The Island Batik Planes, Trains & Automobiles' Blog Hop Final Journey!

Welcome to the final journey of the Island Batik Planes, Trains & Automobiles Blog Hop. 
 I hope you will enjoy traveling with me. We are going to go to a very special place!

I love this collection of Island Batik - Holiday Happenings. I designed a quilt using this fabric that was introduced at Quilt Market in Houston last fall. (But more on that later.)

Look at these gorgeous fabrics!

I even love the logo for these fabrics as it contains a moose.

I have three favorite places in this world and I plan on taking you to one of those. I live in one but love traveling to the other two, a desert and a forest. Can you guess which one I choose for our trip by looking at the fabrics?

If you are still not sure, please watch this video. Those who have read my blogs before know I love to share a little something to give you a hint. I hope you enjoy!

Now you know, we are traveling to Alaska and the Denali National Park! The best thing about this trip is we are going to go on a night tour to see the Aurora Borealis. How neat is that!

So why do I love Alaska and why did I want my quilt to take you there? The first answer is pretty easy - there are some wonderful animals there and the scenery is just magnificent. Such a fascinating place and because of that, I have Alaska pretty much scattered throughout my house in Florida!

in the dining room

also in the dining room

where else - the dining room

Living Room

 


This rug we got in Juneau! It shows the owl, eagle and raven. It is in the living room.




 

 This little guy is on the wall in the living room.

This is in the bedroom. Can you see the bear symbol on the rock and reflected in the lake?

 

This guy is also in the bedroom. He is one of my favorites.

I think you get the idea that I love Alaska and I want to thank Island Batik for giving me the opportunity to take you there by way of their lovely fabrics!

Here is my quilt and I call it "Night Moves".  My pictures do not do justice to these beautiful fabrics which are lovely greens, golds, and cranberry.

This quilt was made using applique, piecing and Broderie Perse. I will show you different parts of the quilt so you can see each example.

This is applique in the middle panel showing the bears and the trees. If you recognize the bears, that is because they were featured in my Island Batik Summer Country Blog Hop on my placemats last August. However once the hop was over, I removed the bears from the placemats and they became Kennel Quilts which were sent to an animal shelter that was recovering from floods. Read more about Kennel Quilts here! 
So the bears are back and they have found a home! Hopefully my Florida bears won't mind the cold weather in Alaska.

Here you see piecing and of course, the best part about Holiday Happenings is all the wonderful animals pictured on the fabrics. I had to use them. Here is a wolf and below is a moose.

Aren't they wonderful? Does it get any better? I don't think so.

Next are the hills and the snow capped mountains. The green hills are celery from another Island Batik collection and the mountains use one of their neutrals. They worked together beautifully with Holiday Happenings. And don't you love the colors of the sky? It was just "purrfect" for the Aurora Borealis.

Here is where I used Broderie Perse. The green fabric placed on the quilt has lots of lovely little trees. I cut them out and applied them to the hills in the background to create depth and perspective.

I used lovely Aurifil Threads in my quilt and they matched this collection beautifully.

Now I told you earlier that I used Holiday Happenings in an earlier quilt. This is Forest Nights and the pattern is available on my website.The same collection but used in two totally different ways! That is what I love about Island Batik. So versatile! Holiday Happenings will be available in April so check with your local quilt shop. 

I hope you have enjoyed your journey and as a way to say thank you I will be giving away two of my Forest Nights' patterns. For an opportunity to win, please comment below and let me know your favorite place to travel.  Also be sure and check out the other Island Batik Ambassadors Blogs. You will see some beautiful projects. The list is below. 

 Monday, February 15  – Caribbean Splash
Bejeweled Quilts
Pamela Quilts
Tuesday, February 16 – London Fog  
Moose Stash Quilting
Wednesday, February 17 – French Roasted
KISSed Quilts
Made In Scraps
Happy Cottage Quilter
Thursday, February 18 – Crystal Cove
Freemotion by the River
Friday, February 19 – Florida Oranges
Fun Threads Designs
Kauffman Designs
Tamarinis
Monday, February 22 – Coral Reef
Mary Mack Made Mine
Purrfect Spots Designs
Tuesday, February 23 – Sweet Georgia Peach
One Quilting Circle
KISSed Quilts
Wednesday, February 24 – Hollywood Hills
The Fit Quilter
Maria Michaels Designs
Thursday, February 25 – Desert Rose
For Quilts Sake
Lemon Tree Snippets
Friday, February 26 – Sea Salt Sandy
Tamarinis
KISSed Quilts
Moose Stash Quilting
Pamela Quilts
Bejeweled Quilts
Monday, February 29 – Jersey Shore
Beaquilter
Lemon Tree Snippets
Tuesday, March 1 – Tuscany Sun
Tammy Silvers
Wednesday, March 2 – Lavish
Freemotion by the River
Moose Stash Quilting
Thursday, March 3 – Fire Island  
KISSed Quilts
Friday, March 4 – Tinsel, Holiday Happenings
Purrfect Spots Designs
KISSed Quilts
Moose Stash Quilting

