Farm Girl Vintage and Row by Row

I finished my Farm Girl Vintage quilt that I am gifting to my granddaughter Nicole.  Nicole turned 2 on May 7th.  My daughter was raised here on the farm and wants her kids to have the farm experience when they come to visit.  Nicole loves horses so I used a panel and horse fabric for the backing.  We will be making a pillowcase together.  They are arriving today and will stay for a few days.  It's hard when they are so far away!

Farm Girl Vintage

Full view Farm Girl Vintage

backing

Rows from three shops in Idaho

I also made three rows for the row by row project.  I have another one in the works.  I'm hoping to be able to collect prizes on it, but won't have much time to sew for a few days with the grandkids here!

Not a Lot of Quilting

This past week was busy with several activities and appointments and hosting a neighborhood party.  I did silly things like yardwork, house cleaning, etc.  The only quilting I accomplished was quilting and binding this quilt for a friend.  Her granddaughter made it many years ago and had it marked for hand quilting.  I free motion quilted on the marked lines (well I tried at least!).  On the cross stitch pieces I just went around the design.  

I will be finishing my granddaughter's quilt this week and I really, really want to start on this year's Row By Row.  Some shops around here don't have winners yet and I have 10 rows collected.

Linking up with Patchwork Times.

Amy's Birthday Quilt

My daughter Amy's birthday is not until September, but she wanted a lightweight quilt with navy blue on one side.  The quilt needed to be HUGE to be a spread for her king bed.  The intent was it could be a light quilt for the summer and an underlay for her queen size quilt I made for her wedding in 2010 in cooler weather.   

I didn't measure it after it was finished, but it was something like 116 X 126.  When Amy was here in April she picked a top out of my stash.  I had to make it larger and she also picked out some navy fabric at a stop at a fabric store.  It is a modern style print.  My late friend Debi had provided some of the fabrics and pattern for the 30's quilt called Gentle Moments from McCall's magazine MANY years ago.

It was a tough project to quilt under my machine, but I got it done.  I had to do a two color binding to make it work.  I had never done that before and I like the results.

Gentle Moments 

Backing - I extended the fabric by adding a panel I had on hand.

Two Color Binding

Closeup detail of the front

My birthday is coming up soon and I am part of a forum on Connecting Threads and I'm in a birthday swap.  My gift arrived early!  I love it!  I love the purple and the embroidery design.

This past weekend I was a volunteer at Camp Erin, sponsored by the Willow Center.  There are many locations around the country, and there is one about 2 1/2 hours away at Camp Wooten.  Having suffered a personal, tragic loss, I knew I could empathize with these kids who had lost love ones.  I worked in arts and crafts and had an amazing experience.  The whole camp is a huge undertaking and this year there was 52 campers and 60 adults.  There were lots of donations of supplies.  The kitchen crew has a tough job and they did great at providing healthy meals and snacks.  Everyone was so kind and helpful and the Cabin Big Buddies worked with the kids tirelessly.  Overall it was tough being away from the land of internet and phones, but I was so busy I didn't have time anyway!  I was exhausted last night and I'm moving sluggishly today but I did get out for my 3 mile walk.  I highly recommend this experience to anyone.

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Lisa's Birthday Quilt

My daughter Lisa's birthday was July 5th.  This spring she had asked for a quilt for their guest room. She and her husband Kevin had a color scheme and idea in mind.  We worked on EQ7 and had a rough design but somehow it didn't get saved!  They came to visit again and approved the fabrics I had set aside and we got the design finalized.  I showed parts of it in progress.  I had it pieced and half quilted before our trip to Hawaii.  I managed to finish it and mail it to arrive on her birthday.   The leaves are fused on and then free motion stitched. I forgot to take a picture of the piecing backing!  

Bricks and Vines for Lisa and Kevin

Happy 4th and LOTS of Quilting!

Happy 4th of July!  Happy Independence Day!  This is a picture of our flag flying proudly, hard to see the waves of grain in the background, bt that is a spring wheat field.

