Extras

One of the benefits of making a hexagon charm quilt is all the extra fabric you have laying around. In one of the scrap packs I got from etsy was this heavyweight fabric. It was much thicker than the rest of my quilt fabrics. I was worried about how that would affect the quilt, so I set it aside, uncertain of what to use it for.
Until yesterday!
I don't know where my travel mugs are, so I got another one at Kohl's (50% off! yeah!). I love this style of mug, but that image on the insert? bleh.
Since the mug was was already customizable, I just pulled out both layers (the 'friends are awesome' one and the throw-away one with the generic friends) and used one as a template for cutting my fabric. The fabric is thicker and stiffer than most, so it stands up (literally) inside the mug.
I love the contrast of the metal rings and the softness of the fabric inside. And the colors are awesome too! Yay for extra fabric!

I'm tempted to go back to Kohl's and get a lot more to customize and sell (on my new etsy store, which is admittedly rather blah right now). But I'm worried about copyright and legal issues. Any advice on that front?

Step 2: Buy stuff

Once I decided to make a quilt and I settled on the format, it was time to start buying stuff. Due to my living situation right now, I have no earthly idea where my tiny sewing kit is. I mean, I know that it is in storage and I could point to it's location (within 5 meters) on a map, but I don't know exactly which box of 80 it is in. So I decided to start a sewing kit from scratch. I spent a couple of hours at Joanne Fabric and built up my stores. Over a few trips to various shops, interspersed with research online, I procured:

• containers for my fabric and for my notions
• bright orange 100% cotton thread for the basting
• white 100% cotton thread for the piecing
• a rotary cutter (with which I have had trials) and a self-healing mat...or two
• size 9 sharps
• straight pins
• those sideways thread snippers that my mom has in blue and I love the feel of
• a pin cushion
• a general book on quilting
• magnets

I also went a little crazy with the fabric.

Can you believe I thought about doing a Christmas quilt AND a regular quilt!?! At the same time!? Yeah, I quickly realized that was unrealistic.

Also, I started by buying fat quarters. Then I did some math and realized that I would be able to make 42 hexagons out of each fat quarter. That is far more than I need from each fabric.

Thankfully, Joanne accepts returns if the fabric is unwashed and uncut. (yay!) Also, thankfully, Joanne's and the quilt shops around here will cut just a few inches off a bolt. And! And! People sell scrap packs on etsy!

Thanks to my down time at work, I have recently developed an obsession with etsy. It is so much fun to look through all the vintage staplers, handmade bags, old flour canisters, piggy banks that are really owls, and fabric. OH THE FABRIC.

Thanks to etsy, I am now aware of some awesome fabric designers.  Heather Ross is one of my favorites. She uses interesting color combinations, and her prints are filled with a great deal of whimsy! I love it! She has done fabrics with gnomes, tadpoles in jars, goldfish in bags, rapunzel in her tower, seahorses, mermaids, and abstract patterns. Unfortunately, I am not alone in my love for Heather Ross, and so her fabrics seem rather hard to find, and expensive. Just today I got in a scrap pack that advertised Heather Ross scraps. I plan on using every available inch of them.

Far, Far Away II by Heather Ross

Now that I have lots and lots of fabric, and all the supplies I need (for now anyway), it's time to start making things!