Monday, May 2, 2016

One of our Tuesday quilters has a 75^th birthday in May so I decided to make her something with a panel I picked up from either a stash sale or a quilter’s estate sale. When I cut it down to eliminate repeats I ended up with something in the shape of a placemat. So I added fabric here and there and this was the result. Each of the quilters at the bee will sign their name to it. I think I’ll make a couple of sets of placemats (one in the male version and one in the female version) and offer them for sale at the quilt show next Spring. It was relatively quick and easy to make, in spite of the trouble I had with the binding on this one.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I was repairing a quilt for a Facebook friend; I finished it up today. There was a lot of wear on one side of the quilt and there didn’t seem to be any easy way to fix it other than replace the back (or the front in the original quilt). I had agreed on a very reasonable price to do the job but when I sent Sarah a photo to show her my work-in-progress she said she wouldn’t be able to pay me until at least July so not to hurry with it. Since the job was almost done I wasn’t going to keep in hanging around my house until then, and I certainly wasn’t going to track her down when July came around. Since her birthday is this weekend I’ve decided to gift the quilt back to her.

I knew that Sarah was concerned about losing too much length and width so I squared it off as large as possible. There is still a bit of the original fabric showing around the binding but I hope she will look at it as a reminder of the quilt her Grandma made for her.

An odd thing about old fabric. I have enjoyed working with Mum’s fabric for my Farmer’s Wife blocks and often spend more time pressing than is absolutely necessary. The smell of the heat and steam on the fabric feels familiar and I breathe it in. On someone else’s quilt though when I press it I notice the smell but I don’t find it in any way pleasant – just old. I guess we really do have a “smell” memory.

This was an online quilt-along from Quiltmaker; we were given a new block every month in what was to be a row-by-row quilt. I always had this slated as a miniature quilt so only did one of each block.

Since I didn’t need to do as many blocks as other participants, I decided to hand-piece the blocks. It was easier than I expected, I enjoyed the handwork, and each month I had a new block to show at the Mini Meez meeting. Since I’d never hand-quilted (successfully) I decided that this would be my “been there, done that, never need to do it again” project.

I was happy with the way this turned out, although I wish I had the same background colour in the log cabin block.

March 19, 2016

I purchased my first jelly roll last fall in anticipation of a Guild demo and workshop. I didn’t have the pattern when I made my purchase and what I bought was totally unsuitable for the quilt pattern. I split the roll in half using the dark ones for a chair cover. There were enough left to make this table topper.

I outlined the white squares and intended to do something fancy on the centre but none of the templates I had were the right size. I really didn’t fancy another paper template so I did some rectangular straight lines in the centre. I used a diagonal line in the corners but none of the stitching shows up much. It is quite a busy piece so I think that is okay.

I’ll donate this to the Guild’s Hands Across the Water event this fall.

March 16, 2016

Late in 2012 I noticed a posting online about a Mystery Quilt-Along with clues posted every hour on New Year’s Day, 2013. I had never done a mystery quilt before or a quilt-along but after I picked my fabrics I didn’t pay much attention to any of the subsequent posts. When I looked for my first clue on New Year’s Day I noticed that we were supposed to have already made 40 quarter square triangle units. Needless to say by the end of the day I was still working on those 40 units and the remaining ten clues hadn’t even been read.

I put the project away for a long time and when I was preparing for the quilting retreat in the fall of 2015 I once again dug it out. It helped that this was one of the projects I had added to my Guild Challenge list for the 2015-2016 season. I finished the top at the retreat, with the exception of the final border. The project (and cut borders) hung on a rack in my studio for several more months and, while clearing space in my sewing studios, I put it in a bin with several other projects that were needing only borders or quilting. I promised myself that whenever I had a stretch of time at home I would tackle the quilting.

The quilting took almost a week of my time. I knew from the start I would outline the pinwheels and do some stippling in the background of those blocks. I purchased some templates when Lainey closed her shop and the Leap Frog was the perfect size for the alternate blocks. Because of all the colour changes in the block none of my markers showed up enough so I had to use a paper template for the free motion quilting.

Pat has asked to have this one hung on one wall of the bedroom. I added a sleeve in case I want to put the quilt in the next show, but we’ll purchase a curtain rod with hooks when it is hung at home.

The quilt finished at approximately 56″ x 68″.