In this episode of This-and-That posts, I wanted to lead off with a little freebie for your Fourth of July: the instructions for a Teeny Tiny Flag quilt.  You can whip this up quickly, and it slips over a dimestore 4″ x 6″ acrylic frame.  I made one recently for a friend in the hospital: no flowers or balloons were allowed.  This brought some cheer to her stay as she loves red, white and blue.

I thought you might like the how-to’s, so download the PDF file (please re-download this new file–earlier this morning, there was a glitch):

Teeny Tiny Flag Quilt

I finished it off with some cute buttons.  For more Tiny quilts (and Teeny-Tiny quilts), visit the Tiny Quilts tab, above.

Here’s a new favorite book of mine, Sunday Best Quilts, by Sherri L. McConnell and Corey Yoder.  Sherri and I have been friends for a while ever since we shared English assignments for the classes we were teaching, at two different community colleges in two different states.  I also appreciate her wonderful quilt designs, and have enjoyed her fabric lines (favorites are Bright Sun, Creekside and Front Porch).

I expect certain things out of books these days.  I’ve stopped buying everything that’s new as I was pretty burned out with what I call “vanity” books — a famous quilter gets a book and really, it was nothing new under the sun.  So now I am pretty selective about what I’ll add to my quilt library.  The book has to have 1) a new way of looking at familiar quilts, 2) a thorough (but not mansplained) direction section, and 3) great photographs, plus 4) the writing has to be pristine and readable, no small feat.

This book fulfills all four of those criteria. If you are looking for a new book to add, I can recommend this one.

Truth.

So our Guild had a rummage sale this month, well, really it was a Clean-Out-The-President’s-Sewing-Room/Garage sale.  Evidently people had been bringing her stuff for many years; husbands would call when their wives had moved to Assisted Living, and leftovers from classes all just sort of congregated in her garage.  Time for it all to go.

I am always fascinated by what quilters used to do Back in the Day.  Like these vests.  Did we really a) have haircuts like that, and b) dress like this?

Another binder had templates with lots of code numbers on them, and then these illustrations.  I loved “Home Grown” #8, and think it would make a great block in a quilt.  No, I didn’t bring that one home.

But I felt like I scored with this box of “vintage” magazines (really, they are just 20-30 years old–how is that vintage?).  I’d bought a few things here and there, stuffing my dollars in the Rummage Sale Jar, but at the end of the night, when so much was left, she said, “Take it all away!” So we did.

I wanted to post some construction images from Ladybird, the quilt from the last post. At this point I was thinking: what am I doing? This was the quilting after the first day. I threw it on the spare bed and left it there for two days.

Better.

In the end, I was pretty happy with it, finding lots of ways to be creative with mostly straight lines.

Finished this book.  I loved it and I’m not a New Yorker.

I had wanted to leave you with my larger flag quilt, all quilted and bound, but it didn’t happen.  So Happy Fourth of July, with a quilt top:

Long may it wave! (click to see it in action)