Too busy to get any sewing progress (and a link party)

A family visit, a lunch with friends (where I cooked everything) and not feeling well yesterday, prevented me to have much progress... but there is something...

The Ongoing Project List:

1. Play with Me QAL - September board (the last one) has been released (see below)!
2. Charity Quilts for DC General Homeless Shelter project - new top started (see 3.)
3. Summer Solstice QAL - 2 blocks done (see below)
4. Minion QAL - no progress
5. Mirror Mirror Afghan - no progress
6. Hello Block Swap - have partners info, will work on this soon
7. Splendid Sampler - no progress
8. Road Home Row-A-Long - will be shared soon, see announcement below!
9. Secret event (January 2017) - no progress
10. Secret event (February 2017) - no progress
11. Secret event (August 2017) - no progress
12. Secret event (Feb-Oct 2017)  - no progress
13. Teal Mini Swap - assembled the border, picked all the fabric

The EverythingElse List:

1. 70273 Project - no progress
2. Jane T - no progress
3. The SK project - no progress
4. the 31000 Xs project - no progress
5. Spirit cross stitch project - no progress
6. Alice in Wonderland quilt - no progress
7. As You Wish -  no progress
8. Crazy optical illusion - no progress
9. Memory quilt 2 - no progress
10. Gyleen's BCP Mystery QAL - no progress

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Let's start with some announcements!!

On September 13th, I will be participating in "The Road Home Row Along" 

Hosted by Marian @ seamstobesew

This is going to be a great event, full of fun rows, highlighting places all around the world! And there will be a lot of prizes too!! Make sure to check the schedule and follow along!!!

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The last board for the Play with Me QAL!

Even if this is the last board, you could still join and have the chance to win amazing prizes for the final giveaway of the QAL. Details on Monday on the link above!! Just send me an email or leave a comment below if you have questions!

--

So... the only thing I made is assemble two of the blocks for my baby quilt from Melissa's Summer Solstice QAL. The only difficult part of these blocks is that at first you have a gazillion of pieces and pick all the ones for each single blocks takes a lot of time... now that I assembled 2, the pieces are much less, and the last ones will come together much quickly.

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How about you? What are YOU up to?

Link it here and share it with me!!

An InLinkz Link-up

Curved piecing and Minions (and a link party)

So many projects in my mind, very few down on fabric :) 

The Ongoing Project List:

1. Play with Me QAL - August pattern released (see below)
2. Charity Quilts for DC General Homeless Shelter project - new top started (see 3.)
3. Summer Solstice QAL - I am catching up! (see below)
4. Minion QAL - all blocks quilted and joined (see below)
5. Mirror Mirror Afghan - no progress
6. Hello Block Swap - blocks for my August partner done (see below) 
7. Splendid Sampler - no progress
8. Road Home Row-A-Long - no progress on finishing my piece

The EverythingElse List:

1. 70273 Project - no progress
2. Jane T - no progress
3. The SK project - no progress
4. the 31000 Xs project - no progress
5. Spirit cross stitch project - no progress
6. Alice in Wonderland quilt - no progress
7. As You Wish -  no progress
8. Crazy optical illusion - no progress
9. Memory quilt 2 - no progress
10. Gyleen's BCP Mystery QAL - no progress

--
Seriously... last week I mentioned 5 reasons why I love Melissa's (HappyQuilting) QAL... let's add another one: it is so easy to catch up!!

With her easy and clear instructions it took me just 3 nights to make all the Flying Geese and all the Drunkard Path blocks!!
Some are perfect, like painted by Giotto... other are less perfect, like painted by Giotto's 1 year old son moderately drunk ;) but I really enjoyed the process, especially because I alternated FG and DP construction so I wouldn't get bored or frustrated. By the end of the process, I think I am a pro at curved piecing (especially considering that I am not precise cutting the pieces).

Since I caught up with all the FG, I wanted to see how all the pieces look on my design floor :)

 (mising some 3'' squares, but everything else looks great!)

Making this project I learned a fantastic lesson: when we use the "no waste or little waste" methods (for either HST, FG or DP) directional fabric and stripes are tricky because pieces will go in opposite directions. However... if you mix the stripes with gingham fabric and polka dots, the "misaligned" lines won't be so striking and they will blend right in with the rest (or at least that what my eyes thinks :) ). Also mixing the scale probably helps.

