Mini Quilt Show

I thought I might do a "mini quilt show" today. I have been showing lots of quilts I am working on for or with other people, but few of my own. This is Mr. Scarlett. He enjoys all the quilts!

This is an all cream quilt I like to use in the Master Berdroom for the summer, I just put it on my bed today. It looks like summer has arrived. It has been in the 90's for about the last 3 days now. I pieced the quilt, but can't take the credit for quilting this one though. It was way to big to go through my Viking! It is not a king size but it is larger then a queen. I wanted to be able to cover my pillows with it. (Keeps the cat hair off) :o)

Here is a close-up of some of the hand quilting I did on this quilt. It is called "Thirteen Stars". I finished it in 2002. I love how this one turned out! It feels yummy to. Hand quilting makes a quilt feel so much softer then machine quilting! This is my feminine side, a pink quilt just for me!

Here is the full picture of it. You will find that I don't have any one style or color group that I stick to. I seem to dibble and dabble in just about anything that suits me at the time. (Except maybe Kaffe Fasset fabrics. ;o)

"Stars and Rails" a Buggy Barn pattern. I keep this one in our family room. Everyone uses this one! You could call it my utility quilt!

A log cabin table runner which also has a home in the family room.

A basket quilt which was made from a Thimbleberry Kit. Many years ago. It has some applique on it.

I made this quilt in 2002. It is a signature quilt. It was signed by all the members in my "quilt bee" at that time. Of course some of the ladies that signed it have moved away or left the bee for various reasons. This quilt is near and dear to my heart, for it reminds me of the friends of the past as well as the present.

Prarie Pines! A Thimbleberry pattern. This was the very first fabric exchange I did when I first joined the "quilt bee" I am currently in. I remember feeling sooo over whelmed! Some of the fabrics in the exchange were down right awful to me! I ended up using them thinking I don't like this one bit! Now it is one of my favorite quilts! It goes to show that it is a good exercise to try new things, and it is O.K. to use some ugly fabrics! I may not like all the fabrics but they really work well together in this quilt! I learned a great lesson!

This is a "Churn Dash" block. I just used up lots of scraps in this one. Kinda just did my own thing with it.

This is a Kaffe Fasset pattern. Someone in my "bee" decided they wanted to do an exchange of "black background floral prints" and use a pattern from Kaffe Fasset. (Not Me!) We actually did 3 different fabric exchanges for this same pattern! The very first quilt I showed as the all cream fabrics on my master bed is one of them. This one and one more which you will see later. Believe it or not, after everyone was so excited about this exchange only 3 people out of 12 ever finished any of the projects!

This was a fun one! At one point my bee was doing "secret pal". I was recieving these blocks one at a time! I had to finish a few of the blocks and put the final quilt together, but I really enjoyed seeing what block I was to recieve next! Fun Fun Fun!

O.K. Here is the 3rd Kaffe Fasset fabric exchange we did. This one was fruit and vegtables! I Yi Yi ! I like how all the quilts turned out but, boy they are busy and were challenging for me to work on!! I still can't get over the fact that I was the only one to finish all 3 of these. It was hard.

A Debbie Mumm pattern. Moo. It's hand quilted.

This is a quilt I made for my youngest daughter! I saw this special hand dyed fabric and knew that she would love it! I gave her the finished quilt for Christmas one year. She was only 12 years old at the time. (What 12 year old would want a quilt for Christmas? Hehehe) I thought she would like it and think it funny that she was getting a quilt for Christmas. Turns out it was a HUGE hit! She was so happy with it! :o)

Here is the scrappy rug I crocheted to go with her "Rainbow Quilt" as she calls it!

Well I hope you enjoyed my "Mini Quilt Show"! I have many other quilts squirreled away but, will save to show you some other time! This post has been long enough!

Happy Quilting!!

Round Robin #5 ; and Family Comes First!

