Finished Gift

 I quilted and bound the blue sampler quilt.   It is ready for gifting.  I figured out the blocks were made in 2004!  It is great to have this UFO off my shelf!

I also took a few flower photos!

Patriotic Quilt Finish and a Few Tops

I made a few more quilt tops for my friend's shop, Your Best Friends Quilt Shop, I will show at the end, but I also had a start to finish this past weekend!  I have a non-quilting friend, who wanted to make a quilt for her son in patriotic colors.  He was in the military for many years and was in the Reserves and called up a couple of times.  It is not an official Quilt of Valor though.  She bought the fabrics and had a basic design idea and I made that quilt a couple years ago in queen size.

She had leftover fabric and wanted to make a quilt for her grandson who is currently serving.  She cut a bunch of 5 pointed stars but then didn't know what to do.  She brought everything to me and I had this panel.  She loved it and I designed around it, fusing 1/4" wide fusible web to the stars and blanket stitching them.  Fortunately she had a large piece of red and I was able to use only her fabric, other than the panel.  The 4 corners are a fabric her mother had had and I had included some of it in the previous quilt.  I pieced and appliqued it Saturday and quilted and bound it Sunday.  I do all my quilting free motion on a domestic machine with a 9" throat area

 Spring is coming!  There is still a little snow in our woods and I can't wait for leaves to come out on the trees!

Here are the tops I quilted for the quilt shop.

This quilt uses a cloth book panel cut up.  Closeup is below.

Linking up to Design Wall Monday.

First Finish of 2020!

I was working on this quilt top during December and couldn't post photos as it was a gift.  I was overwhelmed with lots of other things and got it to the top stage and gifted it that way.  I took it back and quilted it and gave it to my boss today on our first day back at school.

This was a kit I bought six years ago I think (maybe longer who knows!) from Starr Fabrics.  It had appliques with it and got put aside because it was not something that could be worked on at a retreat and keep track of pieces and it never got high on my list at home to work on!  Then I fell out of love with it.  I also had a smaller quilt kit I had made up from the same company.  When I got that quilt finished my boss said how much she loved it and had made a joke about wanting a king size quilt.  Well.....  I was able to order some blue fabric for the border and I started on the quilt.  I had issues and almost quit but I persevered and figured out what I was doing wrong in cutting the strata. 

I machine quilted it this past weekend on my Pfaff Grand quilter and yes, it is tough quilting a king size quilt that way!  I just did an all over stipple/loop quilting and had fun.  I watched TV and stitched down the binding and finished Sunday night!  I admit I like it much better now!

I took a picture on my daughter's bed in my house and then at school today.

She loved the quilt!

Linking up with Design Wall Monday and Monday Making.

Ending 2019 with Quilting and Family

Time flew from Thanksgiving on!  After traveling for Thanksgiving I quilted 3 small quilts for a friend.  I am trying not to overload this post with too many photos, but there are quite a few!

Two of them were You are My Sunshine quilts that I did thread painting on.  It was a lot of fun.

detail of quilting

 The backing for the Santa quilt was a minkie/velour type fabric.  The dimension of the quilting on the backing was amazing!

I participated in a Secret Santa Swap and made this tree wallhanging for my assigned person.  I used an Improv tree tutorial.  It was fun to make and I would love to make another one with bigger blocks for myself.  Unfortunately I have yet to receive a gift so that is sad.  The person keeps saying she will mail it but she had "forgotten" who I was!

 Every year at my school we make these paint filled glass ornaments.  They are so interesting to see the color combos and how they turn out.  Next year I think I am going to leave black out of the options of paint bottles. 

 I also organized these lighted snowman ornaments. 

My oldest daughter and husband and 3 kids came to visit for Christmas.  We hosted some of my husband's family for Christmas Eve.  It was fun to have kids here!

This is Kathryn - age 5 months.  The quilt is an old one on the back of the couch.

 My grandson Jared is 8 and loves machines of all types.  Since it was not farming season he saw my Brother Innovis BQ 350 machine and it has a touch screen.  He loves to figure out how things work and he taught me things about my machine!  He wanted to sew so I got out my pile of pre-cut 6" scrap squares.  Some of the fabrics are less than pretty and are an accumulation from several sources.  He was very diligent and we ended up with three machines set up and Nicole was in charge of putting squares together for others to sew.  The first top was quite interesting and my daughter Amy sewed it in offset rows as the corners would not have matched well!  It needs squared up and borders added and then finished and donated!

 After Christmas my husband and I were scheduled to fly to Kentucky to visit our younger daughter and her family.  Unfortunately my husband woke up very ill and couldn't make the trip.  I was a bit paranoid during my all day trip (3 planes) that I was going to get sick, but did not.  Several people from our Christmas Day dinner with relatives (not at my house!) got the stomach bug. 

On the first full day there we walked across the river to Indiana!  I have added two states to my collection of those traveled in.  We did get to visit with a niece who lives about an hour and a half from my daughter.

Finn loves slides!

Remy is a lefty and loves coloring

Look for another post soon with my first finish of 2020!

Turning Twenty Seeing Stars Quilt

In 2015 I joined a mystery block of the month through Turning Twenty Seeing Stars kit through Tricia Cribb's site.   The link shows a precut kit, mine was not precut.  The pattern was designed by Sue Carter.  I finished assembling the top in Jan. 2016.  I decided to quilt it and finish it!  It used Kaffe fabrics with a black pindot background.  I am linking up with Needle and Thread Thursday.

Scrappy Trip Around the World

Last year I pieced this Scrappy Trip Around the World quilt top.  The pattern is from Bonnie Hunter on the Quiltville site.  I am out of quilts to be quilted from my last basting party and I had a flannel backing for this quilt.  I had fun quilting it, just filling in with swirls and loops and even a few stars.  It is twin size and there are some subtle Christmas prints in the quilt.

 Random free motion quilting.

 It is interesting what a difference an indoor photo makes on color!

 I love striped bindings!

Linking up with Design Wall Monday  and Monday Making and Main Crush Monday

Two more finishes

So far this year I have finished 24 projects, 7 of them were start to finish (mostly baby quilts).  The rest were UFO's I finished, mostly machine quilting.  I also made 10 quilt tops for my friend's shop.

The first project I finished this weekend is an OLD, OLD UFO and it's UGLY in my opinion.  It is a 4 patch stack and whack with junk food fabric.  I purchased the fabric in about 1998 and made the blocks.  It eventually got set together but I am so not a fan of green!  I used fabrics I had on hand for sashing and borders.  I posted a picture of it on Facebook and my son-in-law likes it so it will go to him!  I just did a large stipple with variegated thread.

I finished this quilt this weekend as well.  It was a mystery quilt kit I did last year.  I was so excited it was a mystery with Kaffe fabrics and was honestly a bit disappointed in it. I do love the background light blue polka dot though!  I loved it so much I bought an additional 5 yards and I am using it in a Kaffe scrap quilt leader/ender project.  The quilt measures about 83" square and I didn't have enough fabrics to add to it at the time.

 I did very simple quilting and machine binding. 

I am linking up with Design Wall Monday.