I am looking forward to the assembly direction because it was quite challenging to arrange those pieces without the clear instructions that Melissa always has!! :)

--

By chance, the August board for my Play with Me QAL is also featuring curved piecing! However the pieces here are much much bigger so they are easier to stitch (and they are also fewer ;) ).

If you are interested in learning more about the QAL, you can read everything on the Play with Me QAL official page!

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I made two blocks from my August's partner for the  Hello Block Swap.

Block pattern available here

Butterfly pattern available here

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Finally I finished quilting around each character!

Now I just need to add a border and I will be done. I took the quilt to the quilt shop to pick the perfect fabric. A lady saw the quilt and said "oh, this is so cute, a little kid will be so happy to have it!" and then she corrected herself "oh, well, maybe this is for a teenager"... well... the last time I was called a "teenager" was about 20 years ago ;)
Minions are for all ages!! :)
P.S. I am finishing up the pattern for the "tower of minions" block and tonight I will submit it to Fandom in Stitches, so it will be available soon for others to enjoy!! :)
--
How about you? What are YOU up to?

Link it here and share it with me!!

An InLinkz Link-up

A Splendid week (and a link party)

This was one of my most productive week ever!!!

The Ongoing Project List:

1. Play with Me QAL - June released!
2. WGACA projects (changed projects)
1. Charity Quilts for DC General Homeless Shelter project - no progress
2. SECRET quilt for exhibit - (FDJ) - no progress
3. Minion QAL - half block done (hope to have it done soon)
3. Mirror Mirror Afghan - no progress
4. Hello Block Swap - one block received and one block done (see below)
5. American Quilt (previous known as Americana QAL) - shipped to the quilter!
6. Splendid Sampler - TEN blocks done (see below)
7. Challenge quilt - idea abandoned
8. Road Home Row-A-Long - sent out pattern, no progress on finishing my piece

The EverythingElse List:

1. 70273 Project - no progress
2. Jane T - no progress
3. The SK project - one block done and several more designed!
4. the 31000 Xs project - no progress
5. Spirit cross stitch project - no progress
6. Alice in Wonderland quilt - no progress
7. As You Wish -  no progress
8. Crazy optical illusion - no progress
9. Memory quilt 2 - no progress
10. Gyleen's BCP Mystery QAL - no progress

--
The new board block was released last Monday: Ludo (done with traditional piecing). So fun, fast and easy!

Find all the details at alidatweloqdesigns.blogspot.com

--
This week has been a SPLENDID week: I made 10 blocks for my Selvage Splendid Sampler:

Once I get my selvages out, these blocks are so easy and fast! I am still quite behind, but I prefer to make these blocks in big batches instead of one every three days!!

--

I completed the block for my second partner for June for the Hello Block Swap.

A little house in a block, white and black fabric. Busy but cute I think!

And this is the one that she made for me (she mailed it earlier, so nice of her!!)

Block that I received from Cathryn

--

Finally I went back to my Stephen King project. I have been designing embroidery blocks to have them with me for a upcoming working related trip: being away from my sewing machine will be hard, but having hand sewing projects will be great!

I also completed one of the book covers. I decided to use reverse applique, and on a such a small piece it didn't turn out so wonderful. The effect is fine, but I don't think I will ever use this approach on a tiny piece like this.

7.5''x5''

The Long Walk, book cover

--

How about you? What are YOU up to?

Link it here and share it with me!!

An InLinkz Link-up

One second every day makes a difference (and a link party)

A new tool that gets a looot of things done!

The Ongoing Project List:

1. Play with Me QAL - working on future blocks (cannot share details)
   but I released the third block of the QAL, the Backgammon board!
2. WGACA projects
1. Jane T - paused until completion of other two
2. The SK project - no progress
3. Charity Quilts for DC General Homeless Shelter project - no progress
3. Mirror Mirror Afghan - working on block 8 translation to crochet
4. Block Swap Adventure -  insane block done for March (see below)
5. American Quilt (previous known as Americana QAL) - no progress
6. Project Quilting (#6) - waiting for next challenge
7. Gyleen's BCP Mystery QAL - paused, not liking where this is going :(
8. Splendid Sampler - block 6, 7 and 8 done (see below)
9. SECRET quilt for exhibit - no progress
10. Items to send out - mini tote and pincushion (see below)

The EverythingElse List:

1. the 31000 Xs project - no progress
2. Spirit cross stitch project - no progress
3. Alice in Wonderland quilt - no progress
4. As You Wish -  no progress
5. Crazy optical illusion - no progress
6. Memory quilt 2 - no progress

----
Before talking about the specific projects I worked on this week, let me share a wonderful tool that has been extremely useful for me to find motivation and inspiration to complete projects.

