The next border for the John Deere quilt will be maple leaves. In my last post about this quilt, I had said I was going to be making lots of leaves because there was going to be a second border with leaves. Changed my mind, this border will be the only leaf border.
I liked the way the log cabin blocks look for the Moda Love project so that's what will come next. I'm planning on finishing out the flimsy with log cabin blocks made with 2" finished logs.
Back to the leaves, I made a small change to the maple leaf block. I only used 8 pieces of fabric. I used a rectangle instead of 2 squares.
Why sew more seams than I have to?
And a picture of the back.
For me, this was the best way to press.
Some of the leaves have wider stems but I switched my plan and made the rest more narrow.
These leaves finish at 6".
Linking to To Do Tuesday, Midweek Makers, Clever Chameleon, Wednesday Wait Loss, Put Your Foot Down, Needle & Thread Thursday
The border of Floral Triangles was not completely finished this week but I did make progress.
The first narrowed pieced border and the larger floral quilted border are finished.
This week I'll get the rest of the border finished.
Sorry this photo is a little dark. When I tuned the overhead light on, you couldn't see the quilting.
A close up of the right corner.
The center of the quilted row.
See how the diagonal lines change direction?
I should have a finish to show you next Sunday but I'm sure the binding won't be attached.
Like many of you, I'm brushing off my bread baking skills. I actually baked bread three times this week! I've been sharing with our son and his family who live in another house here on the farm.
This is a loaf of sourdough bread cooling. We had some for lunch Saturday along with home made soup from the crockpot. It looks picture perfect and tasted great too!
The other two batches of bread were baked in regular loaf pans. One was a recipe I've used for 40 years that's a family favorite. The other recipe was new to me, Egg Bread from Kristens blog, The Frugal Girl. It was delicious! The grandsons liked it too.
I want to mention that for some reason when I make a comment on some people's blogs, my comment disappears into that vast void of internet nothingness. It has happened on both WordPress and Blogger. I don't know why, that's one of life's mysteries. So sorry!
Linking to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching, Oh Scrap, Bambi's Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away
The next border on the John Deere quilt will be 6" finished maple leaves. I'm piecing two leaves from each of the fabrics I've pulled. That will give me more blocks than I need for this border but I'm planning on am additional border of leaves farther along.
The weather this week has been very mixed up. Sunday evening it started snowing.
This is what we woke up to Monday morning.
The snow completely melted by 3 pm except for the sad snowman.
The grandsons had a wonderful time playing in the snow all bundled up in their snow pants, coats and boots.
Now we've had several days in the high 50's, low 60's and they're running around without coats!
Linking to Peacock Party, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, TGIFF!, Brag About Your Beauties, Finished Or Not Friday, UFO Busting
A new quilt is in progress. This will be a quilt for the oldest grandson who will be 12 this summer.
Several years ago a friend and I attended a guild quilt show in southwestern Michigan. The quilts were lovely and the vendors were pretty good too.
One of my purchases was this John Deere panel. This tractor looks just like the old John Deere 6-20 of my father's, that is why I bought the panel.
The panel shows the tractor in the four seasons.
This doesn't really look like spring to me but remember, I bought the panel because of the tractor not because of realistic crops.
The way I can tell this is the summer scene is the field corn in the background is tasseling.
This scene does look like fall but they definitely overdid the reddish/orange color.
But winter looks like winter.
The first thing I did was to cut off that ugly blue/green plaid. Now doesn't this look better? That plaid has been deposited in the trash.
The problem with panels is they aren't printed on the fabric squarely. There going to be some strange sashing on this quilt to make blocks fit.
More to show you on the next post. Remember, stay home and stay healthy!
Linking to To Do Tuesday, Clever Chameleon, Midweek Makers, Wednesday Wait Loss, Put Your Foot Down, Needle & Thread Thursday
The center of Floral Triangles is finished!
I could reach the straight red narrow border so I stitched in the ditch on both sides of it.
Here are the applique blocks.
Right side half triangle.
Left side half triangle
Left side border.
I've rolled. I can't reach all the way from the right side to the scrappy border on the left.
I will quilt this border in 3 passes.
First I'll quilt the right side scrappy border and stitch in the ditch on both sides.
I'll roll then quilt the center section with the flower/leaf stenciling.
For the final pass, I'll finish the left patchwork and stitch in the ditch along the narrow rows.
I don't know if I'll be able to quilt the whole border in a week or not.
You'll find out next Sunday!
Linking to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching, Oh Scrap, Bambi's Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away
For my next project, I pulled the Moda Love star I pieced last fall at the Jane Stickle retreat. My intention all along has been to make this star into a charity quilt for the MCC Comforter Bash which is held in the fall.
The flimsy needs to finish at least 60" by 80", this star finished at 32". I added a 4" finished background border around the star. Then I pieced twenty 10" finished log cabin blocks. I pulled autumn fabrics from the 2-1/2" strip box, they're not a perfect match but they work!
The flimsy is the correct width at 60", now I need 20" of length. I could have made more log cabin blocks but I didn't. I have something else planned.
The free Moda Love pattern can be found here. My star was made with charm blocks.
Linking to Peacock Party, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, TGIFF!, Brag About Your Beauties, Finished Or Not Friday, UFO Busting
Stars Around the Garden is a flimsy! I sewed the brown outside border on late last evening. The finished flimsy measures 93" by 108".
