Not exactly a picture for Spring is it? What you see are two quilt blocks of a calendar quilt. Pictured are October and November blocks to be exact. The Spring blocks are further towards the top.
It feels so good to be working towards finishing this quilt. The blocks were made by twelve participants, each participant making 12 blocks for a particular month. I was the August gal.
I can't wait to show you December block with free motion quilted swirling snow.
You can see the corner of the August block. It was determined that lime green was the neutral color at that time. I may have over done the lime green in my block. When you see the entire quilt the lime green illuminates.
When not free motion quilting the calendar quilt I have been making blocks from my scraps - 2 inch left over squares. While all the blocks are not completed I have been thinking about how to put them together. I know I want to sash the blocks. . . .
so I purchased 6 yards of this fabric called Dots Right by Faye Burgos (Marcus Fabrics) at Thousand Bolts for the sash. Prices are also great for many popular fabric lines. They are not necessarily the newest fabrics on the market. They have a great website where you can find fabric that matches colors in a particular swatch. I love the color but now wondering if it isn't dark enough.
So what do you think?
I have designed two different quilts designs. My blocks have 25 color squares with off white sashing rather than 9 squares.
I rather like the on-point. Notice I am using the actual fabric in the design. I scanned it and uploaded it to Electric Quilt.
Oh now I have to decide on what colors and design to use.
Do cold wintery days put you in the mood to hibernate in your
favorite quilting studio/room or place? Does me! Since I am such a project gal I
love burrowing in sometimes to my detriment. Yesterday was such a day when
hubby extended an invitation to take a spin in his new car. I was too deep in
my hole and had absolutely no desire to come out of it. Smart man he extended
yet another invite early this morning before I became too involved. He wants to
take me out to dinner and so we are.
Since I was like a
rabbit in my hole yesterday I finished a quilt and I am quite hoppy happy today
to present the completed Posie Quilt.
But baby! It is still cold out there!! We need Spring
weather with some flowers. Here is just the thing to stir the heart in hope of warmer
days will soon be here.
Posie quilt is finished!
And so now I am doing more happy hoppies!
Not only am I happy about a finish but that the colors didn’t run on the quilt
when washed. A long time quilter friend has often talked about using color
catchers. A little googling and I found that this was a product that could be
purchased at WalMart. It is called Shout Color Catcher with 24 sheets per box.
It can be found in the laundry detergent aisle. There is also a recipe for
color catcher if you have the mind to make your own at One Good Thing by Jillee.
I hope you can see how
densely it is quilted. There are several quilting patterns. Swirls and
circles in the inside borders and a loopy design in the checkerboard
border. Flowers are quilted with a posie motif and the leaves have stems
and veins. The inside sashing has on point squares with ribbon in the
center with stippling outside of the squares. The spaces above and below
the posie block have a 3 lines of various loopy and circular designs.
Doesn't it look good on my love seat? That isn't home for it though. This is intended to be gifted to a very special person.
Since I am so happy hoppy I am wanting to party. Linky Parties here I come:
Just because I think it looks so pretty hanging in my pine tree. What a moment my son just sent me a text message to tell me he proposed to his girlfriend!!
A huge big thank you to Richard and Tanya for featuring Posie quilt!
Thank you for visiting and wishing you a great sewing or quilting day!
This block was a squeeze in project for a group quilt for a friend who recently loss her husband at the end of last year. Now I can present it since she has since received the quilt. How timely only 4 days before Valentine's Day.
Happy Valentine's Day!
We were given color options of pink, lavender and purple. Not having any of these colors in my stash that worked well together off to the local fabric store I went to find the perfect colors and fabric.
The printed fabric was the focus fabric to draw from to match colors.
The center pocket is faced so it could be used to put a signature tag inside as I didn't want to have ink on the block itself. I love the addition of the lavender thin ribbon on the tag.
The final finish is the blanket stitching around each heart. The extra stitching made the block sing giving a nice completed appearance.
