Swaps galore!

As you may have noticed on my side bar, I've joined a virtual quilting bee. Ours is called Snip.Sew.Send.

The way this works is that 12 people commit for a whole year to make quilts together. Each month one quilter sends fabric to the other 11, who make a block for that quilter and send it back. The quilter then assembles them all into a quilt. My month isn't until February, thank goodness since I don't have my mind wrapped around what I want to do. It'll also give me a chance to see what other people send out and get some ideas.

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I've also joined another quilting bee, but this ones is just for kid-themed quilts. It's called Sew Kid at Heart and it's over on flickr. Although I don't have kids and am not planning on having any before I finish up grad school (which will be a while), I love kid fabrics and often the designs are so whimsical, so needless to say I'm excited. For this one, everyone is sending fabric at the same time (in June) and each quilter works on a block of their choice each month and all of the quilts will be complete by the end of the year.

I found a pattern I'm pretty excited about with "bug critters". They're super cute and I think they can allow for a bit of fun and creativity for my fellow quilters. I'm not exactly sure how I'm going to put the group of them together, but this quilt by ...dotty... on flickr has me inspired. It has similar bugs and a great colorway. Don't you love it??


I bought these green fabrics for the bugs and I think I'm going to buy a black solid for the background. Once I get all the pieces I'll see how I want to sash the little buggers, but I'll probably end up doing something in really bright colors.


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Finally, I finished my mini quilt for my Swap Til You Drop partner. Here's a little preview.

I'll post more about after my partner gets it since I don't want to ruin the surprise. I'll just tell you that I tried out all kinds of new techniques and I'm ridiculously proud of myself for finishing my first quilt on my own!!