Color block jewelry for spring

This weekend I was so lucky to have a whole day to spend with two of my favorite creative ladies, Alisa and Staci. We spent 12 HOURS beading on Friday. When all was said and done, we'd created 36 pieces of jewelry. The above are all of the pieces I got to take home! I made all of them except the long coral and green necklace on the right and the ring on the bottom left. Staci made the long necklace and the ring is actually from our shopping excursion on Saturday to the Funky Zebra, but it fit the collection so nicely, I couldn't resist putting it in the picture too!

I just returned from a work trip to Alexandria, VA. I had some free time that I spent shopping on King Street in Old Town. I picked up three very pretty strings of beads at the Potomac Bead Company. The larger coral beads above were one of my finds. Coral and mint ended up being my theme of the day.

The other theme of the day was color blocking. I have been seeing these styles around and pinned a few inspirations. I saw quite a bit of color blocked jewelry out in DC and knew that I wanted to try my hand at it. I absolutely love all of these necklaces - and chose my outfits the last two days just to wear them! The mint teardrop faceted jade and the coral rose quartz (both on the 3rd necklace) were also from my trip to Alexandria.

I traded Staci for the long necklace in first picture that she made. The two sets of coral earrings on the right went home to Colorado with her!

I have been loving the faceted teardrop shape too so I made a couple of little wire pendants. It's been a long, long time since I attempted wire wrapping and the rose gold wire was very simple to manipulate.

I couldn't get enough of the jade beads so I made some earrings to go with the pendant and/or color blocked necklace. Since yellow slipped in the pallet of the collection in a couple of the necklaces, I just kept going with it. I adore both of these pairs of earrings.

These little wooden yellow beads caught my eye when I was digging for yellow beads for the earrings. With the ombré blue beads, it somehow reminds me of My Little Ponies...but in a good way. Ha!

Sorry for the horrible phone pics on these but I wanted to share what Staci and Alisa made too. For some reason, they didn't let me take of theirs home with me to photograph! The above photo is Staci's creations - 4 bracelets, 2 anklets, and 3 long necklaces.

Alisa is the real jeweler of the three of us and it shows! She cranked out so many beautiful pieces. 5 pairs of earrings and 7 necklaces. I'm not even 100 percent that's all she made! If you ever looking for one of a kind, handmade beaded jewelry, you can find her over a 4 Square Studios.

It was a fantastic day and Alisa is so generous to share her studio, home and stash with us. Thank you, Alisa!

Oh Deer...I kept your quilt for myself!

Remember when I made my sister the Lady Lattice quilt for Christmas? And then decided to keep it for myself because it goes so nicely in my living room?!? That meant I had very little time to crank out another quilt for her before Christmas. I had already finished her twin brother's quilt and couldn't give him his without one for her!

I bought a jelly roll and charm pack of Oh Deer by MoMo for Moda at the Wisconsin Quilt Expo last year.

It was a treat for me to make something for myself because I loved the prints and colors dearly (hehe. pun.) So I decided it would be a fair trade to make her an Oh Deer quilt instead of me since I had stolen her first one for myself!

This is the first time I had even bought a jelly roll (40 strips of 2.5"x44" of coordinating prints). In the words of my friend Alisa, jelly rolls are "juicy." They are soooo juicy! They feel great in your hands, are so fun to unwrap and a breeze to work with. I can feel a new addiction coming on...

Anyway, back to the quilt.

It was quick to make and I love how bright, busy and fun it is. I just sewed all but about 6 strips of the jellyroll together in a somewhat random order. Then I cut about 10 inches off one side. I sewed the squares of the charm pack into two rows and pieced that between the two striped pieces. I did the whole top in an afternoon. 

For the quilting I did a meandering pattern, trying not to have any cross overs. 

This quilt was well received by my sister. She called and told me that roommates and guests to her house have all commented on it and she really loves it. That makes me really, really happy and feel a little less guilty that I am sitting under the quilt I made for her first but kept!

Window Panes - Rain or Shine

I made both of my siblings quilts for Christmas this year. I am really happy with how they turned out. I named this pattern Window Panes...for obvious reasons. When I finished, I realized that was even more appropriate with the sunny yellow and cloudy gray color scheme.

A year or so ago, my brother mailed me fabric to make him some pillows. Whatever I had for leftovers, he said to just put in my stash. I knew I wanted to make him a quilt with the scraps. A couple of random charm packs and yardage from my stash later, the only fabric I ended up having to buy was the wider sashing between each "window."

My brother picked out the houndstooth, music note fabric, gingam and a few of the others. I'm so happy with the result but sad I forgot to get a picture of him with it on Christmas!

For the back I used another vintage sheet with gray and white stripes.

The binding and quilting are bright yellow and I quilted my trusty meandering bumble bee pattern. So relaxing to long arm this one!