a snowy winter wonderland -

I guess I can't complain, I do live in the Adirondacks, but I hate it when snow stops me doing things, like going to work! However, there are some in the household that are absolutely loving having a snow day, and all the fun that brings. It may only be the first snow day this week too, since the forecast has us getting another storm tomorrow, and Friday! Oh well, we got about 20 inches today, which was no fun to shovel I can tell you, but it is perfect snowman-making snow, so I'm focusing on the positive, and we do have power! So, happy snow day and enjoy! ♥

Awesome Giveaway!

There's an absolutely awesome giveaway going on at the A La Mode Fabric blog, here.

It's to celebrate Heather's blog turning one, congrats! ♥

You'll definitely want to check it out and get yourself entered, as the fabric she's giving away is simply wonderful. It's in two colorways, one for your boys and one for your girls, love that!

So, what are you waiting for, off you go and have a wonderful weekend, enjoy! ♥

shop update!

New Collage
Originally uploaded by miesmama

I added and moved around lots of new stock in my Etsy shop today, it's fun to see all the colors together. This collage looks very Fall-like in it's colors, but there's lots of other choices. I think I'll have to make a snowier inspired one too.
So go and check out the new and improved shop, over at Etsy, enjoy and Happy Friday! ♥

lovely new bee-ready fabrics

A whole bunch of Good Folks fabrics from Anna Marie Horner, I looooove all her fabrics! I'm also crazy about her Folksy Flannels line, and want to make a couple of quilts in that for my kids, but one thing at a time!

Munki Munki kitties - they're soooo cute, love them!

I recently joined my first online quilting bee, well bee's to be precise, as I actually joined two of them - 'Bee-Stitched' and 'The Fussy-Cut bee'! I'm so excited to be part of such lovely creative groups of people. I'm thinking for one I will choose a wonky log cabin block, and for the other an improv style block with fussy cut munki munki kitties! I bought this lovely fabric for one of the bees, not sure which, and then I'll need another bounty for the other! Fun, fun, fun! ♥

a block of the day

I love this block! It's called the Stripy Circles Block, and I saw it on the Block Party! blog, here. It's a lovely block to do, you get all the fun of the strip piecing, but also the drama of a circle block, with none of the difficulty! You have to give this one a try, and imagine how awesome a whole quilt like this would be?

Happy Thursday! ♥

some eye candy for your tuesday

This makes me almost happy it's still winter!
Nothing more lovely than a box of sewing notions, especially pretty colored thread.

Love these lamps!

Makes me want to find a lost leather case of treasures to look through.

(source for all images - WeHeartIt)

Hope you're having a magical Tuesday, enjoy! ♥

the spiderweb block -

I'll apologise in advance for the poor lighting in these photos, and now that's out of the way onto my first spiderweb block. It is as much fun as the strip piecing block, as it is done the same, except for the measurement at the beginning to keep the white in the middle. I'm not explaining that well at all, but luckily there is a great tutorial at the Quilt It blog, here, I used it and it's wonderful!

I always find the pre-trimming a scary moment, but then magically you have a neat, precise block!

When you have sewn four together, you'll have a full scrappy spiderweb block, yay! For this block I used a bunch of lovely Kafe Fassett fabrics, which really lends itself well to a scrappy block. I'm excited to do more now, I'm really addicted to the strip piecing method, and love the look of it! ♥

I ♥ string quilt blocks

This was a new technique for me, and I loooove it! It is like freestyle paper piecing, with random strips of fabrics, all in random widths, can't get much easier, or more fun than that!

When you first sew the strips together, see above, it looks a little scary, but then...

...when you've trimmed them down to size, it looks amazing!


There are a few changes I'll make from my first attempt - use many more fabrics,
and not in the same order. Although, I love this pillow top to be, I think it was too uniform, and so looked like it needed to line up exactly, but didn't quite. Ooooo, it's so much fun that you have to give it a try!
I was inspired to try this block by my dear friend Kirsten, she made a pillow top that she blogged about here, and you can find an excellent tutorial here on the wonderful Film in the Fridge website.