On a roll—Past and Present finished

The ladies in our monthly sewing group are very seasoned quilters who all possess substantial stash.  Last year we all bought the book Scrap Basket Surprises by Kim Brackett and made several of the quilts from the book.  This year our book is All-Time Favorites.  This quilt, Past and Present is in both books so I counted it for both years!!  I just finished the binding and will toss it in the wash before donating it. It was made from a set of fat quarters I’ve had in my stash for several years.  I think the fabric is by Barbara Brackman and Terry Clothier Thompson for Moda. 

I did a little fancy quilting on this—diagonal lines through the dark squares and small stippling in the backgrounds.  The borders are quilted with a freehand scrolled vine.  Another 8 yard of stash busted!!

Quilts Beyond Borders-Finished Quilts

Quilting is my therapy and I love making quilts but I have more quilts in my home than I could every possibly need.  So now, most of the quilts I make are for charity, for gifts or to sell on Etsy to fund other charitable endeavors.  This week I quilted and bound three quilts for Quilts Beyond Borders.  They send the quilt top, back and binding.  I just have to add batting then quilt and bind them.  They require the binding to be finished by machine and when I first started quilting for them I was very apprehensive about that.  Now I’m better at it and am pretty happy with how it looks.  I do a better job when I sew the binding to the back first, then turn it to the front and topstitch it down.  The next time I do a binding like this I’ll take photos and do a little tutorial.  Here are the three quilts I finished.

I really liked this quilt. It was made of simple squares and rectangles with narrow sashing between the blocks.  The design was very effective and it looked great made in the homespun plaids.  I quilted each block with continuous squares (or rectangles)—very simple but it looks nice.

This is a very sweet quilt.  The flower blocks look like antiques.  They are hand appliqued and the flowers are made from feed sacks.  The alternate blocks are a cute birdhouse print.  I outline quilted the flowers and stippled the background.  I used a simple continuous design in the alternate blocks and meandered the borders.

This is a simple, fun quilt made of bright squares in fuchsia and aqua print fabrics. It is quilted with overall swirls.

Two New Quilts Listed on Etsy

Lately I’ve been busy with commissions and other quilting commitments and haven’t had time to finish any new quilts for my Etsy shop.  This week there were a couple of “snow days” so I worked on finishing a couple of quilts.

First was a four patch variation made mostly from the Chemistry line of fabric designed by Sandy Gervais for Moda.  This was a fun, easy quilt and I just loved these fabrics—pink, rose, cream and brown. 

I quilted it in a modern wavy crossed line design. It was quilted freehand and turned out pretty nice!

The link to this quilt is: https://www.etsy.com/listing/124091596/in-the-pink-lap-quilt

The second quilt I finished this week was from the Papillon line designed by 3 Sisters for Moda.  This is a beautiful line of fabric with a shabby chic look in colors of aqua, ivory, scarlet, blush and stone.  Since we’ve had a ton of snow this week I had to take the pictures inside and they just don’t do the quilts justice.  I really hope we have a couple of nice, sunny days in the next week so I can get some better photos.  This quilt was made with a nine-patch and hour glass design.

The Etsy link for this one is here: https://www.etsy.com/listing/124094282/papillon-lap-quilt

It seems like I’ve been on a roll lately with finishing quilts.  Sure hope it continues!

Buried Treasure Discovered-Big Box ‘o Stuff

A couple of days ago I was looking for something in the basement and I came across this box of fabric. 

What a mish-mash of projects.  There were no UFO’s, just a bunch of fabric with absolutely no rhyme or reason as to why they were in a box together.  I’m going to jump right in and try to get this stuff sewn together so it will be one less box in the basement.  There were some jelly rolls and fat quarter packs I bought to make charity quilts, an apron panel that I’ll sew and donate to the emergency shelter, some flannels for pillowcases and a bag of Moda “Blush” scraps from a previous project.  I just loved that Blush line with colors of chocolate, cherry and aqua.  It will be a challenge to figure out a fun quilt to use those scraps.  Now to get sewing!