Eeeeekk! This is the round robin I was afraid to get and do! It is waaaay out of my comfort zone! It is done in all Kaffe Fassett fabrics! I had to go shopping for fabric for this one. I had 4 different people at the shop trying to help me!! LOL!! I have not had to buy fabric for any of the other round robins I've done so far. I thought my stash was fairly well rounded. No Kaffe Fassett! I have been trying to convince myself that this is O.K. to do! I put it off for a couple of days, but I needed to get it finished now. This is a definite challenge for me. It's good to try new things. Right?! Just difficult.

O.K. here it is all finished. What do you think? I am very happy with it. I felt that it really needed to get more purple back into it from the original center block. I had to be careful with getting it back by adding the softer pinky, purplely bluish fabric in the first go around set of 2" inch squares. Then in the outer set I went with all purple. I am soo happy that it is done. I actually felt I had to purchase a couple of different fabrics and come home and play around with them. Then I finally made a decision. Now, what to do with the leftovers? (Maybe I will put them in the bag with the round robin quilt) :o)

Family Comes First:

I really do enjoy blogging! My goal is to keep an online journal and post at least once a week. Sometimes this goal may not be realized due to other obligations. My family comes first! Always has and always will. I am a devoted mother and wife.

I am using this blog as an online journal, so that my family and friends which don't live anywhere nearby can see. I love quilting and will probably end up blogging mostly about that, but there will be times that I blog about other things.

I will be having out of town friends visiting this weekend. They are scouting out colleges for their daughter. Next weekend my parents will arrive for a month long visit! I only get to see them about twice a year if I am lucky! We will also be going to pick up my daughter and move her back home from her first year of college! The upcoming month of May will be very busy for me! I look forward to seeing and spending time with these friends and family members! Thank-you to my new friends in blogland for understanding!

Happy Month of May!!

Online Quilt Festival!!!

This is so exciting! There is an "Online Quilt Festival" going on! The festival is being held at http://www.parkcitygirl.blogspot.com/ Anyone can enter a favorite quilt of there choice! So I have decieded to join in the fun. (Let's just hope I can figure out the linking to blogs thingy without the help of my computer wize daughters! Wish me luck!)

This is my all time favorite quilt!! I can not take the credit for this one though. My Great Great Grandmother made this quilt. It is from the Civil War Era near as I can figure with dating it. Perhaps sometime around the 1860's. It measures approximately 82"x 100"! It is a large quilt and all done by hand!

This is a view of one of the side blocks, which go all the way around the quilt. They look like they were full blocks cut in half. As you can see by the half block, she used whatever fabric scraps she had left to finish the side blocks. "Waste not Want not".

Can you imagine how frustrated she was when she got to this part of the border!!! If you look closely she had to add a piece of mismatched fabric to this last corner. The rest of the border is all the same fabric. But she did well! I did not notice this until after my 3rd close examination of the quilt! Every time I look at it, I find something new about it that I did not see before. It tells me another piece of it's story each time I view it. I truly love this quilt. It is a peek into my family and adds to the stories my Grandfather used to tell me of the struggles they faced so long ago. My Grandmother lived in a log cabin.

The four corner blocks are done in blue. This is the only blue in the whole quilt. My Grandmother used her color choices well. I greatly admire her artistry, using what little she had.

Here is a close-up of one of the blocks. As you can see she used different fabrics in this one block. The blocks vary in size slightly. Some are 11"x 11", 10 1/2" x 11" and even 11" x 11 1/2".

Here is a closer view of 4 blocks and how they are layed out. This quilt was obviously not a utility quilt. My guess would be that it only came out of a chest or cupboard for very special guests! It does have some brown age spots throughout, but over all is in excellent condition.

This is the back of the quilt, which is all hand quilted.

My Great Great Grandmother Libby! This is the lady we are giving credit to for creating this masterpiece.

I have her wedding portrait sitting on the fireplace mantel. Look at the detail of the frame alone. I feel very honored to have aquired this as well as the quilt. A wonderful piece of history to be shared by all.

Project: Move Away

This is the new June 2009 edition of American Patchwork & Quilting! Some really neat stuff in this issue. A member of my quilt bee is moving away to Texas in June. We as a group have decieded to make a remembrance quilt for this gal. We chose a pattern from the Magazine.

