Quilt a day #17

Happy St. Patrick's Day! I wore my green and white polka dot socks to work today, forgetting I was also going to the Dr. in Moscow afterwards! Oh well, it was fun! My boss gave us all dill pickles this morning for something green. She couldn't find green frosted cookies at the store! Most students at school love dill pickles, except the two kindergartners.

Today's offerings of quilts are just random photos again. I saw the pattern for this first quilt in a magazine a long time ago. I was just starting into the liking yellow phase. If you look closely you will see a mistake, something I didn't notice until it was completely done. My weekly hand quilting group quilted this one, so I know it's older than 7 years old, we disbanded then. There were only three of us left and I was working.
I saw this quilt in a magazine also. I made it in about two days, working intently. It's called Winter Rose. I had the border fabric and desperately wanted to use it. It's machine quilted and machine appliqued and is a large wallhanging.

Quilt a day #16

I can hardly stay awake but I remembered to post a photo! We watched National Treasure II tonight and I tried to hand quilt on an antique quilt but I had to pay attention to the movie!

Here are a couple of Pat Sloan wallhangings I did a few years ago. The first one is Katie's Summer Day and the second one is Katie's Tulips. I gifted Katie's Summer Day to my friend Cynthia, but I have Katie's Tulips. I was inspried by the border print.

quilt a day #15

I have been sewing on an American Hero string quilt today and decided to post more mini quilt photos. The first one is about 13" X 16" and was a pattern I picked up several years ago at a quilt show. I started it and then set it aside because I got confused on the pattern but then finally just changed it to suit myself.The next one is one that didn't start with a plan. I just started sewing batik strips together and sliced then and this is what I came up with. It's about 16 X 20 and I gifted in a Christmas stocking exchange on an internet group.The last one is done with Buggy Barn In the Pink fabrics. I can't stand the color brown or dull colors normally, but I was attracted to this grouping of fabrics and got some FQ's. I made log cabin blocks and they are hard to see but I appliqued some random leaves on the light color. It's 22" square I think!Lisa and Brad are here on spring break and they helped their dad move a "new" combine home today. It was a 7 hour round trip as combines don't go that fast!

Quilt a day #14

I decided to post some miniature quilt photos today. This trip around the world is one I made on Mother's Day sometime in the late 90's. Doug took the kids away for several hours as my present and I got the whole thing made and quilted. The squares finish at 1".
I have no idea what year I made this but it was in the late 90's. I made three of them, gave two as gifts and kept one for myself. It is hand quilted. Without running up two flights of stairs my estimate of size is 12" X 15".
This quilt was made in 2002. I saw the quilt in American Patchwork and Quilting and decided to make it but in a smaller scale. The church dash blocks finish at 2.25". I love the color combination of this one and I used to not like yellow at all! The flowers are fused on and I just stitched them down as the quilting. The quilt is 20" square.

Quilt a day #13

Today was boring housework and playing games with the kids. Tonight I decided to make an American Hero quilt out of some 6.5" charm squares and had to cut more fabrics to have enough squares. Now the squares have to go up on the design wall to distribute the colors.

The first quilt is one that was in Foundation Piecer magazine as a series. It took quite awhile but it was worth it! I usually take this one to put on my bed at quilt camps (even the ones that provide bedding because I never have enough blankets). I made this in 2003 and it's machine quilted.
The next one is a wallhanging I made in the late 90's. Well I started in the late 90's and finished it in 2001! I was going to make some more blocks and just never did so I finished it as a wallhanging.

quilt a day #12

My trunk show at my guild went very well last night. I think it would be fun to present it to other groups sometime. Today was a busy, but fun day. I went to my small art group and it's always fun to see everything. We have a variety of artists in there, I'm kind of on the outside looking in most of the time, but it's still very fun!

My daughter Lisa had great news today. She was one of a few accepted in Georgia Tech's master's degree program in prosthetics and orthotics. It's going to be a long way from Idaho this fall and lasts for two years and the thought of her being in Atlanta is kind of scary!

Many years ago McCall's magazine ran a series (they have run several of them since) in this Grandmother's Country Album quilt designed by Robert Callaham. I made the quilt in the colors pictured, although they weren't my normal working style. Everyone has to branch out sometime! It is machine quilted.The other quilt was made in the early 90's sometime, and is called Blockbuster Baskets. It very definitely has the calico look! It's based on the book Blockbuster Quilts by Margaret Miller published in 1991. I hand quilted it and it's about 56" square.

quilt a day #11

I'm trying to get this done early today since I have a guild meeting tonight. I think I got carried away on gathering up quilts for my trunk show. I had to take several out. I have two suitcases and a quilt carry bag to take. I figure it will be good practice just in case I ever get invited anywhere to show quilts!

