Clue 5 from Pinehurst, NC

Grand Illusion Clue 5 from the Quiltville Mystery quilt 2014. On Christmas vacation in Pinehurst, NC. I took my sewing machine, my previous clues and the fabric needed for clue 5. This clue was too easy. Well, it did give me plenty of time to do fun things with family.

Here are the 25 blocks all lined up ready to sew.

Yay finished this clue! This Green Apple Martini is from Longhorn Steak House.

(Yes I took my finished blocks to the restaurant to get my martini photo this week.)

This is the "recipe". Take your best guess. :)

Playing with possibilities. These are 8" blocks.

All 8" blocks.

These blocks are 12".

Only Bonnie Hunter knows the answer. Stay tuned.....

Meanwhile check out Monday Link Up for other quilters progress on this mystery.

This GUESS has 12" blocks with the green/white checked blocks as sashing.

The last CLUE will be the POSTS.

Sasha likes the black pointing IN instead of out.

So much fun to guess what it will be. :)

See Monday Link Up for more.

G. I. Clue #4 and Reddit Secret Santa gift

Clue 4 in the Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt by Bonnie Hunter at Quiltville was fairly quick to piece.

Cutting squares is a breeze, the pink/blue units were done in step #1 so just blue/white to cut and piece.

These are bits of all the clues so far. Only Bonnie knows how they will all fit together in a quilt!

Ready for clue celebration?

Bubblegum Martini!! Add some of each, stir and enjoy.

(Blue Curacao, Creme de Banana, Bailey's Irish Creme.) 

I love finishing clues! This quilt is definitely a party quilt.

I've got clues 1-4 in baggies ready for our final instructions on assembly.

See other quilters progress on the Monday Link Up.

REDDIT Secret Santa 2014

I joined in the 2014 Reddit Gifts Secret Santa exchange. 

I believe we set a Guiness world record for the largest exchange--over 200,000 people!! 

I was Santa #99,856.

The gift I received was 4 Vera Bradley cloth napkins for me to quilt with. 

I cut a few squares from each one and pieced it like this.

I quilted all the layers with fusible fleece and fusible interfacing to make it stiff.

Then shaped it like a basket and added binding around the top.

Thanks Secret Santa!!

I sent my person an I SPY quilt that I purchased on Etsy.

It came with a laminated list of items to find in the quilt.

I also sent her a cookbook that contains my all-time favorite recipe.

She was pleased. Merry Christmas!! Ho ho ho.

Clue #3 Grand Illusion quilt

Grand Illusion Clue #3 required cutting strips of black, white and green. This clue used 1 1/3 yd green and Bonnie Hunter said we needed 1 1/2 yd green. So this is the only green clue. 

I did all the cutting first: 

Black --6 strips x width of fabric 

White--18 strips x width of fabric

Green--24 strips x width of fabric

One half of the block was black+green+white+green.

The second half of the block was green+white+green+white.

Here are a bunch of the blocks on the design wall.

To celebrate this clue finish the martini is a "Dirty Turtle".

Drizzle chocolate and sprinkles in martini glass. 

Add equal parts chocolate schnapps, creme liqueur, creme de menthe. Stir...

I just love finishing clues!!!

These are the first, second and third clue parts. 

The first 2 clues were 4" blocks and 2" squares.

The third clue is 3" x 6". 

This change of scale really bothers me. 

As a designer I don't think I ever mix the size or scale of blocks in a quilt. 

But I will blindly follow Bonnie Hunter in this 

Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt.

See Monday Link Up for other versions of this mystery quilt in progress.

More designer steering wheel covers

While I'm in fast sewing mode, and I finished sewing clue #2 for the mystery on Sunday, I decided it was time to sew more steering wheel covers for my daughter to sell on Etsy. I make them, she sells them and she keeps the money. If they sell then maybe she can have fun Christmas shopping. :)

So Vera Bradley has some new cloth napkins for sale. I purchased the napkins and then cut them up just a bit, sewed them back together and the steering wheel cover is born! (There are more detailed instructions on how to construct these in my tutorial for Designer Steering Wheel Covers.)

Pink Swirls.

Moon Blooms.

Emerald Paisley.

Blue Ink.

Venetian Paisley (an older print).

Flower Shower (an older print).

Making the casing for elastic....

Pin the grippy stuff.

Sew the grippy stuff down the center.

Sew grippy stuff down both sides.

Ready for the elastic.

Using 2 safety pins, one to lead and one to anchor they get threaded through the casing.

Elastic done! Just one final seam to make the circle.

This is how they come packaged. 

This way my daughter doesn't get confused as to which print is which.

I just mailed them to her yesterday so she will have them up on her Etsy page for sale by the weekend. (Hopefully.)

The one called Variety is my favorite. It has 5 different prints. You can change which print is on top of your steering wheel to suit your mood.

Lynn's Etsy page is: HolmansCreations

She painted my awesome Maryland flag shoes that I wore when I took my row by row quilt in to Spring Water Designs.

See the shoes she painted? Cool! She paints, I sew. Happy, happy.

I'm working on another quilt that I bought as a kit. I will post about it later.

Grand Illusion Mystery Quilt

Bonnie Hunter is at it again with another super fun mystery quilt. Clues for Grand Illusion are posted on her Quiltville blog. She posted clue #1 the Friday after Thanksgiving. Quilters post progress photos on the Facebook group Quiltville's Open Studio. One group of ladies in NJ got together to cut and sew clue #1 and they also had chocolate martinis. Yum!

I want to be part of the chocolate martini group so when I finished clue #1,  I celebrated with a chocolate martini. :) Those piles are 100 broken dishes blocks and 80 HST blocks.

Clue #2 was posted Friday Dec 5.

Make 200 of this unit!

These are my fun neutrals. (Plus I added some frogs.)

These are the pinks I used for this step.

Fun blacks. See the cats, dogs and Halloween prints? Fun.

Time to start sewing all these together....

But Loralai and Sasha want to come in my sewing room. 

Or they want me to come out and play.......

Assembly line sewing. Fun, fun, fun.

These are really fun and pretty.

This little thread catcher was perfect to catch all the tiny corners I clipped off. 

This is a free tutorial: Little Hanging Basket on the Jennifer Jangles blog.

Yay I'm done with clue #2. To celebrate this clue I made a "Grand Illusion Martini".

I just invented this one and it's quite delicious! The "recipe" is below:

Drizzle chocolate around the top of a martini glass and add sprinkles--they will stick to the chocolate. Then add 1 oz each dark Creme de Cacao (chocolate schnapps), Buttershots (butterscotch schnapps) and Rum Chata. Stir with your finger and enjoy!

Next clue is due Friday Dec. 12.....

Click here: Monday Link-Up, Part 2 for other variations of this mystery quilt.