Hello quilting friends! It has been another "awhile" since blogging and quilting. Posie quilting is still in progress - making good progress at that!
In preparation for a September quilt retreat with friends online, meeting most for the first time face to face, I purchased another Janome sewing machine for traveling purposes. Now I have it set up in our bonus room where we watch television. After a grueling day at the computer I can relax with hubby and sew a bit.
The one thing that didn't come with this Janome, one that is basically for sewing for the home vs. quilting, was it was missing a 1/4 inch foot. Try sewing without one after years sewing with one! Using tape as a guide definitely wasn't giving the results that I wanted! The 1/4" foot for my other Janome wouldn't sit low enough to pull the fabric through. After some research I learned that I had to use the same shank from the other machine. Once that was figured out I now was getting the nice even seams that I wanted. Yeah!!!
I have a large container of 2 inch squares leftover from another quilt. Now I am sashing them with 1 inch strips, chain stitching them as I go. I don't have to put much thought other than sew along which is good when I am feeling a bit exhausted. When tired it is not to wise to start anything that takes much thought.
Here is my make shift set up. Maybe I will get a nice table that will be stationary but that will be another time. In the background is hubby's beloved team, Detroit Lions that play and are televised every Thanksgiving.
Well with that note I need to run and check my roast, something special for Thanksgiving day. Our celebration will be this coming Sunday when my stepson will be visiting with turkey and stuffing. Yum!
Happy Thanksgiving to all!!!
Thank you for visiting and wishing you a great sewing or quilting day!
If you read my last post up to this post you will see I have made minimal progress on this Posie quilt due to a situation which I will describe below.
Don't you just love the green and white checkerboard border? It makes me smile!
I took this quilt top to a quilt retreat, my very first one that was in Christiana, PA. I flew from Charlotte to Harrisburg PA and rented a car and drove to Christiana, PA. which is Amish territory. My GPS took me off the main highway where I drove through an area that was strictly Amish farms. What a fascinating area seeing displays, such as colorful laundry hanging on the lines, family members in their garb pulling wagons and working in the fields, apple orchards with apples ready to pick. There were plenty of horses and buggies on the road as well, always being cautious driving around them.
So back to the quilt retreat. I had big intentions of finishing the border and making quilt backs for several UFOs waiting to be completed, but that wasn't what happened. I finished up 3 sides of the border with the last row on the outer strip to still be added. No backings were made.
I had a great time meeting these women face to face, most of them for the first time, having connected with them on an online quilting group for the past 5 years. It was like picking up where we last left off. We ate, talked, sewed and shopped! Of course we ate chocolate too! There were plenty quilt shoppes to visit which of course I came home with an evermore heavy piece of luggage with purchases, gifts and swap items. One evening we had our own quilt show. I didn't bring any since I flew vs driving and was working hard at not taking too much weighty things with me. But I sure enjoyed seeing the beautiful display of quilts marveling their workmanship.
The Posie quilt top is now sandwiched and partially quilted. The quilting is going slow.I have to take care not to overdo. About two weeks after returning from the quilt retreat,which let me tell you I had great energy running up and down the stairs in the Victorian home where we held our quilt retreat and much walking, I was rushed to the emergency room due to shortness of breath. I drove the the local Urgent Care where the nurses did their best not to panic as my heart rate was hovering in the low 30s and who informed me that I wasn't going to drive. I ended up having a pacemaker implant. I am way to young for this!! This is a portion I wrote on my facebook page:
As wild as it was I felt like I was floating on angel's wings, and I
am so ever thankful! Basically being a very healthy person exercising,
eating properly, getting enough rest I ended up having a pacemaker
implant due to a third degree heart block. My body must have been overcompensating for a good while because
when I was admitted to the hospital I was told I was not allowed to get
out bed as they didn't want to pick me off the floor.
I am a bit frustrated that I have to monitor my time while free motion quilting since I an using chest muscles around my heart. I over did a couple of times and paid the price for it in the cost of pain! It will take about 6 - 8 weeks before I can do upper body activities.