We celebrated pi day today, since we won't be at school Sunday. Lisa and Brad will be on college spring break next week and Lisa asked if we had the ingredients for pie, since Sunday is pi day. Yes, I have math geeks for family members!

This first quilt is one I got a kit for at our local quilt show several years ago. I had made up the top and had it, but it's not really me. My brother desperately wanted a new quilt and even though I didn't have their name that year I gave it to him at Christmas anyway, a year early! It took pressure off to make something the next year!The next quilt is one I gave to my other brother and SIL. I did have their name that same year and SIL wanted a red/white/blue quilt star quilt, in the darker tones. Oh I just figured out the year I made these two, it was 2006.This is one of three Laura in Redwork wallhangings I made and gave them as gifts. I had hoped to get one back on my friend's recent passing (my friend made me say which quilts I had made that I wanted back), but I didn't get it. That's fine, I still have the pattern!

quilt a day #10

I changed the picture on the previous post to the finished quilt instead of the quilt top for the 4-H fundraiser and I found the year was 2006 that I made that quilt. I thought I was posting the finished quilt the first time!

A busy day with work, dentist, yet another blood draw and major grocery shopping.

This quilt was one I had totally forgotten about and I forgot how much I loved it. I donated it to the 4-H program in 2005. Fortunately we were able to stop doing raffles after the next year, because I was really donating a lot and had a hard time saying no! I am a huge believer in volunteering and I still do lead 4-H sewing and quilting projects.I have no clue when I made this delectable mountain quilt, possibly around 2002. It's not a great photo, it was taken at a quilt show. Sally Howard in Seattle machine quilted it for me and did a fabulous job. I had seen it in an old issue of Quilting Today magazine.

quilt a day #9

What a busy day! I subbed for my boss this afternoon and then raced off to a special, early school board meeting. I didn't really want to go that bad, but decided to be community minded and endured sitting on hard bleacher seats to watch the chairman of the school board not get his way so that was fun! I made two quilt blocks for my guild's charity project this evening but didn't take a picture.

The first picture from my files is a quilt from the book Four Seasons in Flannel, but I made it in regular cotton and donated it as a fundraiser for our county 4-H program several years ago. The person that won it was so thrilled and called me to tell me she was re-decorating a room in her house for the quilt! It's queen size and completely machine done.
This quilt is one I saw as a BOM many, many years ago called Old Glory. I ordered the BOM and caused a SUI (shopping under the influence) on my Washington State Quilters group. It took years but I hand apliqued the quilt and then machine quilted it. It's a large wallhanging/throw size.

8 days in a row!

I am proud of myself for posting this many days in a row!

We went out to Mexican food tonight, it had been a long time and I am thrilled to have leftovers for lunch tomorrow.

Here are a couple pictures from my files. I made the New York Beauty quilt in 1996. I used over 60 fabrics. It's a Karen Stone paper pieced design and I just couldn't bring myself to do the pieced border she had in the pattern.The other quilt is more recent and it's behind the picture of me on my blog. I took a class from Helene Knott several years ago and this is her pattern of Multnomah Falls. I got engaged there in 1983 so it's special to my husband and I. I gave this wallhanging to him as a Christmas gift. I just haven't checked the back to see what year I made it!

Pansies

It was another busy day here. So much for my afternoon of quilting! I wasn't able to be home. I did get a bit more done outside this morning.

I just have one quilt to show today. I was remaking my bed yesterday and this is one of four quilts that is on it. I took it into my daughters room to take a photo. I made this in 2003-2004, testing a pattern for a friend. I used the fusible interfacing for the appliques and machine blind stitched them own. I found a great pansy fabric for sashing and border to coordinate.
It's back to work tomorrow, then a very busy week ahead! I was inspired by my blog and for the guild program this week I am doing a trunk show of my quilts! We have a lot of members who didn't know me "way back when". I am a charter member of the quilt guild formed in 1993.

Following a theme of color

I did some yardwork today in the beautiful weather we had and my husband and son were out in the fields working. Farming season has begun! I also did some machine quilting, but I'm not ready to show that yet.

