Picnic Quilt

Here is Princess Buttercup, my quilt mentor. She gave me the best birthday
gift a quilter can give another quilter- she helped me measure, square up and generally kick my butt to sew-up the quilt I have not been able to finish for my brother and new sister in law. uhhum, they have been married for 2 years now and
it is finally getting sent off to the quilter! Thank you PB. you know you are the best!


Here is the finished quilt top. It is 64" by 64". My SIL loves orange and blue.
She loves these colors- and I happened to find blue plumeria (her favorite flower- her wedding ring is a silver plumeria) pattern that has orange middles. I worked it
into the quilt and voila- here you go!

I am hoping to send it off to Angela @ Quilting Is My Therapy. She can write with her long arm quilting machine and that is part of what I want done to this.
In the orange rectangles I am going to(hopefully)have her write all kinds of special memories from their courtship as the quilting. I think it will be totally unique and a keepsake they will treasure.

Birthday Fun

OK, so I admit it, I turned 44 on Sunday. I vowed to age gracefully. To me,
that means taking all winkles life hands me without fighting them by botox injections. It means no plastic surgery. It means being able to admit my age.
It used to mean not dying my gray hair, but hey, everyone has their vanity limit.
I now appreciate 85 year olds who have so much energy you suspect they are on
drugs. @ 44 I know my energy level is slipping. I know I will not be an 85 year
old who skis, does yoga or watch the great grandkids all day at the zoo. I'm
still taking a nap everyday.

My Dad took me out for our annual birthday lunch date- and he surprised me
by taking me up to Highhand in Loomis, CA. What a fantastic place. They have
revitalized the old fruit packing sheds into art/ pottery galleries and it is
surrounded by a fantastic nursery with a restaurant named The Conservatory where
we had a great lunch.


The Tin Thimble shop


My stash addition purchases.


Sawtooth additions.


70's stash additions.


Dad & I in the nursery.

"Spring Cleaning"

Hello there quilting friends! How are you doing with stash organization?
I have not done too well keeping the stash organized in the past year.
I've kind of been into the "shove it in wherever it fits" mode. It's not
working for me. So I decided to spring clean- I spent all Saturday night
and all Sunday afternoon and into the evening going through binders, patterns
and fabric. I filled up my dining room table! I got rid of enough to make me
feel truly organized! I documented 10 quilts I had made and had pics of. I
found old projects that got the quilting energy flowing again. It feels so
good!

Free Projects to Inspire Me

I needed some quilt therapy today- and found it at Windham Fabrics site
by clicking on Free Projects. There are 24 pages with 12 free quilt patterns
on each page- plenty to be inspired by!

Happy quilting!
Moorea

Got it back

I was finally able to pick up the Aloha Shirt quilt from the
quilter's- two months late. Oh well, Lauren says he does not
mind, but I am not sure how we will feel about the thread color
being changed without permission. My quilter said she did not
feel the blue tread was going to look good, so she did a tan
color instead. It does look great, but ultimately, I feel it
is up to the customer and she should have checked with me first,
since I am doing this for someone else and they are paying for it.
What do you guys think? Should she have called me, or taken the
liberty as an "artist?"



The pantograph pattern she chose fits the floral theme perfectly.


Every corner was perfect. What a dream!

Aloha Shirt Quilt

The loot!


Playing with combinations.

I have been mighty busy these past few months- Sorry I have not
updated the blog. I did not get to sew at all this Summer. It was
a great disappointment, but it could not be helped. After Josiah
graduated from high school, I put my focus on Daniel and his
Boy Scout activities, as well as working on discipline problems
with my little boys. It all paid off- they are all doing well.


I was able to start sewing again and here is the fruit of my labor!
My first professional quilt! I made this for a gentleman who owns a
shop in downtown Sacramento- I traded him for a huge box of fabric he
had (top) in exchange making the quilt top. I feel I got the better
of the deal, and he thinks he did, so I guess it was a good deal!
I am hoping to make more of these quilts soon- he thinks lap sized
would sell well in the store.


