War Eagle Weekend

This weekend was one that I look forward to all year: The annual Fall Craft Fair at War Eagle Mills and Farm! Crafters and enthusiasts travel from all over the South to congregate in the tents, barn, and convention centers that make up a pretty big take over of little old Northwest Arkansas. 

It's pretty much always a family affair.

We've got food vendors and tents of crafts. Only a few allowed me to take photos within the booths themselves, and I always asked first! Stop number one was these amazing Hawaiian deck chairs, complete with foot rest and cup holder! Maybe later in life we'll own a pair of these for camping.

Then I got to see the booth where my little ceramic tile came from. Maybe you've seen it before in this post.

Here's her info. 

The weather was perfect and the scenery was absolutely stunning.

Baby sister couldn't resist the urge to frolick.

Across the river is the mill itself, and a ton of other booths!

Parents!

Cars everywhere... and we were here pretty early on Friday. Usually on Saturday there are two or three more lots this size that are full.

We finally ended the afternoon with some family time.

Grandparents!

The weekend was fun, productive, and exhausting, as illustrated here. I walked away with a pretty rag rug for my kitchen, a cute little Christmas tin, and a ceramic spoon rest. That's about all I had a good budget for. We'll be back for the Spring craft fair... and if all goes according to plan, it will be on the other side of the booth!

Quilting Progress

Well here we go. I don't know what happened, but I have almost completed the quilt top. It definitely has more pieces than any of those strip quilts that I've completed but somehow I was completely mesmerized by these little triangles and I powered through 6 of the 8 strips.

Why did I stop? Oh me oh my, but I am missing fabric for not one or two, but nine triangles that will complete the bottom row. 

So at the moment it is unfinished until I can pop back to Walmart tomorrow afternoon. I was a little sad when I realized it, but still very thrilled at my progress!

And isn't that last row menacing me? Like a weird fringe, or some pointy teeth.

Kitty enjoyed testing it, and was an excellent model for scale on this. After putting everything together it is... slightly smaller than I thought it was. I will advertise this as an infant rolly-mat. Or it will end up as a wall-hanging. 

The Purl Bee had a year of mini quilts that I really loved, and I think that's my spot right now. I'm not ready for a big scale project. I'm not going to make a quilt for my queen sized bed any time soon--but the mini quilt is cute enough and small enough for me to handle while having a full time job. And, as my husband and I have discussed, a project that has a timeline short enough for me to remain interested.... because I have a problem with that. :) 

Quietly Crafting

Where did Miss Honey go for the past few weeks? Well she was teaching of course! I took an unexpected hiatus from most of the internet due to some pressing matters at school and am very, very happy it is all over. Already I feel a strange sense of relief just getting to sit and write something other than "write more" or "good work" on student papers. Lately, we have had a slew of extra-curriculars, and as a class sponsor, I have been up to my ears in various responsibilities for those activities. A lot of organizing, a lot of communicating, a lot of wrangling awesomely enthusiastic students--it's a wonderful job but I'm happy to have a break!

During these last three weeks, as I was aimlessly wandering through pinterest and doing some wishful thinking for the time to do some fun projects, I stumbled upon some beautiful triangle quilts. My sewing board is packed with things I will probably never do (isn't most of pinterest?) but I had already been looking for a kind of scrap-busting project and this just may be it. 

image and triangle quilt tutorial from happy together

Anyway, squares are so over. Triangles are all the rage now.

I started cutting... and cutting and cutting. Having only really finished strip quilts before, this is a new endeavor for me. I have started quilts and gotten frustrated at how long it took to just get everything together. This attempt, time hasn't really been that much of an issue. I cut a few triangles here and a few there, whenever I had some time I grabbed another strip of unused and unwanted fabric and cut away with the rotary. Before I knew it, a week had passed and I had a hefty stack, which I proceeded to keep organized in this seafoam paper organizer.

It was nice to just cut away and not focus on sewing until all the cutting was done. I tend to get ahead of myself on projects like this. All the colors are pieces of fabric that I had in my sewing room, just sitting and waiting for a project. I would like to get rid of a lot of the fabric clutter in my working space because really, what good does my stash ever do me until I want to get rid of it in a project like this?

The whites were three different fabrics I pulled from Wal-Mart. Easy, cheap, and they have a little pattern to them as well! I like that the patterns are subtle enough to read "white" from a distance and not "print," but it's a nice little surprise when you get up close.

leaves...

...polka dots...

... and triangles, oh my!

So here is the triangle collection I ended up with: a whole gang of mismatched misfits, but I think they work!

At first I laid them out with the white triangles in between the others. It was cute, but not quite what I was looking for. 

So I opted for the zig-zag approach instead! And I couldn't help but separate my colors. At the end of the project, I will have a baby-sized quilt with one warm zig and one cold zag.

I'm pretty pumped about it. Sewing started yesterday and continues on today! And hopefully bit by bit throughout the week until I can consider these scraps busted.