Lots of Heart

Spending today relaxing after all the activity surrounding our guild's quilt show.  Also getting Dutch Gold ready to deliver to Paducah this week.  I'm still so thrilled to know it will hang in such elite company the end of this month.

Early last week I finished most of the piecing for a project I started a few months ago. 

At this point it's a true charm quilt with no repeats of the colored fabrics.

Still haven't decide what I'm going to do about a border or borders.  It's already over 80" square. 

Won't be much sewing going on this week.

Waste Not

The quilting on Dutch Treat #3 (aka Dutch Trade) may be going slow, but I finished another quilt made from the SCRAPS of DT3.  Remember a few months ago I showed what I was doing with the skinny little strips left over from trimming these blocks

Here's where I talked about it

I'm so glad I decided to sew these as I trimmed, because I now have a completed quilt instead of the boxes of trimmings that I have left from DT #1 and #2.  Sitting down and sewing all of them together is going to be a long boring task that may or may not ever happen.

But since I worked on these a few at a time, I now have this

I machine quilted it Thursday and Friday.  Yesterday I decided to add some Broderie Perse applique to three of the corners

It has a wild orange back with some gold detail that doesn't show well in this picture.

None of these are very good pictures and I apologize for that.  This was another quilt on which I used Superior Thread's King Tut "Old Giza".  I absolutely love this color of variegated KT thread and it ends up working well on many of my quilts lately.  Who would think that looking at it on the spool

I had a terrible time thinking of a name for this quilt, until a friend on Facebook suggested "Waste Not".  I think that will be it unless some of you have better suggestion?  Thinking of names may be the hardest part of making quilts. Do you name yours?

The Gentlemen Quilters From Tulsa

Monday afternoon I had a great time in workshop taught by Gary Wasson and Joe Galusha, aka The Gentlemen Quilters from Tulsa, OK.  We all COMPLETED a wallhanging using their EZ Circles technique.  While not an entirely new technique to me, they do use a slightly different method to achieve PERFECT circles with no sewing (3 different type glues were used).

Step one

Ready to apply to background fabric

The wallhangings required 4 circle blocks which took an hour or less to make

Three of them were sliced to make this 9-patch

 And  about 2 to 2 1/2 hours later we all had wallhangings made.

In the evening Gary and Joe gave a wonderful trunkshow which you can view here

I hope you enjoy!

Why I Should Straighten Up My Stash More Often

Remember how I was in the process of straightening up my stash and incorporating the new fabrics given to me by a friend?  And I got sidetracked  when I found a bag of Christmas fabric strips and decided to make some log cabin blocks

I cut and pieced and used every little bit I had .  Ended up adding a few strips of a a couple fabrics I thought would blend in and not be noticed to get these many blocks made.

So today I decided it was time to add borders and get this quilted (it's way past time for a finish in 2011). 

The blocks are 40" square, so I cut five inch border strips to make a nice size for a lap quilt or even a table topper.  I had 2 of the strips when I happened to glance down at one of the bottom shelves of my stash. And I saw a corner of a zip lock bag that looked suspiciously familiar.  Pulled it out and ....

Oops..... apparently I filled two baggies with strips that day!  So not only would I not have needed to scrounge for a way to finish about the last 5 blocks, but I could have made at least a twin size quilt.

But the borders are cut and 2 are sewn on.  I have enough of the border fabric to use for a back too and it works perfectly with the blocks.

It's actually flowers, but it looks like snowballs with a bit of distance and the color is perfect.  I wouldn't have enough to back a bigger quilt.

So I guess there is another little scrap quilt in the future from these strips.  And maybe I'll finish straightening up my stash!



Block 6 Richmond

I was so happy today to discover this week's block for Barbara Brackman's Civil War BOM is the Richmond block.  This is the block I call my "Grandma Block" and I've made several quilts using it with changes in the value placement.  The block is also known as "Aunt Vina's Favorite", "Pinwheel" , "Butterfly" and several others.

If you've read my blog very long, you've probably seen these quilts a time or two.  But

I think it's really interesting to study how different a block can look with value changes.

So this is my block for the Civil War Quilt

Block Base reverses the lights and darks in the four corners and that's also what my Grandmother did. This is the quilt she made in 1981 for my oldest son

And a close up of some of the blocks

And the first quilt I made using the block

"Remembering Grandma" 2006

And a close up of the block

The second quilt I made as wedding gift for my youngest son in 2008.  I replaced the four patchs with single squares, changed value placement a bit and called it "Hidden Stars".  Do you see them?

 Close up of those blocks

Then I added sashing to create stars between the blocks and created "Grandma's Garden" which I finished in 2010.

Close up of those blocks

Lastly I've pieced a dark version that isn't finished.  I plan to add applique to the outer borders.

