Just a few things...

I got an exciting message today from Tracey at TraceyJayQuilts.  She's been working on this pillow using my Mod Medallions pattern!

Isn't it so fun!?!  I love her fabrics and how different it looks just by using different colors for the backgrounds (instead of white like my version) and leaving out the sashing.  Great thinking!  Tracey, you're making me want to make another one!   

I told Tracey that I was just wondering the other day if I would ever see someone else's version of any of my patterns and what that would feel like.  These patterns have been selling well, but I didn't know if anyone was actually making them!  As a designer, this is the best part, I think.  It was so fun to see Tracey's version of Mod Medallions and it makes me so happy to know that I brought some inspiration and joy to someone else's life (because I know Tracy must be so pleased with herself!  It's so dang cute!) 

So, thanks for sharing Tracey!  I'll be sending you a copy of my upcoming pattern when it's ready (should be in the next month or two.)  Also, just for fun, I will send the next two people that send in pictures of their Gigi's Thimble projects a copy of my next pattern as well.  Email your pictures to:

adctd2qultng@gmail.com

Just a couple more things:

First, we put our house up for sale!  We've been living in our house for about 6 years and decided it's time to move on.  We love our house, our neighbors, our view, EVERYTHING, but we decided we want to downsize a little bit and get something that's a little more "us."  We'll see what happens...  I'm just mentioning this because I'm going to be a busy little girl this summer.  We'll see how good I am at juggling. :)

Oh, the second thing is my Dresdens ~

I'm hand appliqueing the last dresden (#12 of TWELVE) onto it's background and then I'll start in on the sashing blocks.  You guys gave me some good advice last time, so thanks for the input.  I'm still auditioning fabrics for the centers.  I bought some of this as a possibility:

But I may hold off on deciding that until my other blocks are made (so I can see what direction they take the quilt in.)

Well, I gotta run.  I've got dinner to make and need to get to a baseball game after that.  Tomorrow is the last day of school for my first grader!  Yay!  It's party time!  (Yeah, I know that mentality will last for about 2 days.) 

Have a great night!

Guest Blogging over at Stash Manicure today!

Have you heard of the new blog, Stash Manicure? 

It was started last month by the amazing Rae Ann Nilson of the blog, Cutie Pinwheel (I'm so lucky to get to mingle with her at our awesome quilt guild!)  It's a fabulous blog that's quickly taking off with authors and followers from all over the world!  Can you guess what Stash Manicure is all about?  Go check it out for yourselves and see what projects I'm up to now - I'm guest blogging over there today.

Have a good one!

It's that time again

I've been wondering how Blogland would carry on with so many of my favorite people off at market... and then I remembered Amy.  She's hosting the 3rd annual Blogger's Quilt Festival right now.  This virtual tour of quilts is a great way to get to know other quilty bloggers and enjoy a whole lot of eye candy in the process.  Stop by Amy's blog to get a list of all of the entries in the festival.  We can still have fun as we sit in front of our computers day dreaming about Market, right!?!

So if you're reading this, I first want to say Hi.  Hello.  Welcome to A Little Bit Biased.  I'm Amber and I'm excited to meet you.  I wasn't sure what to share with you today, but then I remembered that I never officially posted about my first (and only, so far) recipe on the Moda Bakeshop.  I posted about the original CANDY HEARTS quilt back here, but then I made a spruced up version for the Bakeshop.  Here it is:

This is a special quilt to me for a few reasons.

- It was one of those spontaneous designs that came to me when I needed something cheery for my home after a long winter.  It really did the trick.

- It was a fun, fast and flirty project.  SCORE!

- Moda's Bakeshop actually liked it!?!

- They sent me free fabric to remake it in Moda fabrics! 

(When that UPS package arrived it was pure heaven I tell ya!)

- I love the cream background with the pops of color on the hearts and sashing.

- Who doesn't love ric rac? :)

- It was my first attempt at a ruffle edge quilt.

- My quilter did an amazing job quilting it.

You can click here for the tutorial. 

Well, that's my quilt.  Thanks for stopping by.  I'm excited to meet more of you during this wonderful Quilt Festival.  Thanks to Amy for organizing all of this! 

Have a great day!

The Winner

Shelby?  Shelby?  Are you there?  You're the winner.  Are you there Shelby?

