and box of pins match the fabric!

One of my first quilts was a sampler that I made at a course at The Cloth Shop in North Vancouver. Have you made a sampler quilt? 

Blogathon Canada Winner

Wow! What a week! I've had the most visitors ever at my little blog and it was a treat to see all the comments you left on my Blogathon Canada post. I had fun visiting other Canadian quilting blogs from coast to coast! Thanks again to Sew Sisters Quilt Shop for hosting the blog and all the fabulous giveaways. Speaking of giveaways, do you want to hear who won the ten FQs of beautiful Kona Cottons?

It was Jan Baker, who left comment number 285 out of 287 comments. Just goes to show that it's never too close to the deadline to enter the draw! Congratulations, Jan!

I happen to agree with Jan, you can never have enough solids! Here's my Kona solids stash after I did some rainbow-order organizing. Do you have a stash of solids? What is your favourite type of solids?

Blogathon Canada 2013 - Welcome to the West Coast!

 

It's time to kick off Blogathon Canada, a week-long celebration of Canadian quilting bloggers! Together with Heather from Winding Bobbins, I'm representing BC as a host. I'm here to tell you a bit about myself, introduce you to a dozen BC bloggers, and give away some lovely fabric!

Hi, I'm Holly! I've been quilting for close to twenty years and my passion for this craft only gets stronger with time. I founded the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild in 2010 and it has enriched my life in so many ways. I love learning new tricks, being inspired, and, best of all, making quilting friends who really get me. Although I have all sorts of WIPs and ideas for new projects, I don't actually finish many quilts each year. Much of my time is spent chasing after my two daughters, ages six and two. I'm lucky enough to have a husband who supports my quilting habit and is willing to take photos of me holding a quilt in the middle of a busy downtown intersection!

I do enjoy blogging, but find myself posting more to Instagram these days, you can find me there as hollybroadland.

Thanks for visiting and taking a look at a some of my work!

 "Gabriel's Quilt" (2009) - this was my first modern quilt and the quilt I shared at the inaugural VMQG meeting in June 2010

 My first quilt (1996) - This is the quilt that started it all for me!

"HST Tote Bag" (2013) - Here is my swap partner Susan with the tote bag I made for her as part of the Pacific Northwest Modern Quilt Guild Meetup in Portland, Oregon. Pattern by a great Canadian quilter, Leanne of She Can Quilt!

 "Memories of QuiltCon" (2013) - I started this mini quilt at a Lizzy House workshop at QuiltCon in Austin, TX this February. I'm already looking forward to QuiltCon 2015!

 "Ethan's Quilt" (2013) - My most recent finish, I gave this quilt to my cousin's baby this past weekend.

"Rainbow Girl" (2013) - A labour of love that took me 3.5 years from start to finish

Check out these BC Quilt Bloggers! (and be sure to visit Heather's blog for an additional list)

A Pieceful Life

Silver Thimble Quilting

Adventures in Life

What Comes Next?

Stacey in Stitches

CReate the poinT

Quilting Fun

Sew Bossi

The Zodiac Quilter

aRt by Rhoda Forbes

There & Back

Eclectic Gnome

Since I'm a huge fan of solids, I chose a prize that makes me happy. I hope it makes the winner smile as well!

To enter the giveaway for this bundle of ten fat quarters of bright and beautiful Kona Cotton solids from Sew Sisters Quilt Shop, simply leave a comment on this post by midnight PST on Saturday, November 23rd! (edited Sunday, November 24th: giveaway now closed, and the winner has been notified. See Blogathon Canada Winner post.) Please leave your email address if you're a no-reply blogger or I won't have a way to contact you. If you are a no-reply blogger, you might want to take a look at this tutorial by Jodi of Pleasant Home on how to change that. Contest open to international participants.

 Don't forget to head over to the Sew Sisters blog to enter their Aurifil thread giveaway!

The Blogathon is on all week and I hope you'll enjoy getting to know the host bloggers from all across our country!

Monday, November 18	BC	Holly	Holly's Red Bike (that's me!)
Monday, November 18	BC	Heather	Winding Bobbins
Tuesday, November 19	Maritimes	Adrienne	Chezzetcook Modern Quilts
Tuesday, November 19	Maritimes	Marjorie	Marjorie's Busy Corner
Wednesday, November 20	AB	Katherine	Sew Me Something Good
Wednesday, November 20	AB	Andrea	Urban Quilt Works
Thursday, November 21	SK	Flo	Butterfly Quilting
Thursday, November 21	MB	Kathy	Tamarack Shack
Friday, November 22	QC	Izzy	Dizzy Quilts
Friday, November 22	Territories	Danielle	A Geeky Crafty Life
Saturday, November 23	ON	Jackie	Jackie's Art Quilts
Saturday, November 23	ON	Krista	Krista Quilts

How do I number the comments on my blog?

