Layer Cake--Block 5

Here is the next in the series for the mystery Layer Cake Quilt a Long that I am doing.  The challenge was to get a mix of fabrics and not use stripes, as the designer said they wouldn't work too well. I have several stripe fabrics in my LC and I need to get using them or I will be left with a few blocks that are all stripes!! (That could be fun.) I did sneak a stripe in the center and it was a left over piece that was just the right size, yeah.

 I am thinking that for the accent fabric I will use the green that is in some of the fabrics. Each block will have a small,1 inch or so, border and the green will go there. I will try it out and see if it is too,"in your face". There will also be at least 2-3 other borders to use the red /blue/khaki. When the final clues are given as to the setting etc, I may revise. After all, one must be flexible in quilting. How often I have an idea for quilting the final top and re think it as I am quilting away on it!

More pictures and updates from my longarm quilting coming. Right now my room has be taken over by my son and DIL who are visiting from Hong Kong. We are still having holiday fun!

Merry Christmas to all..

May all your borders be square,  and all your points match. May you find the perfect fabric in your stash..and there is enough of it! Here's hoping that quilting brings you  much fun and joy as you tackle your next project. May the Quilt Police only visit you to hand out a commendation!

Merry Christmas !

Cecilia

Road Trip ..to Christal Carter's !!



View from Living Room !

Mid December my friendship group, CottonPatchers, took a trip to visit Quilt designer, author and artist Christal Carter who lives near San Diego,Ca. What a fun day!!  We had a lovely lunch plus a tour of her studio and beautifully decorated house and to top it off...Quilts! We were treated to a small show of some of her quilts,plus previews of upcoming.



Wool applique

Wool hand prints from family.

Then we got to see the incredible Play House that she and her husband built for their grand kids. It's all decorated with quilts too.

Playhouse

Running water in the playhouse!

Everywhere we looked there was something unique and clever to see. Christal uses many of her quilts throughout her house along with antiques and finds from thrift stores and yard sales!

Lots of inspiration. We all enjoyed the day and we all wanted to have our birthdays in her playhouse too!

Please visit her website, http://www.christalcarter.com/ and take a look. If any of you are going to Road to California Quilt Show this January, she is teaching classes and will also be a vendor. Stop by her booth and say hi !

Catching up..Tis the season!

Okay, I'm still here! I have been busy getting all the quilts for customers who need them by Christmas finished and out the door. Here are a few:

Here's a close up of the quilting. I used a goldish thread color and it picked up on the bits of gold in the fabrics,

Echoed Swirls/Cloud color of Glide Thread

And finished the next block in the LC quilt a long...Now , just one more quilt to go and then I can do one of my own or maybe get my Christmas shopping done!!

This Friday my son, Tim and his wife, Sabrina come in from Hong Kong for 2 weeks, YEAH !!! It will be great to have everyone here.

Are you done shopping? Decorations up?

Quilt a Long...Basket Block

Layer cake-Block 3

This cute basket block is the third in the Layer Cake Quilt a Long over at Moose on the Porch Quilts. It's not too late to join in the fun. (See link button on side.) New block every 2 weeks is doable.  You are working with 10 inch squares and it's a little tricky getting some of the cuts right. I had to improvise because I fussy cut the center rose.  Of course, it was in the center of the square. Not enough left on either side  to do all the handle pieces. That's the challenge and fun... have to use what's in your layer cake!

Christmas Carolina Lily

The Carolina Lily pattern has long been one of my faves. I saw this top offered on ebay and jumped on it. I don't have many red/green quilts so that was an added plus. There were a couple issues with the piecing..some of the points are off, but who am I to scold.(some of mine are too!) It was a blast  to quilt and do what I wanted.

 So I chose feathers, which are my favorite motifs. Did them with pearls in the outer border and triangles and a feathered cross in the plain red blocks.

Anita Shackelford design

Karen McTavish design

The only problem area was in one green border. This was a pesky little border! After basting and stitching in the ditch, this area had a lot of extra fabric. Can't figure that out, the other 3 green border were perfect angels.

Where did this come from?  What to do !!!

     Piano key beadboard pattern was a godsend. This great  pattern with beadboard and pearls by Julie Lawson had been my plan all along, as I like some straight line work to contrast with the feathering.  It sure helped this area. Sprayed some starch and pinned ,smoothed and tried steam, slowly quilted and manuevered the fabric as I went. Not too bad, a small little tuck...don't tell the quilt police. I can live with it.

whew...not bad

Julie Lawson design



Tammy Finkler feathered pearl border

 This is quilted with Glide thread, colors to match the fabric. I love how this thread works in my Gammill. It is strong, thin and has a bit of sheen so it really shows off the designs and my background fills. Hobbs 80/20 batting. Wool batt would have been fun , but didn't have a batt big enough. Next quilt.

This will soon be my holiday quilt on my bed..once I get it bound!!

 Now on to the next quilts in the line up that have to be done for Christmas..yikes it's December already!!

Raw Edge Applique

This pretty quilt is the result of a raw edge block swap. You just stitch down three  different sized circles. The blocks are cut in quarters and then swapped and re sewn. These are fun blocks with lots of color and very useful. I have a collection that I use to fill out rows in a design. It seems I can always find a color in these blocks that blends with what I'm working on.

Here the quilter put them all together to make this cheerful quilt.