The pattern is called "Mix It Up". It is the Jacobs Ladder block done in 30's reproduction prints, which is a favorite of our member who is moving.

These are the fabrics I chose to use. Each member is to make 9 blocks as well as 4 border blocks and squares.

Ahh! Now you get to see my special helpers! ;o) Although it looks like they are sleeping on the job!! Literally!!

The blocks are a work in progress. I have everything cut out and ready to go! Zoom Zoom!

More progress! Almost done!

Tah Dah! This is as far as I need to go with this project at this time. The next step will be to have a workshop with the rest of the group so we can put the blocks together into a quilt. Shhh! This is a secret! She doesn't know we are doing this. It will be our surprise gift for her. We need to hurry along if we are going to finish this before she moves. We may have to mail it to her if we don't get it finished in time. Ideally, it will be quilted, binded and labeled so we can hand it to her at her last meeting with us. I have not told anyone in my "Quilt Bee" that I have a blog. I wanted to be able to post things here without having to keep it a secret from you! :0)

All in good fun!

Round Robin # 4

I recieved the next "Round Robin" at my last bee meeting. After this block I think there are 3 more to go. I will be happy to no longer have to add 2 and 4 inch squares! ( Time to work on some of my own projects again!) I added the 4 1/2 " squares. This person wanted vibrant fall colors. Golds, rusts, red/browns and autumn greens. No white, black or gray.

OOPS! As you can see someone didn't read her directions! There is white in there! I wonder if she will take the quilt top apart just to get rid of the white.?

Hmm, this picture turned side ways. Oh well. You get the idea. I have begun the Bunny Hill block of the month "A Tisket A Tasket". As you can see I haven't gotten very far. This is the January block! All cut out and ready to be appliqued. First though, I need to make 9 blocks to donate to a quilt being made for one of our bee members who will be moving to Texas. Then I hope to get to the Bunny Hill project!

Happy Easter!!

Mulch Madness!

This doesn't look like quilting to me!! My husband had some mulch delivered and we have been busy shoveling and spreading this stuff around the yard. It is hard work, but always makes the yard look better!

We bought 2 Jessamine plants and 2 trellis's for them to climb on. We have never had Jessamine before. Hopefully they will like there new home. You can see here what a difference the mulch makes!

The azaleas are begining to bloom. I think North Carolina is very pretty in the Spring! If you can deal with the allergies and pollen! Blah!

Everything is starting to push out of the ground with vim and vigor! Spring has Sprung!

My husband does most of the shoveling and dumping. I do the spreading. Team work! Gets the job done.

I planted 2 of these in the garden this morning, before the mulch covered the ground. Grow! Grow! and Bloom!

Here they are after I plugged them into the ground.

This is the hole I was preparing for them. As you can see we don't have dirt. We have clay! UGH! It is the worst stuff. Hard, clumpy, heavy, and nothing can grow in it! You have to either remove it, or have raised beds of dirt that you have hauled in. As you can see, we remove it. Then I use soil that I have purchased. Then we have to figure out what to do with the clay after we dig it up! I often wonder, how in the world did our ancestors farm here! How did they get there vegtables and fruits to grow in this stuff!!!

Funny Things Happen!!!

This morning I had a special delivery come to my front door! It was from the "Fat Quarter shop"! Hurray!! I am grinning ear to ear! What could this be? Fabric, of course! But, I haven't ordered anything!

Imagine my surprise when I opened the box! This is fabric from a line I am not familiar with. Hmmm. The shipping address on the box says it's for me. Hmmm. What to do?

I called the Fat Quarter Shop, and told them I had recieved a package in the mail and it wasn't for me. Yet, it is addressed to me. They were not sure either and would call me back.

When the Fat Quarter Shop called back they said I was to re-tape the box and the delivery company would come back to pick it up. They know who is supposed to recieve it, and will re-send it. It belongs to Anne Sutton over at Bunny Hill!! This is too funny! I can't wait to see what she will do with what was in the box!!! Hang in there Anne, your fabric is on its way! :0)