By the time our quilt group meeting rolled around I was in desperate need of some inspiration! Too much work and not enough quilting time for this one has put me in a lack-luster-quilting-rut! Fortunately for me, I got my much needed boost at our meeting!
Ignore the hands...just focus on the rightness of this quilt...if you're a quilter then you know just how easy it is to sew a crooked seam...well, this quilt has not one crooked seam - not one! Every half-inch strip is absolutely perfectly straight! Jenny worked some sewing magic on this one!
It was Denise's turn to receive blocks from our group and she asked us to make her 8 1/2-inch Easter blocks in pastel colors...that's all we had to go on and look how cute her blocks turned out! This is going to be a darling quilt!
Lori brought her Halloween quilt back so we could see it finished - with the binding on and with her embroidered words - which you can't see in this picture. We learned that Lori used glow-in-the-dark fabric on the mummy block - who knew that was available?!?
This quilt shocked us all...Helen has been secretly working on this for ages and none of us knew! And none of us knew that she hates it and just wants it to be done! Of course, we all volunteered to take it off her hands...but apparently she doesn't hate it that much! A Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt is truly a labor of love - it has to be because it's all hand pieced and it takes forever to make one this size. Helen wanted our opinions on how to finish it - and she got them - now we'll wait to see what she does. Loved this Helen...more than anyone else...really, just so you know.
This quilt of Terry's is much better in person - it's happy - and perfectly pieced. The blue and white ticking fabric looks almost like seer-sucker - it's light and summery and just says beach, no?
Terry had Ardith buy her this blue toille years ago when Ardith was on a road trip or maybe Terry bought some for Ardith - can't remember - but I do remember that this quilt has been in the works for a while. Terry finally got it finished and it's spectacular!! Terry explained to us that this quilt has "C" cups - something about the seams in the center of the stars - they are flat and there isn't a big bump, some trick she used when piecing them together - it was all lost on me! This star block is called the Rapid Fire LeMoyne Star...so if you want to know how it's pieced without a lump in the center, you can look it up.
This is a whole-cloth quilt that Terry made. The quilting on this is beautiful, and since Terry is a professional long-arm quilter, we would expect nothing less! The back of the quilt is equally as fun - all pieced. At first some of us thought the front of the quilt was pieced, too, but it's just one big piece of fabric - pretty cool!
Neva made this sweet little baby quilt top for one of her nieces (I think) and I do love the simplicity of it. Pink and green squares are really cute for a baby. I'm sure this will be loved to pieces!
Stephanie wowed us with her Grandmother's Flower Garden...but she didn't hand-piece hers...she found it at Value Village for $35.00!!! I swear, she has the best luck when it comes to finds! We told Helen she should hand quilt her Flower Garden but we told Stephanie she should machine quilt hers - the quilting would be lost on this. I started a Grandmother's Flower Garden years ago...cut all the little pieces of paper, cut all the fabric, set up a little "travel kit" so I could take it with me and work on it a little at a time...I made about 25 and then the light bulb came on and I realized there was no way I would ever finish it...but now I wish I had!
Terry just finished quilting these four quilts for Stephanie so we got to see them without the bindings. Stephanie decided to finish up some tops that had been sitting in her pile and just like that she got four of them done! I'm SO envious! My unfinished pile seems to be growing at a rapid pace!
Yours truly showed the girls my new tablecloth for our outdoor table. Since we have an umbrella in our table I need to have a tablecloth with a hole in it. I really wanted a vintage table cloth and saw several when I stopped by the Farm Chicks Show in Spokane last month but none of them seemed big enough or quite right and I would have had to piece several of them together to make one the size I needed - and one with an opening to get it around the umbrella. It was then I realized that I really needed was an old quilt top! I soon spotted one - it was full of holes and pretty stretched out...it was PERFECT! And it was $24, much less than vintage tablecloths or even vintage fabric! I cut one side so I could fit it around the umbrella in the center and added some ties so I could tie it on. I backed it with a cute fabric (on the right above) and then machine-quilted it, making sure I stitched over every hole and wonky-seam. So now I have two tablecloths in one - and I love seeing the old quilt top on my table - plus it goes with whatever dishes we use. It's the little things that make me happy!
