Sometimes you win some, and sometimes you lose some, but during this past year, I (Kara) have actually won some! Usually when I try for raffles and giveaways, my name or number is just not called—not the case this year.
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| Barbara Blanton and I with my loot! |
Every year at the
Academy of AppliquĂ© in Williamsburg, Virginia, two lovely ladies donate a full quilt kit to be raffled off. One year, it was a complete Dear Jane kit, and this year it was Kim McClean's Flower Pots. The kit was full of brightly colored fabrics, and the pattern just really appealed to me. Maybe it was because it was completely different than anything we normally do, but I was determined to make a concerted effort to win this year's quilt kit (the $40 in raffle tickets may have helped). When Barbara read out my number, I know I yelled something in my excitement and immediately ran up to claim my prize. As it was a complete kit, I knew the weight of it—along with my additional fabric purchases from
Huzzah quilt shop—would put my suitcase over the 50 pound limit. Barbara offers a wonderful service that allows the Academy attendees to ship their purchases for a flat fee, which was perfect for my new prize.
Sometimes our mail takes a long time, and the quilt kit was no exception. By the time it got to me it looked like it had been around the world and back.
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A little worse for the wear...
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| ...but everything inside was just fine! |
One of the things I heard as I walked back to my seat after winning was, "Finish it for next year's Academy!" I'm pretty sure that is not going to happen, but I did start it and have one block finished. While the colors are beautiful and bright, I thought a little embellishment would be fun, so I dug into my pearls from Weeks Dye Works.
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| Some of the Week's colors and a few Painters Threads. |
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| A Pekinese stitch with Painter's Threads shimmer |
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| A stem stitch with #5 pearl |
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| This is a fun stitch! |
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| Spiral trellis circles |
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| The almost finished block! |
Finishing the quilt by this March is not very likely, but this is a fun project that I can work on every now and then—I even have the next block prepped!
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| Prepped and ready to go! |
At our last quilt guild meeting, it seemed my winning streak was not finished! Every month we have a Block of the Month drawing for everyone who made that month's block. The block was a polaroid block and most of the members had made 5 or 6, so our total was over 125—a record for the guild. We divided the blocks into two winners, and my name was drawn! I knew this quilt would make a great baby quilt, so I got it started for a new great-niece.
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| All the blocks and the two winners! |
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| A stack of my blocks and the sashing fabric. |
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| Ready to pin baste. |
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| Quilted and ready to cross the pond! |
Hopefully, this winning streak will continue to my Fantasy Football team and the Hawthorne Threads giveaway, but for now I am grateful for my recent wins. Have you ever won a quilty giveaway? If so, we'd love to hear about it. Someday there will be a blog post about my completed Flower Pots quilt, but hopefully, nobody holds their breath on that one. đ
Oh what fun! Both wins could not have gone to a more deserving winner! The baby quilt is sensational. Have fun with the kit!
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