These PP6 green potholders are FABULOUS and very much my style – thank you so much ‘Coisas da Laura’ ! The Dresden Plates design is great and the first time I’ve had the pleasure of having one made for me! It is such a great pattern, but I’ve always been intimidated by it – so much work! And I love the pieced funky angles of the other one. Also, the large size is great so I can get a really good grip on things and not have to worry about my hands! Well, that is if I ever get to use them – they are too beautiful! And the matching hand towel is awesome. I love the 2 rows of fabric – very unique as most you see are just 1 row. And I LOVE the fun stitching around the edge … which I didn’t capture in the photo :(

I got spoiled! Thank you Laura :)

Potholder Pass Round 6 had a monotone theme – potholders you make must only use fabrics in the color chosen by your partner. As you can see, my partner chose green, which is excellent, since that’s my favorite color too :)

My goal with these was to create a shading of green from light to dark and make the potholders opposite from each other. But then I added on the borders and it completely threw off the idea, but I still like them. And for fun, I quilted on the diagonal in a neon green thread – you can see it much better on the left potholder.

I do hope my partner enjoys these – but if not, I’ll take ‘em back!

The Quilting Gallery hosted another swap … this time a Mug Rug swap with over 300 people and 25 countries joining in.

A mug rug is an oversized coaster for your mug or glass or cup and has room for a cookie on the side! Great for those early morning sewing sessions :) For this swap, the guidelines were to make two Mug Rugs for our partners, and they weren’t required to match either.

My partner was open to anything – which actually made things harder! I did snoop around her flickr site for ideas and found she likes purple and flowers, so that’s the direction I went … it’s hard to tell in the photos, but free-motion quilting holds it all together – close up shot attempt of the quilting as well.

For me, CaryQuilter from North Carolina made me the great blue-brown-teal rugs and sent extra goodies too. Again, hard to tell from the photo, but there was some fun quilting and stitches used.

See more mug rug swap photos on flickr.

Fabric postcards are the new rage. I’ve made and sold at a few of my craft fairs. I love them because they are little pictures to share with others – just more fabulous because they’re made from fabric!

There is a new twist as people are making fabric postcards and mailing them to each other. Swapping them like you would trading cards. So of course, I’m one of those swappers. In my swap group, you are matched with three secret partners … and then receive three back. And our swap themes are holiday/season based.

The first swap was for Fall or Halloween – all of my partners chose Fall, and I requested Halloween. For mine, I pleated the brown “trunk” and add the individual leaves. And the bright orange/red had some “thread painting” to make the tree outlines. The top left was simple applique.

And as the holiday season rolled around, a Christmas or Winter theme was next. The gingerbread men and heart are stuffed so they pop out. The trees have fun gold thread and a cute star. And the snowflakes include some blue beads and one that I crocheted (don’t look too close!)

Just before the holidays, I participated in a Candle Mat Swap hosted by The Quilting Gallery. There were 150 participants covering 20 different countries! We all used the Candlelight pattern, by Sandi Anderson, but everyone requested different colors and themes. It was another secret swap, so who you send to is not who you receive from, which I find to be the most fun.

My partner asked for rich fall colors. I also sent an orange flower candle with holder.

I asked for winter colors. She also made cute coasters from leftover fabric and sent a Moroccan vanilla candle.

The pattern was quick and easy to follow, but also fun to see how everyone interpreted it, used colors differently, and added their own quilting and embellishment techniques.