True Random Number Generator said it:

Min: 1

Max: 55

Result: 38

YOU ARE THE WINNER!  YAY!

Shelby, just send me your address and I'll forward that on to Cassie.  She'll be sending this BEAUTIFUL bookmark to you!

Also, we had many of you say how much you loved the sewing themed bookmark, so Cassie has put three more in her shop for those of you who are interested.  These make beautiful gifts.  They make me want to stop sewing and actually read a book!  Ha ha!

Talk to you soon!

A Giveaway For You!

O.K.  I am so excited about this.  My sister Cassie has offered to give one of my readers this beautiful bookmark.  It's so perfect; I just can't get over it.

She had a giveaway a few weeks ago and I was one of the lucky winners.  I fell in love with mine and thought they would be the perfect Teacher Appreciation gifts for the end of the year, so I ordered two for my kids' teachers.  They come all ready to gift, in beautiful damask cloth bags that pull closed.  So not only is Cassie, giving away one of these bookmarks to one of you, she is also offering (to all of you) $2 off any of them in her etsy shop in honor of teachers!  The discount is only good until Wednesday, May 19th so she can get your bookmarks to you (hopefully) by the end of your school year.  If you see one you like in her shop then send her a convo telling her which one you want and she'll adjust the price for you.

Now, onto the giveaway:

This giveaway will end Friday, May 21st at Noon. 

I'll announce the winner shortly after that.

There will be two possible ways to get entries for this giveaway.

1.) Visit Cassie's etsy shop: Between the Lines.  Look at all of the beautiful eye candy in her shop.  Come back here and leave a comment below telling us which one is your favorite. 

2.)Become a follower of her wonderful blog, Serenade for Solitude then leave another comment saying that you're a follower. 

The winner will receive this beautiful bookmark:

Good luck!

Meet Gigi ~

I thought it might be fun for you guys to meet my Grandma, Delma (affectionately known as Gigi by her grandchildren).

Today my little sidekick and I stopped by my grandparents home to get some pictures of my grandma and some of her quilts. These are just some of my favorites, but I've got lots of pictures to share, so let's get started.

First up - she just had to show me this new purchase that she made a couple of weeks ago:

Isn't this quilt fabulous?!?  She got it for $100 from an antique store while on vacation in California!  It had only been in the booth for two days when she found it.  $100 dollars?!?  That is a steal of a deal if you ask me.  It's in great condition and is hand quilted with a scalloped border.  She's got it on her bed for Spring.  I just fell in love when I saw it.

Then we ventured into her sewing room to see some of her works in progress.

These blocks on the chair above are for her most recently started project.  A replica of an antique quilt.  She definitely likes scrappy quilts, which I know has rubbed off on me too.

I love the scrappy flying geese on this border.  They're tiny (2 inches wide)!  What a great way to use up scraps!

When my grandma was a little girl she learned to hand sew when she was about 8 years old.  This is the machine she used when she started on a machine at the age of 10.

The basket to the right of the machine is full of her yardage stash.

Here's some more of her stash.

Now this is what I really went over there to see.  Her red work quilt.  I love this quilt and I remember seeing this on the hoop in her front room as she has been hand quilting it over the years.

These red work patterns were originally for tea towels, but she decided to use them in a quilt.  She only had 7 patterns [and really wanted 8] so she found another pattern similar to the little girls. 

The one in the top right-hand corner is the one that was not part of the original set of patterns:

 

[This is Gigi!]

 

My grandma referred to this kind of echo quilting as "Hawaiian quilting" because it's all "eye-balled" [if that's a word?].  None of the quilting was marked on there except for one of the little waves that you see in the big four patch blocks in-between the red work blocks.  Amazing!

The embroidery is so beautiful on this quilt.  My grandma learned to embroider as a young girl [you know, when they didn't have t.v.'s and such.  That's how they entertained themselves.  I'm pretty sure my kids are not doing anything that even closely resembles that right now :)]  The embroidery that is on the red sashing is a pattern that my grandma had kept from the 40's or early 50's.  She was so thrilled that it worked so well with this quilt.

I absolutely ♥ that quilt!

