Quilts in My Home - Welcome Quilt

I decided to feature another wall hanging quilt this week and his quilt hang right by our front door (and bathroom). 

This simple Welcome hanging was made by my mom in September 2007 just after my husband and I got married.  I like the colors and its a nice splash of color in the entry way of our house.  We have a two story house with 20 foot ceilings so I like to use quilts to splash up the walls and add some color.

 B is very into letters right now so he loves spelling out Welcome.

My sister picked out the quilt hanger and we have the Texas star several places in our home.

As you can see, it is right by the front door (and bathroom).

I love how homey this quilt feels and also how my almost 2 year old has not somehow pulled it down yet.  I think he has learned to treat quilts with respect or he will feel the wrath of mommy.

Project List

So this past week I finished my Halloween quilt top and made a few small things for a craft show.  I have the back, batting and thread to finish the quilt and still need to finish the custom curtain order.  B's 2nd birthday is in a week and a half and I feel like I haven't done anything for that either.

Here is the top of the Halloween quilt:

So this next week and half I want to finish Halloween quilt, finish curtains, make train and/or music storage bins and a few decorations for B's birthday.  B is getting an art easel for his birthday so I want to make him a smock for painting.  I have some oil cloth that I got from the remment section that I plan to use and need to buy some binding and then sew.  It should be quick and easy and hopfeully I can get it done as a little gift for his birthday but if not, I can always give it to him later.

 Here is some pictures from our craft show:

My mom made all the quilts, I made all the rest.

And now here is the updated project list:

Rank	Project	Status	How Many
1	Bento Box Halloween Quilt	75% Complete	1
2	Crayon Roll for Boys	COMPLETED	2
3	Brown Angel Hair Crochet Scarf	75% Complete	1
4	Crayon Roll for Girls	COMPLETED	2
5	Car Roll	COMPLETED	2
6	Custom Curtain Order	Started	1
7	Christmas Quilt	65% Complete	1
8	Trains Fabric Bin		1
9	Music Fabric Bin		1
10	White Crochet Baby Blanket	25% Complete	1
11	Pink Eyelash Knit Scarf	Started	1
12	Kitchen Oven Mitts - Wedding Gift		1
13	Car Mat Quilt		1
14	White Newborn Hat and Booties		2
15	Animal Cloth Blocks		2
16	Floor Cushions		1
17	Swiffer Wet Jet Reusable Pads		3
18	Hooty Hoot Owl Quilt		1
19	Medium Rice Therapy Hot/Cold Bags		3
20	Numbers Bean Bags		1
21	Pink Knit Baby Blanket		1
22	Girl Animal Print Rag Quilt		1
23	Baseball Knit Hat and Booties		2
24	Football Knit Hat and Booties		2
25	T-Shirt Bag		1
26	Kitchen Aid Cover		1
27	Sewing Machine Cover		1
28	Lovey Tag Blankets		2
29	Mini Apron and Oven Mitts Set		1
30	Small Rice Therapy Hot/Cold Bags		3
31	T-shirt Yoga Pants		2
32	Alphabet Bean Bags		1
33	Red Knit Prayer Shawl		1
34	1600 Quilt		1

Chocolate Pumpkin Mini Muffins

I should start out saying that I am not a big fan of pumpkin.  I have tried it in breads, muffins, pies and never been a big fan of it's flavor.  However, I want my son to grow up trying new things and different flavors so I took a small step and made some Chocolate Pumpkin muffins.  I did not make up this recipe, there are tons of variations online but it is easy, quick and most important, doesn't have a strong pumpkin flavor.

Similar to Diet Soda cupcakes, this recipe really calls for 2 ingredients.  Can of pumpkin puree and a box of chocolate cake mix.  Being the "make everything yourself" person that I am, I made my own pumpkin puree.  The Happy Housewife has a great tutorial on how to do so.  I was hoping I would get more puree out of the pie pumpkin but I got only 3 cups.

I added a little vanilla extract and Baking Spice mix from Penzys.  I have seen other add chocolate chips and I personally think that pecans would be awesome in them too.  Next time I am adding pecans for sure.  Others use spice cake mix instead of chocolate but I am a chocolate lover so of course I used chocolate.

These "muffins" are super fudgy and very yummy.  You can't really taste the pumpkin at all but you save calories by omitting oil and eggs and you gain the nutritional benefits of pumpkin which include good sources of vitamin A, beta-carotene, fiber and iron.

Chocolate Pumpkin Mini Muffins

1 15 oz can of pumpkin or pumpkin puree
1 box chocolate cake mix
2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp cinnamon or baking spice


Mix all ingredients together, scoop into mini muffin pans.  Bake at 350 degrees for 18 min or until done.

These come out to about 60 calories per mini muffin.

