BOW-DACIOUS!

I first saw this quilt when I attended a workshop in 2013 led by Bonnie Hunter and she showed us some of her quilts.  I loved it and decided to make it one day.  I just finished it and it will be given to my 9 year old GD for Christmas.  It is very scrappy. 

This back view isn't very good due to the dappled shade.

I just love this border fabric - it was a new fabric at my LQS.

Here's a better picture of the backing.  I'm planning on making quilts with bigger pieces for a while.  This quilt has about 53 pieces in each block!  It take a lot longer to make a block with that many pieces, especially when you need to find scraps that look good together.

I've also been very busy making items to sell at Christmas craft shows in Rickreal OR and McMinnville OR.  Between that, I'm working on Christmas gifts as well.  Here it is the middle of October already!!  This is why I haven't been posting as much lately, or reading and commenting on my favorite blogs.  Sorry, ladies!

Happy Fall!

PROGRESS???

The time is going faster than ever.  And I have been busy with another craft show at the Harvest Fest that took place this past weekend at the Yamhill Valley Heritage Museum.  It is a wonderful facility displaying the history of the area and demonstrating typical methods of harvesting - this weekend anyway.  And, it's only about a mile from my house!

In between sewing items to sell, I have worked on this Christmas wall hanging.  I basted it, along with several other things, a while ago and have done some quilting on it.

Here's a close up of the quilting on the lower section.  I still need to quilt the car, trailer, trees and the "snowballs" under the words.  I'm determined to get it finished before Christmas this year.  Last year, I gave up on it when we decided that we would spend Christmas in Florida.

Another large project is Bonnie Hunter's Bowdacious quilt that I decided to make for my 9 year old DG (who lives in Florida).  I plan to get it finished before early October so I can show it at my guild meeting.  In later October, I will be traveling to Florida again and we will celebrate Christmas early while there in Florida, as this year we will be home for Christmas.

Below are the latest block sections that I have been working on.  And I just now noticed that the lower right one needs to be fixed!  Oops!

Below are all the blocks that I have finished so far.  I need 40 of these.  I needed 15 more when I took this out last week, and now I have finished 2 and have 2 more almost done.  Each completed block has these 4 sections (like the ones above), and has 53 pieces.  I had decided to make this quilt after participating in Bonnie Hunter's Virginia Bound workshop in Texas and seeing this quilt that she showed us along with other quilts of hers.

I sorry that I haven't been blogging as much lately.  The time just isn't lasting as long lately.  

SCRAP REPORT FOR APRIL

My time to spend on the Scrap Attack was limited this month because we were out of town for 2 weeks and 3 days.  However, I did take my Featherweight sewing machine along on the trip and while I was visiting my sister, I used the sewing room (which was a tiny room off of the master bedroom that my grandpa added when he built the house about 70 years ago) to make some scrappy blocks.

You can see some scrappy blocks towards the front of the picture.

Scrappy blue and white snowball blocks

 My goal for the month was to make more blocks for the  Bow-Dacious quilt that I am making - it's a Bonnie Hunter design.  I'm not sure how many I made this month, but my guess is about 8.

 Each block has about 53 pieces in it.  Each block is made up of 4 smaller blocks.  I might make less of the blocks than the pattern calls for because it will be for a twin bed.  The pieces are pretty small - a lot of 1 1/2" squares.  You can see my sewing table below.

Next month, this will be my goal.

Well, I will do my best!!

USING DESIGN WALL!!

Since the design wall was up, I thought I would put up some blocks.  Last Christmas, the president of my guild in Texas gave us some 2 1/2" strips of fabric.  I didn't know what to do with them, so I just sewed them together and cut them into 6 1/2" rail fence blocks.  Well, I didn't have enough for a whole quilt, so I dug out my box of Christmas fabric to see what I could come up with.  I wanted to use fabric from stash.  I used white, plain or white on white, for the middle strip and used up some small pieces of white.  Then I had quite a bit of some different yardages, which I put together with white and pretty soon my design wall was full!

This is what got me going - the blue and white from my guild president.

I almost have the top together and will figure out something for borders, but there are 12 rows of 10 blocks each, which will measure 72" x 60".

As "leader/enders" I have started another quilt by Bonnie Hunter called Bow-Dacious.  I have am making some progress too.  The block below measures 9 1/2" square.  If I follow Bonnie's directions, I would need 49 of these blocks.  Along with the border, the quilt would measure 84" x 84".  I don't know how big I will make it.  I'm using all scraps for this so far.

These little parts of the larger block measure 4 1/2" square.

