Under the Sea

I finished the binding on this quilt on our trip down to the beach over the weekend.  I'm calling it Under the Sea because of the mermaid fabric and wave-like design in the piecing.  It is going to be a Christmas present for my 2-1/2 year old granddaughter.  She loves to go swimming and playing in water, so hopefully she will appreciate the mermaid theme.  The quilting is an all-over dolphin design done by the Gammill Girls at the Front Porch quilt shoppe.

Other than attaching a label to this quilt and the one for my younger granddaughter, I'm finished with my Christmas sewing for this year.

Mischievous Wife Quilt

On our trip home from New Jersey last month, I finished the binding on this quilt.  It was my adaptation of the Gypsy Wife quilt that our Moda group did last year.  It was quilted by the Gammill Girls at the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe.  I bound it in the same fabric as the border.

It's a nice sized quilt, a bit longer than the ones I have photographed on the fence before.  It hangs down onto the ground by several inches.  I still don't know what to do with it.  It's okay and all, but I still don't love it.

Vintage Christmas - January Blocks

This year our group that meets at the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe is doing Lori Holt's Vintage Christmas blocks.  Some people are doing the Vintage Christmas quilt that is pictured on the cover of the book, which involves making 6-inch squares for all 42 blocks in the book.  Some are doing the Christmas Eve quilt, which uses 25 of the blocks done in the 12-inch size.  Probably some people will do some of the other quilts featured in the book.  I probably won't be alone in doing something completely different with the blocks.  At least one other person mentioned that they were going to do something different.

What I really need, when it comes to Christmas quilts, is a Christmas wall hanging.  Everything featured in the book was either too big, or too small, for what I was wanting.  I decided to use blocks from the book and make up my own wall hanging size quilt.  It will feature a 12-inch block in the center, surrounded by sashing, 6-inch blocks, more sashing, 3-inch blocks (made from an element of one of the 6-inch blocks in the book), and an outer border.

For the class, we were assigned 5 blocks for this month, if we were doing the cover quilt.  Of those blocks, I only wanted to use 2 of them in my quilt, so that's all I made.  On the left is the Christmas Candles blocks and on the right is the Glisten block, both in the 6-inch size.  Lots of tiny pieces here.  That's not my favorite thing to do, but I'm willing to do it for a quilt that I want to have.  Maybe I won't go crazy before the year is over and the project is finished!

Blessed are the Peacemakers

This is my finished quilt from the 2015 Moda class at the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe.  I decided to name it "Blessed are the Peacemakers" (from the Biblical Sermon on the Mount/Be-attitudes), because the book that the pattern came from was called Vintage Quilt Revival and the fabric line I used was called "Piecemakers."  Revival made me think of the week-long special church services from the church of my youth, and piecemakers, of course, made me think of its homophone, peacemakers, and voila, we have the name.

Below is a picture of the label I made for the quilt.  I used a leftover scrap of the background fabric for the main part of the label.  Even though it has a small pattern to it, I thought it would work out fine, and I think it did.

2015 Moda Quilt Top

This is my Moda quilt top from our 2015 project.  We did the Vintage Quilt Revival book this year.  I did mine in the Piecemaker fabric line by Kathy Schmitz, which is all blues, browns, and creams.  I think it has a nice masculine look to it.  If I were doing it over again I would pick different fabric, though.  I wasn't paying attention to how much of the fabric was directional.  I'm a little OCD about keeping the direction right, so that made it less fun to work with.

I decided not to go exactly with any of the three layouts from the book.  One layout had the blocks simply sewn together in rows, no border, no nothing else.  The second layout had dark, narrow borders around each block and then light sashing and dark cornerstones to put the blocks together.  The last layout used setting squares and set the blocks on point.   I thought about doing the second layout from the book, but I didn't have enough background fabric to cut the sashings the width recommended in the book.

As you can see, I decided to go with a narrow sashing in the background fabric and no cornerstones.  I like it better than butting the blocks up to each other directly.  I think the individual blocks stand out a bit better this way.  I had a good bit of fabric left over from the fat quarter bundle I was using to make the blocks with, so I decided to cut them up into 5 inch squares and make a pieced border out of them.  I still have some left even after that.

