Patriotic Quilt

This is my design.  I started the center with strip quilting 10" blocks using up old pieces of blue and red fabric.  The finished center is very scrappy looking.  Simple strips for the border sashing 8" wide and the corner stones are 8" New York Beauty blocks with an extra tip in the center to extend the ray.  I'm happy with the design and with the center finished, I will work on the corner stones this weekend and perhaps the sashing as well, we'll see how far I get.  Should have this top finished up in a couple weeks and ready for quilting!  Stay tuned for the final product.

The Weekend Plan 6/18/10

This weekend I plan to set up my quilting machine tracks which allow me to essentially use my regular sewing machine as a quilting machine.  I plan to set it up in the living room (don't tell my husband)(first I'm going to see if it will fit in the master bedroom) and finish up some quilts that have been calling my name lately.  Also I have a design that I'm working on for an art quilt for winter and during my fabric folding, came across two pieces of fabric that are going to be absolutely perfect!

     How is it that when you are "organizing" things seem to get a bit messy first?  I have a pile of scraps on the living room floor left over from my frenzied folding this weekend (ah Red Bull, a girls best friend when you need to get something done!)  I am getting fierce with tossing out the random small bits, proud of myself for that.  Stripping up the bits that are 1 1/2 inches or larger in width and tossing them into the pile.  I think some plastic shoe boxes will work for the color sorting and then I will start working up some strip quilts to donate this year and get that stash off my shelfs!  

     I have a dear friend Mona who lives in Ukiah and my next BIG quilt project will be for her.  She has been an amazing friend and I really don't know where we would be without her!  Right now her brother is very ill and needs all our prayers.  Her favorite color is blue and I have a pretty good idea of what she would like, so I am sorting with the thought in mind of fabrics that will work in her design.  I sorted and folded 5 boxes this weekend and there are STILL several more to go!
    Okay...so take a look at this!  Here is what I can do with all my tiny bits...http://www.quiltsbyann.com/Shredded_Quilt_Technique.html  Am I losing my mind???  Here's another method...http://www.hgtv.com/crafting/fortune-cookie-challenge/index.html

Finally! It's On The Bed!

     This photo just in from Andrew!  I finally got his quilt finished and he was able to carry it home to London, England in his suitcase.  I think he's really happy with it, I know I am!  Almost sad to see it go, it's been such a part of my life for the past year.  I'm grateful to Deanna Wright for letting me use her quilting machine, I would not have been able to finish it without it.  So much fun, I really want one now...have to save those pennies for a long time though, they are rather costly. 

     Starting on a new project this weekend, a red white and blue quilt from strips with kind of a basket weave effect and a little pink baby quilt out of some left overs for donation.

Fabric Folding and Sorting Continues

Since our move, I have been giving great thought to the organization of my enormous fabric stash.  I am one of those people who cannot bear to part with even small pieces...I keep thinking I'll be able to make something out of that and it's wasteful if I toss it.  Well, I have come across a couple things that are making this process easier.   The first one is Fabric Folding around a 6 inch ruler.  I like this, I can see my fabrics and they are neat and orderly.  I have sorted them by color, which I am finding amazingly practical.  I use my fabric like paint and this let's me go to a color on the palette quickly and easily.   I am working my way through a box at a time and discovering things I had forgotten about.  It's a new adventure every day.  This is great for 1/4 yard and bigger...now what to do with all the tiny scraps?

Well, I came across this site:  http://www.quiltville.com/scrapusersystem.shtml 

After reading her thoughts, I think I will get some bins and sort my small scraps by color also.  When I am creating, I am looking for a particular color and this would effectively allow me to utilize these scraps in a pleasing manner.  I like her recognition that you paid good money for that fabric and it's a shame to toss it. Waste not, want not!

Stack and Whack Hunting Fabric

Here is another top that I have sitting in a drawer...I love to make tops.  And if I had one of those expensive, amazing quilting machines, they would all be quilted...someday.  Anyway, this was a stack and whack as you can see, made from some really ugly fabric which contained hunting motifs.  The fabric had been purchased to cover a long table for an outdoor event.   Again, if you click on the picture you can enlarge it to see the detail.  The spiral effect is pleasing to me.  I still have yards of this stuff...I think a boy's quilt might be in order for the grandsons.

Button Gift Tags

To give a little quilted gift, you have to have a little gift tag to go along with it.  I made a bunch of these one day.  They are made from simple tags that you can buy in bulk at the office supply store.  Take a few old buttons and a little dab of white glue, place them where you wish.  Embellish those buttons with small beads or other smaller buttons, draw a few leaves with a felt tip pen.  Now, take a Qtip and dab it in some colored chalk and rub that along the edges of your tag.  Finally take a fine tip black felt marker and make the "stitches". I like to tie these onto things with raffia which you can get in a small package, it's cheap and it will take years to go through.  Another way to attach them is with narrow satin ribbon, or the inexpensive gift wrapping ribbon that you buy, the kind you curl with the scissors.  It's all about saving money these days and this is a delightful way to have some fun creating a little tag out of things you may have on hand.

