Finally Finished

Whoo Hoo! 

I put the final stitches on this sweet summertime Watermelon quilt last night just before midnight and I just love the way it turned out.

This quilt started with fabric purchased at Rosie's Calico Cupboard in San Diego.  I found the watermelon seed fabric, then chose the green while I was there.  I knew I had white fabric at home in my stash. 

My next job was to find a pattern. 

I have a bunch of 3 yard patterns from Fabric Cafe.

http://www.fabriccafe.com/

These are quick to cut and easy to sew patterns.

The Wind Mill quilt pattern looked really interesting because when I altered the dimensions of each strip each square could look like a watermelon slice.

My first plan was to find a watermelon print at my local quilt shop, but alas, there was no watermelon print fabric that matched the fabric I already had.  The watermelon seed fabric I had was pinkish

and all the print fabric was more red.

So I was back to the drawing board............

I've always wanted to do an applique border so I figured that this was my opportunity to create one.

Awhile back I remembered seeing an applique on the Moda Bake Shop website

so off I went to find it.

Maria Wallin's quilt "Sun Kissed Squares" inspired my watermelon applique border treatment.  I really liked the vines she created and the little flowers she used throughout the quilt.  I just made a watermelon to match my theme and used the flowers in a different way.

You can find a picture of Maria's quilt here:

http://www.modabakeshop.com/search?updated-max=2011-06-07T00%3A00%3A00-05%3A00&max-results=12

This is the label I made for the back of the quilt.

When I saw this swag banner made by Kerri over at the Lovely Little Handmades blog I knew I wanted to make one.

Mia's party gave me an excuse to try it out.

You can see the banner Kerry made for her daughter's Polly Pinwheel party here:

http://lovelylittlehandmades.blogspot.com/2011/06/pinwheel-party.html

I changed it up a little by using felt instead of fabric.  I also made the appliqued letters on my embroidery machine.  Pretty fast and fun!

Here are some other fun watermelon things that I have made or found.

The cool watermelon border fabric came from Joann's and made terrific tablerunners.  I used some of the scrap border fabric to line the bottom of some plain kitchen towels that I found at the 99cent store.  Micro Mitts were also made from some scraps.  I found a watermelon candle at Walmart and the watermelon drink jar came from Fry's.  Our dear friend Jo loaned us the watermelon bowl and shakers. 

All that is left to do is plop Mia down on the quilt wearing her little pink bathing suit with the watermelon applique and take some pictures........

when she gets up from her nap I just might do that!

Having a watermelon kind of day here.............

tammy

One in a Melon

The first birthday of Miss Mia is fast approaching

and Jenny is planning a watermelon themed party for her.

So in the spirit of things I decided to create some watermelon themed accessories.

Can you see the little pink bathing suit pinned on the quilt?

I appliqued some watermelons on it!

I found this cool watermelon fabric when I was at Rosies Calico Cupboard

in San Diego.  I was hoping to find a coordinating watermelon print fabric

here in Phoenix.  Unfortunately I didn't find any and I didn't have enough

fabric to really complete this quilt.  So I decided to add a white border

and make some cornerstones out of the leftover piecing.

Here is the quilt top with white borders and leftover pieces for cornerstones.

Now the fun part begins............I'm going to add some applique.

Yesterday I loaded my longarm with this Nativity panel.

I've been having significant problems with my longarm lately.

A couple of months back I purchased new wheels to upgrade my longarm.

Unfortunately the new wheels have created a problem with static electricity.

The static electricity has arced and messed with the electronic with my machine.  Fortunately the folks at APQS have been really helpful providing a grounding kit and technical support.

I haven't wanted to load customer quilts until I have had this problem resolved, which I think I may have done yesterday. 

The Nativity panel came out pretty good.  Only one blip with the machine.

I'm hoping to quilt Mia's quilt tomorrow and that will be the final test.

She checked out the top today and told me that she likes it!

Blessed are the piecemakers,

tammy