In preparation for the Blogathon Canada giveaway I'll be having next week thanks to Sew Sisters Quilt Shop, I wanted to number the comments on my blog. Since this is my first time hosting a giveaway and I'm planning on using the Random.org Random Number Generator to determine the winner, I wanted to have an easy way to figure out who number 42 was should they win. Off I went to ask my trusty friend Google and I came up with a tutorial called Help with Numbered Comments in Blogger by Jenelle of Echinops and Aster. Her solution is to add some code to the CSS (style sheets) in your Blogger template and it's simply a matter of cutting and pasting the code.

I'll let you follow her easy-to-follow tutorial if you'd like to number the comments on your own Blogger blog. The only thing I would add is that I was momentarily stumped at the first instruction of "Go to Template Designer". It turns out that Jenelle had already thoroughly explained that in her post "Layouts and Templates in Blogger" that is part of her awesome "Tech Help for Bloggers" series. In case you just want a quick visual, I'm going to give you a screen capture to show where that is.

Select "Template" from the left hand menu and then click "Customize" and you'll be brought to the Template Designer. 

Click "Advanced" and it will open a new menu for you.

Scroll to the very bottom of this menu and you'll find "Add CSS". Ta da! See Jenelle's post for the code you'll need to paste into the box.

Enjoy your numbered comments!

Rainbow Girl in Blogger's Quilt Festival

Welcome to my blog! If you're visiting through Blogger's Quilt Festival, thanks for stopping by! I really did mean to post this quilt as soon as the ROGBIV Quilts category linky opened up last week, but I got caught up in making a Totoro Halloween costume for my daughter so I'm posting on the last possible day, of course! If you know me, you won't be surprised!

I finished "Rainbow Girl", a colour wheel quilt from Joelle Hoverson's pattern in "Last-Minute Patchwork and Quilted Gifts", back in September so that it could be in the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild's special exhibit at the Northwest Quilting Expo. I wrote a lengthy recap post about this quilt at that point, so I'll keep this fairly short.

Label of "Rainbow Girl"

I named this quilt "Rainbow Girl" because that was the nickname my Grade One teacher gave me after I painted rainbow after rainbow in her classroom. I'm happy to say I still keep in touch with Mrs. Smith and have printed out a photo of this quilt to send her in the mail (yes, the old-fashioned kind with a stamp and everything!).

I took my quilt to Vancouver's beautiful Stanley Park for an outdoor photo shoot.

As soon as I heard that they'd painted rainbow crosswalks in Davie Village, I knew I had to take my quilt there for a picture!

Enjoy the festival and have fun visiting this online quilt show! You can vote for your favourite quilts in fifteen different categories including my category, ROYGBIV quilts.

Blogathon Canada 2013 is coming soon (and I'm a host!)

Have you heard of Blogathon Canada? Did you participate last year? Are you ready for 2013? Blogathon Canada is a week-long celebration of Canadian Quilting Bloggers brought to you by Sew Sisters Quilt Shop. In its second year, Blogathon Canada celebrates the tremendous craft, talent, and passion of the online quilting community in Canada.

Here's how it works:

Each day host bloggers will introduce themselves and their work on their blogs. They will include links to more blogs from their province so you can visit those blogs as well. The host bloggers will also host a giveaway of some of their favorite goodies from Sew Sisters so you have a chance to win every day of the week! This year Sew Sisters has teamed up with Aurifil, Northcott and Robert Kaufman to bring you even more fantastic giveaways! Check out their blog for more and see how you can join the party! Go to Sew Sisters Quilt Shop.

I'll be starting off the tour as one of the BC hosts, so be sure to come back here on Monday, November 18th to learn more about me and to enter the giveaway!

Here’s the Schedule

Monday, November 18	BC	Holly	Holly's Red Bike (that's me!)
Monday, November 18	BC	Heather	Winding Bobbins
Tuesday, November 19	Maritimes	Adrienne	Chezzetcook Modern Quilts
Tuesday, November 19	Maritimes	Marjorie	Marjorie's Busy Corner
Wednesday, November 20	AB	Katherine	Sew Me Something Good
Wednesday, November 20	AB	Andrea	Urban Quilt Works
Thursday, November 21	SK	Flo	Butterfly Quilting
Thursday, November 21	MB	Kathy	Tamarack Shack
Friday, November 22	QC	Izzy	Dizzy Quilts
Friday, November 22	Territories	Danielle	A Geeky Crafty Life
Saturday, November 23	ON	Jackie	Jackie's Art Quilts
Saturday, November 23	ON	Krista	Krista Quilts

2013 Finish-a-Long: Quarter 4 Goals

I had such a great time when I joined Leanne of She Can Quilt in the Finish-a-Long last quarter, that I had to make a new list for Quarter 4! However, when I sat down to think about what I really think I can get done this quarter, I realized most of the work hasn't been started yet, so I can't put it on the list. The big example is my Cotton Couture Challenge project which is due on November 18th.

