To Do List and En Provence Mystery Quilt

December 9, 2016December 9, 2016 Elizabeth E.10 Comments

In one month, I finished off two things. And added one: Quiltville Bonnie Hunter’s En Provence Mystery Quilt. In my defense, I also finished making all the words for the Alphabet Quilt, and just picked up the Halloween Quilt from the quilter’s, which now needs binding. Wait, I may have added one more thing: setting the brain working on what to do with the Christmas Tree Blocks, and if I’ll make any more.

Part one of the En Provence Mystery Quilt asked us to make 221 of these four-patch groups. I was able to make 207, and will find the time to make the others in the future.

Part Two asked us to use the Tri-Recs tool and make 100 of these units. I started in on scrappy (above) but soon switched to one-fabric, running out before I finished. Never fear. More fabric is en route to finish them off.

I’m pretty sure that’s about as caught up as I’m going to be from here on out, but it’s a good start.

Click •here• to see what’s up on her website.

Warning: she has a TON of blinky advertisements, but very graciously has created a PDF of each step that we can download. And never fear, you will able to purchase her pattern after the Quiltville Mystery is over with in her online shop.

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Oh! Christmas Tree Quilt

December 5, 2016April 30, 2017 Elizabeth E.21 Comments

Oh! Christmas Tree Quilt
Quilt #175
Began January 2016 • Finished December 2016

It’s finally finished. I started this once I saw the QuiltMania magazine it was featured in. It is a pattern from Wendy Williams of Flying Fish Kits. I had a companion in the making of this, in Wendy Welsh from New Zealand. She was about a month ahead of me in construction and was such a great help, especially in untangling the borders dilemma. All of the posts about the making of this quilt are referenced in the Quilt-A-Longs tab, up above.

I did finish it by my goal of December 1st, but had to find the right ~~locale~~ accessories, like the lumber-jack looking guy above. (By the way, the most important man in this photo is unseen, holding up the Christmas Tree quilt. Thanks, dear!)

I had written about how I quilted the center: a meander with tiny stars here and there.

As usual, I printed out my quilt with partial transparency and doodled and doodled, coming into a dead end always. But finally, inspired by an idea from *here,* I chose to do swirls around my stars with a spiral in the center, linking them all together.

I quilted the cream background fabric around the wool felt appliqués, then in around those red triangle points, leaving them unquilted. I did outline them in a straight stitch, helping them to stand out from the background.

My husband Dave and I went out for a photo shoot as the sun was dimming, first hitting the tree lot at Teen Challenge (below), a charity near our house.

And then we went looking for more evergreens for backdrops, a near herculean task in Southern California. We finally found these pines in the university parking lot. I told my husband that Marsha, in Vermont, could photograph hers out in the woods amid the snow, but that typical to our climate and locale, we have to pose in an asphalt parking lot.

The back is a series of panels and fabrics from Cori Dantini from her Merry Stitches line, purchased at Quilt Market this past May and available now. It’s fun to use them on the back.

This quilt (or parts of it) have gone to Spain, all around my town, and then finally tucked in at home to be finished with the quilting. I took inspiration from all of those who followed along on the Quilt-A-Long and on Instagram, but am indebted to my husband for his love of my quilting and constant support. Lastly, the design for Mary and Joseph and Baby Jesus are found here on the blog. Uusually we say that what’s important about Christmas isn’t found under the tree.

But in this case, it is.

I hope your Christmas season is merry and bright and filled with the love of our Savior.

Quilt Bee

Final Bee Blocks for 2016

December 4, 2016December 2, 2016 Elizabeth E.9 Comments

And….that’s a wrap!

The Mid-Century Modern bee began four years ago, and I recently sewed the final blocks in Anna Maria Horner fabrics (as per the Queen Bee’s request). We were supposed to do the blocks we’d requested for her, but I didn’t think mine would translate, so I obtained permission to do these: some Chuck Nohara blocks, writ large.

You’ve perhaps seen this logo, nestling down on the side of my blog for a while. Cindy (who had the idea for this bee) and I developed it one night while sitting side by side at this computer. I do think we collaborate well.

And…that’s a wrap for The Spelling Bee, too, although some members are still cranking out their words. This bee ended officially November 30th, and I hope that everyone has their words by the end of the year. All of mine are above; because of the length of my verse, about half of them were made by my beemates, and I did the rest.

My original intent for my wordy quilt was to have it be done all creams and pinks and reds for a Valentine quilt, but as soon as I got it up, I realized it needed some color. On the side I pinned some fabrics to audition for the quilt, and I have some ideas.

You can find a how-to for every letter over on the Quilt Abecedary Blog, which I wrote when I got in my mind to free-form create an alphabet. Have fun.

I plan to do a year-end wrap-up of the two different bees, so then you’ll see what we’ve all been up to. I like doing bees as I’m exposed to new ideas and new blocks and a different way of looking at the world. Who would have known that an enlarged Chuck Nohara block in AMH fabrics could look so fabulous? Now I do, thanks to my beemate.

Good Heart Quilters · Quilts

Christmas Tree Block Swap

December 2, 2016November 29, 2024 Elizabeth E.12 Comments

This picture-filled post shows when a bunch of the local Good Heart Quilters (my little quilting group) got together to trade Christmas Tree blocks (pattern found on this post).

Usually we don’t meet in December, but then Leisa had this idea about these Christmas Tree blocks. Those who were interested in the swap came together in a Flash Mob Quilt Night; we had a great time, although family trips and sickness prevented some from coming.

We’re nothing if not helpful. Some of us had our trees already made, so we all pitched in a sewed, ironed and trimmed the others’ blocks so we all went away with our set.

We dealt out all the blocks. I asked everyone to count their blocks, for after an evening of letting loose with children-and-husband-and-life stories, lots of laughing (too many delicious cookies) I couldn’t be depended on to get the numbers right.

This is one of mine, made afterwards, with a bit of my husband’s blue-and-white plaid shirt.

Fun fussy-cutting.

Now I either need to make 4 more blocks, or rethink everything and add a ton more. We could use another Christmas TV-watching quilt, because of:

The Crown, streaming off of Netflix, fictionalizing Queen Elizabeth as a young woman.

Poldark, on PBS (we watched the first season via CDs from Netflix).

And apparently Endeavor, a crowd-pleaser in our house, will return for a fourth season.

Oh, and then there’s that big event called Christmas, which needs some time…Happy Quilting!