Apparently in the mid 90's I was following color theme. I showed one of my favorite quilts yesterday and here are two more in those colors. This kaleidoscope was also based on a quilt I saw in Quilter's Newsletter. I just made mine a lot smaller! I don't recall if I paper pieced it or sewing all those odd angles. I know I had a ruler so who knows! It's hand quilted and made in 1993.
This was a free pattern by Marti Michell before she started all her templates. It came with a magazine renewal or a calendar. I changed the pattern since I didn't like a couple of the designs in the original. It is hand appliqued and hand quilted in a cross hatch pattern and made in 1995. A photo of this quilt appeared in a magazine special called Applique Quilts in 2003 with the pattern designer credited correctly. There was a little write up about me and another of my quilts as well. That will be shown at a later date.

One of my favorite quilts

This is one of my favorite quilts. I do have quite a few favorites, but this was my most time consuming quilt at the time I finished it in 1993. It was based on a quilt I saw in an issue of Quilter's Newsletter magazine and I ordered the back issue from 1982 with the pattern in it. I love the contrast of fabrics and I hand quilted it with pink thread. I sent a photo of this quilt to Country Woman magazine and they published the photo in 1995 in the blue ribbon winners section.
This is a top I finished the borders on this morning. The blocks belonged to my late friend Debi and they were from a swap in 2000. She gave the blocks to me last summer and after she passed away last month I got them out and had them on my design wall. This was her layout and her border/sashing fabric. It's a little busy, but it is a special memory quilt as the blocks were made by a lot of people we both knew.

Table Runner

This is a tablerunner I made last weekend. I just wanted to do something quick and springy and had this pattern sitting here. It was supposed to use charm packs so picking fabrics was tricky, as I don't have any charm packs. It turned out more pastel than I wanted, but I am still happy I was able to make the whole thing in one day including binding!
I am too tired to do much of anything else. I just have two borders left to sew on a top, but I have all weekend to get more quilting done!

Some Oldies

I'm having a forgetful week, forgetting to take my purse to town Monday (it's hard to buy anything with no money!) and I definitely didn't speed! Today I forgot to put sugar in the Snickerdoodles I was making. After that I couldn't remember where I put the mixing bowl to make a new batch of cookies after throwing the others away. I finally found it in the microwave after looking for 20 minutes!

In the early to mid 90's I got going on a lot of small projects that could be finished in a shorter amount of time. This little Grandmother's Fan is 12" X 16". I made it in 1993 and added ribbon for an accent and hand quilted it.This wallhanging is about 18" square and also made in 1993. the leaves are dimensional and the violets are gathered yo-yo's with french knot centers. I think I needed a little practice at having a square quilt! The pattern was in Miniature Quilts magazine. It's hand quilted.
I saw this quilt in a Christmas quilting magazine in the mid 90's. I didn't date the quilt unfortunately. It is paper pieced and I just had to make it. I machine quilted it on the diagonal with metallic thread. It's about 32" square.
I actually took these photos tonight. As I said my photos are going to be random based on what I feel like posting and some days you will get more than one!

My second quilt and others

So I don't make myself crazy, I am going to randomly be posting photos of quilts in no particular order. I am not actually taking a photo a day, just posting one!

I can't seem to find a picture of my first quilt in my files, I still have the quilt, but I do have a photo of my second quilt. I took a class with my MIL and a friend of hers and made this Irish chain quilt. Picking fabric was very hard, I am much, much better at it now! I still have this quilt also. It's hand quilted and made in 1988.
This one below is a photo transfer quilt I made for one of my coworkers. The 16 students at my one room school took photos (some of them brought some in from home) and we made greeting cards out of them and sold them as a fundraiser. I took the file of pics home secretly so I could make my two coworkers Christmas gifts. They were thrilled with them.
I made this mystery over New Year's with my WA State Quilters online group. I made it in patriotic colors to donate to American Hero Quilts. I still need to add borders and get it sent off!

It's March, wow!

With our lack of snow this winter it's hard to fathom it's already March! I just hope the rain comes at the right times for farming through the spring and early summer.

I want to try something new, posting a quilt related photo a day. I got this idea from both my daughter Lisa's 365 photo project last year and my friend Sharon. Now obviously I can't make a quilt a day, but I have lots and lots of quilts to choose from. I have an overflowing linen closet of quilts and they are all over my house as well. I usually have between 30-35 on display at any one time. I have been quilting for 23 years and spent a few years being quite prolific. I started out with machine pieced, hand quilted bed quilts and would manage to do a few a year. Then I discovered wallhangings and from there machine quilting and wow I could make a lot more things! I am one of those that calls anything that has a top, batting and backing, and is finished a quilt, no matter the size.

I just randomly went into my files of projects worked that haven't been posted here yet. This quilt top is one I assembled last fall from some swap blocks. I was thrilled with how it came out with the different size leaves. I'm not a fall colors person, but since I decorate for the seasons this will fit well if I ever get it quilted!

