One last finish for November!

On our Michigan trip this fall, we stopped at Plum Lake Quilts in Sayner, WI, where I bought a kit with The Little Red Hen pattern Jingles. It was fun to work with wool and make something I would use. The majority of the quilt is cotton. 

This 41" by 60" quilt is for us. I changed the design slightly. The strip with the appliqué was in the center and I moved it down because the quilt will hang.

I free-motion quilted this with Glide 40-wt  #10877 Sterling Gray thread. I used a large meander on the narrow stripes. 

The area with the wool appliqué has a horizontal stipple.

When the season is right, this quilt will hang on the quilt rack above a couch in our living room.

Yesterday I decided to clean one of our four large dormer closets. This one hasn't been cleaned for a while. It's taken me two days and I now have 5 large trash bags and 1 large box to deliver to a Second Hand store near us, 1 large bag of trash, and 4 large pieces of luggage to deliver to the new owner.  The closet looks MUCH better and it was easy to retrieve the Christmas decor this afternoon! 

Now I think it's time to focus a little more on Christmas and maybe a bit less on quilting ...

Some Small Finishes

My latest finishes are all Christmas/winter table runners for us. They all are flat, but, as usual, I do not get down on the floor to straighten them out.

The two red pickup runners are each 16" by 47". I free motion quilted one with a loop de loop

and the other with a meander.

The third runner has bears and trees. It is 14" by 42". 

I quilted it with a horizontal stipple.

I used Glide 40-wt #10WG1 Linen thread on all three runners. They all have the same gray fabric on the back.

I'm working on a couple more projects for us and various donation quilts. With Thanksgiving this week, I doubt that I'll get in much more quilting. We are hosting and just a bit busy! 

Happy Thanksgiving!

A Third Finish for November

One day I was reading something that Christina Cameli had shared. She suggested cutting up charm squares and sewing them back together as strings. I had two matching Kaffe Fassett charm packs that I decided to slice into pieces without thinking through the process. If you do this, do not cut too big of a slant or your strips will have to be trimmed to less than a 5" width. I'm just speaking from experience here. 

This just came out of the dryer and I did not get on the floor to flatten it.

This donation quilt finished at 52" by 57".

I quilted this on my long arm using the pantograph, Water Wings from Urban Elementz. Although I love free motion quilting, I'm trying to learn to use pantographs - it is getting easier and my quilting is looking better! I used 40-wt Glide thread - Lemon Ice #80607.

I found fabric for the back that matches one of the fabrics in the quilt. It is orange rather than pink as it looks in this photo.

This is the third quilt I finished at the recent retreat. Again, all I had to do was hand stitch the binding. I also did some wool work at the retreat. I'm hoping those projects are finished soon.

Another November Finish

At the recent retreat, I did lots of handwork.  My second finish also just needed the binding sewn down. It is called Bright Gems. I saw a picture of a quilt similar that was called Vintage Jewels. I made my squares about 4 1/2" finished and used bright colors (because the pastels didn't seem to fit). 

This donation quilt is 58 inches square. 

Did you see the binding? It was in my stash and seemed the perfect choice.

The backing is from my stash also.

I free-motion quilted this with a meandering stitch using 40-wt Glide thread, Bone #17443.

It was nice to get another quilt finished. And there's still more to come!

A November Finish

In early November, I have a retreat with three friends. I have missed this for a few years and was delighted to be able to attend this year. We were missing one of our group but we still had a great time. I found that sewing on my machine - I assume it must have been the height of the table and/or the chair - was painful. (At home, I can typically sew for 1+ hours at a time.) Anyway, I did very little machine stitching and lots of hand stitching. 

I finished Hill n Dale. I purchased a kit for this quilt in early September. I fell in love with the baby blue fabrics - Moda's Crystal Lane by Bunny Hill Designs. I very seldom buy kits but it was on sale and quite a deal.

I decided to use the same fabric line for the backing and finally found fabric at an online shop. This matches the most used fabric (the medium fabric used in the square patches) on the front.

The quilting motif is just two loops with an echo across the loops. Here is my practice piece:

This 64" square quilt will be staying with us. I used Glide Linen #10WG1 40-wt thread to quilt this.

At the retreat I finished putting the binding on this quilt - it just needed the hand stitching.

There are more finishes to come...