I have gotten a lot accomplished in the last week!  I have pretty much ignored yard work, but I will have to tackle that this week.  I wish I had taken pictures at the wedding we went to Saturday evening but did not take my phone or camera.  The location was beautiful in a wheat field overlooking a lot of fields including some of ours.  The reception was at the former Grange Hall, now Community Hall next to our rural volunteer fire station.  The log building was built in the 30's.  I'm mentioning this because last week I showed the quilt I was giving as a gift and here it is all finished!  There is one closeup block and one scenic quilt picture.  I just did an allover free motion stars and loops in brown variegated thread.

center block - quilting closeup

Lewis and Clark Bicentennial quilt - gifted July 2, 2016

Next quilt up was Lisa's quilt I have shown parts of.  I am not going to show the completed quilt until she receives it.  She should receive it tomorrow on her birthday!  I was going to wait until my sisters were here next weekend to send it down with them, but mailed it instead.

After that quilt was quilted and bound I tackled Amy's quilt.  Again, I am not going to show it until Amy receives it. I am mailing it tomorrow if I get the binding done today.  Since we are going to a celebration later today I hope I can get it finished!

Since my granddaughter is only 2 and can't read yet I will show the progress I made on her quilt! I had gotten this far in May.  Her birthday was May 7th, but since she is still in a crib there was not a huge rush to finish her big girl quilt.  This is the Farm Girl Vintage quilt, perfect for the granddaughter of farmers and it has lots of pink!

After staring at the top as it was below, I knew I had to enlongate it before adding borders.  I made a row of block using leftover pieces I had in a baggie.  I had drastically overcut 2" squares so several of the blocks used those.

Farm Girl Vintage

Here is the finished quilt top, twin size.  The border looks wrinkled as it is sticking to my flannel design wall.  I have horse fabric for the backing since Nicole loves horses.  It's next up for quilting!

 Linking up with Patchwork Times.

Finished Top and Vacation

June has been crazier than usual!  I had a busy last couple weeks of school, getting out June 9th and that weekend we had some company.  We spent a wonderful week in Hawaii and I got to one quilt shop on Big Island, Quilt Passions.  On Oahu, we had several activities planned and didn't take the time to go find a quilt shop.  I played in the ocean instead!

Sunset on our last night in Hawaii

Fish fabric as a remembrance of our wonderful snorkeling cruise

Floral print for a backing

I also bought a pattern and their last year's row because I thought it was cute. I was too early for this year's Row by Row.

Monday I got out an OLD UFO, from 2004/2005.  I knew it was in colors that would be perfect for a wedding gift.  The BOM was Lewis/Clark Bicentennial and there were fabrics made for this.  Since Lewis and Clark are HUGE in this area (they traveled through here and built their canoes across from my mom's house) I bought it back then and had apparently made the first 11 blocks pictured below.

The directions for completing the quilt were awful or non-existent.  I might not have printed them all at the time. I searched the internet high and low but couldn't find a completed quilt.  I have had a busy week sewing this top together.  I made the final two sampler blocks, the alternate star log cabin blocks, and then had to figure out borders.  I drafted one and cut all the pieces and it wouldn't work!  I have no clue what happened, but I ended up using all the pieces I had cut and just doing improv piecing for borders.  I needed to make it longer to be queen size and the lights are the only fabrics I had enough of left.  I had a plain brown in my stash I supplemented.  I will be doing a scrappy binding after I get it quilted.  I have it basted now and will start quilting this afternoon with an all over design.  Did I mention the wedding is this coming Saturday?

Lewis and Clark BOM

I didn't get my daughter Lisa's quilt finished before I left for Hawaii but it's mostly quilted!  My daughter Amy's is basted and next up for quilting after these two!

Lisa's brick and leaf quilt

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Progress on Quilt Tops

I have made some progress this week.  I am making both my daughters big quilts at their request.  I showed LIsa's last week, it is a queen size.  I couldn't get a great picture without things in the way but this is a sort of layout on the leaves.  There will be three vines randomly coming down and leaves will be on either side.  I wanted to see if I had enough.  They have fusible web on the back with the paper still attached currently.  The quilt will be bound in red.