It doesn't seem like I'm spending any time at all on it using the leader/ender method.

What are you working on?  I still need to do more organizing, though, so I can't do too much sewing. I thought that while the blocks are up, I might as well sew them together, right?

QUILTING AND BINDING FINISHED ON GRADUATION QUILT

It feels so good when a quilt is all finished.  And after the 25th anniversary quilt, with "custom" quilting, it felt so good to do an "overall" quilting job.  

I again used Angela Walters "Free Motion Quilting" book for inspiration.  In fact I used the same quilting design as I did on the Virginia Bound quilt (in header).  Except, this time, I think I finally got the hang of the hook in the "Swirled Hook" design.  Some of these same shirts were used in Virginia Bound and they aren't used up yet!

They aren't perfect, but maybe you can see a few of the hooks in the close-up pictures.

This is Bonnie Hunter's "Star Gazing" pattern and again, even though there is a lot of piecing to do, it seems to go pretty fast when you follow each section in the pattern as she describes it and get the chain piecing going.

I didn't have one piece of fabric that I could use for the whole back, so I pieced it (just like Bonnie does)!  I had some of the musical fabric left from the front - mostly used in the red and light colored triangles.

The whole back.

I also had some "historic" fabric pieces and some blue that went with it all and pieced it together the best that I could.  I think you can see the quilting better in this section below.

I still need to make a label and plan to do that this next week.  Woo Hoo!  Now I can get on to some fun UFOs, hopefully!

We found out that our DGS will be going to college in Minnesota, so I think this will help keep him warm for the cold winters they have there.

Oh, BTW, I didn't start anything new in April.

GRADUATION QUILT TOP DONE

I finished the quilt top for my GS's high school graduation - Star Gazing from Bonnie Hunter's book,  "Scraps and Shirttails."  It is made from a variety of scraps including men's shirts, but also some new "musical" fabric because he plays the trumpet, piano and organ.

Close up of the border.

  I have to say that Bonnie's instructions are always easy to follow.  I bought sashing fabric from Connecting Threads on sale and got similar colors to what she used in her quilt.  The cheddar is some Jo Morton fabric that I purchased at a garage sale and I used it in another of Bonnie's quilts that I made last year (see my heading picture above),

I have to add that we are very proud of my GS, as he has earned scholarship offers from 2 colleges and he has until May 1 to make up his mind.  Both schools are offering an academic scholarship, plus an organ performance scholarship that brings the price down within reach of a regular family - for all four years!  He wants to major in history, which is right for him as he is very studious and loves the old fashioned way of life (at least he thinks he does) better than modern life.

Now I'm piecing the back so I can get it quilted before we go to his graduation in June.

TWO QUILTS STARTED

I have 2 quilts that I need to make as gifts for this summer.  First is for my DS#1/DIL's 25th anniversary on July 1!!  This is what I have started.  In the 9-patch there will be 4 of a dark blue print and 5 pinwheels.  There will also be a pinwheel for each cornerstone.  Here is what I have on my design wall - and that's all I can fit on it.  I put it up "on point," but I might not make it that way.  

I'm going to need a gazillion pinwheels for this quilt, so I've been making tons of HSTs and will need to get more fabric.  Since I'm not using a pattern, I still have to figure out exactly how much fabric I need to buy.  I have enough of the blues - I have 7 different ones and there will be 30 12" blocks.

Next, I need to make a graduation quilt for my GS, son of the above couple, who is graduating from high school in June.  I decided to make the "Star Gazing" quilt from this book by Bonnie Hunter.

Here's the picture in the book.

I have just started making a few blocks and because I'm making 2 quilts at the same time, I can use them for leaders and enders for each other.  I wasn't sure I would like it, but now that I have a few blocks done, I do!  I will be putting sashing between the blocks like in the picture above.  Can you see the musical triangles?  He plays the piano and organ so I thought I would add that.

I have a plan!  I am going to get one of my oldest UFOs quilted before my next guild meeting on Feb. 10.  It's all basted.  Then, if I can squeeze it in, I also have another wall hanging top that needs to be basted and quilted.  I also have my appliquéd basket quilt that I'm working on finishing up the hand appliqué for the medallion and another hand embroidered project for handwork.  I like having several different things to work on - it's more interesting that way!

Not to mention several other UFOs!  We'll see if I can squeeze a couple of them in to finish up this year.