I hope you find it as interesting as I do to see how this block can be changed. 



It's Snowing Again!

I'm glad my oxygen delivery man was able to get here before it started to snow again.  He comes from Joplin, MO and I think they will be getting more than us. At least I hope we don't get much. I don't wish that on anyone in this area. 

A friend shared this link of the NASA photos of this week's blizzard.  Pretty amazing!
Looks like something you'd see in a disaster movie.

I got all the blocks made for my log cabin Christmas quilt and pieced the rows together this morning.

At the moment it is 40" square.  I have to decide if I want to just leave it like this and use as a table topper, or add some borders and make a small lap quilt.

Then I pieced the three small blocks that make up January's Raggedy Ann and Andy BOM.  Now I have to do the embroidery on them and hopefully be caught up before the February block is posted on the 20th.  Obviously I still need to make the horizontal sashing.

Someone should have warned me how addictive English paper piecing can be.  I can't seem to stop working on the little hexagon pieces long enough to make any progress on the Brilliant Star blocks.

Maybe I should get snowed in more often.  I'm actually showing progress this week!



My Design Floor Monday

I don't have a design wall set up at the moment, so my floor usually serves that purpose.    I've continued to juggle several projects this past week.  

Making progress on the 1" hexies project

I just love working with these fabrics

A new project--5" log cabin blocks (1/2" logs) from scraps I purchased at The Buttonhole in McPherson, KS a few years ago.  You could fill a zip lock gallon baggie with all you could squeeze in for $5.  They had just dumped some scraps from the cutting of a Christmas kit so I scooped up all of them in addition to a few others.  That meant the strips were already color coordinated.    I'm finally doing something with them though I'm not sure of the layout.  Here's one for now. 

I love the non-traditional blue fabrics in the mix.

I still have strips left, so I'll keep making blocks until I run out.

What got me started on this?  I spent a couple of days folding more of the fabric I received from my friend and re-organizing my stash.  In the process I found that bag of scraps so of course I got side-tracked before finishing the job.  But I did get 6 sections done.  Five more sections on that wall to go and then a second wall........

We are under a blizzard warning here..not common in this part of the country.  I'm more concerned about the possibility of ice which is supposed to hit tonight.  I've had a big pot of bean and ham soup simmering all day and just ready to put some squash bread in the oven in a few minutes.  Crossing my fingers we keep electricity.



Bound and Labeled

I found the perfect fabric for binding on Dinah's Delight (I think so anyway) and got it finished last night and also labeled.

So now it is really done and I can move on to the next finish while I'm on a roll.

What Is A Quilt?

I had a really pleasant day yesterday. I started and finished quilting the Dinah's Delight quilt top I made last December.  And I was smiling the whole time.  Why?  I realized that this is the type of quilt I most like making and it had been awhile (or so it seems to me) since I'd finished one like this.

In my head, when I think "quilt", this is what I picture. Lots of different fabrics, different in both color and texture. Preferably smallish pieces.  An off white background (ideally that is scrappy too like this one). Washed to give it that old crinkled look.   

My criteria for a scrap quilt...

     It must have...

         Some red 

             Some yellow
                 Some plaid
   Other than that just about anything goes, although I prefer not to use a lot of pastel or brights. Definitely no solids. 

I don't want to step on any one's toes.  I see all sorts of beautiful quilts all the time that are not scrappy in the least.  And I admire them.  I'm just saying that for ME, quilts are scrappy.  And I suspect most of you feel the same or I doubt you'd be reading my blog since that is mostly what I show here (well that and lots of Dutch Treat applique). 

I think we all have our preferences and tend to lean one way or the other..scrappy or not.  I'm sure there are those who sort of cringe when they see all the colors and especially the mix of backgrounds I use in my quilts.  That's okay.  Different is good.  Different is interesting. 

But back to yesterday.  It just made me happy to be handling this quilt.  What can I say..small things make me happy.

I still have to bind it as you can see. That is a job for this afternoon or evening.  And it still needs laundered, but already I like the texture that is apparent in low light.

One of the reasons the quilting went so fast is that I chose to do another all over small meander.  This is such an interesting pattern..one that challenges you to find the block.  It was a mystery quilt from my friend, Cynthia, at Iowa Star Quilts.  The free pattern is still available on her website.  Here's her top from her blog.  Guess it will no longer be a mystery for you, but it's still a great pattern to make.

Now to catch up with the Dutch Treat blocks made in the last few evenings.

#142 Separate Tables

#143 Shapes

#144 Shasta Daisy

#145 Shooting Stars

#146 Silver Bells

#147 Singleton

#148 Smarties

#149 Snowflake

Closing in on row 11.  Have a great weekend!