It is now ready to take down to the quilt shoppe to be quilted.  Not sure when I will get the chance, though.  It may not be until after the holidays.

September Moda Blocks

Even though we didn't actually meet for our Moda group in September, we still got our block assignments.  I'm glad that we did because I want to get them finished up.  I finished up the second one today.  Just two more blocks to go.  Woohoo!!

August Moda blocks

Here are my blocks from last month's Moda meeting.  I don't love the way the Tea Leaf block (on left) turned out, but I don't hate it either.  Oh well, it will be fine.  I like the one on the right better.  I forget the name of it, though.

We are getting close to finishing up the blocks.  I'll be glad when it's done.  I hope I have enough fabric to finish it.  Still not sure how I'm going to put them together either.  I think I'm done with sampler quilts for a while.

A Cotton Rose Christmas

I finally finished my guild project quilt.  I had it quilted at the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe.  It is an all-over pantograph of poinsettias and holly.  I finished the binding on this one on the way home from our road trip to New Jersey.  I sewed the label on on our trip to Tuscaloosa to move my youngest son into the dorm over the weekend.  Here is a close-up of its label.

Eternally Linked

This is the quilt that I've been working on for my step-daughter and her fiance for a wedding gift.  It is finally all finished.  I had it quilted at the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe.  It is an all-over pantograph called "circles."  I finished the binding on a road trip to New Jersey to visit my mother-in-law.  I sewed the label on a week ago at the library.  Here is a close-up of the label.

April Moda blocks

Today I made my blocks for the Moda class that I go to every month at the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe.  I think I did a pretty good job of matching my seams this time.  I probably should have used a different fabric for the center of the spinning star block, but I'm sure it will be fine.

March Moda Blocks (2015)

I got my sewing machine back from being fixed and decided to start by finishing my Moda blocks.  These are my blocks for our Moda group this month. 

I reversed the values on the one on the left.  The original block had white where the blue is and cream where the lighter brown is.  The patches that are cream here were multiple different colors in the original.  Since I'm working with just shades of brown and blues, I thought it would work better the way I did it.  I'm sure it could have been done using the original value placement, but I opted for this way instead. 

The one on the right was supposed to be paper pieced, but I did it with "flippy corners" instead of paper piecing.

So far, the machine is working fine, but I haven't really put it to the test yet.  It was sewing straight stitches fine before I took it in.  The problem was with decorative stitches.  I'll probably be testing those out next.

February Moda Blocks 2015

Our blocks for this month at Moda U were "rolling squares" (on left) and "red cross" (on right).  The directions for both blocks had paper-piecing components.  The rolling squares blocks had paper-pieced square-in-a-square units, and the red cross block was completely paper-pieced. 

They went together pretty easily.  My points match pretty well, but they aren't exactly perfect.  For me, they are definitely good enough.

January Moda Blocks - Vintage Quilt Revival

This year our Moda group, at The Front Porch Quilt Shoppe, is doing the blocks from the book Vintage Quilt Revival by Katie Clark Blakesley, Lee Heinrich, and Faith Jones.  In January we were given the Riviera and Dakota Star blocks to do.  In the original instruction, in the book, the blocks are done in multiple colors, but I decided to do mine in all blues, browns, and creams.  I bought a fat quarter bundle of Piecemakers fabric by Kathy Schmitz from Moda, and some yardage of one of the cream fabrics in that line.  Hopefully I'll have enough to make all the blocks. 

The book gives 3 different layouts for the blocks once they are all finished, but I'm not sure that I'm going to use any of those 3 layouts exactly.  At this point, I've decided to wait until all the blocks are finished and see what speaks to me.

Jacobean Garden Trellis

This quilt was finished on Dec. 23, which is a good thing since it is a Christmas present for my daughter-in-law.  She doesn't know that she's getting a quilt for Christmas.  In fact, she asked for an electric heated blanket.  She's getting that too.  I guess it will be the Christmas for getting warm.