The tool is an app for smartphones called "1 Second Everyday" and the name of the app explains what it is :)
The creator of this app has a very powerful story and a good TED talk, so go and check him out!

The great thing for me in this app, is that you can have different "timelines" so I have one for my personal life and one for my Crafting life!! :) Having to record a second of my crafting life every day encouraged me to take out my projects and work even for just few minutes on them! Some days I got more done than others, but still every day I did something creative (because I had to record it) :)
To be honest, it is kind of hard to record when you are doing something crafty because we only have two hands :) but because the video is just one second anyway, you don't need to worry too much about the action, light, sound, etc... It's super easy and below you can see what I had after one month (30 seconds video)! Oh, the other cool thing is that you get the video "stitched" together (as they say) with one single click, no editing, no extra time required! The original video is a great quality but I compressed here to save space in my account :)

(this is the first time I try to embed a video here... it may not work, if so let me know!)


--

These are my latest blocks for Pat's and Jane's Splendid Sampler 

Block 6, 7 and 8

To see all my blocks, check out My Sampler Journey page

--

When partners in the Block Swap Adventure group tell me "choose whatever block you want" I tend to select challenging blocks with a gazillion of pieces! :)

I do that both to challenge myself and to try blocks that I would probably never choose if I had to make an entire quilt with them! This is definitely one of them! 

Lake Life (by Kari Carr)

Note: HST finish at 1 inch square! O_o the block is 12'' finished

The block has a gazillion of tiny HST but I think it turned out beautiful! Linda said that she likes traditional patterns, red and white and that scrappy is ok. I hope she likes this block! To my surprise it turned out extremely precise considering the amount of pieces!!

--

For my Splendid Sampler, I asked people if they were willing to send me some of their selvages in exchange of something from me. Several generous people agreed to send me something so I am making them something in return.

A mini tote and a pin cushion!

The mini tote is perfect to keep the Splendid Sampler blocks... or if they choose to box the corners it becomes a great thread catcher basket. I hope my first generous donor likes it! I will make more because they are really fun and easy to make. 

--
Early this month I shared the third block for my Play with Me QAL

I am looking forward to see boards shared by the people in the group! We have about 50 people playing along, it is so fun!!

If you didn't join, it's not too late!

Visit the QAL page for more details.

--

And last, but not least, I want to remind you that I am working on charity quilts,
and I would love your help!! 

Quilts are for a quilt drive to help the kids in the DC General Homeless Shelter. 

And you can help me by donating orphan blocks, partial blocks, or fabric (scraps, strips, leftover, uglies, whatever). 

If you are willing to mail them to me, I could use them to make more quilts for these kids!!! 

If you are up for a loving donation, please send me an email at tweloq[_at_]gmail[dot_com] or leave a comment here with your email address so I could give you my mailing address. I promise that your donation will be used to make some kids happy and feel more loved!! 

I started assembling few quilt backs... but nothing worth sharing, just yet... 

--

How about you? What are YOU up to?

Link it here and share it with me!!

An InLinkz Link-up

Resolutions and announcements :)

Today I announce two events: Play with Me QAL (first block) and the WGACA project!

The first board was shared today to people subscribed to the Play with Me QAL over at alidatweloqdesigns.blogspot.com. If you are interested, check out the latest blog post and follow the instructions to get your free pattern!

--

The WGACA project is my idea of organizing projects to get them from UFO to FO :)

The concept of "What Goes Around Comes Around" reminds me of "completing the circle" and this made me think that if I "connect" projects with each other, they may carry each other to completion. 

The idea took its final shape when I heard the latest podcast by Sandy from "Quilting for the rest of Us". 

In this episode she mentions that someone choose "Three" as her word of the year for 2015 because three is the maximum number of projects she could work at the same time. 

When I heard this, something clicked in my mind :)

I cannot work just on 3 projects at one time, because I need many more projects to keep my creative juice going, to be inspired and to be happy :)

However, 3 seems to be the perfect number for the WGACA idea and this is how it works:

• I lock 3 crafty projects to WGACA, which means that I can work on them only by following WGACA rules.
• I need to make some progress on each of them before going back to one that had already some progress done in the past week.
• the progress will be tracked in the planner below (copy printed and hanged in a prominent place in my house).
• the progress tracked need to be "concrete". Concrete means anything from "I picked the yarn out of the box and put it in my to-go bag", to "I completed 10 blocks", to "I designed the next block". However it needs to be done in a single session.
• I can work on all my other projects without rules, but those three are locked with these rules!
• once I am done with one page of the planner, I can decide to print another page, to lock different projects, to continue with these projects or to wait until next month to start a new planner

This is the planner I developed. I hanged this right across my mirror so every time I get ready I see it and I know what I should work on ;)

Download the PDF HERE!

