It is a very nice, cool day in Vermont.  The sun is shining.   Sue and I have had our first class.  Lynn Harris was the teacher.  The class was Tiny Pieces.  We worked with one inch pieces of fabric for part of the class.  We did begin with small pieces that we put together in an improvised log cabin.  The squares are 4″.  I don’t know what I will do with them, but expect another small wall hanging for the give away box.  

The little red and white star is 2 1/4″ square.  It is very easy to make.

We also learned how to make pinwheels, quarter square triangles and four patches using one inch pieces of fabric.  The two pieces are 2 1/2″ square.  The small inserts measure 1/2″ square.

It was a fun class and we did learn a lot.

The opening program and viewing of the quilts is tonight.

Have a great day and happy quilting.,

          The climbing rose is beautiful this year.

This is the second in the Moda Blockbuster 2 series.  It is a simple 6″ nine patch consisting of two four patches and two half square triangles.  It was fun  and easy to make.  We need easy once in a while.  The third block should show up in an e-mail today or tomorrow.  It will have to wait in cyber space until I’m back in Maine. 

 

 

 

I like to make four patches and “smush” the seams on the back.  Is that a valid quilting term?  The block lays much flatter which is great for quilting.  

I’m off to Vermont in about one hour.

Have a great day and happy quilting.

Some of the flowers from my N.H. garden.

     

I was looking for a quilt in a stack in the bathroom linen closet when I found this quilt.  I know that I made it because of the quilting and the backing, but the front puzzled me.  I didn’t remember making it.  The colors are not my colors.  Then I remembered that the orange and yellow bins were overflowing because I don’t usually use those colors.  I took all the colors and fabrics that I didn’t like and put them in this quilt.

Then I couldn’t figure how I made the block.  It must have been a technique that I learned because I have a gaa-bage piece with the same pattern. 

 

It’s definitely not a mile a minute.  After pondering this puzzle for a while, I remembered taking a class in Vermont with Linda McGehee.  It was a pocketbook class where we made different textured fabric. I learned spiral piecing and other ways of creating texture with fabrics.   I have Linda’s book and there it was.  It is called Lattice Piecing. It is made by cutting and inserting strips several times.  Each of the series of cuts is at a different angle.  When I made this quilt, I must have put it into the closet, out of sight and forgotten.

Miss Molly has inspected the quilt and seems to like it.

Now that I have Linda’s book out, I should try some of her other techniques.  That would be fun to do.

Have a great day and happy quilting.

I am back in N. H. for a few days to get ready to go to the Vermont Quilt Festival.  I left Maine in a rain storm, but the sun was out half way down.  The weather was beautiful today until suppertime when a thunderstorm came up.  Miss Molly does not like thunder and was very upset.  I think that she likes Maine much better.  She enjoys taking a nap on the swing in Maine and does not like to go outside here in N. H.

This morning, I had six poppies in my Maine garden. My flowers are beautiful here.  I’ll take some pictures tomorrow unless the rain storm destroyed them,  We really needed the rain.

Years ago, when at the quilt festival, I designed a Dresden Plate quilt in my head.  It was going to use hand dyed fabric as well as some purchased ones.  I gathered the fabric for several years. The colors had to be just right. When I think back about some of my earlier quilts I realize that I gathered fabric for years for some until I had just the right combination.    The medallions are very large and the quilt grew to king size.  It is beautiful in its simplicity.

I saw a pattern that stated spectacular quilts from simple shapes. I thought it would be nice to make a simple quilt.  I didn’t pay attention to what it really said.  It did not say simple quilt.  It said simple shape.  The simple shape was a square.  The quilt was not simple to make.   I started gathering fabrics for this quilt and liked what I had, but there was something missing.  At that time, I was teaching some of my co workers how to quilt.  We quilted at my dining room table that had a cutting mat that covered the whole table.  I had found it at a yard sale for $2.00.  It was fun.  We could cut anywhere near our machine.  I miss that mat.  One of my friends had bought a piece of pink fabric at Keepsake Quilting.  She laid it on top of my pile of fabric so we could see it.  That was it!!! Just the right color to finish my spectacular quilt.  I sent a piece of the selvage to Keepsake with a check and by return mail I had my accent fabric.

Every quilt does have a story.

Have a great day and happy quilting.

 

Miss Molly and I were sitting on the porch swing enjoying the cool evening air.  I had some un-sewing to do and she was just taking it easy.  There are two poppies tonight with more to come.   I don’t know what these flowers are but they are small and very pretty.    The end of the driveway is filled with these pretty little flowers.  They weren’t there last year and who knows where they came from.  

When I decided to make the gaa-Barge series, I made a mission statement.  In the statement I said that I would make one a week and even if they were not good, I would keep them in the series.  This one is not good.  After the success of the underwater scene, I thought that I would make a landscape.  This is part of the White Mountains as seen from a cabin where we stayed during a fishing trip.

It’s a good thing to make an awful piece once in a while.  It makes you think and do much better the next time.  I can only say that this one inspired me to do better.

I think that I did because I figured out a way to make Landscape Gaa-Barge and even taught a class with the procedure.  This one stays in the series to remind me that not all quilts are well made or beautiful.

Next week, when there is another Gaa-Barge post, I’ll show you one of my class examples and just maybe will tell you how to do it.

Have a great day and happy quilting.