This is the book I'm currently reading.  I love Marie Bostwick's books!  I checked it out of the library last week and started reading it; then I discovered that it seemed familiar.  I looked on my book shelf and found that I had a copy, but I decided to re-read it anyway and am enjoying it immensely!  It's in the series of "the Cobbled Court" novels and I highly recommend it.

Are you excited to get going on your quilting projects in the new year?  Good luck with them!

MY SECOND FINISH FOR 2014!

Last summer when we were in Oregon visiting our DS and family, my GD (age 21) said she wanted to make a quilt.  I wasn't surprised because she has designed and made one before and loves them.  She also sews a lot of her own clothes.  She didn't know what design she wanted to use, so I showed her Bonnie Hunter's web site, Quiltville.com because there are lots of free patterns on it.  I showed her the Bricks and Stepping Stones pattern, because I had seen it before and liked it - and she liked it as well, so that was the plan.  

First, she needed fabric.  She pulled out several plastic bins full of fabric that she had bought at various places (especially Good Will), most of it more appropriate for clothes.  She went through the fabric I had with me and cut several pieces from there and then we heard about a quilt shop going out of business!  She wanted all of the "bricks" to be different!   Great idea!  We finished the top except for the border and I brought it home with me to quilt.  

I had some other priorities, so I worked on it as I could and then had to take my machine in for service two times.  Finally, it's finished!

Too big to get in the picture - it's a large queen size.

The center was quilted in the ditch the inner black border was quilted with a loopy pattern and the 10" border was quilted with a variety of meandering leaves and ferns.  I used Essential PRO quilting thread that I purchase from Connecting Threads.  I've been very happy with this quilting thread.

Close up of some quilting

After my guild meeting on Monday night where I will take it to show, it will be sent back to Oregon.  Too bad I can't deliver it in person!

BLOGGERS' QUILT FESTIVAL - SCRAPPY

I have always been drawn to scrappy quilts, so years ago when I started following Bonnie Hunter, I thought her ideas were great.  I love going to garage sales and I started buying men's shirts to make quilts and I have made some donation quilts out of them.  The pile just wasn't going down though!

Then I heard that Bonnie Hunter was going to be speaking at the Quilters' Guild of Dallas and giving a workshop!  I wasn't a member, but I knew some members of my local guild who were and asked if I could ride with them to the next meeting.  I think it was in May that I went to the first meeting and joined the Dallas guild and signed up for Bonnie's workshop in September, because I wanted to be sure I could get in it.  This might be my last chance and I wanted to be sure I didn't miss out.

On September 7 I attended the workshop with 2 of my guild friends and had a wonderful day!  Below is a picture of Bonnie and me holding up a mystery quilt of Bonnie's that I made a few years ago.

Here is my finished "Virginia Bound" quilt.

Virginia Bound

I am entering this quilt in the scrappy category of the Blogger's Quilt Festival.  If you so desire, you can go there and vote for the quilt you like best, or even nominate one of the quilts to be the "Viewer's Choice."

VIRGINIA BOUND - QUILTED AND BOUND!

Virginia Bound, designed by Bonnie Hunter, is FINISHED!   I went to Bonnie's workshop on September 7 and I finished sewing the binding on October 2.  This quilt is published in her book,  Scraps & Shirttails.  Thanks for a great workshop and quilt pattern, Bonnie!

I'm pretty sure this is the fastest that I have ever completed a quilt.  Usually it takes months, if not years!

I was kind of surprised that the light colored diamonds seem to pop out at you.

I quilted it on my Janome 6600 sewing machine and the quilt pattern (as much as I could follow it) is from Angela Walter's book, Free-Motion Quilting, and is swirled hook.  However, it took me a while to figure out how to do the hook, so depending on which part of the quilt you are looking at, you might not see it.

This picture contains some of the blocks that Joan sent me - I sent her some of mine in exchange.  I also traded some fabric strips with other people at the workshop.

Since the top is scrappy (mostly made with men's shirts that I bought at garage sales), I figured that I would make a scrappy backing as well.  The majority of the fabric I used for the back is from either garage sales, thrift shops or was given to me.

Except for some of the border fabric, that is.  The cheddar/orange fabric is from Andover's Jo Morton and I bought it at a garage sale for $2.00 per yard.  Same with some of the dark green in the border - I had to throw in some reproduction fabrics!

I decided to participate in Lori's quilt along (QAL).  It will be a small one and I hardly had to do anything to get this first part put together because I had all the HSTs leftover from other projects.  The basket block was also a leftover block.

Tomorrow we're supposed to get a "cold" front!  I'm not sure how cold it will get, but we'll take anything lower than the 90s - or 80s.  Woo Hoo!!