christmas in january?

It's a little weird to work on a Christmas quilt in January. It seems appropriate since this quilt has lots of little snowmen prints. And it's c  o  l  d here in NYC. As I write this, it's 13 degrees in Central Park (3 blocks from my home) and it feels like NEGATIVE 3. It's going down to 7 degrees tonight. I'm one of those crazy people because I love winter and snow and snowmen and ice! (Ok, the sleet on Saturday was not fun.) 

This blurry pic was taken with my iPhone this past weekend. I always like to do a test layout before I sew my blocks together. I originally planned to have my strips of geese flying in opposite directions. But when I did that it just looked like a confused, directionless mess with no visual focus. Carrie Nelson's pattern is perfect just the way it is. The individual pattern seems to be out of print, but it can be found in the book A Touch of Rosie, which is what I'm using. It's full of good stuff!

So here's the look that I'm going for. Mostly. I'm going to simplify the border slightly.

These prints still make me happy! Anne Sutton's Bunny Hill Designs prints are always fun. This collection is Winter Wonderland, and it completely reminds me of candy canes. Anne has another Christmas collection coming out this month that I've already preordered! And Anne is offering a free monthly ornament pattern on her blog here. Just wait till you see her cute appliqued, embroidered snowmen angel ornaments.

And now the geese get sewn into strips! Lots of simple sewing, just perfect to do while listening to iTunes and drinking hot tea!

bring on the snowmen!

I love red and white quilts at Christmas. And I love the Winter Wonderland collection by Bunny Hill Designs for Moda with happy snowmen, stars and trees!

I bought a fat quarter bundle when it first came out several months ago. But I had no idea how to use it! Most red and white quilts seem to be in solid fabrics, or else they're in vintage turkey reds. I searched though photos from the Infinite Variety show of red and white quilts in NYC a few years ago. That didn't help... most of the quilts were done in solids. Then I bought several patterns but none of them were exactly right. Finally, while reading A Touch of Rosie Quilts by Carrie Nelson, I came across this quilt.

I thought that this might look like shattered peppermint candy if it was done in red and white prints. And of course I love peppermint candy! So I had my pattern. 

Once again, I'm using the Fit To Be Geese ruler to create accurate flying geese. There is very little wasted fabric when using this ruler, and even the trimmings look pepperminty!

Winter Wonderland sold out quickly. There is some on the Bunny Hill website, and there is plenty of it on Ebay. If you're lucky, you might even find a few bolts at your local quilt shop. I'll need to buy yardage for my backing before it disappears!

The quilt will need 212 geese, and I've finished 152. The repetitive sewing and trimming is actually a nice break from my previous quilt project - no thinking involved! Just cut, sew, trim, repeat! The quilt will also have a sprinkling of twinkly stars.

Oh, and in case you thought I just made 152 geese instead of sleeping, well, I didn't! I've been quietly working on these over the past few weeks, in between other projects.

A Touch of Rosie might be out of print, but Carrie has just reissued Due South as an individual pdf pattern. It can be purchased for download on her website.