Crazy Buttons

I was in a little quilting store and saw some neat buttons made from plastic clay that you bake.  They were so pretty and SO expensive.  They couldn't be that hard to make could they?  I googled some directions and a short time later...these were born.  The copper cabochons will be made into a necklace and earrings.  I plan to copper foil them and then solder connecting rings...we'll see how that plays out, may not work with the heat and the plastic, but I'm gonna give it a try.  Worst case scenario, I will just have to screw in connectors or wire them.  Either will be pretty.These were experimental, and I learned a bit as I went along.  I incorporated  gold foil, glitter, random bits of colored clay, then rolled them  and shaped them to get the swirling effect.  Kind of fun.

Royal Bloom

This is a small section of a quilt top that I made some time ago...waiting for a backing and some batting, but I love it.  It fits a queen size bed and took about two days to make.  The trick is to pick a starting fabric for the middle and then draw out a color component from that fabric to the next selection and so forth.  Then it's just a series of small 9 patches and single patches placed together to create the "blooming" effect.  If you click on the picture you will be able to see this more clearly.

here it is laid out on the floor for you to see the blending effect that is created.  John would like to see me finish this top into a quilt.  I think it's one of his favorites, mine too.

Sunflowers In The Morning for Gloria

I got up yesterday morning and made these two potholders for our dear friend Gloria Pineo who lives with her husband in San Leandro.  We were meeting them for lunch yesterday and hadn't seen them in a long time, so I wanted to take her something that would remind her of our last visit.  A couple years ago,  Gloria and Jim came up to our house in Weimar and she poked through my fabric stash to find something that she would like so we could do a little quilting project together.  I remembered how she loved the sunflowers. Below is a close up of the quilting detail.  This was fast and fun and I enjoyed her excitement when she received them.

Simple Pot Holders and the lessons contained in them.

Several years ago, I attended a class at the Pacific International Quilt Show in Santa Clara, CA.  It was a wonderful class on machine quilting.  To take the class, you were required to bring 12-15 "sandwiches" of muslin and batting that were each 20" square, these you would use for your mini "quilt" and learn the various techniques.  It let you create a sample to take home and refer to.  Well, they have been sitting in my closet for too long and I don't use them so I decided to cut them up and make pot holders.  These are just a couple that I like.

In April, I will be giving a small class for the young women from our Foresthill Branch, here at our home, to teach them how to make these simple pot holders.  They will be able to make one for themselves and hopefully we will get several made for our Branch kitchen.  That's the "service" part of this project.

There is a saying that goes something like this...The woman you see before you today, is the girl that once was.  Every time I sit down to sew or create something, I think of my mother who though it was so important for a young girl to have that skill that she bought me my first sewing machine and paid for lessons.  I will always be grateful to her for that, she gave me a wonderful and enduring gift.  The young woman who learns the basics in sewing will have the ability to sew for herself, her future family, her home, her loved ones.  She will have a creative outlet who's bounds are only her imagination.   When I see fabric, my mind races to all the projects that I could do with that.  I cannot bear to part with scraps...they can always be pieced together to make something wonderful.  Sewing is grounding, meditative, joyfilled!  And I feel wonderful when I give someone something that I have created with my own two hands and watch their face light up.

As a small child, I carried around a pillow case of my mother's scraps from her sewing projects.  I ran all over the neighborhood with that pillow case, it was magic!  All the girls wanted to see what I had and we would cut them up and make doll clothes for our Barbie Dolls.  I was 5 or 6 at the time.  And I recall a little "sewing" machine that did a chain stitch, which we all took turns on. Oh, be careful, pull the wrong thread and all your hard work would unravel!  My mom delighted in my projects and it was one of those special moments when I received her approval and it felt wondeful.

This is the back side of the pot holder with the chickens.  I hope these little "mini quilt" projects will inspire my younger sisters in the Branch to explore their creativity.  Each pot holder embodies the elements that you use to make a full size quilt.  They will learn how to measure, use a quilting ruler, a cutting mat and a rotary cutter. They will create the top, create the back, place the batting, quilt the project and stitch on a binding.  Very simple, fast and fun and yet the important elements are there.

If our young women are inspired by this project, I have many, many more fun things that we can sew and that they will delight in.  Teach and Inspire the girl who will be come the woman and you teach and inspire generations!  Thanks Mom!

 Backside of the "cats" pot holder.