Hand-Pieced Quilt Along... Finally Finished

Way back in January 2012 (yikes), I started Erin's Hand-Pieced Quilt Along. I loved it! It gave me something to look forward to each Friday when she posted the next block. Well, I had the top pieced together last summer, and this summer, I finally decided to get it quilted and bound. This WIP is finally finished.

Here it is!

 It will hang in my sewing/craft room someday, and I hope Peanut asks about it. Then I can talk to her about...

• loving what you do
• doing what you love
• not everything will come out perfect
• even if it's not perfect, you can still be proud of it

You see, there is no way I'm ever going to wash this wall quilt. I'm pretty sure it would fall apart. I'm not kidding. Sorry there are no close-ups... it's wavy, some triangle points are completely cut off, and the stitches are totally uneven.

 BUT, I still love it and I will be proud to hang it up. I started something and I finished it. And I'm OK with it being perfectly unperfect :)

PS: The scrappy binding is definitely my favorite. It took awhile to hand-sew the scraps together, but I managed to use scraps of each of the fabrics I used in the blocks to create the binding. I love it!

Linking up with Connie's Linky Tuesday and Quilt Story's Fabric Tuesday and a new one that I've found called Link a Finish Friday over at Richard and Tanya Quilts... Links are on my sidebar!

A Few Quilts in Grizz's Family

I took these pictures of a few quilts last summer when we were visiting Grizz's parents. 

Please bear with the poor photo quality and just enjoy some eye-candy :) Perhaps I can take better pictures another time...

A Grandmother's Flower Garden and a Wedding Ring
Faded and well-loved... and still loved today :)
(I've been told who has made these before, but of course I have forgotten... perhaps Grizz's great-aunt?)

Hand-Appliqued Butterflies
Aren't the colors beautiful? And the hand-quilting!
(Grizz's Mom)

Pretty Pink Pineapples
More beautiful hand-quilting!
(Grizz's Mom)

July Goals Finished

I did it! I finished them the weekend before the wedding. I still can't believe I did it, especially since it was my first time hand-quilting! It feels good to follow through with a plan, even with a little one in the house... it can be done! 

(Thank goodness for naps and Daddy-time!).

 Easter. 

My favorite part is the tone-on-tone white crosses. 

 Christmas.

My favorite part is the singing Santa (Dear Mr. Claus from Moda).

Fourth of July.

My favorite part is the wonky star of course - first time ever sewing one of those!

St. Patrick's Day.

My favorite part is the reverse applique (I found some helpful hints here and here).

Goal Setting Post

Almost Finished Post

Thank you Melissa and Shanna for hosting "A Lovely Year of Finishes;" it definitely helps to have a little extra motivation!

I also have loved the Summer Series at Clover & Violet - so many fun project ideas for when you are on the go and you can't bring the sewing machine with you! I've linked up two of these table runners with them (the Christmas one and the St. Patrick's Day one)... go check out what everyone else has hand-crafted!

Also linking up with...

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I'm Almost Done! (July Goals)

Yup, that's right! I have a week until my friend's big day and all I have to do is finish the binding on all four table runners/toppers. I can do it!!

I finished the quilting quicker than I expected - it went much faster once I found the right combination of needle to fabric :) I still need to work on getting my stitches to look as nice on the back as on the front, but that did improve once I got rid of the hoop - but once I did that, the table runner got a little poofier. More practice needed I guess! I did like that I could quickly pick it up during Peanut's cat naps without taking the risk of waking her up by turning on the sewing machine.

Now to hand stitch the binding to the back - maybe I can finish a side before Peanut wakes up again!

*Edit from phone: Sure enough, after just finishing one side, I heard some one wake up! She's lucky she's cute :)

To see the entire story on my July goals, see this post...