At least one row of posies are quilted with 3 more to go an one of the long sashes almost quilted.
Thank you for visiting and wishing you a great sewing or quilting day!
Several years ago I won a door prize from my local quilt store QBee Quilts, 2 paks of 5" x 9 1/2" Studio E rectangle cuts. The Posies are made from the fabric line named Calypso, one that is now outdated and hard to find. I love this fabric and have used the green in several other quilts in the past!
I found a picture of a quilt with similar blocks and have had it on hand for a while, not knowing exactly where I had found it, and who to give credit to for this adorable block, I designed the one pictured here using Electric Quilt software program.
After having designed and made the blocks I found the designer. Wouldn't you know it is a free and available pattern! The shape of the leaves do vary, mine being a bit more complicated to sew than Moda Bakeshop's pattern named Trifle Dish:Posies.
The size of Moda Bakeshop's block is 4" x 8", mine is 6" x 12."
Now with quilt top sewn together with Posie blocks staggered I wanted to find the perfect blue or green that would enhance the blocks, the favorite colors of a good friend. Lime green seemed to work well with the happy colors of each Poise. Several years ago it was determined that lime green was the new neutral color. It seems to work well with many colors.
The outside border is going to be a checkered one, an idea I captured by looking at Mary Englebreit posters and pictures that have such borders on many of her prints. I created a Pinterest Board that is dedicated to her art work. In the picture below are the beginning pieces of the outside border.
Here is short slide show of only a few out of hundreds of wonderful, fabulous, beautiful and amazing quilts on display at the AQS Quilt Show 2014 Charlotte, my hometown! AQS was celebrating their 30th year anniversary in the Queen City Uptown region at the Charlotte Convention Center. There were modern quilts, art quilts, traditional quilts, primitive quilts and applique quilts. I stopped taking pictures after awhile since it was a lesson of patience while viewers stood in awe and discussed each quilt in detail while standing in the camera lens view. I thought a booklet with a photograph
pictures of every quilt would be provided such as I did at the AQS Quilt Show
in Paducah, a few years back, but instead was provided a booklet listing of all the different quilts by title and their descriptions without images. But needless to say it was a great show and an enjoyable Saturday afternoon seeing the collective talent in one setting.
For those interested the Best Quilt of the Show was Melissa Sobotka's Chihuly's Gondola (float boat filled with colorful globes). Here is a great snapshot of it. Amazing to see it up close!
Dresden's Dilemma was wonderfully quilted, another gorgeous quilt!
While there I test drove several longarm machines (Gammill, APQS, Innova, A-1) that sit on racks and a Janome that sets down in a table that had an 18 inch throat. There were other longarm vendors too that I didn't get around to visiting such as Handi Quilter, Babylock and TinLizzie.
And of course what is a quilt show without all the other vendors? All the wonderful new tools, gadgets, rulers, thread, beautiful fabric, quilt kits and quilting room furniture to name only a few.
Vendors can be an interesting lot. Many don't even have a place called home other than their RV or have such heavy travel schedules and are away from home months at a time. Interesting and different lifestyle so different from mine. I need a place called home! Some are so enthusiastic about their items and I found myself catching their fever! Hmmm, I walked away with 2 rulers and a pattern because I mentioned to a personable and engaging individual that the quilt behind a rack was too beautiful to be hidden. For $60 I purchased the SueNami pattern created by Sue Tucker, her Rapid Fire Hunter's Star, Petite Star ruler and her Wing Clipper ruler. I hope I can find other uses for these rulers. If you are familiar with them and have made other quilts with either ruler please feel free to share.
By days end I definitely spent my wad of money on quilty stuff I absolutely had to have! Now to go and make some quilts!
Thank you for visiting and wishing you a great sewing or quilting day!
When not free motion quilting the calendar quilt I have been making blocks from my scraps - 2 inch left over squares. While all the blocks are not completed I have been thinking about how to put them together. I know I want to sash the blocks. . . .
