Quilt: "A House for Daisie"

This isn't the cutest quilt I ever made, but it has a great story.  I had made the quilt for no reason, it was just a center block that I had put big borders around, and I was quilting it to give as a charity quilt to a quilt guild.

As I was finishing it, it occurred to me that the fabric was covered with daisies.  I thought of a relative who was having a terrible legal battle over custody, and the little girl's name was Daisie. Then I saw that there was a house in the middle, and Daisie really needed to be able to come home.  Eureka!  I had made the perfect quilt to give to that family at that very anxious time in their lives.  And it was a complete miracle, because I hadn't even planned it.

A quilt for Sally P.

A dear friend, Sally P., has cancer again. I found out that Susan Y. and Amelia B. had made a quilt top for Sally, and I offered to quilt it for them on my long-arm machine. 

First, I had to add strips to the backing because it wasn't big enough. 

Then, since I have very little experience on the long-arm, I had one fiasco after another as I tried to load the quilt top, backing, and batting onto the machine, and again as I tried to figure out how to use the laser and follow a pantograph. 

But miracles do happen, and I got the quilt quilted between 11:00 pm and 1:30 in the morning on Sunday night.  Amelia was able to bind it on Monday, and Susan and Amelia delivered it to Sally on Tuesday, before she went in for surgery on Wednesday.

I think it is beautiful!

 The front, which was pieced by Amelia and Susan.

The back.  I added three of the strips to make it big enough.

Hailey's Zigzag Quilt

Our 7th grandchild, Hailey, was born in January.  I had just gotten my long arm machine, and I kept trying to practice on junk fabric but I was running out of time, so I just put on Hailey's quilt and started quilting it without much practice ahead of time

 

I had a bit of trouble with the straight lines, but was pleased with all my little leaves.  I gave it to Janette and Seth, and they liked it.

 

(Notice my bright turquoise walls and checkerboard floor in my sewing room.  I love it!)

 

I picked out the bird fabric first, and then chose the zigzag colors to match it.

Quilt from my childhood

I taught quilting in Hilton Head, SC, and stayed at a lady's house.  She had this appliqued kit quilt from the 1960's, and it looked familiar to me.  I'm going to have my mom and sisters look at it, I think this is the same poppies quilt kit that my mom made for my sisters' double bed around 1964.  If it isn't the same kit, then it is very similar except for the color.

I remember the quilt kit, the fabric had very light blue printed lines all over it, to show where to add the applique and where to hand quilt it.  My mother did two, a quilt with orange and yellow poppies, and one with lavendar/purple flowers.

Gabrielle's quilt

Here is the front and back of my granddaughter Gabrielle's quilt, which I made for her last October.

Response to Susan, my biggest fan

(I have had complications with my computer for a couple of months.  Here is the reply I wrote to Susan a long time ago.)

Dear Susan,

Every day I kick myself for not having written a book or created any patterns to purchase. I'm sorry, I don't have anything for you to buy. Maybe some other books could help you.

I have followed other precision-impaired quilters for years. Some of my favorite examples are Gwen Marston and Freddy Moran and Keiko Goke. If you ever have a chance to buy any books written by them, you will enjoy their styles of quilting too.

 

I just remembered another book which I think you would really love. It is called "Sunday Morning Quilts" by Amanda Jean Nyberg and Cheryl Arkison, copyright 2012. It is still in quilt stores now, or you can order it online, probably from Amazon.com. (I really should have written this book, I am mad that Nyberg and Arkison beat me to it.)

Here are the book titles by the other quilters that I recommended:

Collaborative Quilting by Freddy Moran and Gwen Marston, copyright 2006.

Freddy and Gwen Collaborate Again, by Freddy Moran and Gwen Marston, copyright 2009.

And I'm so sorry, there are too many things going on in my life right now to do private lessons. Honestly, you would be the first one I would choose to be my student. Thanks for all your kind words.

 

Email from a fan of mine

This is the best fan mail I ever received.  I don't know this lady, she emailed me out of the blue.  The email was entitled,  "My first fan letter at age 70."

I just found you. Tomorrow you are teaching a class at thimble pleasures. I am crying bitter tears because I can not afford to take the class.

I want to tell you that I have fallen in love with your designs, and am over the moon that they are not straight.