The quilting is an all-over panograph of paisley done by the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe in "reeds" thread from King Tut.  I pre-washed the quilt and the black wash out into the light fabric in the lattice so that it looks like a light gray now.  I used a color grabber sheet in the wash but apparently it wasn't enough to catch it all.  I think it still looks fine, but it is a little disappointing that the color bled so much.

You may also notice that my cat, Tiger, decided to make an appearance in the picture.  I think he matches the quilt nicely.

At the Shore

This is my most recent finished project.  I decided to call it "At the Shore" because it reminded me more of the Atlantic coast (i.e., the shore) than it did of the Gulf coast (i.e., the beach).  It is made with half-square triangles set in an Oceans Waves setting, and machine quilted with an all-over panograph of seashells.  The quilting was done by the girls at the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe.  The binding was hand turned.  It is now labeled and ready to go.

Again, it is not really a bed quilt, even though it is photographed, at the top, on a bed.  It just covers the top of the bed with very little overhang.  The bottom photograph is on a small loveseat.

Feelin' Groovy

I decided to name this one "Feelin' Groovy" after the Simon Garfunkel hit of the same name.  I've found that I like to name quilts after songs.  But I suppose that fits with my personality and love of music.  I thought the fabric had a groovy, funky feel about it.  Although it is displayed on a bed, it is not really intended to be a bed quilt.  It is 64 inches square and fits nicely on the top of a full size bed, but it has almost no overhang.  It is intended to be used to cuddle under on the sofa while watching tv.

The quilt was machine pieced, using my own original design.  It was machine quilted at the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe using the "retro flowers" pantograph.  The binding was hand turned.  It still needs it label, but other than that, it is completed.  It was actually finished on Nov. 29, but I was waiting to post about it until I came up with a name.

Dancing Ribbons

 I finished this quilt on Nov. 1, but I just got around to taking a picture of it today.  This is another one of my UFOs that I finished this year.  I think my goal was to finish 3 UFOs this year.  If so, then this one completes the goal.  The other two were Hearts on a Chain and Christmas Kittens.

The quilt is machine pieced, machine quilted, and hand bound.  The quilting is an all-over meander pantograph done in variegated thread.  It was done by the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe.  The quilt finished 46" x 66", which seems like a nice size for a quilt to snuggle under on the couch.

Here is a picture of the label.

I'm contemplating putting this one up for sale, but I haven't decided yet.

Size Matters Quilt Top

Here is my finished quilt top for the Size Matters quilt.  It has fifteen 12-inch blocks and twelve 6-inch blocks, put together in columns instead of rows.  The 12-inch blocks have 1-inch sashing between them.  The 6-inch blocks have 1-inch sashing on the top and bottom with two inches of the focus fabric in between them and a 3-inch piece of focus fabric at the top and bottom of each column.  The columns are divided by 1-inch sashing strips.  The inner border is one inch like the sashing and the border is three inches of the focus fabric.  The top measures 60-1/2 inches by 72-1/2 inches.

I'm happy with the design that I came up with for the odd number of blocks and the two different sizes of blocks.  I think it makes a nice sampler quilt and will be a good size for using on the sofa.

Oops, I just realized that I forgot to take a picture of the September blocks individually.  Well, I guess it's too late now.  They are all 6-inch blocks.  They are the second and third blocks from the top in the left-hand column and the second one from the bottom in the right-hand column.

October Moda blocks

These are the last of my blocks for the Size Matters quilt that our Moda Friendship group was doing this year.  The two 12-inch blocks are for my quilt and the six inch block on the left is actually for the shop quilt.  I finished them yesterday and started putting the top together.

Wish Upon A Star

I finally finished my Storybook Star quilt.  I finished the binding on our trip to Memphis (Oct. 13), but I just got the label sewed on yesterday.  I had trouble coming up with a name for it.  I finally settled on "Wish Upon A Star", because I figured that work whether it was used as wall hanging, lap quilt, or baby blanket.

It was machine quilted at the Front Porch Quilt Shoppe with a pantograph called Pretty Daisies.  I really like the quilting pattern, however, if I used it again, I might get them to enlarge it a bit.  It makes for really close quilting.  I was thinking I might post this one for sale on my Etsy shop.  I haven't decided for sure yet.