Gentle Moments partially finished

I have this top in my collection for awhile.  The pattern was in McCall's quilting in 2001 and my friend Debi wanted to make it and bought the pink. She gave it to me along with all her 30's. Amy wants a quilt roughly 126 X 108 with a very thin batting and navy blue on one side so it can play double duty.  When she was here she saw this in my stash and said it would work.  I had set it aside because there was a booboo.  I had somehow mismeasured on the pink border and the quilt was not laying flat.  After taking the outer borders off and removing 2" off each side I got it back to this point.  Then I had to make two more white boders and then the piano key and finished it off with the only piece of 30's I had that had enough yardage.  It's so big I didn't have a place to lay or hang it.  It's in my lumpy yard so it doesn't look even and it's wrinkled so ignore that!  It was sunny so the color is a bit washed.

Gentle Moments 109 X 125

strange mushroom



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We have woods behind our house and I have been going out and laying out trails for our dog to follow.  She is 15 months old and is doing very well at her search and rescue training.  I loved this mushroom, not sure what it is, and I love the purple flowers on the skunk cabbage.  

skunk cabbage flowers

Bricks!

It seemed to take forever, but I finally got the background done for my daughter Lisa's quilt.  The short mortar pieces between the bricks sewed up quickly but it took a long time to sew all those horizontal rows.  Now comes the fun part of drawing up leaf shapes to applique over the top.  They will be fused and stitched, it would take me forever and a day to hand applique.  The binding will be red.  

I did get several pieces sewn on my postage stamp quilt as leader/enders as I was sewing this!  I wish I had taken the time to cut more tumblers for my patriotic leader/ender tumbler quilt.  I need to see how many more I need to assemble that top.

For fun I thought I would revisit some older quilts in future blog posts. I did it a few years ago and had fun.  I finished this one in 2003.  It was a series quilt in the old Foundation Piecer magazine and made completely with Moda Marble fabrics.  It's still one of my favorite quilts and I usually take it to quilt camp.

A Little Progress

I haven't made progress on the Farm Girl Vintage quilt because I decided it needs to be longer, so I have to take a row off and make six more blocks.  In the meantime I did get my One Block Wonder pieced.  I love it!  I am debating borders, nothing is really grabbing me, so I may just quilt and bind it as is.  However it gets added to my long list of "to be quilted" for now!

One Block Wonder

I also started piecing my daughter Lisa and husband Kevin's quilt.  They designed it and there will be red vine applique over it.  There will also be "mortar" between the rows, for design wall purposes it's not there!  I have the rows on top sewn together.  It's split in the middle on the unsewn rows strictly for layout purposes.  I don't like to have pieces over the two pieces of design wall, they don't stay as well.

Lisa and Kevin guest room quilt

That's all my excitement.  11 days of school left, and we leave for Hawaii 4 days after that.  

New Project!

Yes, I have lots of projects that need finished, some with time goals, but I couldn't resist cutting a new project yesterday.  I had hoped to sew most of Mother's Day, but other things took over and I didn't have much time.  

Last year I was in a quilt shop and saw this gorgeous Hoffman Spectrum print from the Bright Christmas line.  The feel of the fabric is fabulous.  I bought enough for six repeats and it has been staring at me for months and months.

I knew I was going to make a One Block Wonder so yesterday I got the repeats cut and stacked and ready to sew the half hexi's together.  I can't wait to see what it looks like sewn together!

Other than that nothing too exciting is going on.  I am working on borders for the Farm Girl Vintage quilt I posted last week and hope to show that next week.

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Farm Girl Vintage blocks

I was on a fabulous quilt retreat this past weekend at Reflections Inn.  The owners go out of their way to make our retreat amazing.  The most we can have is ten and that is what we had this year.  I am terrible at taking pictures during retreats and my very old camera died and without cell service and limited internet my phone was off most of the weekend.

Last year I joined a Sew Along for the Farm Girl Vintage blocks.  I only got three blocks made.  While trying to figure out a project for retreat that was compact I decided to cut out the remaining 45 blocks.  That was an undertaking in itself!  The blocks finish at 6".  

I managed to get all the blocks but one made at retreat and I also learned rug hooking with wool strips.  I will take a picture of that later.  I inherited a massive amount of wool strips for rug braiding, but they can be cut down for rug hooking.

I had a quilt for my daughter cut out, but didn't get to that!

