A New Project

I love it when a leader/ender project becomes the focus/main project!

I've been doing a lot of secret sewing projects and as usual, I can't share them just yet. But, I can share the latest leader/ender project that has just moved to the main feature project.  

This is my version of Krista Moser's Rock'n Roller Coaster, using Tammy Silvers' Kismet fabric.

This is a very special project for me. I was honored to meet and spend three days with both of these awesome ladies back in September during the much-revised Ohio's Amish Country Quilt Festival. I knew that I wanted to create something special from that time together and this is the result. 

As many of you know, I test patterns for Tammy and love doing that. (We've had lots of communication over the past couple of years, but we'd never met in person, so meeting her was really fun!) What you may not know is that Tammy designs fabric too. I've been eyeing her Kismet line and was thrilled when she gave me a set of 2 1/2" strips. WooHoo!

That made my fabric choice for my special project easy. Whew! Now I just needed to decide on a pattern. Low and behold, Krista's Rock'n Roller Coaster pattern uses 2 1/2" strips. Decision made!

I typically have a patriotic quilt as a leader/ender project, but I decided that I wanted to take a break from that and start this quilt. It's quite easy, and the hardest part was deciding which strips I wanted to use because the quilt only uses 15 print strips. I have lots left over and am looking forward to using them for another project too - one that I've designed.  :-)

Of course moving the leader/ender project to the main project means that I need to start a new leader/ender project. Truth be told, I have some that I could have and maybe should have started up again, but I decided to start work on my Ava's Garden quilt, which is designed by Myra Barnes of Busy Hands Quilts. I am honored to test and sew for her too, and I decided that it would be cool to include one of her projects in this mix of things. (Of course I am working on a secret sewing project for her right now, but I wanted something that will be mine to keep.) 

I have always liked the Churn Dash block and the fact that these are made from 10" squares is great because I just happened to have a Berry Sweet by Elyse DeNeige 10 Karat Crystals pack sitting around my sewing area. I even had the yellow background fabric. Sweet!

I love the picture above. I think it shows how I feel about myself as a quilter - a nice healthy mix of traditional and modern. :-)

Stayed tuned for updates of this and those secret sewing projects I mentioned earlier. :-)