If you want to participate, you can download the pdf above.
And this is a little visual reminder about the rules :)

The successful strategy in picking the projects, for me, is to have a project that I really really like to work on (that will be the driving force), one that I am less enthusiastic about but that I still like a lot and one that has been a UFO for to long and that I just want to get it done. In this way the happiness of working on the first project will drag the actual actions needed to make the other two.

So what about you? Do you have strategies to tackle your UFO? Is a simple list enough for you?
Let me know in the comments below!!

Cute little guys (and a link party)

Not as much progress as I hoped this week, but I spent several nights entering giveaways and answering to people entering mine :).

The Ongoing Project List:

1. Block Swap Adventure - paused until Jan
2. Charity quilts - no progress
3. Americana QAL - no progress
4. 2016 QAL - it's not a secret any more! (see below)
5. Allietare QAL - third clue half done (see below)
6. Knitted hand warmers - decided to leave this for next year :)
7. Jane T - no progress
8. Xmas present 2 - done (see below)
9. Pantone Color of the Year 2016 - designed the mini, bought the fabric!

The EverythingElse List:

1. the SK project - no progress
2. the 31000 Xs project - no progress
3. Spirit cross stitch project - no progress
4. Mirror Mirror Afghan - no progress
5. the Ender project - no progress
6. Embroidery calendar - no progress
7. Project of Doom 2015 @ Fandom in Stitches - paused for a while
8. Alice in Wonderland quilt - no progress
9. As You Wish -  no progress
10. Crazy optical illusion - no progress
11. Memory quilt 2 - no progress
12. B quilt - no progress

--
I think this is the last Xmas present for this year!

Pattern by E. Andersson 

Pumpkin is a little alarmed about the presence of a funny looking guy on our kitchen floor :)

Super simple pattern. I shorten the body (4 sections instead of 5) and I fill them with fabric scraps and crumbles: they are the perfect filling to give some weight to the piece!

--
The third clue of Bonnie Hunter's Mystery QAL is out. I decided to follow along, but I will make 1/4 of the units because I don't need a big quilt and I am not sure if I will like the design :)

I decided to go with brighter colors: cyan/aqua/teal (instead of red) and bright yellow (instead of gold). I will probably donate this quilt to charity as a baby quilt, so I want it to be fun and colorful!

For this clue, I didn't do strip piecing, but I cut every single square individually. That's why I actually have only half of my pieces done, but they are super easy and I will get the rest done soon.

Linking up at the Monday Link-up party!

I like the level of scrappiness I have. Let's see if it is going to work in the overall design!
--
Finally I finished up these two little guys:

Birds from "Sweet Tweets" (by Erin Cox)

Holiday Gingy (my pattern). It will be available soon on Fandom In Stitches.

I quilted it with falling snowflakes because I was inspired by the wonderful work of Susan @ quiltfabrication. I decided to use a metallic thread. I turned out pretty cool, the sparkle is just perfect. It was quite a nightmare to quilt with it though. It broke several times, but going slow seemed to be the good solution to this problem.

--
Finally, let me re-announce the QAL I am going to host next year!
Actually there are two big ANNOUNCEMENTS:

1. I am moving all my patterns to a new website alidatweloqdesigns.blogspot.com!
   If you want to read more about the move, check out the link above.
   During the month of December, please be patient with me as the move may get messy and patterns maybe get lost in boxes :) if you have any issue, don't hesitate to get in touch with me!
   
2. I will be running a FUN QAL for 2016... a very non-traditional QAL that incorporates several techniques to create a quilt like you have never seen before!
   Not interested in the entire quilt? No problem!! Each block can be incorporated in a finished project perfect to gift to yourself, your kids, your nephews or your grandkids!!
   What is the theme? Board Games!!

To find more information about the QAL and subscribe to the newsletter to get more information during the month of December, please visit the official page for the QAL.

--
And last, but not least, I want to remind you that I am working on charity quilts,
and I would love your help!! 

Quilts are for a quilt drive to help the kids in the DC General Homeless Shelter. 