My "project" is still a bundle of beautiful bright solids that look like this (image borrowed from Michelle, since I haven't even photographed my fabric yet):

At this point, I don't know what my plan is, but I think I'll probably make something for my eldest daughter, since I've never made her a quilt.

I have lots of small projects that are priorities, but don't count for the FAL since they haven't been started yet. I'll write them out for myself because I really do want to finish them before the end of the year.

1.Fab Bee nature block for Barb

2.Pac Man block for Chris

3.Farmer’s Wife blocks for Barb

4.Tote bag for VMQG swap

5.Halloween blocks for VMQG

6.Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus tote bag for Super Y

7.Totoro costume for Eleanor 

8.Cotton Couture Challenge project

9.Christmas ornament for parents

Wow! Knowing myself, there's no way I'm going to get this list done! Better not add to much to my official Finish-a-Long list. I need to focus on my small projects so I'll have space to work on other stuff in the new year.

Here's my list of eligible projects to finish in Q4:

Just one quilt! If I get really ambitious, I may finish my Easy Going Modern quilt as a Christmas present. Here's the progress I made back in July 2012 when I took Felicity's fun workshop (mine's the ombre version in blue). A quilt top in one day and it hasn't made it further than that in the past year and a bit. I wonder how many of the quilters in this photo have finished their quilts.

I look forward to seeing what everyone else is working on in the FAL this quarter!

Rainbow Girl: WIP no more!

Back in July, I wrote up my list of Q3 Finish-a-Long goals, with high hopes that I would complete all three of my works in progress by the end of September deadline. Here's finish three out of three. Yes, you read that right, I completed all of my goals for this quarter!

I proudly present to you.... Rainbow Girl! 

This quilt has been a labour of love and I'm so excited to see it finally finished! I started selecting fabrics for the colour wheel back in Spring of 2010 and finally stitched on the label in September 2013. Three and a half years is quite a long time to make one quilt, but if I'd finished it earlier than July 2013, I wouldn't have been able to get this awesome picture with the newly-painted rainbow crosswalk in Davie Village in downtown Vancouver. It was meant to be!

I was inspired to name this quilt "Rainbow Girl" because that was the nickname my wonderful Grade One teacher Muriel Smith gave me after I painted many rainbows in her class. She once told me that a rainbow I had painted for her hung in her classroom from the year I was in her class until she retired!

I basted this quilt back in November 2012 and was eager to finish it, but anxious about ruining all my hard work with the quilting. My old Singer wasn't up to the task, but this February I brought home a new Janome 7700 and it just loved all the straight line quilting on this project! I entered "Rainbow Girl" into the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild's special exhibit at the Northwest Quilting Expo and that deadline was the perfect impetus to get this project finished once and for all!

Amy Dame braved the mean border guards to get our quilts down to Portland, Oregon (yay, Amy!) and Bill Volckening wrote up a great review of our exhibit including a photo of my quilt. Thanks, Bill!

I've written a number of posts sharing my progress on this quilt, so this will just be a few details on the final steps as well as some glamour shots.

I quilted it as recommended in the pattern, with intersecting straight lines that remind me of the spokes of a bicycle. Because all the lines met in the middle, I decided on a thinner 50wt thread (Aurifil 2021 Natural White). Believe me, I was scared to see what would happen when all those lines came together, but it worked out beautifully!

 When adding the oodles of boring white binding, I kept the binding neatly rolled around the leg of my extension table.

This was the first time in my nearly twenty years of quilting that I joined my binding rather than tucking in one end! I used the Perfect Binding Tutorial by Julie of Jaybird Quilts and it was clear and useful! I love the way you can't tell where you started sewing on your binding. Note to self: when joining the two ends, leave a dog ear on each side before you sew your seam and the strips will line up when you press the seam.

Another first, when I hand stitched the binding, I loaded up six needles at a time so I wouldn't have to break my rhythm when sewing. Loved it! (cute pincushion is a gift from Amy).

I wanted the label to be special after all the work I'd put into this quilt, so I chain stitched a rainbow. I had never chain stitched before, but the Easiest Chain Stitch tutorial on Sublime Stitching made it simple.

Photo by Michelle McLatchy

 And now for a few more beauty shots!

At Beaver Lake in Stanley Park

At Show and Tell at the Vancouver MQG meeting, Photo by Michelle McLatchy

Quilt Stats
Name: Rainbow Girl
Size: 56"x56"
Pattern: Color Wheel Quilt from Last-Minute Patchwork and Quilted Gifts by Joelle Hoverson
Fabrics: Tons of Kona white, plus 52 scraps of a rainbow of colours, some from my stash, some swapped with friends (especially Barb), and some purchased for this project
Batting: Warm & White (thanks again to Krista for catching me before I used Warm & Natural for this bright white project!)
Quilting thread: Aurifil #2021 50wt
Timeline: Started in March 2010 (before the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild even had its first meeting!), basted in November 2012, completed in September 2013.
Total project time: 3.5 years!

