Category Archives: Where we’re published

Where We Are Published: Azure Skies

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Have you gotten your latest issue of American Patchwork and Quilting?  The cover looks like this…


It is the December 2020 issue.

We happen to have a quilt in the magazine.  This one….

This quilt has such humble beginnings….

Do you remember the story?

It was nap time at childcare back in February of this year and I got to thinking about what things I have lined up that I need quilts for.  I looked at the UFOs that blog reader Roxanna had sent and I pulled these half square triangles thinking that I would just count them and see what would be needed for them.

I only had about 20 minutes before the kids were waking and didn’t want to be making a mess.  Making a plan with these would make perfect use of my time.  I counted.  Hmm.  There are a lot…over 250.  I started calculating how big of a quilt that would make.  Then as I was looking at the blocks, I realized all the fabrics were Kaffe fabrics.  Hmm.  Yes, I could make this into a nice donation quilt.  At first, I thought I would make a single sized quilt.  I thought I would just lay out the triangles and sew them together and straight and in a row…just boring.  I thought, “oh the prints will just have to shine”.  Then I started playing with the blocks and laid them out like this….
Hmm.  Yes.  This was better.  I notice that the fabrics were mostly blues, greens, and purples.  I liked it.

So I laid out a few more half-square triangles….


YES…I love this!!  I went with this design.  I decided to make it bigger so I pulled some of the Kaffe fabric you all have been sending me.

But that would have to wait.  The childcare kids were awake so it was back to work for me.  I left the blocks that were sewn on the kitchen island and then over the next couple days I trimmed all the blocks.


I was able to find a matching white background fabric, pulled the Kaffe fabrics I had and I cut out 140ish more blocks over the next day at nap time.

Then I started sewing them into blocks.


I checked my stash and I had a Kaffe fabric that I think will be perfect for the border.  I didn’t have a piece of matching fabric for an inner border.  I ended up getting a box in the mail from a blog reader.  Inside was, you guessed it, solids and two the matched really well  (THANKS BETH!!!)


At the time, I thought I would use this as a donation quilt for a benefit.  I went to load it on the frame…Rosie was just a pup then.


I had it this far and stopped.  This was a nice quilt…maybe I should submit this to a magazine.


So I went downstairs, out to the porch, and hung the quilt.  I snapped a couple of pictures, submitted it and within 15 minutes I got a reply back from American Patchwork and quilting saying, “How soon can you have the quilt here?”


Then I called Carla from Longarm Quilting Inspirations.  I thought this quilt would be best with some nice detailed quilting and Carla was the girl to do it.

Here you can’t see the great work Carla did….


But happily, I took some pictures before the quilt got sent out…Check this out!! Continue reading →

Where We are Published: Yankee Doodle

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Have you seen the latest issue of Quilts and More?  We have a project in the magazine so if you haven’t grabbed an issue, you might want to.  This is the Summer 2020 issue.

As always, there are lots of other fun projects in the magazine.  I do like Quilts and More as there is a variety of projects from bags to pincushions to quilts.  For those of you who don’t know, Quilts and More is a Meredith Publication as is American Patchwork and Quilting another awesome magazine we work with.

Here is our project…. Continue reading →

Where We’re Published: American Patchwork and Quilting

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Have you seen the latest issue of American Patchwork and Quilting??  The is what the cover looks like.  This is the June 2020 issue.

Kelli and I are super excited about this issue because we have not only one but TWO quilts in the magazine….

This is Fun and Games…
You might remember around Christmas time I was playing with a box of leftovers and scraps a blog reader sent me.  I ended up creating this quilt with it.  Someone asked me how I picked yellow…I didn’t.  The leftover half square triangles were from the blog reader.  She picked yellow.

I had a great time making this quilt…It was really easy and lot of fun…and who doesn’t have enough scraps lying around to make this??

The next quilt is Happy Surprises.  This quilt some of you might remember.  Here it is….


Does it look familiar?  Well if you were reading the blog back in 2016, you might remember the quilt as the cover quilt for the American Patchwork and Quilting 2016 Calendar.

APQ 2016 Calendar Small (2)So yes..they are reprinting it for the magazine.  That was fun as we, like you, are able to revisit the quilt…and I’m betting some of you are seeing it for the first time.

In 2014 Kramer and I had gone to Oronoco, near Rochester Minnesota, for their big antique show called Gold Rush.  It’s always in August and if you like antiques, it’s the place to go…a little expensive, but great place.  Anyway, while I was there I took pictures of many of the quilts I saw.  I’m always looking for ideas.


I tried but can’t find the picture that inspired this quilt.  The original had a blue background.  The quilt was very ratty and was tied.

I looked and studied the picture once I got home and had trouble seeing the block as it isn’t a traditional square block.  It’s more of a rectangle block and it took Kelli to help me see that.

Here’s a picture of Ruby sitting on the quilt.  I dug around in my photos hoping I might find one of her on the quilt.

HappySurprise-2

See what I mean about the block being rectangular??  This was beyond my match calculations and Kelli had to figure out the match for it.  Once she showed me the block, I drew it all out..but the math, that was all Kelli.


At that point, Kelli and I submitted the quilt to American Patchwork and Quilting but we never heard anything back from them.  So when it came time to write our book, we decided we’d put the quilt in our book…..

But mid way through making all of the quilts for the book, American Patchwork and Quilting contacted us and asked if they could have the quilt for the cover of the calendar.  Of course we said yes…so then we were left scrambling to find another quilt for the book.  It was hectic there for a big but we figured it all out.

If all of that doesn’t convince you that you might need a copy of this magazine, check this out….Oh my I love it.

They did it in this colorway too.  YES, please.  Oh my, so pretty.


The other quilt that caught my eye is this one.


Trust me..there are other great projects in the book.

So for Kelli and I…another first.  It’s the first time we had two quilts published in the same magazine.  What an honor….as I always say, we love working with American Patchwork and Quilting.

Where We’re Published: American Patchwork and Quilting

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We have a quilt in a magazine again.  We’ve been on a bit of a roll.

It’s in this edition of American Patchwork and Quilting- April 2020.  It hit the newstand on February 7th so if you’re interested, keep your eye out of a copy.


I am in love with the cover quilt.  Doesn’t that look “so me”….but again, it’s a quilt I’d make for myself so it gets put on the back burner.  I read that this quilt is going to be the quilt along quilt.  So if you want to make it and need some motivation, join the Facebook quilt along from American Patchwork and Quilting.

Here’s our quilt.

This is a fun quilt as I made it from leftovers from a previous quilt we had published.  This one…

Quilty-2
This was in Quilty Magazine.

I had a whole bunch of leftover half square triangles from the star points of the original quilt and used them to make the quilt below.  How fun!!


I love making something out of nothing.

Here’s a close up of the quilting…. Continue reading →