The garden quilt top is finished.  It has been basted and ready to quilt.  I looked at it all one afternoon trying to decide how to quilt it..  I drew out several quilting designs but nothing seemed right.  I decided to stitch in the ditch with invisible thread and think more about what I would quilt later.  The only problem with invisible thread is that you can’t see it.  It’s not hard to thread through the needle, but is hard to see where you have already quilted.  I’m using Superior Threads mono poly.  It glides through the needle with no problem.  Not at all like the old invisible thread that was terrible to sew with.  While I was sewing the stitch in the ditch lines, I was thinking about what I would do for quilting.   I have some of it settled in my mind.  I can quilt those designs in the spaces made by the invisible thread and then decide what to do in the other spaces.

Now that the Garden Quilt is on it’s way to being finished, I am starting another new project using the last twelve 10″ blocks from Kimberly Einmo’s block book.  I’ll use more of the Japanese cotton fabric to make these blocks.  They are the same fabrics that I’m using in the Moda Blockhead 2 blocks except the Moda blocks will have a black background and the Kimberly blocks will have a white background.  The two quilts will look very different when finished.  

 

 

 

The Grandmother’s Flower Garden quilt top is almost done also.  Just one more row of blocks and then the partial row that straightens out the bottom of the quilt.  I’ll probably hand quilt that one.  It seems a shame to machine quilt a quilt that was pieced by hand.

Have a great day and happy quilting.

Miss Molly and I were sitting on the porch swing this afternoon.  It was a wonderful place to relax and work on the Grandmothers Flower Garden quilt. The air smelled so fragrant from all the flowers around the front of the house.

I looked around at all the flowers.  The lupine will be gone soon, but still is beautiful.  The yellow iris, purple chive flowers,  white pom pom bush and the Ragusa rose bush are all in blossom.  On the other side of the white fence, Grandpa’s geraniums are in full blossom.  My Dad gave me the first plants and his grandchildren gave them their name.  As I looked around, I spotted the first poppy of the season.  It is beautiful as usual.  It is a vivid orange with a purple center.  It always reminds me of a quilt that a friend made with purple fabric and a big splash of orange.  It was a very striking quilt.

I have decided to join the second year of the Moda Blockhead blocks.  Each week, I will receive a pattern.  The size is from 6″ up to 18″ or whatever the designer decides.  All my blocks will be made from Japanese cotton fabric.  I have a multicolored print which I will use somewhere in each block.  The background will be black.  There are enough color and patterns of fabrics in this stash to complete the quilt.

Block 1 is Stellar Star by Lynn Hagmeier.  There are 13 designers at this point who will take turns designing the Moda Blockbuster 2 blocks.  It will be a fun journey.  I’ll post each block as I make it so you can go on the journey with me.

Have a great day and happy quilting.

The Canadian Lilac does not smell like a lilac, but is very pretty.

  Iris

Beginners and enders are small pieces that you sew together between sewing seams.  They make starting a seam much easier.  The needle doesn’t eat the beginning of the seam.

Confetti is a king size quilt that was made with 2″ squares.  Using the 2″ pieces as beginners and enders made this quilt easy to make.  It took a long while to sew all the pieces but sewing for a few seconds between other seams made it effortless.

I had a stack of log cabin blocks in my ufo pile.  When I made them I was trying out a new “easy” way to make a log cabin block.  I don’t know why I didn’t finish them.  They only needed corners.

One day, as I was sewing, I needed some beginners and enders and spotted the log cabin blocks.  I could sew triangles on the corners as a beginner and ender and the blocks would be finished.  I would just have to square them up and sew them together.  In two days, I have four blocks ready to finish.  This ufo will be finished in no time at all.

I’ll look at my ufos differently now.  Maybe using them as beginners and enders will diminish the pile.

Have a great day and happy quilting.

Going Buggy is the seventh in the Miss Rosie Series.  All thirteen quilts in the Miss Rosie’s Spice Of Life Quilts book by Carrie L. Nelson were made by me and my daughter after we challenged each other to make all thirteen quilts using only our stash.  We were glad when the last stitch was made.  Miss Rosie took over our life for a while.

I enjoy sewing curved seams such as the Drunkard’s Path block.  Carrie made her curved blocks another way.  She invisible machine appliqued circles using freezer paper.  Then she cut the circles into quarters.  I didn’t enjoy this method until almost the last block.  It took me all that time to be comfortable with doing it that way although I had done invisible applique before.

The traditional name for this four part quilt is Dogwood Blossom.  Carrie changed it by alternating the colors in the four segments.

My Going Buggy had a white background.

My daughter’s quilt has different fabrics for the background.  

All three quilts look different.

Have a great day and happy quilting.

 

 

 

I love to make mystery quilts. It’s fun to use another person’s design.  Of course, when you begin, you have no idea what the end result will be.  You only know what value the fabric should be – light, medium, dark, etc. Instructions are given one at a time for several days or weeks.  Only, at the turn of the last page, will you know what the quilt will look like.

Several years ago, I made the quilt that is pictured below.  I had made other mystery quilts designed by this quiltmaker.  They came out very nice.  This quilt  took a lot of days and lots of sewing,  When I finished the top, I realized that I could have made it in half the time, cutting and sewing my own way.  It could have been made with squares and half square triangles.  It was a simple block made complicated.  Live and learn.  The mystery was why this designer chose to sew it this way.

It is a very pretty little quilt anyway.

Have a great day and happy quilting.