sneak peek: stacked coins

I started this new quilt top a few days ago. It has been a while since I did this much piecing and I really enjoyed it. It's funny to think about that because I was so busy late in the fall finishing up all my gift quilts. Many of those were pieced back in late spring/early summer. I had forgotten how much I enjoy this part of the process.

This pattern was based on a feature on the Moda Bake Shop. I wanted the finished quilt to be bigger and use the entire jelly roll for the front, so I modified the pattern a bit to get the size I wanted. I'm thrilled with the results so far. I used one of my most coveted jelly rolls for this quilt. It is Verna by Kate Spain for Moda Fabrics. I'm still not 100% certain about what the future will hold for this beauty, but this may very well be headed for Etsy.

a rug for my mug

If you're a quilter, you've undoubtedly heard about the latest trend known as the mug rug. Over the course of the last several months, these bigger-than-a-coaster-but-not-quite-a-placemat darlings have been popping up all over the blogosphere.

Last weekend we held our latest meeting for the Music City Modern Quilters Guild. Our agenda for the day was to participate in the Java Mug Rug Challenge from our sponsor, Burgundy Buttons. It was fun to sit & sew with the other gals in the guild. I had not put much thought into mine beforehand. I had a vague idea of what I wanted to do, but no pattern sketches. I had been sick the week prior and just hadn't had the energy to get myself together.

Here was the result... I managed to do the entire thing, start to finish before I packed up to go home. Now that it's been photographed, I am left to sit and wait to see if Deb Strain likes mine the best. Oh, I really hope she does. To see the other entries into the challenge, click here.