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Riding the exercise bike to retreat!

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Having fun with my ATG!

Decided I had had enough of the pink ATG. I'm just not really into pink tools. So I dug out some chipboard gears and other Tim Holtz type doodads and went to work. I didn't take any pics of the process (my bad) just the finished product. I love it! I'll always be able to pick mine out in a crowd.



Thursday, January 10, 2013

Some Upcycling Fun

Found this little gem at the Goodwill last Saturday and thought it would make a good ink station for my Distress inks and blending tools.

As you can see, though, it's a little beat up and needs some upcycling love. It holds 24 Distress ink pads and I've measured out 6 spots for blending tools along the top.


I took everything apart and drilled the holes for the blending tools, then sanded everything a little to rough it up for the paint. Next, painted the wood my favorite purple and the metal scrolls with white acrylic. Then wiped some of that off while it was still tacky to give it a nice distressed look.


Added some Graphic 45 paper to the visible surfaces and put everything back together.


Finally, loaded up with ink pads and blending tools. Also have room on the upper shelf for a box of gelatos and I think I might store my Distress Stains there too. We'll see how that works after I've used it for a few weeks. Not bad for a $2 Goodwill item!!!!

Monday, January 7, 2013

Quiltville Mystery Quilt---Easy Street

This turned out to be quite the quilt. It was way outside my comfortable batik box I've been working in lately, but I love it and it was alot of fun to do. As Roger said "It's Green!" and it sure is. Here are the rest of the steps up until the finished quilt top.



Block A and Block B. These are set on point with side and corner triangles. I forgot to photograph the corner triangles.



And here is the finished quilt top. I love how the flying geese radiate out from the B blocks. Just picked up some backing fabric, so stay tuned for the big finish in a couple of weeks.

Tuesday, January 1, 2013

Happy New Year! It's Mystery Quilt Day

I think this is my 7th or 8th New Year's Day mystery quilt from planetpatchwork.com. Today's quilt was super easy to put together and turned out really pretty.


 
I chose a blue/grey color palette.
 
 
We started off adding the lightest fabric choice onto some background squares.
 
 
Next we added another light strip to make a corner "L".
 
 
Now, we added some light strips to make a criss cross. This is starting to look like a path.
 
 
Next, we turned the previous blocks into a crossing path block with lattice and cornerstone. I actually traded out the original crosshatched blue I had chosen for a lighter leaf pattern. My original fabric was too close to my background fabric in value.
 
 
And finally, all of the path blocks are put together with a striped latticework and more background fabric for the borders. Another fun mystery quilt is in the books!