The pieced border in my quilt is different from the pattern pieced border. I had a jelly roll to work with, not yardage so my squares finish at 2" which is a different size than the pattern. I had the bright idea to have a design in the border, not just a checkerboard which would have been a lot simpler. I spent 5 days piecing that pieced border! Note to self - next time just go with simple!
After a lot of unstitching and redoing, this is what I came up with. I think it turned out very nice even though there were several times I was frustrated enough to just shove it in the trash and be done with it.
My original intent for this flimsy was to send it to my Pennsylvania DIL for their church group to have hand quilted then to be auctioned in the fund raiser which supports their school.
The quilt committee is very particular about the flimsies they accept. I've already had a flimsy not accepted because it wasn't up to their standards. I'm not criticizing them, if someone spends a $1000 or more to buy a quilt, you want it to be a quilt you can be proud of. Like I've said before, my quilts aren't perfectly pieced.
Anyway, my pieced border didn't turn out like I had envisioned. Two of the borders have the brown square in them, the design worked out.
Two corners aren't the same as the other two, I couldn't make the brown square fit right so I left it out.
I don't know if this will disqualify my quilt or not. If they accept it, fine, if not, I'll just keep it. Maybe someday I'll actually get it quilted.
This photo is a good example of what I'm talking about, look at the top corners and compare to the bottom corners. To me it's not a big deal but it might be to some people.
I don't have an EQ program and if I did, I probably couldn't figure out how to use it.
Several of the blocks have fussy cut centers just to make them more interesting. That's not something you'd notice unless you look closely.
Another fussy cut block.
The brown fabric and the brighter blue fabric were from my stash.
The light blue from the collection is dreary and sad, kind of like the sky outside this morning.
Here are other posts about this SAG project.
The main fabrics were from a jelly roll and a fat quarter bundle of Snowbird by Laundry Basket Quilts for Moda. The collection was from 2014 and is no longer available. There really wasn't enough variety in this collection. I added all the browns and several dark blue fabrics to add more contrast.
I'm planning on making another Stars Around the Garden quilt in colors I like better than the brown and blue fabrics used in this quilt. I haven't decided if my SAG will be blues and white or if I'll go with a blue/yellow/white combination. I won't be starting that quilt anytime soon, too many other projects to work on.
Linking to To Do Tuesday, Midweek Makers, Wednesday Wait Loss, Put Your Foot Down, Needle & Thread Thursday
Floral Triangles was rolled this week!
I was working on this triangle block last week.
Left side border.
Sorry, I forgot to take a picture of the whole row before I rolled.
I've quilted the right side border and ready to start the right side half triangle.
Hand Quilt Along is an opportunity for hand quilters and piecers to share and motivate one another. We post every three weeks, to show our progress and encourage one another. If you have a hand quilting project and would like to join our group contact Kathy at the link below.
Kathy, Margaret, Emma, Tracy, Deb, Susan, Nanette, Edith, Sharon, Karrin, Gretchen, Kathi, Bella, Daisy and Connie
Linking to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching, Oh Scrap, Bambi's Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away
At the beginning of 2019, I started piecing Ohio stars in conjunction with RSC. I kept up the first three months of the year and sewed red, green and yellow stars then got sidetracked and never made anymore.
Now it's 2020 and I want to get sewing Ohio stars again so here are orange and teal stars. I'm using civil war fabrics for my stars. They finish at 4-1/2".
Orange is not my favorite color but I made them anyway. Technically these are cheddars but they work.
Teal is a color I like and I think these little stars are cute.
I'm foundation paper piecing the stars.
You can read more about my star project here, here and here.
Linking to TGIFF, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Finished Or Not Friday, Peacock Party, UFO Busting, Scrap Happy Saturday
After several months of time out from Stars Around the Garden, I'm making progress again.
I went to Calico Point and bought brown yardage that looked good with the fabrics.
The inside sashing has been attached and here is my progress so far.
The applique center looks like the background fabric is white but it's not. It's a cream with a pale beige background design.
The light fabrics in the blocks look yellow but they're not. The flimsy does look nice in real life but the photos just didn't take well.
There was a breeze when I was trying to take pictures. I took another one on the clothesline then decided to try out the stump.
You can read about my Stars Around the Garden here and here.
When completely pieced, this flimsy will be donated to a quilt auction to benefit the church school my Pennsylvania grands attend. They'll hand quilt it.
Linking to To Do Tuesday, Clever Chameleon, Midweek Makers, Wednesday Wait Loss
Vacations are supposed to be relaxing and embroidery is relaxing so I combined the two. Here are the blocks I embroidered while I was in Phoenix.
These embroideries were designed by Gail Pan and were selected from two of her books, Christmas Patchwork Loves Embroidery and Simply Christmas No. 3.
Since I've been home, I haven't touched my embroidery needle, I've been quilting. I'm too close to finishing Floral Triangles to spend time embroidering.
This was the block I was quilting when I left in February, since then I've completed the rest of the row.
Another block.
These yoyo flowers are so cute! I wonder how they'll hold up over the years?
Left side border.
This row is quilted, time to roll!
Starting the quilting on the top row which is the last row! Right side border.
Right side half triangle.
And a whole triangle.
Linking to Kathy's Slow Sunday Stitching, Oh Scrap, Bambi's Show & Tell Monday, Monday Making, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away
