Friday, August 23, 2013

Two finishes this week


What do you mean it's not MINE?  Buffy thinks
all quilts belong to her
Actually, it's been a couple of weeks since I've posted about a finish...

Welcome Home

This quilt was made to honor and bring comfort to a recently-returned veteran from our town. 

The pattern is called Fourth of July by Bonnie Hunter at Quiltville.  I used Red and blue homespun along with an off-white background fabric. 

 
 It is quilted with Stars and loops in the center .



 



   ... and words honoring his service all around the inside border.  I finished it off with feathers in the outside border and a red and white ticking for the binding.  I hope to be able to present this next week sometime (after I finish the binding and wash it a few hundred times with some color catchers!).


 







100 Hugs a Day

My next finish was a baby quilt I whipped up for one of my husband's co-workers.. 

The pattern is from Deanna at Wedding Dress Blue called 100 Hugs Quilt


I couldn't believe how fast this came together.  A 100 patch in the middle made from 2 1/2" squares from a jelly roll from Jelly Roll Fabrics (20 strips made the whole quilt with some squares left over for my scrap bin) and a nice white on white for the borders and triangles. 



I pretty  much had fun doodling with circles, balloon shapes, hearts, flowers and loops with swirls in the border area.  I finished it off with a multi-colored stripe in pink and purple, yellow and green for the binding.  It is so cute!

All in all, I'm having a good time with my FMQ - thanks to the excellent tutorials by Leah Day at the Free Motion Quilting Project.  Her guidance and inspiration have given me the courage to set my imagination loose and have fun with quilting.



I only have one obstacle. 


I'm not sure I'll ever get these Machingers clean again! (from the Welcome Home quilt, not the baby quilt!) OH yeah, and the cats keep pulling the Pinmoors off my basted quilts.  I know they're supposed to be non-toxic, but have you ever seen one that a cat has yakked up?  I have to put my basted quilts in the closet when I'm not actively working on them, and fold them in on themselves when I need to walk away for even 30 seconds! 


Until next time... Happy Quilting!


Monday, August 19, 2013

Why do I quilt

First let's explore what is a quilt... In technical terms a quilt is 3 layers of textiles joined together by stitching.  A woven top and bottom layer with a layer of additional material like batting for warmth and loft.  In simplistic terms it is a blanket or bed covering.
To me a quilt is much more. 
A quilt is:
  • A warm hug when the world is cold
  • Comfort for one in need
  • A place to rest your body when you are weary
  • A fort for children at play
  • A place to have an impromptu picnic
  • A colorful addition to a room
  • Memories of loved-ones long past
  • A piece of art to adorn the world
  • A work of heart pieced with love and prayers for one who I may never know or know very well
  • A labor of love 
  • The smile on the face of a loved one.
Dad and Me with his Quilt
Picture by Mom - used with permission


So why do I quilt?  To feed my creativity, and to share my love.  I quilt to wrap someone in love and comfort, to bring a smile to their faces.  I quilt to thank our service members, to let them know I appreciate the freedoms their service provides.  I quilt for the love of creating something beautiful and meaningful from a pile of fabric.  I quilt because I must.
 
 

Monday, August 5, 2013

Practice makes (Almost) Perfect

I am happy to report that my machine is back in working condition - the bobbin winder works as smoothly as it ever did!  She just needed a little drop of oil.  The repair company didn't even charge me!

There have been a lot of projects in the works in my basement workshop. 

Maybe last week, you'll remember I was working on the Prayer Shawl for my sister, practicing with feathers. Just when I was happy with the practice, my machine decided to stop winding bobbins.

This week I was able to finish the quilting! I started out with the feather wreath in the center using a color that matched the backing - oh mistake #1...


The picture doesn't show it, so hopefully nobody will notice all the little green dots here and there.

I wanted to carry the feathers throughout the piece, but I didn't like the way it was turning out - so out came the seam ripper.  After 2 days of ripping out feathers, I thought I'd never want to do them again...



 I decided on an all-over loopy flower-stippling design for the braids....


 
and back to feathers in the border.
 
I'm loving the way it turned out.
 
 


Now all that is left is the binding, and slip it in the mail for a quiet surprise.

The flying geese are for a quilt I'm making for my father-in-law.


 
 
For him, I wanted to do something fun!  My original thought was some kind of I-Spy design and gathered up fat quarters for many of his favorite pass-times, camping, cars, snowmobiling, fire department, fixing things, and collecting yardsticks. There are many stories of various things shown here, like the ice cream cones.  When our son was little, they'd let him have "a thousand scoops" ice cream cones, "but who says we know how to count". 

The flying geese come from a story he tells about how he'd watch the geese every year and as he tells it, geese mate for life.  One day on the road he passed a goose sitting on the side of the road next to a goose that had been hit by a car. The rest of the flock had gone on their way.  The next day he passed the same spot, and the goose was still there, sitting next to his fallen mate.  Every day for about a week, he'd pass the same spot, and see the same sight. On the last day, both geese were down.  The second goose had died of a broken heart.

My in-laws have been married for 55 years, and have one of the strongest marriages I've ever seen.  I hope in 25 years, our son will say the same thing about us.

Linking to Leah Day's FMQ Friday Linkup.  I wish my work looked half as good as her 'mistakes'...