So now, I have to make the backing with 8 yards of this lovely
gray blue fabric and send it off to the quilter next week.
Yahoo!

Mom's Quilt

I have been putting this quilt on hold because I was stuck
as how to get the balance right- some of the blocks
were sewn in the wrong order and it just looked like
there was a "hole" where an everglade block should be.
I finally took the whole thing apart across the middle,
flipped it, and voila! it worked. It's not perfect, but
I knew my Mom would love it anyhow. She just wanted it done!
It ended up being 60 X 80- which is a lovely size to
snuggle up in on the couch!


Here is the pieced backing. I wanted it to be an ode to
the Gee's Bend quilts my Mom loves so much.
I did not have time to make it any more intricate,
or I would never have gotten it done! I was able to get
it ready to take with me to a church women's retreat I
went to a few weeks ago and finish the binding there.
Whew! If you click on the pic, you can see the
variegated thread and how I quilted it to look like
streamers. (Same thread as the wall hanging below.
I am very happy with how it turned out, and Mom LOVES it!

Evergaldes Wall Hanging

I finished the little "vote on the border" wall hanging.
She really liked the brown border.


I used variegated thread to quilt it. I love the way
it turned out, it looks like streamers!



I know she is going to love this. It matches her
furniture so well. Sorry about the washed out look-
silly flash! The back is as fun as the front.

Vintage Patterns

While looking through many boxes of photos for a huge
project(Josiah's high school graduation presentation
board) due next month, I cam across a box full of old
family photos my aunt had given me a few years ago
after she cleaned out my Grandmas' house. I Little did
I know the box was a time capsule! In the bottom were
THESE! I still have some investigating to do, but I
think that my Gram got these on a visit back to see all
the family in Arkansas in the 1990's? sometime. My Gram
did not quilt, but she brought back a few family quilts,
and the pattern at the end, Grandma's Fan, had the same
hand quilting done on it. ENJOY!




I really want to try Palm Leaf.



V Block is very cool-
I cannot wait to try it with vintage fabrics.

Click on this to enlarge and you can see a dotted
quilt pattern, a very sweet spider web.





I call this Sand Dollar



Here is the pattern. It is not from 1922-
it is pattern # 1922. It is complete.

A Gift

This giant tub was given to me at church a few weeks
ago by our pastor and his wife. His Mom had passed
away and they wanted to pass her quilting goodies
onto a quilter- so I was the lucky recipient!
Thank you! Thank you! Thank You!


I called Princess Buttercup to hot foot it over
so I could open it up with her and share its riches!


Besides many desirable pieces of fabric and notions
was this twin sized pieced eight point crumb star flimsy.
It was probably made in the 50's (some of the pieces
give it away) and the edges were turned and hand
stitched to be what PB thinks was a useful bed covering.
I can understand not wanting/ having the time to had quilt!


A closer look.


This beauty is a string quilt that is badly worn in some
areas due to the really just inappropriate use of stretch
fabric as quilting material. PB says she can show me how
to repair and reuse this fabulous quilt! I was not so sure
I wanted to take that on, but I am willing to try and I know
I will learn a lot in the process!

Happy Great Day!!!

He isn't here! He is risen from the dead,
just as he said would happen. Come,
see where his body was lying.

~ Matthew 28:6, NLT

Vote for the Border

I finished the little 3" scraps mini- which
finished at 22 X 17- and I can't decide
which color to use as the border. I am going
make a wall hanging for a dear friend at
church. I am leaning towards black. What do you
think? Please vote in the poll on the side bar.


Black- this one would really highlight the colors,
but will it detract from the brightness? I'd frame
it in a 1" border.


Brown- this looks good at first, but the more I
looked at it, the more it seemed blah. But in a
1" band, it could be just right.


Green- If it was not for the green block on the
left that disappears into the green, this may
work in a funky fashionable army sort of way.
Not sure.


Yellow- this seems too bright, but for someone who
LOVES color- it could be just the ticket!