First finishes

I have a few projects to share in this first month of the year. Some are finished, others, not completely finished but certainly presentable and functional.First up, the finished ones. Blocks for The Great Canadian Stashbusting (is that one word or two?) bee. A Ribbon Star for Stacey:

And for Mel, a block featuring Flying Geese using the awesome Cotton + Steel fabric she sent:

Stacey wanted rainbow colours with black on black background pieces - that was such a challenge! She asked us to stay away from black prints with white elements but that is all I have in my scraps bins and stash so off to the quilt shop it was, only they didn't have a lot to choose from either. I think it turned out cute even if the background has very little variety going on. For Mel's flying geese block I used a tutorial from Color Girl Quilts. Hubby and I are headed on vacation this coming week along with one of our daughters and her husband. I told daughter I'd like to make her a zipper bag for her toiletries and makeup but she has a nice sparkly one she likes so she asked if I could make something to hold her makeup brushes instead. Inspired by a silverware holder my mother-in-law made me many years ago (for taking on picnics) I came up with something I think will work.

(And no, for the record, I'm still not tired of Catnap fabrics)

The final project is my sewing room. Having spent many years sewing on the dining room table (and having to clean up each night for supper) it was an amazing blessing to move into our laundry room and make it into a sewing space for the past 15 years. At only 5' x 9' it has been functional and I've made a lot of great projects in my no-so-big space. After the offspring married and moved out for the second time (the moving out thing, not the marrying thing) my husband (and Ikea) helped me transform a vacant bedroom into my new sewing room. It's not complete yet, but it is wonderful just the same. I can't believe I am lucky enough to have somewhere like this to sew in.

I don't think I'll have any more projects to show for January (unless a suntan counts) but I think my 2015 is off to a creative and happy start!

e.