Primitive Quilts and Projects Magazine Winter 2019 - Santa Claus!

Winter is here and Christmas is just around the corner! Time for me to get the house cleaned up and ready to pull out the boxes of Christmas decorating goodies!

I've got a cute little Christmas project featured in the new Winter 2019 edition of Primitive Quilts and Project Magazine called Ho Ho Ho Santa, and it's just small enough for you to start now and finish well before the big day!

Ho Ho Ho Santa from Primitive Quilts and Projects Magazine Winter 2019

Primitive Quilts and Projects Magazine Winter 2019

Ho Ho Ho Santa is all wool appliqué and measures 12 5/8" x 16", and I used Aurifil Lana wool thread for the appliqué and embroidery.

In other news, my projects and manuscript for my newest book is complete, and you'll be hearing all about it sometime next year!

Happy Sewing and until next time,

Martha

A Festive Fourth of July

This year is almost half over, and it has passed all too quickly! I've spent most of my days working on quilts for a new book, which I won't be able to share with you for quite some time.

I had fun this month putting together a cute little Independence Day centerpiece for the upcoming holiday. It has a few new items from Hobby Lobby, "USA" blocks from my own childhood building blocks, my own crafted paper hat and firecrackers from Country Living magazine patterns from years ago, a vintage star cookie cutter and cup, and red and blue pom poms to fill the tiered trays. Coincidentally, in addition to this new centerpiece, the rest of my little family room is decorated year round with a patriotic theme.

My centerpiece is sitting on my very first machine quilted quilt. For the class, we were told to bring something to quilt, so I quickly pieced a small nine patch quilt and brought that to class. I chose solid red and white fabrics, figuring that even if my first machine quilting was a mess, at least I would be able to use the small red and white quilt in decorating for the holidays - Christmas, Valentine's Day, Independence Day. 

I took my dear little Kenmore sewing machine to the class, and free motioned loops and stars over the top. And to the casual observer, it probably doesn't look too bad. My plan for this little quilt's use in decorating has been fulfilled many times over.

This month my quilt, Autumn Stars, from my patriotic themed book, Betsy's Scrapbag, will hang at the Texas Quilt Museum beginning June 27. The exhibit will run through September 29, 2019. The museum is located in La Grange, Texas, and if I can manage to escape my feverish quiltmaking for my book, I would like to take a trip to the museum, which would be my first time. I have also always wanted to visit that part of Texas, so it would be a fun trip!

For more information on the Texas Quilt Museum, here is a link to their website:

http://texasquiltmuseum.org/index.html

Happy Summer Sewing!

Martha