Card Tricks Complete!

My card tricks are all finished!  Hip hip hooray!

A pair of tricks!

     

A view of the back.

They finished at eight inches square and were constructed with two layers of cotton batting.

I think they turned out fairly well.  More practice is needed for sure, but not too shabby for a first attempt!

In other first attempt news, one of the local quilt stores had a class on using a Nolting long arm machine this weekend.  I think I liked it better than quilting on my little machine.  I found she was certainly more intuitive for free-motion!

The store owner had 15(!) quilts still to finish before Christmas, so it may take a while to get some more practice in, but I'm already planning to come back in the new year to try again!

Linking up with Let's Bee Social.

Woodland Sampler - May

Both of my card trick blocks have been assembled and quilted.  There has been a lot of learning happening during the process, but all's well if it ends well!

Starting the Quilting

Binding Pinned

This was my first time quilting using a walking foot and, though this wasn't the simplest first piece I could have tried, I think I'm starting to get the hang of it.  However, I do need to look into why my machine has taken to skipping stitches.

The first potholder went through a lot of stitching and un-stitching (and possibly some yelling...) on the way towards getting the ends of the binding joined, but the second one went a bit smoother.  Hopefully the next set will be even easier still!

All that's left is a bit of hand stitching to finish off the binding!


I also picked up my Woodland Sampler again.  This cross-stitch fell off of the to-do list back in May.  I stitched the May box in July, and over Thanksgiving a gnome took up residence there!  I'd like to finish half the year before 2015 rolls around...  Only one more small square to go!

May Gnome

Linking up with MOP Monday, Slow Stitching, and Let's Bee Social.