Project List Update

This past week I have been busy working on my Halloween Quilt.  I am guessing I am about 60% done with it, I have 2 of the 6 rows done and will probably need 3 more hours to finish putting the top together.

Here is a sneak peak of the blocks before they were laid out. 

I am hoping to finish the top this week, get the backing fabric and then baste and start quilting it by this weekend.  I am thinking about quilting with with silver thread...

I also made my first crochet earflap hat!  I made this for a friend and followed a pattern online and the hat turned out a little tall but should work.  My friend is a Penn State fan and so I made it white and navy for her daughter.  

I have a craft fair this weekend so this week will be busy making up some crayon rolls and car rolls to go with the quilts and scarfs that I already have for sale.  Whatever I don't sale at the fair (which will probably be everything) is going up on Etsy next week and my Etsy shop will officially be opened!

Rank	Project	Status	How Many
	White and Navy Earflap Hat	COMPLETE	1
1	Bento Box Halloween Quilt	60% Complete	1
2	Crayon Roll for Boys		2
3	Brown Angel Hair Crochet Scarf	66% Complete	1
4	Crayon Roll for Girls		2
5	Car Roll		2
6	Custom Curtain Order		1
7	Christmas Quilt	65% Complete	1
8	Trains Fabric Bin		1
9	Music Fabric Bin		1
10	White Crochet Baby Blanket	25% Complete	1
11	Pink Eyelash Knit Scarf	Started	1
12	Kitchen Oven Mitts - Wedding Gift		1
13	Car Mat Quilt		1
14	White Newborn Hat and Booties		2
15	Animal Cloth Blocks		2
16	Floor Cushions		1
17	Swiffer Wet Jet Reusable Pads		3
18	Hooty Hoot Owl Quilt		1
19	Medium Rice Therapy Hot/Cold Bags		3
20	Numbers Bean Bags		1
21	Pink Knit Baby Blanket		1
22	Girl Animal Print Rag Quilt		1
23	Baseball Knit Hat and Booties		2
24	Football Knit Hat and Booties		2
25	T-Shirt Bag		1
26	Kitchen Aid Cover		1
27	Sewing Machine Cover		1
28	Lovey Tag Blankets		2
29	Mini Apron and Oven Mitts Set		1
30	Small Rice Therapy Hot/Cold Bags		3
31	T-shirt Yoga Pants		2
32	Alphabet Bean Bags		1
33	Red Knit Prayer Shawl		1
34	1600 Quilt		1

Quilts in My Home - Chili Pepper Quilt

Not far from my Texas Quilt hangs the Chili Pepper Quilt.  My grandma made the Chili Pepper Quilt as a wedding shower gift over 4 years ago for me.  My grandma loved chili peppers and always had chili pepper things decorating her home, including chili pepper lights for a Texas themed christmas tree.

I think my favorite thing about this little hanging is how it fits perfectly in my kitchen.  My grandma had never been to my house and didn't know of this little patch of wall space between cabinets, countertop and the edge of the wall.  Somehow, she made a wall hanging that first perfectly there and adds a pop of color and decoration to my kitchen.

 

She quilted around her applique and in the ditch and also added some quilted leaves and peppers in the white spaces.  I LOVE her applique, she was a master at it and I wish I would have learn from her how to applique.

Quilts in My Home - Texas Quilt

Some of you might remember me mentioning a new series on my blog a few weeks ago.  Well, here it is!  I am starting a (hopefully) weekly series of Quilts that I own and are in my home.  I come from a family of quilters so I have quilts that I have made, my mom and grandma made and others that I have received as gifts.  One of the things I love about quilts is that there is usually a story behind why the quilt was made.  As part of this series I will highlight quilts in my house, describe who made them and the story behind the quilt.  I think this will also be a great way to document all the quilts I have (which off the top of my head is just over 25). 

I decided the best way to start off this series is with my favorite quilt.  If we ever have to evacuate or the house is on fire I am grabbing this quilt (along with photos and such).  I call it my Texas Quilt and it hangs in our living adding a pop or color to our very tall (20 foot) beige wall.  

The reason this is my favorite quilt is 1. I love all things Texas and 2. This quilt was made my myself, my mom and my grandma who is no longer with us.  It is the only 3 generation quilt I have and it can not be replaced.  This quilt was 1st place in the Lee County Quilt show and got an honorable mention in the group category at the Austin Quilt Show.

I bought the pattern for this quilt from a quilt store in Amarillo and asked my mom to help me make it since I had to have this quilt and I wasn't near talented enough to do it by myself.  We also asked my grandma to help since he was the queen of applique and would do justice to those blocks. I did the log cabin and other small blocks along with picking out a lot of the fabrics and general colors of the quilt. My grandma created all of the applique blocks and my mom did the strips, lone star block, Texas star block, pieced the overall quilt together and hand quilted the whole thing!  My grandma actually picked out all the fabric for her applique blocks but it went perfectly with what I picked out, I guess we have the same taste levels.

