Fall Quilt Festival

Amy is once again hosting the Bloggers' Quilt Festival and I have decided to enter a quilt.

This quilt is made from selvages, the edges of the fabric that I used to throw in the garbage! I have been following Karen Griska's Selvage Blog for a couple of years now and have been saving my selvages for about a year. I washed all of the fabric in my stash this summer and cut off all of the selvages as I ironed and folded the fabric pieces.  I had an overflowing drawer full of selvages and decided it was time to make a quilt with them.  My husband gave me Gwen Marston and Freddy Moran's book "Freddy and Gwen Collaborate Again" for my birthday earlier this year. As I wandered through its pages, admiring the quilts, I found the one I wanted to use for my selvage quilt--Liberated Wedding Ring. 

One day, I decided to try one block, just to see how it would look. These blocks are foundation pieced on muslin. I liked the results and soon had one complete ring finished. The next day I decided to make a few more and within two weeks, I had finished piecing the entire quilt. It was addictive!

A long arm quilter at the London Friendship Quilters' Guild did the quilting--lots of feathers and I LOVE the way it turned out. The selvages hold lots of memories of friends who saved them for me as well as clothing I made for myself and my daughter over the years. There is even a selvage from my dress I wore on my honeymoon over 21 years ago in this quilt!

Thanks for visiting my blog to see my quilt. You are welcome to visit any time!

Country Spin

I spent some time this week working on the rest of my Country Spin blocks. I have completed all of the pinwheels now and have about 1/2 of the blocks completed with the sashing.  Here is a look at how the blocks will be sewn together.

I have been having a problem with the fat quarters I am using for this quilt--they are smaller than regular fat quarters!  The cutting for this quilt works out well for full sized FQ's (22X18") but these ones were about 19X16".  I am having to do some piecing for the sashing, which is not fun, but it looks fine. It just takes a little longer.

I will be making this quilt as big as I can with the material I have. I am still aiming for a lap quilt. I would like to have this one done and off to the machine quilters by the end of next week so it is done in time for me to do the binding before Christmas. 

Birthday PJ's

My twin nieces will be 11 years old tomorrow. It does not seem that long ago that they were tiny babies! (2lbs 11 oz and 3lbs 8oz) Now, they are almost as tall as me and I am sure I will soon be the shortest in the family. Sigh!

Their favourite Uncle (actually their only uncle--my husband) picked out the fabric for this year's pj's at Quilts and Calicos in Exeter (see sidebar for the link). We are going with a winter theme this year.  They should be nice and cozy in these flannel pj's this winter!

I found some cute labels at the local sewing store.

I took this next picture in my backyard of our Worplesdon Sweetgum tree. The leaves turn many beautiful colours this time of year.

30's Spin Class

This past Saturday, I went to a 30's Spin class organized by the London Friendship Quilt Guild. The quilter who taught the class is from England and comes to visit her friends in Canada every year. Last year, she did a disappearing 9 patch class which I also attended.

This is a strip quilt and goes together quite quickly. I learned the hard way that I need to make sure I sew each unit exactly the same or it does not work out very well!

My first two blocks are the bottom two. Christine and I shared a table and she is using 30's prints for her quilt.

By the end of the day, I had made 22 blocks. I hope to use 42 blocks in this quilt to make it a lap sized quilt. It will be a Christmas gift so I have to get cracking and get it done!

Here are a few more of my blocks part way through the afternoon. This quilt will be called Country Spin.

I had fun at this workshop and pleased with my progress so far. It is always fun to see what fabrics others are using and how the personality of the project changes based on what fabrics are used.

Today's goal is to make my neice's birthday pj's. Their birthday is on Sunday so the deadline is looming!

Slow but steady Carolina Christmas Progress...

Christine and I got together yesterday morning to continue working on our Carolina Christmas quilts. Christine finished getting all of her blocks together. I love the colours and fabrics that she is using.

I finished sewing my 25 blocks together yesterday. Christine and I are going to get together in a couple of weeks to work on the borders together. She is going to get her quilt to this stage before we meet again.  The end is in sight for this project. We both hope to finish these tops before the end of November when we have both signed up for an Indian Orange Peel workshop. After the workshop, we will be getting together to work on the paper piecing for this very challenging and interesting project! 

I will do another post shortly about the workshop I participated in on Saturday.

Nairn Quilt Show Report

Last Friday, 3 quilty friends and I went to the quilt show in  Nairn. The show was organized by a group of volunteers from the area who are organizing a big show next May with some quilts and quilters from the Netherlands. There will be a quilt show, classes, vendors, etc. at that show. The show this past weekend featured quilts, both old and new, made by people from Middlesex county. The quilt above was one in a series based on the four seasons. There was lots of thread painting using fancy stitches from the maker's sewing machine on these wall hangings to add details like trees, bushes, etc.

This quilt was made from ribbons that this family had won at their local fall fair over the years. They had won a lot of ribbons!

 

This beautiful taupe and red applique quilt was one of my favourites. Here is a close up of one of the blocks.

Another one of my favourites, this wall hanging was paper pieced.

This blue and neutrals scrappy quilt has me inspired to do something like this from my stash. Speaking of stash, despite an inspiring vendors' mall, I only purchased two fat quarters and some foundations for a scrappy pineapple wall hanging at the show. We had a delicious lunch in the tea room --homemade soup and tea biscuits, apples, pie, cookies...wonderful!  Here is a quilt from the Netherlands, displayed near the door of the church to entice people to come back for the Netherlands quilt show in May 2011. I will be there, will you?

Check back soon for a post about the workshop I attended on Saturday.

Wow!