Another quilt that absolutely boggles my mind is this one:

 

Does anyone recognize this?.  The pattern was in an American Patchwork and Quilting magazine from a few years ago [I'm sorry I don't know which volume.  Mine are lent out right now, so I can't look it up right now.]

This quilt is crazy!  There are 12,600 3/4" squares in it and it only took her 4 months to make.  Absolutely amazing!!!

One last thing I want to show you is another antique quilt that my grandma keeps on her kitchen table:

Look at the curved piecing and the flowers hand quilted in the circles!

She purchased this quilt for about $300 many years ago.  [Wouldn't you agree that the other one at the top of this post was quite the steal at $100!?!  That one fits their queen or king bed - not sure what size it is, but this one just fits over this table.  Your latest purchase was a great find Grandma!  But I really think they are both beautiful!]  

Well, I do have more pictures from our visit with Gigi, but that will have to do for today.  Thanks everyone for staying around long enough to see why my Grandma is so amazing.  I love having her close by.  It was a treat, Grandma!  Thanks again!

Oh, and thanks to you too Grandpa~

[for the songs and coloring!]

A Mother's Day Gift & My Wedges Are Done!!!

I'm a few days late, but I wanted to show some pictures from our Mother's Day Brunch with my extended family on Saturday.  My mom decorated all of the tables with this egg/chicken theme.  She is so creative.  Entertaining and tablescapes are definitely her thing.  She really goes all out!  Aren't the paper skillets such a fun idea?  I just thought the whole thing was so cute.  Good job Mom!

The food was delish and even went along with the chicken theme. We had breakfast burritos, my grandpa's recipe for fried chicken, banana's & whipped cream, muffins, fruit, and orange juice.  The men prepared the food while all of the women relaxed and mingled with one another (well, except my mom, who was in the kitchen over-seeing everything).  It was a great brunch!

After brunch, I was able to present this gift to my mother:

Many months ago she had tested out my Sugar & Spice pattern (which you can find here) using some lovely Fig Tree fat quarters that I had given her to use.  She just made a smaller version of the pattern, which is perfect for a crib or lap size quilt.  So for her Mother's Day gift [from mine and my brothers family] we finished it up for her.

My co-worker quilted it with her long-arm machine and

I was so pleased with how it turned out.  Dense quilting always puts a smile on my face and the rose design suited the fabric well.

This is the fabric we used for the back and the binding:

Happy Mother's Day Mom!  Hope you love your quilt! 

Oh, and I'm happy to say that all of my dresden wedges are ready to be sewn together.  Poking/pressing the points didn't take as long as I thought it would.  I started ironing them last night and finished up today!

It's kind of nice to commit to Blogland that you're going to do something.  It would have been very easy for these wedges to sit in my basket for another month or two, but just saying out loud that these would be done in a few days helped!  Now, for my next goal:  This week I plan to get the wedges for my 10 other dresdens sewed together.  Wish me luck! 

Color Me Bright

I'm a girl who likes to use up scraps.

 

So when my Sister-in-law Brittany {totally amazing quilter - check out her blog!}, told me about a really easy dresden tool, I knew I had the perfect fabrics to try it out on.  A lot of these fabrics are left-over from my Mod Medallions quilt, some are from my Wagon Wheels quilt and I had to buy just a few to freshen up the stash a bit.

I'm roarin' to go on a {bright and modern} 12-block dresden quilt.  I'm excited and determined that this will not be a 5-year project. 

2 nights ago - I got all of the wedges cut out.

1 night ago - I got all of the ends folded in half and sewed together to create the tips.  Like this:

Today, I cut them all off the chain and will also cut off the inside corners so that my tips will lay flat.

Over the next few days I plan to get all of the wedges above looking like the wedges below.

So this wonderful little tool, makes dresden's easy!  Full instructions, a

tip-poker-outer-thing and the ruler were included for the cost of $9.99 {minus a 40% off coupon.}  I'm not scared anymore! :)  It was really fun!

See?  I've got one and a half done!

I'm still auditioning fabrics for my centers, but aqua was my first inclination.  Any thoughts on that?  How do you feel about the polka dot background?  Kind of crazy right?  I think I like it though.  This ain't your grandma's dresden plate quilt. 

Now, I better go get snippin' and ironing before I get sidetracked.

(And I know I will because I'm expecting a treat from the UPS man today!  Yay!)