I have my Farm Girl Vintage blocks on the wall.  Excuse the wrinkles, I crammed things in a bag to come home, silly me!  I took the first picture and as much as I love the "Gingham" block on the right side, it was glaring at me.  It's all I could see so I remade it this afternoon and rearranged a few blocks in the second photo.  I did change a couple since then too. The orange pumpkin still sticks out, but that is the nature of the block.  Now to get it assembled, several borders added and quilted for my granddaughter.  She turns two on May 7th. No, it won't be done by then!  The backing has horses on it.

I am linking up with Patchwork Times and Main Crush Monday.

April is Flying By!

Where has the month gone?  I haven't a clue.  My daughter and grandkids visited for 8 days and the next weekend my other daughter and husband were here.  I went to two quilt shows and did yard work.  Now I am getting ready for a quilt retreat this weekend!  It's taking me awhile to cut out my project, the 6" blocks for Farm Girl Vintage.  I have 3 blocks made and will take the other 45 blocks with me to sew up.  It is time consuming to cut out sampler blocks!   

My big finish for the month was my Fire Island Hosta.  Below are photos of it with closeups of the quilting.  I had fun with free motion.  It's hard to stuff a 100 X 100 quilt through my Pfaff Grand Quilter, but I did it!  I set up extra tables around me to hold the bulk.

 I had pre-entered the quilt in the Palouse Patchers quilt show in Moscow, ID.  I am not a member of the guild due to distance but this is the third time I have entered in their show.  I am glad I had the deadline or I wouldn't have gotten it finished!  The photo below is a bit blurry, but you can see my ribbons I shockingly won!  All voting is done by members before the show and viewer's choice is voted on Saturday by quilt show attendees.  Since I had company I didn't get to the show until Sunday and I also needed to pick up my quilt that afternoon.  I won Viewer's Choice - Large quilts and First in Machine Piecing!

Below is my favorite quilt in the show.  I loved all the detail and I didn't get the name of the quilt!  I like to take pictures of the tags so I can remember these things and I didn't do it.

detail of the above quilt.  I loved the rivet accents.

I got this old UFO quilted in March and finished the binding in April.  It was from 2000-2001 and was a row robin with the Pat Sloan Yahoo group back then.

This is also the last picture of our cat I accidentally  took.  I had him put down last week at age 17 1/2.
We got him at 5 weeks old.

quilting detail in the border

I also finished my Folk Art Album quilt in memory of my friend Debi.  She gave me the kit.  I started it in 2009!  I hand stitched all the wool applique onto flannel.  I just stippled the backfround for some dimension.

Folk Art Album

quilting and stitching closeup

an outdoor shot of the quilt

I went to the Seaport Quilters show last weekend in Clarkston, WA.  It was fun to meet up with my friend Mary from Washington!  I was also with three local friends, and had a great day.  

Now to some non-quilting pictures!  My husband loves to take our grandson on adventures with a neighbor and his grandson.  They were dressed as Daniel Boone and went looking for treasure with maps and yes, that is a pretend hatchet!   They walked a long way through fields, woods, crossed a creek and there was a clearing where they somehow found the makings for grilled cheese sandwiches, Jared's favorite food!  The boys found a treasure box with chocolate coins and real coins and thought it was great fun.

My daughter and I drove to Sandpoint, ID, my second trip that week, seven hour round trip!  We picked up sandwiches and ate them on Lake Pend Oreille. Nicole went with us, and was a pretty traveler.  She loved the sand and the play equipment at this park.

Nicole at Lake Pend Oreille

Jared was a Fireman for Halloween last year and brought his costume so he could go to the volunteer firefighters meeting with Grandpa.  He loves to be with Grandpa and we were doing some farming during the time he was here which thrilled him.  He rode in trucks and tractors.    

Doug, Jared and Nicole.  She was actually dressed for bed but loves being outside.

When our younger daughter was here the next weekend we went for a walk. This windmill was originally put up by Doug's father and grandfather in the early 30's.  They sold the property in the 40's and we acquired it in 2010.  There is a house on the property we rent out and we farm the fields.   Doug rebuilt the base for the windmill and all the blades are in good shape.  It doesn't actually pump water now, but it's a great keepsake.  In the field behind it we have the first release of Huffman wheat planted, named after our son Brad.  Here is the link to the blog post I wrote about the wheat. 

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