Last night was our London Friendship Quilters' Guild meeting. The quilt show committee presented the prizes for the quilts in each of 7 categories plus the overall viewer's choice award. I won Honourable Mention in the "Other Quilted Item" category for my selvage stool "Sitting on the Edge"!  The Quilt Show committee made these beautiful banners for each person who won an award! Each award winner also received a certificate and a cheque. I was thrilled to win an award!  There were many spectacular quilts at the show.

Have a good weekend!

Another D9P top done!

I am on a roll with Christmas gifts this year. I have my two nieces' flannel PJ quilts pieced and the backs pieced as well. They are ready for the long arm quilters now. This project certainly used up lots of my flannel scraps. I had two overflowing baskets of flannel before I started this project and now have one basket with flannel in it--not overflowing anymore!

I am going to a workshop organized by the London Friendship Quilters' Guild on Saturday. It is being taught by the same quilter who did our Disappearing 9 Patch class last fall. I think I will bring my D9P tops in to show her on Saturday.

Guild meeting tonight... Quilt Show in Nairn tomorrow....Workshop all day Saturday....Another quilty weekend in my neck of the woods!

Fall Postcard

Tomorrow night is the October meeting of the London Friendship Quilters' Guild. I made a postcard today for the monthly postcard exchange. I used fabrics leftover from my Cobblestones quilt "Autumn Journey".

I went for a walk in the woods today with a friend. Lots of crunchy leaves under our feet.

I am just about done the pieced backs for my nieces' flannel quilts. It will be nice to have these two quilts done and off to the long arm quilters so that I can get to work on the next Christmas gifts...

Sewing with Jacqui

I spent Friday morning at Jacqui's house. I worked on putting some more blocks together for my niece's PJ quilt and I put together a second row of my Carolina Christmas quilt. This one takes a while because of all of the seams to match up. There are lots of star points that I don't want to cut off too. Here I am with my first two rows done. I am loving the way this quilt is coming together. So far, I am uninspired as to what to call this quilt. If you have any ideas, leave a comment. If I use your idea, I will send you a surprise in the mail...

Jacqui worked on quilting her Friendship Braid quilt. She and I each made a Friendship Braid lap quilt for our local hospital chemo ward. My quilt is off at the machine quilters being quilted. I hope to have it back soon so I can get the binding onto it.We are supposed to bring our finished quilts to our next Elgin Piecemakers Quilt Guild meeting later this month. I will take pictures of everyone's quilts at that time and do a blog post about them.

Happy Thanksgiving to all of my Canadian readers! I have lots to be thankful for--my family and my friends are at the top of the list.

May Flowers and Apples for the Teacher

Anyone who has been reading my blog over the last week or so has probably noticed that I have had some issues with pictures within the posts and for my header. Blogger changed the photo uploader last week and I think they still have a few bugs to work out!  Bear with me--hopefully, it will work better soon!

Today, I spent much of the day sewing two more rows on my Claudia's Quilts row of the month quilt. I finally tackled the dreaded May row--May Flowers and I also did the September row--Apples. I am using only batiks for this project and actually had to go out and purchase some red batiks for the September row. The May row had me stumped about what colours to use. I am not as happy with it as I had hoped but I am not going to take it apart at this point! I have the pattern printed for the October row and will work on it shortly.

This weekend is Canadian Thanksgiving and my daughter will be home from University for the weekend. We are hosting dinner this year so there will be lots of cooking going on--I will have to put away my sewing machine and bins of fabric for a few days!

"Harvest of Quilts"

The biannual quilt show of the London Friendship Quilters' Guild is packed up and cleaned up now. Lots of people came to the show--family and friends of members as well as people who saw our advertising and dropped by to see the quilts. There were an abundance of items at the raffle table and many of our charity quilts were on display. The tea room served delicious treats. The quilts were beautiful and showed the hard work and artistic talents of the members of the guild.

This blue and white quilt had only two fabrics in it!

They say diamonds are a girl's best friend!

This one was made by Christine at a disappearing 9 patch workshop last Fall.

One of the guild members took an Indian Orange Peel workshop with Heather Stewart.  I am organizing this workshop for myself and 17 other quilters in November.

This quilter does beautiful applique work and had 4 applique quilts in the show.

This afternoon, I added the borders to my niece's Christmas quilt. I will finish her sister's quilt top before taking both of them to the machine quilter's to be quilted. This quilt looks a bit wild but it is made of material leftover from PJ's that I have made each year for my nieces' birthdays. 

I hope to get the other quilt top done this week.

Gee's Bend Challenge--The Big Reveal!

Today was the first day of the London Friendship Quilters' Guild "Harvest of Quilts" show. I volunteered in the morning at the raffle table with Christine. At lunch time, we went out for lunch with the group involved in the Gee's Bend Challenge and everyone got to show off their projects. Others in the restaurant were also admiring our handiwork!

For most of us, this project took us way outside our normal comfort zones.

Everyone used fabric from our stashes--often the fabric was something we would not something we would normally use in our quilting projects. The back of this quilt was as interesting as the front!

My quilt was made mostly of denim and corduroy leftover from shortening jeans and cords. The pocket is from an old pair of jeans that my daughter wore at one time.

The binding was made by wrapping the backing fabric around to the front of the quilt and sewing it down. The corners were not mitered!

Lots of wild fabrics in different combinations were used in these projects.

Some of these fabrics were used to make boxer shorts for this quilter's sons!

This was a fun challenge and we have decided explore the possibility of doing another challenge soon!

The bonus of this project was getting to see everyone again and going out for lunch. It was a great opportunity to get caught up with the latest news!