 But wait – there is more! As always! Island Batik is giving away a couple of fabric bundles to celebrate these new collections! There are multiple ways to enter – see them all and enter below.  

Thank you for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed your trip!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Welcome to my Planes, Trains & Automobiles Blog Hop for Island Batik!

I was so excited when I heard the theme of the Island Batik Ambassador's Blog Hop was Planes, Trains and Automobiles! The very sound of it makes me think of travel. And after being in the travel industry for many years, I knew this would be easy (or so I thought).

Island Batik sent me some lovely fabrics from their Coral Reef Collection! Aren't they gorgeous? They are available now at your favorite quilt store! Which is your favorite color?

However, the more I looked at them, the more confused I got as there were so many options! This wasn't going to be easy at all. I have to decide what I will make. Am I going to use a destination or mode of travel as my theme? Finally a decision was made and I knew it was "purrfect". I hope you will enjoy the journey with me. Here's some music from Johnny Cash to help get us started! So "Allllllllllllllllll Aboard".

 

I think you probably know by now, that I decided on the mode of travel rather than the destination. One of my motivations was my husband's love of trains. Both his father and grandfather worked for the Missouri Pacific line. He has wonderful stories of childhood train rides. 

Another motivation was my love of cats - Chessie Cat in particular. She was the mascot for the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad also known as the "Railroad" Kitty! For her history, click on her name. So anything with kitties was great for me! I am sure you recognize her picture. My favorite is her kittens playing with the trains while she sleeps! But there is more!

My husband use to build model railroads. One of our kitties, Denny loved the Railroad room and it soon came to be known as "Dennyville". That was the name we put on the Depot and we still refer to that room as Dennyville today. 

This is Dennyville. Please notice that the large white building with the spots is "Purrfect Spots" Industries. My husband had big dreams!

So now you have looked at the fabric, heard the song and looked at pictures of trains. Are you ready to see what I made? 

Welcome to the "Island Batik ABC Express"!
Hop on board!

  Here are some more views.

I had so much fun making this cute quilt. The cars are pieced and the wheels and alphabet were applied with fusible applique. All the colors are from the Coral Reef Collection except for the sky which is a beautiful blue from the Caribbean Splash Collection. The black is a blender fabric and the train windows are from the Neutrals Collection.

I quilted with clear invisible thread made by Aurifil. It sews like a dream and it doesn't break! I will do more quilting, but do to time constraints, I didn't have time to do all that I wanted.

I already have somebody in mind who will receive this and he is a cute 3 year old boy (my husband's great grandson and namesake)!

I hope you have enjoyed your journey and as a way to say thank you I will be giving away four fat quarters from the Coral Reef Collection. For an opportunity to win, please comment below and let me know your favorite mode of travel and your favorite color in the Coral Reef Collection. Also be sure and check out the other Island Batik Ambassadors Blogs. You will see some beautiful projects. The list is below. 

 Monday, February 15 (TODAY!) – Caribbean Splash
Bejeweled Quilts
Pamela Quilts
Tuesday, February 16 – London Fog  
Moose Stash Quilting
Wednesday, February 17 – French Roasted
KISSed Quilts
Made In Scraps
Happy Cottage Quilter
Thursday, February 18 – Crystal Cove
Freemotion by the River
Friday, February 19 – Florida Oranges
Fun Threads Designs
Kauffman Designs
Tamarinis
Monday, February 22 – Coral Reef
Mary Mack Made Mine
Purrfect Spots Designs
Tuesday, February 23 – Sweet Georgia Peach
One Quilting Circle
KISSed Quilts
Wednesday, February 24 – Hollywood Hills
The Fit Quilter
Maria Michaels Designs
Thursday, February 25 – Desert Rose
For Quilts Sake
Lemon Tree Snippets
Friday, February 26 – Sea Salt Sandy
Tamarinis
KISSed Quilts
Moose Stash Quilting
Pamela Quilts
Bejeweled Quilts
Monday, February 29 – Jersey Shore
Beaquilter
Lemon Tree Snippets
Tuesday, March 1 – Tuscany Sun
Tammy Silvers
Wednesday, March 2 – Lavish
Freemotion by the River
Moose Stash Quilting
Thursday, March 3 – Fire Island  
KISSed Quilts
Friday, March 4 – Tinsel, Holiday Happenings
Purrfect Spots Designs
KISSed Quilts
Moose Stash Quilting

