Name Tag and More! (lots more)

Last month I joined the Portland Modern Quilt Guild (PMQG) — YAY! Exciting! It's really inspiring, there are so many talented quilters out there.... and they're pumping out super amazing quilts like crazy! We meet each month and they're all bringing new incredible quilts to show & tell each meeting. WOW (where do they find the time?)! I love it, the ideas the colors, the fabrics. Last month they kicked off the new year by asking members to make a name tag to wear at meetings. Above is the name tag I made. BRIGHT, Amy Buttler and Anna Maria Horner fabrics - plus I used the sparkle thread I won at the last meeting (I love sparkles even more than bright). Then I ironed on my label I created for my quilts and added some buttons for a little extra touch of cute. The binding isn't the greatest (it's actually kinda sucky because I was in a hurry and it's pretty darn tricky to make a binding for a little tiny quilt) but's it's OK I still like it, even if it's not perfect.

I've been plugging away on my Sparkle Punch Quilt Along. I've got a long way to go, but I'm hoping to finish for my daughter's birthday in April. Cross your fingers for me.

Here's the awesome swap gift I received from my GenQ Valentine Swap partner. It's a lovely little zipper pouch. The colors are gorgeous - scrappy pinks and reds. But my favorite part is the quilting she did on it. Random straight lines, some follow the shapes and others are just on their own. Looks great.

And look at this super cute pin cushion my sweet friend made for me! Doesn't it look GREAT with all my favorite leaf pins stuck in it? So colorful and cute. I love it!! 

In the meantime I've been doing a lot of drawing (instead of sewing). More cartoony caricatures for my friend in the commercial real estate biz. I hope these guys like their funny bottle labels I've been making. Here's the finished project — a custom Maker's Mark bottle— for the last drawing I posted.

It's kind of weird to draw pictures of all these random people I've never met. Here's the next one I've been finishing up this weekend.

I'm working on my watercolor skills with Painter as well. Below is my Christmas card (I know - old news) I drew for this past Christmas. Painter is a little less forgiving than working in Illustrator, so it's a bit of a learning curve. I really love the look though. 

I'm practicing and hopefully I'll get a lot more polished at these cute watercolor illustrations soon.

Swap Gift and Graffiti Love Bots

Swap Gift and Graffiti Love Bots — what? Yep, that's right. Here's what I've been working on this past week.

I signed up for the GenQ Valentines Swap. Here's my Valentine surprise I'm working on for my swap buddy. I'm pretty excited, this is the first swap I've done and my partner looks pretty cool. Check out her blog. I hope she likes this little goody I'm working on. There's actually three different projects in the works in this picture. YIKES... I might need to just go take a clean-up break.

And.... I'm really digging the Spoonflower Fabric Design Contests. Putting together a fluid theme and repeat is way hard. It's much harder than I originally thought (all those gorgeous fabrics in the quilt shops make it look so easy!). I'm really enjoying the learning, and the reason to exercise my doodling skills— I get rusty if I don't draw for a while. Really rusty. The image above is my entry for the Graffiti/Street Art contest this week. I call it - Love Bots. Funny though, I don't really love it, but it was fun trying to come up with an idea and illustrate it based on the theme. What would you write if you had to graffiti up a wall?