Previous posts about Rainbow Girl:
July 3, 2010: Rainbow Girl
November 23, 2011: WIP Wednesday
August 22, 2012: WIP Wednesday
November 19, 2012: Blogathon Canada 2012
July 8, 2013: 2013 Finish-a-Long: Quarter 3 Goals

Q3 Finish-a-Long post #2 - baby quilt

Back in July, I wrote up my list of Q3 Finish-a-Long goals, with high hopes that I would complete all three of my works in progress by the end of September deadline. Here's finish two out of three. I have to give a huge thanks to Leanne for hosting the motivational FAL, without her inspiration (and deadlines!), I doubt I'd have a finished quilt right now!

This simple little patchwork baby quilt was made with love for my cousin's new baby boy. I used the same Kate Spain zoo fabric that I'd used for Ellie's quilt back in 2011. I added a mix of coordinating tone on tone prints and Kona solids. I kept it simple, cutting five inch squares of each fabric, and adding a few pieced blocks here and there. I made my first ever hour glass blocks (yay!) using Rita of Red Pepper Quilts' tutorial. I also pieced a few half-square triangles and striped blocks to add interest. When planning the layout, I arranged the blocks randomly and tried to balance out the colours in a way that was pleasing to the eye.

I quilted in an organic crosshatch pattern, meaning that I didn't mark a single line on this quilt! It was so much fun watching the pattern emerge! I used a taupe Aurifil thread (2314) from a new box of 28wt threads I got over the summer. 

For the backing, I used exactly one yard of Amy Butler's full moon dot that I had in my stash. Actually, this entire project used fabric from my stash, the Kona charcoal binding was leftover from my first set of potholders for the VMQG-FVMQG swap, and even the batting was scraps from another project.

I thought Baby E deserved a personalized quilt, so I fused this six inch tall letter E to the backing and blanket stitched around the edges before basting the quilt. 

This was a fun project and I'm looking forward to giving it to our little cousin sometime before he turns six months old. It finished at 35"x42", so even though he's not a newborn anymore, it's plenty big for him to use it for years to come.

"Memories of QuiltCon"

Back in July, I wrote up my list of Q3 Finish-a-Long goals, with high hopes that I would complete all three of my works in progress by the deadline. I'm happy to report that I have met my goal! Three finishes in three months would already be some kind of record for me, but it ended up being three finishes in just three weeks because you know I like to cut it close to deadline!

"Memories of QuiltCon"

I sent two of my quilts down to the Northwest Quilting Expo in Portland for the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild's special exhibit at the show. Only three VMQG members made the trip to Portland for the show, so we were lucky to get a report back from Portland MQG member, Bill Volckening. His blog post, titled "Northwest Quilting Expo: Vancouver Modern Steals the Show", shares pictures of a number of the VMQG quilts that were on display.

"Memories of QuiltCon" is one of the two quilts I had in the show. It's a 12"x15" mini quilt that I started at Lizzy House's awesome workshop at QuiltCon.

 Me and Lizzy with my finished quilt top on the design wall full of other students' work

 I had to use some of Lizzy's Pearl Bracelet (bought at QuiltCon!) for the back. I followed Laurraine's corner pockets tutorial from her blog, Patchwork Pottery.

Thanks to my good friend Michelle of Eclectic Gnome for this picture of a happy Holly sharing the completed quilt at the September VMQG meeting. The quilts were due that night and were being driven to Portland the next day. Knowing me, are you surprised that I'd started with a quilt top at 10:00am that morning?

I'm really happy with how this quilt turned out and I'm glad that the deadline finally got me to finish it just seven months after I started it in Austin! I love playing with HSTs and solids and I also enjoyed trying out some matchstick quilting for the first time. I think a mini quilt was the perfect way to experiment with this incredibly dense style of quilting!

Post one of three done. I'll be back with more soon!

I'm on Canadian Quilt Talk!

Hop on over to Brandy Lynn Maslowski's blog, Explore Fibre, or head to iTunes to listen to Episode 9 (Modern Quilting Uncovered) of the new Canadian Quilt Talk podcast! This week, Brandy Lynn interviewed me about modern quilting, how I started the Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild, and how our guild is now an official member of The Modern Quilt Guild. I had a lot of fun chatting with Brandy Lynn about a topic that I'm passionate about and I hope you enjoy the interview! If you'd like to stay in the loop about future Canadian Quilt Talk podcasts, you can like the facebook page.