Sew Cute Tuesday, August 31

A SIMPLE QUILT FOR A LITTLE GIRL

I took this pinned quilt to show at our group meeting this morning.  I thought you would enjoy seeing how easy and cheerful it is. I start by buying kiddy fleece blankets, size 50 x 60, on sale.  This becomes the basis for my theme and color scheme.  I love the cute candies on the pink fleece. 

The top is only a couple of charm packs and white Jellyroll strips in between, each row just staggered.  No picky piecing for me.  The pink border made it very close to the size of the fleece blanket backing, where you can see the machine stitched edge.  I will cut that off and bind it with the green, which is from a whole Jellyroll that I bought for bindings. 
So, no pieced backing, no separate batting and I am going to machine tie it with a wide zigzag at zero, which make a neat little bump. Will do those in pink, in the center of each block.  I use a walking foot and there is no problem with lumping or anything on the back.  What could be easier?

This quilt will be a charity quilt for Project Linus, which is one of several local groups to receive our quilts twice a year, the next one in October.  I know it will make some little girl feel special.

      I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.   Please join me there.

RSC15 week 35

AN INDIGO SENDOFF

Five Saturdays this month seemed like a lot of indigo, but we met the challenge each in our own way!  First are my balloon blocks, which I really do like for the richness they give to the mix of colors, as in the samples below.

The butterfly quilt is waiting to be pinned and quilted.  I'm so happy with the way this D9P turned out.  No deadline for this one.  

There are two other tops which are in the planning stages and a Project Linus girl quilt due in October.  They don't involve indigo, so they can wait for another day.

However, the one I am so excited about right now involves the HST 3-inch blocks, which I received from Summer of Easy Quilter by winning her giveaway recently.  The package arrived with more than 90 blocks in bright aqua, greens and red-orange, balanced with a dark blue print, indigo of course.

 I quickly decided to make pinwheel blocks, simple and one of my favorites.  Also, I was able to make more blocks with this four patch design.  They went together quickly and I finished four rows of five pinwheels each plus spacers, about 42 inches wide.

The overall plan I am working on is a row by row arrangement using jelly roll strips and charms.  We'll see what happens from there.  Here is one layout idea that I had.  By the way, I love the little pinwheels that occur in the centers, because of the way Summer trimmed her flippy corners off.  Thanks again, Summer!

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.  Hope to see you there.

Sew Cute Tuesday, August 25

A LOVELY GIFT

I was fortunate to win the giveaway by Summer at Easy Quilter last week.  She sent about 90 flippy corner HSTs,    All are in wonderful oranges, blues and greens.  After I pressed and sorted them I started playing with design ideas.  I love the windmill block and there will be plenty of blocks for sure!  Here are three possible color arrangements for the blocks.  I decided I like the center one with mixed colors.  When looking at this photo I saw the little white windmill in the center, a nice surprise.

I decided to work in a row by row design. The samples of strips possible are the next step I'm working on; two ideas are below.  Tomorrow I'll begin piecing the blocks and continue from there.  It's all I can think about right now.  Thank you so much, Summer.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.   See you all there!

RSC15 August 22

ANOTHER GOAL REACHED, ANOTHER QUILTER

This week I finished piecing my disappearing nine patch butterfly quilt.  After piecing the nine charms together, it looked very pretty.  I had second thoughts about cutting it up, but I knew I had tried to place the blocks with that in mind.  So out came the new rotating  cutting mat and I plunged right in.  It ended up with eighty blocks that mixed very nicely.

    For backing I had found a piece of about nine yards.  It is dark (indigo?) blue with tiny rose flowers.  But after searching through my stash, I could not find anything for binding.  Then in my batiks drawer I found the perfect raspberry piece.

    Looks great, doesn't it?  So today I got over to Hobby Lobby and bought Warm and White batting, which was perfect in my rainbow quilt and was nice to work with.

Looks great, doesn't it?  So today I got over to Hobby Lobby and bought Warm and White batting, which was perfect in my rainbow quilt and was nice to work with.

    I also had the chance to get a friend started in quilting.  We worked together step by step every day.  She just finished making a table runner in her chosen color scheme and is now stitching on the orange binding.  I am sure that the clincher will be when she shows it at our group's show and tell, with kind feedback from thirty or more of the nicest quilters anywhere.

Q

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.  Come along and join us.

Throwback Thursday, August 20

A TRIBUTE

Here is a quilt for my son, Chris, which I began when he was in college.  He wanted a black quilt, but I said, "No way."  I decided on dark blue with a simple Amish style pattern.  I got it almost quilted when he got engaged and married.  She had a different color scheme planned, so I put it away all these years.  He lived through cancer and a divorce, then side effects in recent years.  I hoped to finish it for him, but he passed away in April.  