I'm back from blogger hiatus!

I hope I can keep up blogging now that I decided to take the plunge and start again. My daughter Lisa told me it had been six months since my last post. Really? I told her I had a plan to start on March 1st but I am doing it a couple days early!

I don't know where the fall went and then of course was Christmas and mostly I just did quilting for others. I will slowly try to catch up on photos.

January and February have not been great with several health issues (mono was just the start and I'm still fighting the tiredness of that) but I managed to finish a quilt top today. I started the embroidery after Christmas from Alex Anderson. I used colored pencil to fill in the embroidery and really enjoyed that. I used a bunch of 2.5" 30's squares from my friend Deb, who unfortunately passed away recently. I should have tried to brighten the photo a bit.

On the way back from Deb's memorial service in central WA I stopped at Palouse Falls. I love waterfalls and the landscape around this is so impressive. My friend Robin had not been there before and it was a nice break in the drive.

Quilting Finishes

I haven't gotten very many things accomplished recently, but here are two quilts I finished in August for my friend Deb.
The blue one is a hearts and flowers quilt. The blocks were made by members of the WA State Internet Quilters in memory of Deb's parents. Deb had the mottled blue batik and I came up wtth this setting using almost every scrap of the blue! I machine quilted it and bound it and included a quilting closeup.
The second one is an antique Double Wedding Deb purchased off ebay. I machine quilted it with warm and natural batting, then threw it in the washer and dryer. Deb was astounded when she saw the quilt! I must admit, the washing really added to it. The binding was tricky, but I managed!

I went to visit Deb and delivered the quilts in person and that was fun to see, since she had no clue I had finished the Double Wedding Ring!

I spent two nights in Ephrata and took off early on the 22nd to head to Seattle. I was at Lisa's dorm by 10 AM and headed out of Seattle with her and a very loaded car by 10:30 AM that day! This was taken from a rest area on I-90, loved seeing Mt. Rainier!

Another picture try

I played with the colors a bit and I'm trying again to see what this picture looks like. Compare it to the one below and I this one is a little more accurate, but still not right.

Table Runner

I have lots and lots of tops to machine quilt but Sunday something came over me and I had to start a new project. Friday and Saturday I had gone on a shop hop, we went about 400 miles with 12 official shops on the hop and an extra that was too new to be part of the hop. Each shop gave a block pattern out, and I have made many sampler quilts over the years and didn't really need another sampler with 12" blocks.

I decided to use 10 of the blocks and size them down to 6" and found some fabrics in my stash and started sewing. I sewed the borders on last night. One block had 63 pieces in it and he star points were 3/4" finished at the 6" size! The two blocks I did not include were a Drunkard's Path and a very cute heart vase and heart flowers block from the Quilted Heart. I would love to make that up into something else.

The tablerunner is a bit dark but is great for fall and I love it. It must be my monitor, this looks very pink. It's not, it's orangy red, rust and pruple based with sage green!

Some Scrappy Quilts

I always have good intentions to get back to my blogging but then time flies by! It's been a very different summer. There is always something going on with not much quilting! I'm trying to fix that though!

I thought I would start trying to catch up on blogging with posting my most recent finishes. In late spring I participated in a block swap with a small internet group and we were provided a paper piecing pattern for scrappy strip blocks. I guess I got carried away rough cutting pieces! In July I got the quilt together from the swap and here is the photo.During my rough July I randomly sewed the leftover pieced together, trimmed them to a usable width and added sashings from my stash. I quilted all three of them on my new Pfaff Grand Quilter last weekend and I LOVE that machine! I didn't do fancy quilting, just got the hang of controlling the machine. All three quilts are being donated to a cancer clinic for patients undergoing chemo.

Will I Ever Catch Up?

Life is so complicated right now it seems. Good and bad. In June I was gone for almost two weeks traveling and having a spectacular time! Here are a couple pictures of my trip to New York. Three days in city area and 3 days in the West Point area where my nephew reported on the 29th. More details on that later. Before that I was on my 25th anniversary trip with my husband in Canada. I have pics of that trip also.Here I am at the Statue of Liberty.One of the many gorgeous views of part of West Point and the Hudson River.

My dad passed away on July 4th so I have been doing a lot with helping with that. We are having a Memorial "party" on July 18th. Dad didn't like funerals (but went to tons of them) and liked parties so that is what we are doing. More of a celebration of life. Dad was ill and had no hope, it just wasn't expected that he would go when he did, but it was a blessing. He is free of the intense pain he was suffering.

I have a new Pfaff Grand Quilter and it's still in the box!