Our guild has been issuing challenges for the past year or so, an attempt to get members to finish projects, rather than just begin new ones. We were asked in June to find two projects, one with a Christmas theme, to complete by our party on December 15th. My first was a 9 patch red and white top that wasn’t the best constructed quilt I’ve ever done, but I decided to practice some of my free motion skills with my first feathered wreath. I wish that I had gone over the back with a pair of scissors and clipped threads and used two layers of batting to make the feathers more puffy , but it still managed to collect a blue ribbon at the Blue Hill Fair.

My second challenge quilt was a pile of fabrics in July, featuring the only Christmas fabric I had in my stash. I said that I would make Union Stars and the size would be determined by how far the fabric went. As you can see, I managed to make a throw size quilt and had just enough blue grey flowered fabrics to finish the border.

My current quilting project is this red/brown/tan throw quilt that I’m having so much fun with making little variegated flowers and leaves. I was going to crosshatch the center squares, but I ripped it out after realizing how much thread it would use because I can’t sew it in a continuous line. The stippling looks better than the straight lines, emphasizing the more elaborate free motion work.

I’ve been sewing up a storm this past week: in charge of a mini-mystery for our guild even though I’ve never participated in a mystery quilt before, sewing stuff for and working at the craft co-op, starting work on two challenges my guild has begun for the fall, finishing the top of my row-by-row quilt, and quilting lots of feathers for a modern wall hanging. I’m also in charge of publicity for the guild’s quilt show next month so I’ve been hanging posters all over town and writing lots of press releases.

I quilted a top for one of my husband’s co-workers with an overall leaf and loop pattern.

Last year at the state show in Augusta, I took a modern quilt class and finally finished quilting it. I wish I had made the rows straight across rather than emerging from the larger cube, like a starburst, but I wasn’t about to pick out the 1/4 I had already done, so I just finished it.

I’m taking a class by Sue Nickels at the state show this year on feathers and stippling. In anticipation I bought her book and started my practice a little early. I’m hoping she can look at my work and give me some pointers.

 Over the past year our guild has been working on different techniques for blocks, such as 4 different ways to make 1/2 square triangles and 3 different methods of flying geese. I learned a lot of things, including a more efficient method of paper piecing and that I hate to piece curves (no drunkard’s path quilts in my future!). I set off the rows with wide chunks of solid fabrics to hopefully show off some free-motion quilting. In writing this, I realized that I “forgot” to finish the row of applique blocks, maybe I’ll use that one block I did make as the label on the back.

These tote bags made from my chicken’s feed sacks are flying off the shelves at the local craft co-op.

This 4 patch posy is made of soccer and flag fabric, so appropriate for the recent World Cup games. Our guild makes lots of children’s quilts for Bags of Love and that is where this one is headed after I put on a border and quilt it.

I made these little bags out of upholstery samples from the local furniture store. I’m using one made with a black and white Greek Key fabric as my new summer purse. They took about 20 minutes to make and are so cute!

This past March, a bunch of us went to a 3 day retreat in Bar Harbor. I finished all 25 blocks by the end of the weekend and finished the top a few weeks ago. I want to really do some fancy quilting to finish it right, but figuring out exactly what to do takes some time. At least, that’s my excuse for not getting started.

Bookmarks are a great way to use up scraps of “too pretty to use in a string quilt” fabrics. At our guild’s spring picnic, held at my house, I won a game of Left, Right, Center. Many of my stack of fat quarters were nothing to write home about, but one piece of oriental fabric was so pretty I cut it all up into 2.5 inch strips, rather than stick it in a bin with the other reds. Cut the strips about 8 inches long and do the same for a piece of interfacing and a coordinated backing fabric. Cut all 4 sides with pinking shears or a pinking rotary cutter, add a bit of ribbon with a V cut out of the ends and sew around the edges about a 1/4 inch inside. Pretty and practical.  

I also made some pillows (haven’t gotten the forms yet) from lobster placemats I picked up at Mardens. I zigzag stitched around the outside edge after I trimmed them so the looser weave fabric didn’t unravel and added thin inner borders. A wide red border and a dress shirt back finished it up. Pretty darn cute, if I do say so myself.