    Last week I read about Cynthia Brunz's idea for volunteers to finish a quilt for another.  I took the quilt to my local Monona Quilters on Monday and one of the members very kindly offered to finish the quilt so it could be donated to a local charity called Road Home.  This group provides housing for homeless families.  I am so very grateful that it will go to a family who really needs it.  Chris was a very generous person and would have appreciated that.

 

This quilt will be my small tribute to Chris, who was taken too soon.  I am grateful to have this new community of caring quilting friends, both near and far, who have helped me to focus on a way to give of myself and my talents now and in the future.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com. 

RSC15 week 33

MOOD INDIGO

Well, I finally got around to my balloon blocks this week.  I hated cutting into those lovely batiks.  Of course, I ran into problems.  I measured the long pieces too short, so had to cut new ones, further depleting my prescious stash.  So now I have indigo scraps.  My scrap and crumb piles seem to be growing fast.  It must be the summer weather. Anyway, here are my three indigo blocks.

You can't see it, but even the darkest strips have a printed pattern.  A couple of the short ones had to be fussy cut and ended up with bits of orange and yellow blobs on the ends.  

Anther project, my butterfly quilt, is coming along well.  I have six of the ten strips pieced together, and the bigger it grows the better I like it.

I'm also starting on a veggie and fruit quilt, very easy because they are all WOF.  I got all the pieces from our group's giveaway table.  Have ordered some Harvest gold fabric for the solid strips and border.  I think it is going to be a tablecloth or picnic throw.  This is just a layout of the fabrics before cutting.  I think I see some indigo or purple in there.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.   Go along and join the fun.

Throwback Thursday, August 13

 REMEMBERING

When my daughter went off to college I was just learning how to do English paper piecing.  I did not want to try out a big project, so I made the tumbling blocks, which reminded me of her baby blocks.  When I found this stiriped piece in the exact colors and size I needed, it was easy to appliqué several of them on and hand quilt it, with lines indicating the shadows of the blocks.  It became

MY BABY'S GONE AND LEFT ME.

Now, over 30 years later it hangs on my bathroom wall, where I can enjoy it daily.  I just finished a rainbow quilt for her daughter, now entering the big world of high school.  The title remains appropriate.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.   Please check out what others have done.

Sew Cute Tuesday, Eat Healthy

At our Monona Quilters meeting last week I picked up a pile of similar pieces from the giveaway table.  When I got home I realized that they were all WOF and had an idea for an easy strip quilt. So I laid out the strips at half width to try them out and just look at some of the assorted produce!

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I think that strips of the gold fabric will set them off nicely.  My friend and I were wondering who would want such a fruit and vegetable quilt.   Just then a delivery man came to the door and said he sure would like it!  No accounting for taste, so I will put this together when I am able to find the right gold fabric.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.

RSC15 week 32

 This has been a hectic week for me.  One thing that took extra time was linking up with Krista Quilts for   Throwback Thursday.  It is a fun place to share your projects done way back when or even more recently.  I posted a photo of a Christmas tree skirt I made for my daughter's December wedding 20 years ago.  Hope you will check that out.

   As for indigo, I found a lot of it is in my D9P top, so that counts for this week. I loved using my new rotating Olfa mat for cutting the blocks.  The partial layout below shows the indigo prints.  My granddaughter helped with the layout.  There is no one else around here who can crawl around on the floor!

I have pieced the first two of ten rows of 8 blocks. Since it is basically a random layout, I have to keep referring to my photos.  Even doing that, I got a couple of blocks out of place.  But being random, who cares?  

The balloon blocks got passed by in my excitement with this new project and here it is the end of the week.  I hope you have all had a productive week.

I link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com, Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com and Throwback Thursday at kristaquilts.blogspot.com.

Throwback Thursday, August 6

CHRISTMAS NOT TERRIBLY LONG AGO

My lovely daughter and her husband celebrated their 20th anniversary last December.  I had been quilting for several years then and decided to make them a tree skirt for their first Christmas together.  She had been an avid seamstress since her early teens and had made bridal gowns and bridesmaid dresses for friends.  I had no such experience, but had saved many scraps from all our sewing projects.  

Her favorite colors were rose and green.  I chose fabrics from all our memorable projects for the tree skirt, including the green satin from her own bridesmaid dresses.  (She did buy her own gown.)  I just made a large circle and a pattern for the segments.  It was easy to strip piece each segment and then join them.  The binding was also from the bridesmaid green satin.

Neèdless to say, the skirt is filled with many memories for both of us. I love seeing it under her tree every year, a real family treasure, and she still uses her rose and crystal decorations on the tree.

I am very happy to have this chance on Throwback Thursday to share this great memory.   Thank you, Krista here at  kristaquilts.blogspot.com.  I also link up with RSC15 at superscrappy.blogspot.com and Sew Cute Tuesday at blossomheartquilts.com.