My Tom Cruise moment.

I ordered fabric for my quilting class/niece's blanket online from the wonderful people at Hawthorne Threads last week. I was a little unsure of what I wanted so I went through their website a couple of times last week. Of course, by the time I decided to buy, some of the fabric I wanted was out of stock. :o(  I really like their website because they have a color grid that displays fabrics in a specific color with the option to show from high dominance, to low, to "it's in there somewhere". I'm completely new to mixing and matching fabrics so that was a wonderful tool to have. :o) I also visited my local quilt shop Running Stitch Fabrics and came away with only one fat quarter and two half yards of Heirloom by Joel Dewberry. I wanted the whole Heirloom line, but I need to be focused. My last stop was JoAnn Fabrics. I got 4 fat quarters just in case. I think I only need 4-6 fat quarters and there's a slight chance I may have gone overboard. Oh well... more fabric for another project!

My fabric order arrived this Monday and I couldn't open up the package! I was almost jumping on the couch, proclaiming my love for the fabrics á la Tom Cruise. :o) I did good, I must say. My sister is very specific about which colors can be in my niece's blanket which I thought was going to be hard. But looking at my selection, I'm so excited to start cutting and piecing RIGHT NOW! I have the book that's required for the class already and the temptation to start is so hard to resist! But NO. I'm doing things the right way, and I will wait. But that doesn't mean that I can't take out my fabric to pet every once in a while. That doesn't sound creepy at all. ;o)

The required colors (as set by my very picky sister) are Magenta, Red, and Purple. I know we're both in love with Gray right now, so I'm sure she won't mind me throwing some in there too. Here's a shot of all of them together:

I'm not completely sure about the first gray from the left. I know that I love the pattern (it's Starlet in Gray from Jenean Morrison, the Silent Cinema collection) so I might have to try it out with a few of the other patterns. If it doesn't work out, it will just go in my "to use" pile for later.
Here are the pinks:

Blockprint Blossom in crimson (Joel Dewberry, Heirloom), 2 random pink fat quarters from JoAnn, two random red fat quarters from JoAnn, Cherries in Pink (Monaluna, Spring Metro Market) and Peeps Illusion in Pink (Lizzy House, 1001 Peeps).

Purples and Grays:

Peeps Jewels in Purple (Lizzy House, 1001 Peeps), Empire Weave in Garnet (Joel Dewberry, Heirloom), Starlet in Gray (Jenean Morrison, Silent Cinema), Kona Solid Ash, Castle Wall in Pewter (Jessica Levitt, Kingdom), and what I think is Raspberry Tart (Patricia Bravo, Nature's Elements).
I just hope that my wonderful color collection will translate into a wonderful quilt!
P.S. I will eventually have enough space in my computer to download all the pictures from my camera which will give me room in said camera to take better pictures than my Blackberry Curve 8520 can currently take. I have hope. :o)

Finished!.... Well, kinda.

I finished my place mat tops! I want to shout it from the roof tops and show them off to anybody and everybody! It wasn't too bad, actually. I just needed a table at the correct height (bent over a coffee table is not as comfortable as it sounds) and some TIME. :o)

I survived machine applique. :o) I'm super glad I spent the $14 on the open toe foot. I can see what I'm doing! Imagine that. I decided against using the blanket stitch because I couldn't seem to get the right stitch length/width  combination, AND it uses up a lot of thread! I went with a zig zag and I loved it.

Once I finished all the appliqueing, putting the tops together went by super quickly. I did *EXCELLENT!* on macthing up most seams.

However... some seams were not so lucky. :o( Wah, wah, wah....

Oh well. It's my first time, AND nobody will notice, AND we'll probably only use them a few times a year. It doesn't take away from the fact that I'm closer to finishing! Whoo!!!

Now... To sandwich!  Quilt sandwich, that is. ;o) Oh! And I signed up for a beginners quilting class at my local quilt shop! It doesn't start until the end of September, but that should give me enough time to figure out my fabrics. I'm going to quilt two birds with one stone: my sampler will be my niece's baby quilt. :o) I had planned on these classes being almost stress free for my husband since they're on Sundays, but that was before football was back on. :o( AND they're from 1pm to 4pm. Double :o(  But it's only 4 weeks! He'll still have 14 more of regular season PLUS the playoffs and I'll be able to translate all my new found skills into lots and lots of quilts!!! :o)