I have tried everything for years, and I simply can not cut or sew straight. I have piles and piles and piles of fabric and am frozen, unable to start any project knowing it will wind up in the trash because I just can not do it.

Please tell me you have a book, patterns, notes, anything that I could purchase so that I can learn your

method. I'm pretty good reading instructions.

I am trying to reinvent myself, as feb 1 will mark the one year anniversary of the death of my husband of almost 50 years.

Now it is me, and my fabric and my thread and my need to create.

I'm so sorry that circumstances have made it impossible for me to attend your class tomorrow. I can only hope that I will be able to manage it in the future.

I think what you do is genius…. it absolutely positively speaks directly to me. How wonderful for you that you found "your" true self.

thank you from a fan

Susan L.

 

Wow!  That makes me feel appreciated.

I'm no good at the long arm

I started quilting Hailey's baby quilt on  my  long arm machine, and boy, am I humbled!  I can't make it do anything!  I am a complete novice!  Even though I have quilted award winning quilts on my home sewing machine, the long arm is a whole different animal, and I have NO SKILLS which transfer.  It is depressing.  I am looking to attend the big long arm quilting convention in Salt Lake City in May (HMQS)  so I can learn the basics.




And I am posting this link for my sons Seth, who is a tinkerer, and for Adam, who is interested in 3-D printers.  I think they would appreciate knowing about the artificial hand made for a fingerless 5-year-old boy.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/02/07/5-year-old-without-fingers-receives-custom-robohand-made-using-3d-printer-and-150-in-parts/

IQF had lots of wool

The newest trend in quilting and in crafting that has really caught my eye has been wool.
I keep buying wool dyed pretty colors, and keep meaning to make some wool appliqued wallhangings or a nativity scene, but haven't done it yet.

In Houston at the International Quilt Festival, there was a booth that sold little balls made of wool.  They were hard like marbles, not fluffy like pompoms.  I just had to buy some.  Look at all the cool things you can make with them:

Now I probably have enough woolen fabric and wool felt and the little balls to make every project on these four pictures.  Daughters-in-laws: Do you want to have a craft day with me?

Bits and pieces from my trip to Houston

 I had the best time in Houston a couple of weeks ago, at the International Quilt Festival.  I shopped full time, and in 4 days I covered all 2000 booths (well, the numbers went from 100-2000 but I don't know how many vendors there really were.)

I ended up buying some supplies for some cute projects.  I bought about $10 of colorful buttons (to go with the ten pounds of buttons I already own) and I want to make wooden letters (see above) with my grandkids or with my daughters-in-laws.

 I read two more novels on the planes.  They were both by Adriana Trigiani, she is one of my favorite authors.  (My favorite so far has been "Lucia,Lucia").  I really like her Big Stone Gap series.  I just read the third book, "Milk Glass Moon", and the fourth, "Home to Big Stone Gap."

  Here is some vintage trim I bought, I have high hopes of making some funky curtains for my sewing room and using this on them.

Surprise! My quilts were still represented at IQF

I had the greatest four days at the International Quilt Festival in Houston last week.  I haven't been there in several years, not since I taught there last time.  And since I haven't been advertising myself, my business has fallen off a bit.  I am still trying to figure out how to get my business going again.

Anyway, I went with the expectation of just shopping all day every day.  I had no quilts entered in the competition, and I wasn't going to be teaching any classes.

Imagine my surprise when I saw one of my quilts on the main posters on entering the building:

 My quilt, "My Stars and Yoyos" is the quilt on the right.  It was purchased by Karey Bresenhan for the International Quilt Festival Collection about 2002.

 Quilts from that collection were photoshopped onto famous landmarks for a series of posters on the wall at the International Quilt Festival this year.

 My quilt happened to be on two different posters.

I have no idea why they said "antique" quilts.  Mine is certainly not an antique.

I was excited that my quilt was up there,  too bad my name wasn't there too.  Karey Bresenhan has full rights to publish it however she wants without having to put my name on it.  It would have been fun to see my name on the poster as well.

The next day I was in the Bernina booth, and they had one of  my quilts displayed in there too.  I had made it for them, in partial trade for a Bernina sewing machine they sold to me at a reduced price for national teachers.  It was fun to see that even though I have been quite absent from the quilting business for a few years, my legacy still lives on!