 But wait – there is more! As always! Island Batik is giving away a couple of fabric bundles to celebrate these new collections! There are multiple ways to enter – see them all and enter below.  

Thank you for stopping by and I hope you enjoyed your trip!

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles Blog Hop

The Island Batik Ambassadors have been very busy getting ready for the "Travel" Blog Hop!

This is just our way of showing the newest fabrics from Island Batik that are now on the store shelves.

Every day over the next couple of weeks, a new fabric collection will be showcased on different blogs.

There are great give aways and lots of fun projects, so please load, get on board or jump in your car for the Planes, Trains, and Automobiles Blog Hop! 

Here are some examples of the fun designs you will see!

Here’s the schedule:
Monday, February 15 (TODAY!) – Caribbean Splash
Bejeweled Quilts
Pamela Quilts
Tuesday, February 16 – London Fog  
Moose Stash Quilting
Wednesday, February 17 – French Roasted
KISSed Quilts
Made In Scraps
Happy Cottage Quilter
Thursday, February 18 – Crystal Cove
Freemotion by the River
Friday, February 19 – Florida Oranges
Fun Threads Designs
Kauffman Designs
Tamarinis
Monday, February 22 – Coral Reef
Mary Mack Made Mine
Purrfect Spots Designs
Tuesday, February 23 – Sweet Georgia Peach
One Quilting Circle
KISSed Quilts
Wednesday, February 24 – Hollywood Hills
The Fit Quilter
Maria Michaels Designs
Thursday, February 25 – Desert Rose
For Quilts Sake
Lemon Tree Snippets
Friday, February 26 – Sea Salt Sandy
Tamarinis
KISSed Quilts
Moose Stash Quilting
Pamela Quilts
Bejeweled Quilts
Monday, February 29 – Jersey Shore
Beaquilter
Lemon Tree Snippets
Tuesday, March 1 – Tuscany Sun
Tammy Silvers
Wednesday, March 2 – Lavish
Freemotion by the River
Moose Stash Quilting
Thursday, March 3 – Fire Island  
KISSed Quilts
Friday, March 4 – Tinsel, Holiday Happenings
Purrfect Spots Designs
KISSed Quilts
Moose Stash Quilting

 But wait – there is more! As always! Island Batik is giving away a couple of fabric bundles to celebrate these new collections! There are multiple ways to enter – see them all and enter below.


a Rafflecopter giveaway

Purrfect Spots: Island Batik Featured Designer

Purrfect Spots: Island Batik Featured Designer: There are times when things happen in your life that makes you so happy and this is one of those times! Island Batik is featuring me as ...

Island Batik Featured Designer

There are times when things happen in your life that makes you so happy and this is one of those times!

Island Batik is featuring me as one of their designers. I have just returned from Quilt Market in Houston  and I was notified of this honor. Woo Hoo! I am so pleased.

I love working with their wonderful fabrics and "Caribbean Splash" was one of my many favorites. Can't get too far away from the beach.

 
Besides their lovely blue & yellow fabircs, the quilts were made using Aurifil threads and Quilter's Dream Batting.


Read all about me in the Island Insider!  Thank you Island Batik!

Just had to share!

Purrfect Spots: We have winners for the Island Batik "Summer in th...

Purrfect Spots: We have winners for the Island Batik "Summer in th...: Congratulations to OhioLori and LauriJo as you are the winners of my Island Batik Sherbet Delight Pattern.  Please email me here so I c...

We have winners for the Island Batik "Summer in the Country" Blog Hop

Congratulations to OhioLori and LauriJo as you are the winners of my Island Batik Sherbet Delight Pattern. 

Please email me here so I can get your pattern to you. 

Thank you for participating in this Blog Hop!