Bags & Table Toppers

With Christmas on the way, I've been working on making presents for my family. I periodically pick up kits that appeal to me that are on sale. (I have trouble passing up a deal!) So, I decided to make a couple of these up as presents.

The first bag I made was a kit that I got from Connecting Threads a year or two ago. The pattern is Laguna by A Quilter's Dream.  It is designed to use just 6 fat quarters to make the bag.  Here is the front:

And the back:

Or maybe I got those reversed....  There are a couple of simple pockets on the inside:

I think it turned out really cute. That pattern had you do turned edge applique, but I just did raw edge fused applique with a buttonhole stitch. I made the buttonhole stitch a little bit too small so there were some eyelashes, but I still like it. For the blue flower, I decided to make the fabric pattern run parallel to the direction of each leaf so I ended up not having enough of that fabric for the inside pocket and just used something that I had on hand that went along with the other fabrics.

The second bag was also a kit from Connecting Threads. This pattern is called Mini Quilt Bag by Susan Terpin of Connecting Threads. They call it that because the outside of the bag is a mini quilt.
 
This bag is nice because it's bigger than the Laguna bag and has more pockets. The two outside pieces form 6 pockets on the outside and the inside has a regular pocket divided into 3 sections and a zippered pocket on the other side:

Both bags are finished and ready to be wrapped for Christmas.

I've also been working on a couple of table toppers.  These are both from kits that were bought on sale at Keepsake Quilting. The first is from a pattern called Merry-Go-Round by Atkinson Designs.

I really love the clean, modern look of this one.  The top is pieced rather than appliqued and went together pretty quickly (once I started reading the directions rather than making assumptions...). I've got the stitch-in-the-ditch quilting done, but still need to finish the rest of the quilting.

Of course I didn't want to finish one table topper before starting another one. ;) So here is the second table topper I'm working on:


This one is from the Prairie Flower pattern by Marjorie Rhine. The curved pieces are appliqued on background pieces before sewing the background pieces together. I wasn't very careful in positioning things, so it looks much better from this distance than from up close, but I'm still liking it. The pattern had you piece the green diamonds around the edge, which is what I tried first. But I'm terrible at piecing diamond in a rectangle blocks so my blocks ended up much smaller than they were supposed to be. So I paper-pieced these blocks instead and they came out perfect! Luckily there was plenty of fabric so I didn't have to substitute any of my own. This one also has stitch-in-the-ditch quilting finished and is waiting for the rest of the quilting.

It feels good to have a good start on Christmas! I still need to make infinity scarves for my sisters and nieces, and make something out of some little linens of my mom's for my sisters. Then it will be time to step back and take stock of what I have to see if I need to make anything else. I'm planning on taking the week of Thanksgiving off of work to try to get all of this done. We head to Kansas City sometime around Dec 10 for my sister's wedding (which is on the 13th) and we'll just stay out there through Christmas, so I have to have everything done before then. Wish me luck!

Tomorrow I get to attend the taping of a couple of episodes of The Quilt Show. We usually can't take pictures, but I'll at least tell you about it. And if we do get to take pictures, then I'll share those with you.

Happy quilting!

Nancy