Baseball Curves Quilt for ‘Modern Bee’ + Giveaway!

It’s my turn on the Craft Book Month blog hop at Craft Buds! For those of you who don’t know, Craft Buds is my other blog that I run with my friend Mary. The two of us started Craft Book Month in September 2011 for two reasons:

a) to encourage others (and ourselves) to make projects from the pages of our beloved craft books

b) to look behind-the-scenes at the stories behind craft books, their authors, publishers and the many people who contribute to their production

My third and final goal with Craft Book Month was to fulfill a personal goal and wild dream. I wanted to write a sewing book. And so I set out to learn everything I could about how they are made, how to pitch a book proposal. . . the whole shebang. In the process, I met wonderful people at several craft book publishers and in March of 2012, I got the incredible news that Stash Books had accepted my book proposal!

Modern Bee — 13 Quilts to Make with Friends is filled with full-size quilt patterns from myself and 11 friends who I had the pleasure of sewing with in an online bee, Mod Stitches. We each claimed one month and designed a block and coordinating quilt, swapping fabric and finished blocks with each other throughout the mail. I designed two quilts for the book, and sewed blocks for each of the others.

I’m sharing some little-known facts about my “Baseball Curves” quilt here today!

Freespirit Solids 
Fun fact #1: Freespirit provided the fabric for this quilt, which I pre-cut into arcs and curves for my bee members. I asked them each to make three blocks of the same color, so I wanted to take care of the cutting part completely.
Baseball Curves Quilt Top
 

Fun fact #2: I don’t think anyone in my bee was excited about sewing curves. In fact, I think I heard a couple of (Internet) gasps! 😉 But you know what? Everyone did an amazing job with their blocks, and they all fit together perfectly. It just goes to show that YOU CAN DO IT!

Baseball Quilts back in the mail from Angela Walters

Fun fact #3: The lovely and talented Angela Walters quilted this bad boy for me. When I opened the box, I was speechless! I gave her complete freedom to quilt it however she wanted, and I will forever bow down to her free-motion skills. Just gorgeous!

Fun fact #4: I bound the entire quilt in Kelly green. Then I ripped it out and added baby blue. So much nicer.

Boxes of Quilts Arriving
 
Fun fact #5: While I was finishing up my quilt, boxes and boxes of finished quilts starting arriving at my house, from the other girls in the bee. My front porch started to look like this!
Quilts to C&T

Fun fact #6: Once I’d collected all of the quilts for the book, I needed to mail them all to the book publisher in California for the photo shoot. Talk about nerve wracking. I researched the best way to mail quilts, and came up with all sorts of things. In the end, I wrapped them all in clear plastic bags from the dry cleaner, and stuffed everything into two boxes, like this.

You can imagine my relief when my editor Michele wrote, “Lindsay, the heavily-duct-taped boxes have arrived!”

Modern Bee—13 Quilts to Make with Friends

Fun fact #7: For their photo shoots, my publisher took the quilts on location to someone’s house for “set shots,” and they also took “flat shots” of each quilt in their offices. I got to chat with my book team ahead of time to make suggestions on the overall vibe for the book, including photography and props. We went with a modern, fresh yet retro feel, which really complemented all of the quilts in the book! I think I gasped when I saw this fabulous photo for the first time.


Craft Book Month at Craft Buds

Don’t forget to follow along with the 3rd Annual Craft Book Month blog hop. We’re celebrating all month long inspirational craft book projects, a crafty contest, free patterns and
prizes!

Week One
Monday 9/2: Fabric Mutt / LRstitched
Tuesday 9/3: Stitch This! The Martingale Blog / Stitched in Color

Wednesday 9/4: Fabric Seeds / Pile O Fabric
Thursday 9/5: The Feisty Redhead / Rae Gun Ramblings
Friday 9/6: Sew-Fantastic / Clover + Violet
Saturday 9/7: A Prairie Sunrise / Small Town Stitcher


Week Two
Monday 9/9: Hopeful Threads / Go To Sew
Tuesday 9/10: The Sewing Rabbit / Sewing Mama RaeAnna
Wednesday 9/11: Marci Girl Designs / imagine gnats
Thursday 9/12: Sew Sweetness / amylouwhosews
Friday 9/13: Lindsay Sews / 13 Spools
 Saturday 9/14: Inspire Me Grey / Angela Yosten 

Week Three
Monday 9/16: Sew Very / Craftside
 

9/1-9/30: Link up your craft book project at Craft Buds from your blog or Flickr account, and enter to win prizes. Winners will be announced on Tuesday, October, 1!

Modern Bee—13 Quilts to Make with Friends

Modern Bee will start shipping from Amazon on Oct. 1.
I’d be honored for you to quilt along with us!

 

 Giveaway!

Would you like to win a copy of Modern Bee — 13 Quilts to Make with Friends, courtesy of Stash Books? Just leave a comment on this post for your chance to win. You can tell me about your favorite project you’ve ever made or what you’re working on right now, if you’d like!

Update: the winner is commenter #4, Claudia!

HELLO!

I’m Lindsay Conner, and welcome to my sewing home! I am a modern quilter, author, editor, pattern designer, wife, and mom. I use this space to share my latest projects, tutorials, and patterns!

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