Betsy’s Creation: Flag Quilt Top

June 21, 2019August 23, 2019 Elizabeth E.17 Comments

BetsysCreation_1

Betsy’s Creation • Flag Quilt Top Finished!

Last week in another post, I threw together a fun little worksheet about how to make a flag quilt, then got busy and not only made this quilt top, but also a wallhanging:

BetsysCreationWH_1

In case you didn’t see that free worksheet…

BetsysCreation_Illustration

…click here to download a PDF version of this: Betsy’s Creation_OPQuilt

It’s a just a worksheet and assumes you know how to put together a quilt. Why did I have enough for a quilt and a wallhanging? Seems I had a bit of a miscount, excited as I was to be cutting into all my reds, and whites and blues. I overshot my mark of 15 sets.

BetsysCreation_1a — *I put each strip set on my design wall, then added a blue rectangle to coordinate.*

BetsysCreation_1c

I mixed them around until I found an arrangement I liked, putting four to the side for the wallhanging, then sashed and bordered them with the light blue. I used Painter’s Palette Solids in Aruba (121-100), available from Pineapple Fabrics, if your local shop doesn’t carry it.

BetsysCreation_2

Then I went outside and fought the breezes to get these few shots.

BetsysCreation_3 BetsysCreation_4

I did all the cutting, the sewing and fighting-the-breezes-for-a-picture in three days. I tell you that so you know it’s a quick quilt to make. I’ll hang the smaller version in our front hallway in July, but the larger one will be quilted and tucked into the car for fun picnic blanket getaway events.

Happy Red, White and Blue Sewing!

Other Red, White and Blue projects I have made:

RedWhiteBlueStar_kitchen table

Red, White and Blue Star

SweetLandLiberty_front

Sweet Land of Liberty

Red White Blue Quilt

Red, White and Blue Quilt (friends blocks)

AmericaIsATune_front

America Is A Tune (it must be sung together)

Fourth July Tiny Quilt

Happy Fourth of July (Tiny Quilt)

Happy Fourth of July 2018

July 3, 2018June 16, 2019 Elizabeth E.13 Comments

Fourth July Tiny Quilt

To honor the 4th of July, I stitched up another tiny quilt. I love being patriotic, as the meaning has a sense of loving America and its peoples, the history and the early settlers, and those who set up the government in 1776. It helps that my nickname in my childhood was Betsy, but I do love the red, white and blue.

Fourth July Tiny Quilt_1

I went through my Orphan Quilt Blocks box, found one that wasn’t being used, and smallerized it, using this PDF pattern to cut it out: Fourth July Tiny Quilt Star Center

Fourth July Tiny Quilt_2

I put on two borders, quilted it (so fast because it’s so small) and put a single-thickness binding on it (cut your strip 1-1/2″ wide), gluing down the back binding and top-stitching it down. It is one of those quilt projects you can take at full throttle–no fussy cutting or intricate piecing. Put your pedal to the medal and crank out a 4th of July star tiny quilt!

Fourth July Tiny Quilt_back

It slips over the back of one of those cheezy plastic stand picture frames (under 2 bucks at Walmart). [More on the quilt underneath it at the end of the post.]

Tiny Sailboat Quilt_front on frame

Here’s a post with general directions as well as how to make a sailboat design.
And I have also made:

Mini Quilt Spring 18_4

a snowman,

Tiny Pumpkin Quilt_front

a harvest pumpkin, (which has more directions, especially on that binding)

Tiny Trees

and some Christmas trees. (I included the directions for the smaller trees.)

AmericaIsATune_front AmericaIsATune_back AmericaIsATune_label

I made the quilt above quilt five years ago at the same time we had a government shut-down, and I was moaning about government needing to behave itself then. I now look back on that particular chaos with a wistful glance; would that we had that steadiness now!

Shout Hurrah for America

Yet, I still believe that America is a Tune, and that we must figure it out — sing it — together, no matter how painful things are. After reading the book Hamilton, I value what those early fathers of our country (and mothers, too) must have faced and appreciate how much work they did and how inspired they were to come together and get the framework off the ground.

Uncle Sam

Have a Happy Fourth of July!

Quilts

America Is A Tune: October Schnibbles Quilt

October 20, 2013October 19, 2013 Elizabeth E.11 Comments

America Is A Tune (it must be sung together)
finished October 2013
Quilt #122 on my 200 Quilts List

I was making this quilt all during the recent embarrassing shut-down of our country. It was embarrassing because I’d been thinking about the ideals that began our nation, and I felt that no matter what your political persuasion, the sacrifices of those early leaders would pale in comparison to the sacrifices being made by those now congregating in the halls of Congress. And perhaps because they made those sacrifices, maybe those early leaders recognized the fragility of the nation, and worked hard to get it going and keep it going. The title of this quilt is from Gerald Stanley Lee, a clergyman writing at the time of World War I, and I think it kind of expresses what I would hope we, as a county, could embrace again: working together.

Okay, enough on that, but I am really happy the shut-down is over.

Clover Schnibbles

Sherri and Sinta chose Miss Rosie’s new pattern, Clover, for our Schnibbles this month. I couldn’t face making all those teensy blocks, so this was my plan:

So I cut the center “flower” blocks 3” square (finish at 2.5″). Then cut a bunch of 1 3/4″ squares and sewed them into a four-patch, which would finish at 3″ square, too. I randomly picked these measurements, and so also include how I constructed the side setting triangles and the corner triangles.

And although it happened again: this pattern included no cutting instructions for those of us who don’t buy gobs of Moda pre-cuts, this brilliant design is all Carrie Nielson, from Miss Rosie’s Quilt Company, so get the pattern before you start.

What prompted this was a visit from my son, who is a political animal–eats, drinks and sleeps politics. Somewhere in a chest of drawers out in the garage was a little T-shirt I’d bought for a grandchild at the Senate Office Building when we had our sabbatical in Washington DC. And when looking for that to give to him (so his daughter could wear it), I found this tea towel, with some of Washington DC’s landmarks.

My favorite one, the World War II Memorial isn’t on here, nor is the World War I memorial, which is hidden off to the side of the Lincoln Reflecting Pool (on the left, as you face Mr. Lincoln).

The backing fabric is an ancient fabric from Susan Winget. I’d been saving it for a patriotic quilt, and it now has found its home. I quilted it in a cross-hatch design, while listening to The Light Between Oceans, by M.I. Stedman. I have three hours to go and I’d better get going on quilting last month’s Schnibbles, so I can finish the book and talk to my mother about it.