Here are some closeups of the quilt.  You can see the fine detailing of the applique and also the different ways each block was quilted including quilting of boots, stars, longhorns, cowboy hats and coyotes in the border.  

 Handquilting in the border

 The Alamo

A Longhorn

Texas Star and Oil well.  I want a whole quilt made up of Texas Star blocks but I need to work on my skills more first. 

Windmill and some cactus 

 Lonestar block and Boots

Tree and State of Texas

Texas flag and Bluebonnets - the state flower

Hayley Baby Quilt

My friend asked me to make her a quilt for her sister-in-law and wanted it to go with the nursery bedding her sister-in-law picked out.  The bedding was the Hayley Collection from Pottery Barn Kids.  It took me a while to figure out a pattern but I decided to purchase the crib sheet from the bedding collection and use that as fabric in the quilt to help it blend in with the rest of the set. I was also able to match the colors correctly because a picture off the internet does work that well.

Here is the bedding set -

and this is the quilt I made to coordinate

 And the back pieced with some of the fabrics:

The crib sheet has cute owls, birds and trees on it so I cut out squares from the sheet and then found coordinating fabrics to make a shadow box block.  Since the bedding has a lot of white in it I added white sashing between blocks and used pieces of the crib sheet as my cornerstones.  I also didn't want a heavy binding and used the crib sheet for the binding to give it a soft feel with pops of color.

The final quilt was 45"x45" and can be hung up in the nursery or used as a play quilt but is larger than a typical baby quilt so the little girl can grow with it. 

Here are a few more close up shots:

I really hope my friend likes it and that her sister-in-law likes it!  It is always hard to make something and not knowing if the receiver will love it as much as you do. 

Project List and Finished Projects

Yay for finished projects!  I knocked a few things off the list and only added one big thing to it.  I went to a local quilt show yesterday and found some really cute Halloween fabric and am going to try and get a Halloween quilt done in the next 2 weeks.  I am going to do a Bento Box design and the quilt will be a smaller lap size probably.  B's 2nd birthday party will be October 30th so I would love to have it done for that so I can show it off to our family and friends at least.

I also finished the car fabric bin following the same design as the food fabric bin I made B.  This one holds all his cars and next I will do the music bin and train bin (and I finally found cute train fabric I liked!)

I also finally made B a crayon roll.  He likes to color and usually does at home and when we go out to eat.  We use the colors at the restaurant and I typically take home the free 3 crayons that we get.  Now I have a crayon roll to keep in my purse to put those loose crayons in and to have on hand if B needs to color.

Now, take a guess and see if you can guess which brand of fabrics these are?

Did you guess Riley Blake All Star 2 collection?  You know me so well.  I picked up these fat quarters a few months ago because I had to have them of course but I love the color combination together for the crayon roll.  I have enough left over to make another crayon roll or two in the same combination.

The other big project I finished is the Hayley baby quilt which I will post about separately.  I am almost done with my brown angel hair scarf but ran out of yarn and need to run to Joann's to pick up another skein.

Here is the rest of the list:

Rank Project Status How Many Hayley Bedding Quilt COMPLETED 1 Crayon Roll for Boys One COMPLETED 2 Cars Fabric Bin COMPLETED 1 1 Bento Box Halloween Quilt Started 1 2 Custom Curtain Order 1 3 Brown Angel Hair Crochet Scarf 66% Complete 1 4 Christmas Quilt 65% Complete 1 5 Trains Fabric Bin 1 6 Car Roll 2 7 Music Fabric Bin 1 8 White Crochet Baby Blanket 25% Complete 1 9 Pink Eyelash Knit Scarf Started 1 10 Kitchen Oven Mitts - Wedding Gift 1 11 Car Mat Quilt 1 12 White Newborn Hat and Booties 2 13 Animal Cloth Blocks 2 14 Floor Cushions 1 15 Swiffer Wet Jet Reusable Pads 3 16 Hooty Hoot Owl Quilt 1 17 Medium Rice Therapy Hot/Cold Bags 3 18 Numbers Bean Bags 1 19 Crayon Roll for Girls 2 20 Pink Knit Baby Blanket 1 21 Girl Animal Print Rag Quilt 1 22 Baseball Knit Hat and Booties 2 23 Football Knit Hat and Booties 2 24 T-Shirt Bag 1 25 Kitchen Aid Cover 1 26 Sewing Machine Cover 1 27 Lovey Tag Blankets 2 28 Mini Apron and Oven Mitts Set 1 29 Small Rice Therapy Hot/Cold Bags 3 30 T-shirt Yoga Pants 2 31 Alphabet Bean Bags 1 32 Red Knit Prayer Shawl 1 33 1600 Quilt 1