Too much swap freedom = headache

I signed up to participate in a mug rug swap. It was a no-holds-bar sort of a thing. I liked that idea, although having that much freedom for creativity seemed to turn mine off :)
I asked my swap partner what colors she did NOT like or wanted me to stay away from, and that was basically my only restriction. Jenna, if you are reading this, stop, close your eyes, and exit this post if you want to be surprised.







So, I tried a few different ideas for this mug rug. I wanted to try out some new piecing designs that I have seen on other great blogs....not all of them went well!

My first attempt was a pieced-in circle. I had read Angela's (of Cut to Pieces) Tutorial
On which she made it look easy peasy!! I think I should have started with a bigger diameter circle for my first attempt! It ended up rather puckered even with the snipped notches






Okay, truthfully, my first attempt at this was even sillier than that. Angela even said Right in her Tutorial, make sure to cut the circle .5" bigger than the exterior square - so of course, I forgot to adjust my circle size. Instead of wasting it, I thought I would try to zig-zag topstitched the two together. Also puckered a bit - GRRRRRRRRR. SCRAP THAT IDEA FOR NOW AND MOVE ON! I finally did.






I moved on to a cute scrappy triangle, paper pieced concept. Tutorial by AmandaJean over at Crazy Mom Quilts had a tutorial



Wow, does making each of these take some time for as little as they are! I cannot imagine making the like hundred of these that she must have made for her cute pillow! I'll likely make these again sometime as it would be a good scrap buster.







I actually liked this mini top, except when I got done I decided the execution had a bit to be desired. Plus, I remember afterward that the ONLY color she did not particularly want was yellow, of which there is quite a bit of for "pop" Ooops.

So, I decided to try yet another idea that i have been seeing around blogland instead. I didn't have a pattern or anything since I needed such a small scale, so I decided to wing-it. I think this it turned out pretty good if I do say so myself. I had several stupid Quilter moments, but I survived as did my seam ripper (which was my friend as the binding fought with me every step of the way - no seriously, cut wrong, tried to "splice," cut wrong Again, tried to re-patch further back, puckered, took off the entire binding, THREW IT IN THE TRASH, re-cut a binding, and attached it without issue. Really, i'm not sureif I was more annoyed at the one that would not cooperate for an hour or that the next went on in 5 minutes!)












SIGH OF RELIEF, first swap project complete and in the mail. While I was frustrated at times, I will so do another swap! Hope my partner likes it as I LOVED the one she sent me.






Isn't it fantastic?!? SO cute! Go see Jenna's other work at Sew Happy Geek






-Sew Sane Jane
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