Last night was the Catholic school auction, where we came home with season tickets to athletic events at John Bapst Memorial High School, roller skating/movie/Discovery Museum tickets, and a month worth of tumbling classes. The live auction items were for the high dollar items and my Patriotic Log Cabin quilt was the very last item up for bid. Two couples really wanted the quilt and I could hear amazement in the auctioneer’s voice as the bids went up and up. The final winning bid was $925. I am so glad that the school will get such a sum for my contribution and am grateful that there were people there who appreciate the amount of time and effort I put into it. I’m still going to pick a more simple pattern for next year’s quilt and having been given a grant for $100 by the state guild for supplies, I think I’ll enjoy making it all the more.  

After visiting a quilting friend’s house over spring break, I was inspired to do something about my sewing space. I have 2/3 of a finished basement room that runs the length of the house. One day after some of the kids grow up and move out I will take over the schoolroom that connects to my sewing space and has full southern exposure. It wouldn’t be so great for fabric storage, but the lighting would be much better. I started by organizing all my fabrics, separating them into strings (in 2 drawers), fat quarter size pieces (folded and put in clear shoe boxes by color), and larger pieces (folded and stacked by color).

All the decorator fabric samples I was given by my friend went in their own bins so I can be inspired to make more notebook covers and little zippered bags to sell at the Waldo County Craft Co-op in Searsport.

I’ve also been madly making nautical themed pillows to sell there starting on Memorial Day. 

I also swapped out a bigger and more sturdy table for an old metal-topped kitchen table from the 1950’s so I have one station set up for piecing and one for free-motion quilting. Then I went through all my old projects and washed and folded a dozen baby quilts to put up for sale and put aside in a basket a heap of books, fabric, and tops that will never be finished to sell at the trash or treasure table at our guild’s quilt show this summer. So, while waiting patiently for the garden to dry out and warm up enough to till and plant, I’ve been busy as a bee cleaning, organizing, and sewing.

Our quilt guild is hosting a quilt show in August and each of us are expected to make a wall hanging, less than 20″ in height as a raffle item. Me, being the smart aleck of the group, asked if I could make my entry a pillow instead.

I took an extra block from the scrap bag and put on a few borders before measuring the sides. A trip to Goodwill resulted in a matching men’s shirt and a pillow for the form for a few bucks. I cut the men’s shirt to match the top and sewed them together around all four sides. I clipped the corners and flipped it right side out before putting the pillow form inside and rebuttoning the back. I like this technique of making pillows as I don’t like sewing zippers or flaps and it has the added benefit of recycling.

For last year’s Maine quilt show I made a modern queen size quilt, free-motion quilted in teardrops and vines, but this year I wanted to make something smaller and more intensely quilted. Our guild made 4 patch posy blocks for Bags of Love charity quilts and I liked the results so much that I made a double sized one in blue/lime green for a friend. By stacking 4 layers of fabric and cutting squares, you get a kaleidoscope effect with half the work of a standard Stack and Whack. Then I used the same butterfly and flower fabric in a pink colorway, with miniature 4 patches as the border. It measures about 42″ by 52″ and is quilted with a large teardrop loop flower in each block center and micro-stippling in the sashing. I’ve been working through many of the designs in the 365 Free Motion Quilting Designs book by Leah Day and the flower design is #175.  After doing all that stippling I can see the pattern in the dark every time I shut my eyes. Since the show isn’t until July, I’ll put it aside for a while and work on some other projects before I start the binding.

Last year our quilt guild made these adorable covers for 5×8 inch pads of paper. They are great for keeping in the purse for grocery lists and such, with pockets for all those stray jotted notes that usually disappear in the depths of one’s bag. I made up some for Christmas gifts and then decided to attempt to sell them. I’ve made some with doggie prints for a local dog grooming shop owned by a friend and some with nautical themes to sell at the county craft co-op this summer. 

Last year I made a queen-sized blue and white quilt for the local Catholic school yearly auction. The winning bid was $400 and so I decided this year to make a fancier quilt, a king-sized Log Cabin. The pattern is called Simple Tribute by Alice Berg from a 2003 American Patchwork and Quilting magazine. I’ve held onto the magazine that long simply to make this particular quilt. Now that it is finished, I don’t particularly want to make another since it contains 100 blocks, each one taking at least 20-30 minutes to make. Even with chain piecing meant that I think I put in over 100 hours. It looks a little ruffled at the edges just because it was folded just before I spread it out to photograph it, but it really does lie flat. I dropped it off at the school last week for the director of development to ooh and ahh over it. 

I free-motion machine quilted teardrops over the darker portions and stippled over the neutral portions and stiched in the ditch around each star. Next year I think I’ll pick a very simple pattern like a 4 patch posy to have more time to focus on the quilting and less on the piecing.