And you can help me by donating orphan blocks, partial blocks, or fabric (scraps, strips, leftover, uglies, whatever). 

If you are willing to mail them to me, I could use them to make more quilts for these kids!!! 

If you are up for a loving donation, please send me an email at tweloq[_at_]gmail[dot_com] or leave a comment here with your email address so I could give you my mailing address. I promise that your donation will be used to make some kids happy and feel more loved!! 

No progress for me this week, but I bought some batting, I have 3 quilt tops done so it's just a matter of assembling some backing and then get down to the quilting!!

--

How about you? What are YOU up to?

Link it here and share it with me!!

An InLinkz Link-up

Sew Mama Sew Giveaway and QAL announcement!

THE GIVEAWAY IS CLOSED

SewMamaSew.com

Hello giveaway hoppers!
If you are new here, welcome!!
If you have been here before, I am glad that you came back!!! :)

If you are new here you should know that I am obsessed with Paper Piecing and I offer FREE paper piecing patterns of very famous characters like Snoopy & Friends, Alice in Wonderland, Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck and many many more!

Two big ANNOUNCEMENTS:

1. I am moving all my patterns to a new website alidatweloqdesigns.blogspot.com!
   If you want to read more about the move, check out the link above.
   During the month of December, please be patient with me as the move may get messy and patterns maybe get lost in boxes :) if you have any issue, don't hesitate to get in touch with me!
   
   
2. I will be running a FUN QAL for 2016... a very non-traditional QAL that incorporates several techniques to create a quilt like you have never seen before!
   Not interested in the entire quilt? No problem!! Each block can be incorporated in a finished project perfect to gift to yourself, your kids, your nephews or your grandkids!!
   What is the theme? Board Games!!

To find more information about the QAL and subscribe to the newsletter to get more information during the month of December, please visit the official page for the QAL.

And now, let's get down to the giveaway business :)

Some Halloween Themed charms...
and few Tula Pink's Fat Quarters...
and a Clover needle Threader!
THE GIVEAWAY IS CLOSED

Rules are simple:

• leave a comment below answering a simple question:
  Do you have a favorite board game?
  Mine was "Non T'Arrabbiare" which is the Italian version of the English Ludo :)
• for an extra entry, follow my new blog through Blogger (GFC) or Bloglovin, or join my AlidaTweLoQDesign FB group, or follow on Pinterest, and add a second comment below to tell me how you follow! (new followers are welcome! and if you are already following, just let me know how!!)

Important notes:

• the giveaway will close on December 13th at (11:59 p.m. EST), and the winner will be contacted by email on Monday, Dec 14th.
  If I don't hear back by Tue (5 pm EST), I will pick another winner.
• this giveaway is open to anyone (US and non-US)
• comments are going to be moderated, so they will not be published immediately.
  But in 24h I promise that I will approve all the comments that are not spam :)
• if you are a no-reply blogger, please leave your email in the comment because I will NOT publish comments by no-reply bloggers without the email (I need a way to contact you if you win). If you are worried about spam, just type your email like "tweloq [space] at [space] gmail [dot] com" or similar :)
• !!! IMPORTANT !!! During past giveaways I received at least 50 comments from no-reply bloggers and I didn't add them in the drawing (even if I appreciate the comment, I need a way to contact you if you win). So if you don't receive an email from me answering your comment, come back and put another comment with your email!!! I cannot hunt your email through fancy links, website, etc. I am NOT making YOU jump through hoops to get the prize, so do NOT make ME jump through hoops to get your email address
• UPDATE: at this point (Wed, Dec 9, 9:49 pm EST) there are 30 comments from no-reply bloggers or from people that ask me to click links/profiles to get their email address. Sorry people: if I cannot access your email directly from your comment, I will NOT publish it.
  HOWEVER: I decided to change the rules... I will add a prize for the no-reply bloggers and for people that do not provide their contact information. I will send it to a random location in your home country (that I will guess from your name) and then I will write you a clue about where to find the next clue for a national/international scavenger hunt! :) if you don't make it easy for me to find you, I won't make it easy for you to find the prize!! :)
  Seriously: it takes 5 minutes to check if you are a no-reply blogger!! There are tons of tutorial that shows you how to check and how to stop this terrible thing that is preventing you to get new friends, replies to your comments and prizes!!! A simple step-by-step tutorial can be found HERE: http://www.flusterbuster.com/2013/02/are-you-no-reply-blogger.html. It has pictures and detailed instructions...

THE GIVEAWAY IS CLOSED