Planned But Banned…THE END!

June 8, 201710 Comments

In my December 12, 2106 post, I showed you a quilt Sandy and I had planned but then it was banned from her house. You can read about it here.

After finishing the top, I took it to my trusted quilter, Mrs. KB. She suggested a rolling wave pattern to soften the angles and I like it!

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I am loving the green and purple contrast. It took us forever to decide on this green fabric but it’s perfect.

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My go to method for tacking down quilt bindings is to use a slip stitch by hand. I have three large quilts in progress and the thought of tacking down yards of binding by hand is causing “severe procrastination syndrome”…. a common problem for me!

I decided to use my machine to tack down this binding. I watched a few on-line videos, took a deep breath, and got started. I like how this worked out and plan to use this technique again with my other two quilts in progress.

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I usually give away quilts to people I love BUT I just might keep this quilt for myself!

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THE END.

“Your Opinion” Give Away

June 1, 201719 Comments

I need your opinion!

Everyone who comments will have their name entered into a drawing for one package of American Made Brand 5″ cotton solids in patriotic colors (shown below).

The winner of the drawing will be announced on Monday, June 5, so be sure to check back in with us!

Now, back to why I need your opinion!

I made the quilt below from a kit I purchased from Quilts & Sew Forth in Mentor, Ohio. It’s a fast and easy pattern that uses two yards of three different fabrics. BUT there was not enough fabric in the kit to make the binding. On to plan B which requires a trip to the quilting store…I love this plan!

What color fabric should I use to make the binding???

Here is a close up of the fabric colors and patterns.

Let us know what you think!

Lessons Learned…

May 22, 20174 Comments

Several years ago I made a non-traditional Christmas quilt for my sister. She lives in Florida and regionally, the colors and decor are much brighter and more “beachy” than here in the Midwest.

I used a pattern from an Eleanor Burns book, Christmas at Bear’s Paw Ranch , and as you can see, the non-traditional Christmas colors look perfect against a “Florida Pink” wall. She has this hanging up throughout the year and of course I stopped to admire my work and reflect on lessons learned.

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This quilt was my first attempt at using large scale prints AND of course I didn’t think about matching large prints when I pieced the outer border together. The prints didn’t match AT ALL and looked wonky-goofy. I ripped off the outer borders and pieced them together again in a rough attempt at matching.

The final version is lovely and the border mistakes are lost in the overall quilt. Some of the fabrics have sparkles and who can resist enjoying such a beauty 365 days a year?

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Eleanor’s patterns are great for quilters of all skill levels. Do you have a favorite “Eleanor Pattern”? Let us know!

12 Year Project — Complete!

May 18, 20175 Comments

Yes it’s true! This quilting project took only 12 years from start to finish. I started this quilt 12 years ago as a beginning quilter. I no longer have this pattern on hand but I remember how much fun I had picking out all these bright batiks.

I was just learning accurate machine piecing and I was obviously having trouble with points! It was probably a combination of inaccurate cutting AND using a machine that did not have a 1/4 inch foot. Yikes!

The block below is better but I am my own worst critic! After I got this back from my quilter, I realized just how many points were actually square and I wasn’t crazy about the variegated thread on navy fabric. Something that seemed so right had turned out so wrong! I decided this quilt just needed to go somewhere and hide, so it did!

One of my favorite quilt bloggers is Tierneycreates and on March 6, 2017, she posted a piece titled “Quilt Studio Archaeology and Purge, Part III”. I started thinking about my own quilt studio archaeology and dug this quilt out from under a pile of “stuff”.

I only needed to add a binding and this 12 year project would be complete! While I was tacking down the binding, my son and daughter-in-law commented on how much they liked this quilt, hmmmmm, it’s now theirs for posterity!