The challenge when quilting this is not to catch the hopping foot of the machine on the edges. Some of the circles are stitched right at the edge and some as much as a 1/4 inch in. I went slower and quilted with one hand on the blocks, tucking down edges. The quilting design needed to catch most of the edges and provide a uniform coverage,because when this is laundered, this quilt will bloom! We chose Twirly Roses with Glide thread in Linen.

                                                                    Off to put the turkey in.
                                                                     Happy Thanksgiving!

Yellow Brick Road of Flowers!

This quilt is a popular pattern, Yellow Brick Road. My client did it in happy upbeat flower fabric. It is like quilting on a flower garden! We picked a variegated thread that had the colors of the flowers. Jester/Rainbow by Superior Threads fit the bill and looks just beautiful . It seems to capture the flower colors in each fabric. This thread has a bit of poly in it and so has a little sheen to highlight the colors and the quilting.
 Looking  at the quilt pattern, all of the pieces are either square or rectangle shapes. It is often a nice idea to choose a quilting design that has swirls and curves to add interest and  contrast. Makes it fresh and not so boring. The design chosen, Oodles of Doodles, is perfect.

The backing fabric is a light pink so I matched the bobbin color to that.  I really am liking this design and think it has lots of potential. It could be stitched vertically on the quilt, so it would look like a vine growing. (This could be done by loading the quilt differently on the frame.)

Here's a close up with little flash. You can see the design better.  I will finish this up today and then on to the next. I am trying to get all my "must have by Christmas" done. It dawned on me that next week is Thanksgiving and the holidays around the corner ! Yikes.

Layer Cake ,Block @, I mean Block 2

Okay, here is block 2 in my version of the Layer Cake Quilt a Long over at Moose on the Porch Quilts (link on right). This is a pretty Layer Cake and a different look for me. Each block is going to have a narrow border around it in an accent fabric. What should it be???? Anyone have some ideas.

Here are the fabrics and the first block. It is mostly red/white/blue with tan/kakhi and a bit of green in a couple of the fabrics. I think I will have to venture on and get a few more blocks done and put them on a design wall and see what they say...I hope they speak!
 Guess it's time to go load a quilt and think of something else!

Iowa Visit

I just returned from a visit to Iowa to see my Mom and some of my brothers. Mom was recently moved to an Alzheimer's facility  and my sister and I went to pay her a visit and see how she was doing. The residence is beautiful and she seems to be adjusting. Friendly staff and she is well looked after.

 The  family home has been cleared out and listed for sale, so we can finance her situation. One afternoon we met at my brother's place and went through items of family value.  I was delighted to see that the  Dresden Plate quilts made by my Great grandmother had survived!

Celia Hagarty Rathgeb made two identical Dresden Plate quilts. One for each of her daughters. I knew my mom had the one passed down from her mother, but I was surprised to see she had both! This quilt is the one in better shape. Each plate has 15 blades and is 7 1/2 inches and the block is 10 inches. This is a smaller plate than is normally seen.  The sashings have a cable design quilted in them and a larger cable is quilted in the outside borders. Around the plate is a floral design and a florette in the cornerstones! All hand pieced and quilted. Pink thread in the pink sashings and border and white everywhere else. That's a lot of quilting! And then to do it twice !!

This has always been my favorite quilt pattern and I am so happy to have these quilts. My mom knew that I would treasure them.

 I am sorry that I didn't get pictures of the other quilts that went to family members which were made by Mother, but am sure I can visit them at my siblings houses.

Now it's time to do laundry, catch up and load a quilt on the frame!

Dorothy's Garden Jubilee Finished

It is hard to get a good picture that shows the quilting on this beautiful quilt! This is the same pattern as the picture on the right , but the customer enlarged the designs. It is very effective and the blooms have more presence. Some of the flowers are 3 dimensional and most of border flowers have ruching and other treatments.  The backgrounds are free hand in a McTavish type design and the border is beadboarded on the outside and free flowing vine and leaves on the inside.

This photo is a little closer. Still hard to get all the pretty quilting to show , but the flowers sure look pretty! Dorothy A..you did good girl!!

Viewer's Choice-Congrats to Linda Gray

This past weekend our guild (Orange Grove Quilters , Garden Grove,Ca) held our show. A bit smaller show , about 100 quilts, as we had a different venue. Know what? It was better !! More intimate, very friendly and we even had the Girl Scouts doing food. Win win!
 Linda Gray's basket quilt was chosen Viewers Favorite and well deserved. She did a great job on the piecing and applique and it was a joy to quilt.

The fabric choices were perfect to show off those flowers.  The applique was outlined with So Fine thread and the same was used in the block background. Light purple was used to outline the sashing and do the swirl design inside the sashing.  Outer border has a swag design in black to blend in .
All in all a quilt to be proud of, congratulations Linda!

Layer Cake Fun !

I've joined in the Layer Cake  Quilt a  Long over at http://moosequilts.blogspot.com/ (Moose on the Porch Quilts).  Every 2 weeks  there is a new block by a designer for us to do. This is the first one.
  Fabric is Clermont Farms by  Minick & Simpson. It is a real stretch for me. I am usually  a purple,green,blue girl. This time I went out of the box. I really love all the fabrics in this selection.

I think I can have some fun with these. I do need one accent fabric that will be surrounding each block and then used as a border. What do you think?  red, dark tan, green (there is a bit in some of the prints)
 No idea what  this will look like in the end, but should be fun getting there!