Sewing Room Floor

My grandson, Anson, sitting on my new sewing room floor.

I have always hated having carpet in my sewing room.  And this time, I got the exact flooring I wanted:  vinyl with exactly 12" squares.  It makes your eyes crazy when you look at the room, but I have heard from other quilters that with this floor, you can square up quilts and even measure fabric.  How cool is that?

On Recent Quilt Teaching trips

I taught quilting in Rocky Mount, NC a few weeks ago.  Then I flew to Sarasota, Florida and taught quilting last week.  Here are the women showing off the little fusible house appliques they learned to design in my class "Playtime Neighborhood for the Precision Impaired".

Sarasota, Florida    May 2012

Their guild met in a Mennonite church, and I was a bit stunned to see that they had musical instruments for a rock band. (Look on the stage in the photo.)  I asked about it, and was assured that most Mennonite churches today offer both traditional and contemporary worship services.

I stayed in a nice motel in Sarasota, but when I taught in Greensboro, NC in April I stayed in a quilt guild member's home.  Here is the beautiful home, off a huge culdesac in a golf course community:

I had the whole upstairs to myself, in a massive guest suite.  I really enjoyed my gracious hosts.

Adam made this when he was 8

I found some patchwork that Adam had sewn together when he was almost nine.  I figured he and Tiffany would think it was cool to have a baby blanket for Anson made by Anson's father when he was a child.

So I added some red striped borders, and put on a red flannel backing, and gave it to them for Christmas.

It is ugly but lovable.

Nativity Quilt

I went to Elizabeth's preschool program at Christ the King Lutheran Church last week, and they had this pretty quilt hanging on the wall inside the church.

I just love nativity scenes, and nativity quilts.

My new little Christmas quilt

"Good Neighbors III: Christmas"

I designed this little quilt about 7 years ago, and have made four of them, in different colors.  This time I put snowy fabric on the ground and on the roofs, and decorated the houses for Christmas.

"Good Neighbors I"

"Good Neighbors II"

"Good Neighbors IV: Easter" is not finished yet.  It has some Easter eggs in the grass.

Rocket Ship quilt for Anson

The bottom border doesn't show in this photo but you get the idea.

Adam and Tiffany requested that I make their baby's quilt using a rocket ship picture that Adam drew, and they said I could add any borders that I wanted.  I think it turned out really cute.

The diagonal border was easy to do, I think I will use that on a future quilt as well.

Before I put the name "Anson" on it, I made doubly sure that they weren't going to change their minds at the last minute.  But they said they were 100% positive they were naming their baby Anson, so I did that applique about a month ago.

Go and See the International Quilt Market on a DIFFERENT blog

Okay, now I have a serious case of inferiority complex.  Rachel just sent me this link

http://www.dana-made-it.com/2011/11/fall-2011-quilt-market-recap-houston.html

and this woman showed TONS of photos of the Houston International Quilt Market.   (By the way, I absolutely adored the fabric and the booths.  Thanks, Rachel.)

It made me realize how little and wimpy my blog is.  Sorry!!!!  I apologize for its boringness and insignificance.  Now that I see how other bloggers do it, I should be shamed out of existence.  But I'm not gonna be.

Look at how cool I am

I have received many ribbons for my quilting over the years.  I kept intending to hang them up all the way around the walls of my sewing room, up near the ceiling.  It would have made kind of a quilt-ribbon wallpaper border.  But I never did.


The pinks, lavenders, and whites in the top left corner are all the special awards and special recognitions I received.  Then the blue ribbons (1st place), then the reds (2nd place), then some green, whites, yellows that are third places.

(Later, after I took this photo, I found a few more scattered around on the floor because Elizabeth and Thomas had found them and started playing with them before I took the picture.)

Pink Quilt

I was cleaning out closets the other day and came upon some things I had made years ago.

This is one of two quilts I made when I was pregnant with my first baby.  I made a Puppy quilt for a boy, and this pink quilt for a girl.
By the time I had Tara ten years later, this quilt really didn't get that much use.
It has a few stains on it, and I'm not that crazy about it anymore.  But I remember how proud I was of it when it was first made.