This was a short week of quilting. I left Wednesday afternoon for the Jane Stickle Retreat in Shipshewana, Indiana and returned home today, Sunday the 24th. Since I knew not much handwork/quilting was going to happen, I wrote a post earlier in the month for today's post.
Every year my guild, the Maple Leaf quilters, donates a hand quilted quilt to the Michiana Mennonite Relief sale which held the 4th Saturday of September.
Elaine and Lynn designed the quilt for the for the 2020. Guild members either pieced 9 patch blocks or EPP'd the hexden flowers. Remember those flowers I made last summer? This is the quilt they were for.
I personally think this is an absolutely gorgeous quilt but then I'm partial to blues. The background fabric is very soft gray.
I don't have any pictures of the whole quilt. Since this wasn't my quilt, I didn't feel right about hanging it on the clothesline, especially with all the mega snow on the ground! This is a king sized quilt.
I was asked to mark the quilt. I took pictures as I marked in case anyone wants to know what I did or what I was thinking.
This is the center of the quilt. I marked the white squares diagonally both ways which should make the blue blocks puff nicely. The diagonal lines flow through the first applique border into the next section of squares.
I marked with a light gray pencil just dark enough to see but you have to look closely.
For the next border, I marked the background with a cable stencil.
First I mark each corner of the border but I left part of the ends off so I could run the rest of the cable into the curves.
A picture of the corner.
All the applique will be stitched in the ditch.
The cable is just to flatten the back ground fabric and highlight the applique.
For the straight part of the border, I measured how many times the stencil would fit in the length. I marked this with yellow headed pins. They're there in the picture but kind of hard to see.
I chose the center oval as my repeat. When I see how much border is left, I slightly move the stencil to add length, adding the additional space in the center of the ovals. (When marking other quilts, sometimes you need to shorten the cables. I do it the same way, shorten a little and it works fine.)
I don't know if that makes any sense to you. I guess it's just one of those things you need to see.
Next is another section with squares and again I marked the white squares diagonally both ways.
For the outside border I used a Baptist Fan design.
Again, I mark the corners first then slide the stencil over to the right since I'm right handed.
This stencil was different than my other Baptist Fan stencils, it didn't have the whole next section. I had to move the stencil every time. So I counted in 5 curves and put that line on the line of the marked curves then marked. This means you won't have the tiniest curves.
Here are some other pictures of the quilt.
Just want to give you a heads up, I won't be posting again until sometime the first week of December, maybe the 5th. We will have a full house this week for Thanksgiving and beyond. I also need to gather my thoughts to write about my retreat projects.
Linking to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching, Oh Scrap, Bambi's Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away
Several years ago, I bought a kit from Connecting Threads called City View. The kit contained fabric from the Emma & Myrtle collection designed by Amanda Jean Nyberg.
I finally pieced the kit and spent the last week machine quilting on my sewing machine.
I did my usual straight line 1/2" quilting with white thread. She measures 52" by 72".
I had wanted to take pictures outside in the snow but it was too windy so inside the house it was!
I always like the way the straight lines look when they cross in the corners.
I know the spacing in between the lines isn't perfect but, hey, it's quilted!
This was a very easy pattern to make. I like the bright colors and the binding stripe looks lovely!
For backing I used fabric from Amanda Jean's Good Neighbors fabric line which also came from Connecting Threads.
I don't have plans as to who the recipient of this quilt will be but someone will need a quilt and I'll have one ready to go.
Linking to Midweek Makers, Peacock Party, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, TGIFF!, Brag About Your Beauties, Finished Or Not Friday, Free Motion Mavericks
I did a lot of hand work this week. First I quilted. I didn't get to quite the center of the quilt but I'm ok with that.
One of the reasons I didn't accomplish more hand quilting was because I was busy appliqueing the rest of the leaves onto the center medallion of Stars Around the Garden!
I had thought I might applique circles onto the corners but I'm going to hold off on that idea awhile.
Also, not only did I finish the applique for Stars Around the Garden, I traced off the November blocks for Happy Little Things . . . and . . . I embroidered them, October blocks too!
I had planned to use blue and yellow fabrics from my stash but I found this lovely fat quarter bundle at Caroline's. There is a lovely variety of the yellows and I don't have any of those blue fabrics.
Jacquelynne has designed lovely finishes to these blocks but I'm going to do something different. I'll bag the embroidered blocks and fabrics and take them along to retreat later this month. Happy Little Things is project #3 so I may not get to it there, just depends on how projects #1 and #2 go.
Linking to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching, Oh Scrap, Bambi's Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away
A year ago, at the November 2018 Jane Stickle retreat, I pieced a king sized Boston Commons for our bed. I got her back from the quilter in October. She measures 98" by 120".
Lori Null did a lovely job with the quilting. The picture should be larger if you click on it.
The quilting in the braid part is orange peels which shows on the backing but the color is definitely not true!
It's a lovely medium blue batik fabric with white thread!
There are feathers in the white path and in the outside blue border. I'm sorry they don't show in the above picture. It was really hard to get pictures of the quilting.
Just for fun I added a yellow flange binding. I'm not sure I like it now but, too late, I'm not going to remove it!
Linking to Midweek Makers, Peacock Party, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, TGIFF!, Brag About Your Beauties, Finished Or Not Friday
This week I felt rather uninspired for my hand work. I did finish the hand quilting on the row I was working on last week.
Now the whole first row of Floral Triangles is completed!
There are 7 rows in this quilt. The next row should go a little faster since there are more pieced blocks in this row than applique.
I didn't even touch the leaves for the center medallion of Stars Around the Garden.
Last week I said I'd show you some of the trees around our home. The sky was very overcast and dreary when I took the photos so they aren't as brilliant colored as when the sun shines directly on them.
These 2 trees are in our yard.
There is a chartreuse undertone which adds a lovely contrast to the orange leaves.
Wouldn't these colors make a lovely quilt?
This old maple is huge!
She's already lost a lot of her leaves but she adds so much color contrast to the other trees along the lane.
Linking to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching, Oh Scrap, Bambi's Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away
