Granny Square Quilt is FINISHED :D

So, here is the deal.  Late Thursday night I got the reminder email about our Modern Quilt Guild meeting Saturday morning and saw that the theme for the meeting was "group swap blocks and fabric swaps.  This immediately brought to mind the Granny Square swap that I did with my friends.  So what do I do?  Yep, you guessed it, I worked ALL day Friday to get the quilt done.

The first thing I had to do was to trim the blocks.

I trimmed the blocks a 1/4" away from the edge of the outer colored square.

Then I sewed a 2-1/2" white border onto each block.

Next I trimmed all of the blocks to 12" square.

 I did this because it was the best way to get the blocks all square and the same size :)

This is where I enlist the help of my 18 year old.  She is great at arranging blocks for me :)  We laid them out in a 4x6 pattern.  
But wait?  I need a back.  I did have some of my block fabric left over to use for the back and/or the binding.  But I didn't like the leftovers for either.  Then I remembered the fabric I bought at Ikea on clearance a few months ago :)  It would be perfect!  It's just funky enough :)

Once that was all sewn together the "how to quilt" battle began.  I had originally planned to hand quilt it, but I couldn't find my hoop :(  I also wanted this baby DONE!
While I was arguing with my Quilting Ancestors (as Konda put's it), I sewed on a 5" white border around the whole quilt.  I was still himming and hawing when I just decided to machine quilt it.  BUT WHAT DESIGN????
I didn't want to stipple it.  I didn't want stars or squares.  Maybe pebbles?  NO WAIT!!  Flowers?  NO! I'll do the quilting I saw on Myra's blog!!!  PERFECT!!!  It's a kinda-loopy-swirly-ocean-wave-kinda design.
It was a REALLY fast pattern to fmq once I got over my directionally-challenged-ness :)

Lastly, how to bind this quilt?

I sort of liked the left over black from my block, but I didn't have enough :(  ...so I dug into my black stash box... that I sort of forgot I had ;D

There was some OLD black gingham that I don't even know where it came from.

It was PERFECT!!  I really LOVE this quilt :)

So, now for my first BIG quilting mistake :(  In my HUGE hurry to get this quilt finished, I decided to try Red Pepper Quilts binding tutorial.  Let's just say that I REALLY did a BAD job :(  She is a professional and I AM NOT!
After I got home from the guild meeting I took a seam ripper to it and hand sewed it on.  It took me a while, but WOW it looks SO much better.. and I got 3 episodes of Bones in while I did it :)  I even made Chicken Divan for dinner :D ....and washed the laundry and a few quilts that I have been needing to wash, but haven't had any dye catchers to do it.  I'll tell you more about my washing tomorrow :)
Have a GREAT Sunday!!!

A Sneak Peek!

Holy smokes am I tired!  I woke up early, ignored my family ALL day... well as much as you can ignore 4 kids... and got the Granny Square Quilt finished :) ...just in time for the Utah Valley Modern Quilt Guild meeting tomorrow at Broadbent's in Lehi.  We are sharing quilts we have made from swap blocks or fabric swaps.  I'll be sharing the Granny Square Quilt and the Red & White Pinwheel Quilt.  Here are your teaser photos...

More info to come tomorrow :)  I have got to FINALLY get in the shower!!  ....I mean, it's only 11:30pm!  Geeze Lousie!

WIP Wednesday with a little finish :)

So I really did get those Granny Squares finished before lunch today :)

I am very happy to have them off of my list.  #1 GONE, finito! ;)  Now, this one is still a WIP, as I need to make something with them after the swap next Monday :)  But what to do?  Hmmmmmm...  
Here are the links to other ladies in our swap Kristin, Pamela and April (these aren't April's actual swap squares...)
 I think I am going to make my mom's table runner out of granny squares.  They are SO cute!!!

On to what else I did today :)  I made the pillow cases for the troubled teenage girls.  I signed up to help Danny over at Mommy For Reals.  I made these guys (and a HUGE mess) this afternoon and I even mailed them off to Danny in Arizona!  #2 DONE!!!

Super soft cozy chenille for the front.  ALL of my kids love chenille, so hopefully one of the girls at this camp will too :)

I LOVE this back fabric.  I can't wait to do something with it!!! ..well, something for me with it!  (I've got  3.5 yards left....)

The center fabric is tightly stipple quilted.

The top ended up being TOO SMALL, so I added the accent purple border to get it up to  the 20" requested size.  I like the little snap of color ;)

This is a very soft pastel purple with little flowers.

These pillow cases are 20" square.  HUGE!  I was able to use my stash for the whole project so that is a major bonus :)

My hubby just surprised me by coming home early, so I am going to chat with him :)  Have a GREAT day!!!

.....So, I just got back from a hot date with my husband before he had to head out to meet with our church youth groups tonight :)  FUN!!  We went for chinese food.  I got my favorite garlic snow peas!  They ROCK!!!

Any hoots, I was down loading all of my pictures to Picasa and found that my boys had been taking LOTS of unauthorized pictures... Here is my favorite...

These pictures are of the front and back of a quilt I made for him when I was pregnant with him 9 years ago. How funny is that, that he did a quilt photo shoot, just like his mama ;D  lol  This quilt is a rag quilt with vintage cowboy fabric.  I still LOVE this quilt!!!

Now for the REALLY funny photos.  My boys are NOT allowed to play with my yoga ball....

Pretty hilarious!  BUSTED!

Here are some Skylanders, posing next to my AWESOME table runner :)

...a picture of me filling out my quilt show forms last week...

...my daughter eating lunch...

She'd be SO happy I shared these.  He also took some of her back side, that I am leaving out for her sake ;D

I am linking up with Freshly Pieced WIP Wednesday AND...


I am going to be linking this up with Elizabeth and SHOW OFF FRIDAY over at a Pieceful Life :), Sew & Tell Friday with AmyLouWho and Sarah over at The Fabric Addict for CAN I GET A WHOOP WHOOP???