Tools of the Trade: Irons

A couple of years ago my sister-in-law commented that she was still using the same she’s had since she got married about 40 years ago.  Well that right there tells you she isn’t a quilter (yet—but I working on her!!).  I’ve gone through dozens in less time than that.  For years I used a wonderful T-Fal iron they used to sell at Sam’s Club.  In fact, those are the irons we had in the shop.  They were inexpensive—about $30—had great steam and would last through heavy use and many falls on the floor.  Unfortunately they don’t sell that model anymore.  I bought two different T-Fal models but they both failed to steam.  Many quilters don’t use steam but I do.  And I also IRON not press in direct opposition to what most quilting “experts” advise.  My blocks fit together nicely and my quilts end up flat and square so I’m not going to change anything.  When I put the top on the frame to be quilted I want it well-ironed with smooth seams.

Anyway, I’d been using a Sunbeam iron that worked pretty well but the cord shorted out and it would no longer heat up so I went on the hunt to find a decent iron for quilting.  I’ve gone through all the expensive brands (Rowenta, Bernina, Reliable, Oliso…) with poor to marginal results so I tend to go low-end and replace them frequently.  The funniest thing I found in my search was a warranty on the soleplate.  That just cracked me up.  I’ve had irons quit steaming, start leaking, burn out, heat too high, not heat, etc., etc., etc., but the ONLY thing that hasn’t failed is the soleplate.  I’m just wondering what could possibly go wrong with it. 

What I ended up with is this Hamilton Beach iron.  It was cheap and it steams like a champ.  In fact, it steam so much I’m afraid it will take the wallpaper off the wall if I set the ironing board too close to the wall!!

I’ll let you know how it works out.

New Quilt Started-Pineapple Blossom

The pattern for this quilt is on Bonnie Hunter’s Quiltville blog--here:  http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2005/06/pineapple-blossom.html
I’ve admired this quilt for quite awhile and finally decided to jump in and make it.  I had this box of batik scraps from an applique project I started some time ago.

I’m making 24 blocks for the quilt and the box of scraps wasn't THAT big so I though I'd use them up with this quilt.  I even found a pile of 2-1/2” strips of batiks to use when the scraps were gone.  Well, I’ve finished cutting all the parts for the quilt (except borders) plus a nice little pile of leftover squares, strips and strings, and it looks like nothing is gone from the box. 

It’s always a little disheartening when I think about how much fabric is in my cupboards, bins and shelves and how little is gone when I make a quilt.  Oh, well.  Every little bit used is progress.

Last Minute Finish

Last fall I went down to Madison to the Quilt Expo.  My daughter Jen is in school in Madison so I picked her up and she went with me.  While we were there she decided she’d like a quilt for her bedroom at school.  She saw a pattern she liked and picked out a bunch of fat quarters.  I started the quilt but set it aside to work on commission quilts and just hadn’t had a chance to finish it. 
A couple of weeks ago Jim said he’d like to take a weekend trip to Springfield, IL to see the Lincoln Museum and we’d stop in Madison on Friday to take Jen to lunch.  This was the perfect deadline to finish the quilt.  I finished the blocks early in the week.

Then I sewed like crazy to get the top put together.  Our monthly sewing group met on Thursday so I got up really early and quilted it.  Thursday evening I started binding then finished it up just in time to leave on Friday morning. 
Jen was so excited to get it and it matched her room perfectly.  It was so worth the early morning to finish it.  She loved it!!

Pictures just don’t turn out well when I take them inside.  There’s no good place to get a shot of the whole thing and the lighting is poor.  Oh well, you get the idea.  This quilt was also made from the Lemon Pepper pattern (same as the Curious Nature quilt).  I just love that pattern.  It's so easy and the quilt looks way more complicated than it is.