It’s my lucky day to participate in another wonderful blog hop by Carol of Justletmequilt.com. This one is called Welcome to My House. Since I have an affinity for images of houses, cottages, log cabins and those sorts of things, I knew this was another blog hop that I HAD to join! Check out the end of this article for a little giveaway too!
A few years ago, while browsing through different sewing blogs, I came across an international movement or quilt-a-long, from 2013, where quilters made mini-houses utilizing scraps of fabric. Check out this blog, Building Houses from Scraps to see the incredible results! These quilts blew my mind!! Who can do that sort of work and not lose their mind!!? Apparently, not me! If you can imagine, those houses were complete at merely 3 inches each. That’s incredibly tiny by anyone’s standards. I would love to have seen them up close!!
This is one of the little houses that I made awhile back for a Covered In Love block drive. This house measured 4.5″ and is the same pattern that I used in the pouches below.
I began my own little house project using a wonderful paper-pieced pattern from verykerryberry.com. I made several tiny houses at 4.5″ and kept them in a little box, hoping to eventually make a little quilt. I tried to use only scraps instead of cutting into yardage. Did I have enough scraps? Do you know me?? I began in earnest making little houses but soon realized that I’m not disciplined enough to make an entire quilt of those tiny things. Although I did make about 25 or so houses, I slowly been using them up on smaller projects like zippered totes. Each little house became my new favorite. I would always put a little creature in the window, because who wants an empty house!?
Which brings me to today’s blog assignment. I dug out the same 4.5″ mini house pattern and made this colorful mini house double-zippered tote. I cut into some of my precious Liberty of London fabrics! Can you believe that until now, I didn’t have any actual Liberty scraps!! I did have some remnants from my recent trip to the UK. What a great use for them, right!? Even the little deer in the window is from a Liberty print. The inside lining is Liberty of course, but the outside pocket uses a favorite purple Me & You for Hoffman batik print. I used the same fabric for the pocket on the second tote shown here. The magenta batik fabric surrounding the house complements all the pink tones and helps keep the bag from having too many tiny prints.
The deer peering out the window makes me smile!
Of course, making tiny houses is addictive and I made another one with regular cotton fabric. I like how it came out, but the tea-drinking cat is my favorite part, of course.
The black cat in this window is holding a cup of tea in his paws. I cut into a lovely precut just for this little feline.
I adore the above bold paisley “Thalia” print from JuneBee for Ink & Arrow. It has all of my favorite colors. I decided to just go with it, even if the roof of the house is red, and the rest of the fabric is the opposite of a cool color. The little scrappy houses are not meant to be too matchy-matchy. For the lining, I went with the Authentic “Define Black” print from Sweetwater. While I wanted a black print for the lining, I avoided using something like just a polka dot. Sweetwater was the first quilting fabric company that I became familiar with. This “Authentic” line is a reprint of their first fabric line with Moda, and I am so grateful to have snagged a piece of it. The words are uplifting (timeless, natural, pure, genuine, real, authentic, simple and renew), and who doesn’t need encouragement these days!? I added one little touch with my zipper pulls? I took quilt buttons that were lying around in my studio and converted them into functional zipper pulls. They really do make using the zipper much easier, but they are pretty as well.
It is time to leave bright pinks and blues behind as we turn into the fall season. Thinking about the autumn season, I went to my stash and pulled the fabrics you see below. The warm mustard color goes with everything and who doesn’t love a little jungle theme to inspire? So how about a little giveaway?
Leave a comment and tell us your favorite animal if you would like to win this little fall-inspired stash bundle. Most fabrics will be fat quarter size. This giveaway ends Sunday, September 16, 2018.
Five-piece fall inspired giveaway. Leave a comment telling us your favorite animal to win.
Check out the other fabulous bloggers and their house projects. Here is the schedule below.
September 10
Pieceful Thoughts of My Quilting Life
September 11
September 12
Beaquilter
Days Filled With Joy
Freckled Fox Quiltery
Wont-To-Be-Quilter
Why-Knot-Kwilt
CreativeBlonde
Adventurous Applique and Quilting
Quarter Inch Crafter
All Thingz Sewn
September 13
Quilting & Learning – What a Combo!
That Fabric Feeling YOU ARE HERE
September 14
Benita Skinner’s Creative Space
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That Fabric Feeling 
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Those are some cute house projects. The kitty in the window is cute.
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thanks so much.
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Those tiny houses are so cute! They certainly make a great accent for pouches, etc. Thanks for linking to TGIFF 🙂
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I love your Scrappy houses – house blocks are always a favourite of mine. My favourite animal is a cat – my blog is named after a beautiful cat we had for 16 years and appears on the blog’s header. His name was Koshka, Russian for Cat. I would love the opportunity of being in your Giveaway.
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Koshka is a lovely name. I picture a very elegant cat with that name. Thanks for stopping by and good luck in the giveaway.
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I love dogs…but also elephants! I like to see videos of different species taking care of each other like the crow that adopted a kitten. Thanks for the chance to win, LeeAnna at leeannaquilts at gmail dot com
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I also love interspecies friendships. I always think that if a dog and an elephant, or a cat and a bird can be friends, what’s wrong with the rest of us humans who can’t get along!! Thanks so much for visiting. Best of luck.
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Sew cute, and what a nice way to feature a small block! I love dogs! I used to think I was a cat person, but I’m allergic to cats. Now dogs are my favorite. Or maybe narwhals. I can never decided which. . .
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You’re not the first person to mention narwhals recently. I really thought those were fantasy animals, like unicorns but lo and behold, they’re real. Thanks so much for stopping by.
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I am definitely a dog person, but do like images of cats. I also like birds in quilts and hope to make a bird quilt in the future. Your house blocks are terminally cute!
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Thanks so much. I just saw a bird quilt that was adorable and yes, now I want to make one too.
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The tea drinking cat is my favourite too, since I do have one here. Lovely finishes.
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Thanks so much. I appreciate the sweet comment.
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