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Flight II {a quilt top}

June 5, 2015 jennifer Quilting and Sewing

The Flight Quilt I made last year for Bonnie Christine’s blog tour was among my favorite completed projects of 2014. When I finished it, I didn’t feel done with the pattern OR Bonnie’s beautiful Winged fabric collection, so a second version was begun.

I’d been working on another single block quilt (photos coming soon) and kind of had that style on my brain, so I enlarged my original pattern again and made this quilt top, titled Flight II.

Once again, it’s my foundation paper pieced version of the traditional circling swallows quilt block. Please don’t ask me why it’s taken more than six months to take, and share, a few photos. I’ll just start rambling.

At least I still love it, right? For this version I decided not to have the star points go all the way to the edges, so I added a border in the background fabric. I haven’t made many quilts with a dark background and this was a fun departure for me. I’d say it’s also the most purple I’ve ever used in any project, ever. And while I don’t love purple, I love these fabrics and the way they work together.

My sweet kids did a great job of trying to hold this quilt top for me as the wind wrestled to literally have it “take flight.” This might be my favorite photo:

We were laughing so hard! The rain started falling shortly after and we drove home in a downpour. Such was our spring. The quilt back and binding are ready and waiting for me to simply make time for basting and quilting. Oh, how I hope to finish this soon! The school year was such a crazy one; that girl I thought I was, the one who sews, is beginning to feel like a distant memory and I don’t like it. Balance has become a very real need in my life and I’m hopeful I can begin to correct things over the summer.

Summer! Wow, that happened fast. Can you believe it’s June?

Jennifer

2 comments circling swallows

Anchor Mini Quilts

March 31, 2015 jennifer Quilting and Sewing

I think I’ve finally made peace with being home from Quilt Bliss . What a fun weekend it was! When Pamela asked me to help with some sewing in preparation for the retreat, I jumped at the opportunity. Soon thereafter, a pile of DaySail by Bonnie & Camille was on my sewing table for cutting.

These anchor mini quilts were used as gifts for the teachers (Pamela’s awesome idea!), and were a lot of fun to make. I used my Anchor Quilt block and made four separate blocks.

Instead of leaving them at 14.5 inches square, I trimmed the two sides so the block was 12.5 inches wide and 14.5 inches tall. I then sewed 1.5 inch squares together to make strips which were used as borders. A white border followed the scrappy squares.

I love how they turned out! In fact, I keep thinking I should make another one to hang with my other mini quilts, but I’m not sure which color/print is my favorite:

The red floral print above was one that surprised me. I didn’t anticipate it being in my top 3 favorites in the Daysail collection, but I really love it! Which one is your favorite?

There are so many great blender prints in the Daysail collection, as well as several that make awesome bindings. I really enjoyed putting these together and experimenting with different combinations.

The stippling was done by Ella Lung , who did a beautiful job!

Much as I loved having them all hanging together, it was even better to see what Pamela did with them. She had the fantastic idea of inviting all the Quilt Bliss attendees sign each quilt in the outer white border as a thank you for teaching. I loved watching people sign their names. I was also just brave (or dorky) enough to ask Camille Roskelley for a picture with her and the quilt she ended up with:

I really enjoyed making anchor blocks again. I love my original anchor quilt , but it might be fun to make another version in some colorful nautical themed fabrics.

While finishing these mini quilts, a friend suggested one more use for them that I hadn’t thought of. I’m working on it now and am excited to share it soon!

Jennifer

One comment anchor, anchor quilt, mini quilts, Quilt Bliss, quilting

Prairie Sweets Quilt Blocks

March 25, 2015 jennifer Quilting and Sewing

Back in 2007, when my 6th baby was not yet crawling and I’d made my very first quilt, I somehow saw a picture of the Prairie Sweets quilt pattern by Fig Tree Quilts . Not yet knowing enough about quilting to have any clue how little I knew, words like applique and circles meant little to me. I just knew I liked the pattern, so I bought it.

And it sat for 7 years. Lots of things happened in those seven years. I kept quilting but I never made that quilt, as the words applique and circles came to mean “more work than I have time for” while other patterns grabbed my attention instead. Last year I took an honest look at the pattern, wondering if it was time to get rid of it. I was a little surprised to discover I still wanted to make one.

I decided to try having an “on the go” project this year, as I knew I’d spend lots of time in the car and wouldn’t be able to do as much sewing as I would like. I made all the pinwheel blocks and tried glue basting for the first time to secure the rings. So far it’s been an effective way to hold them in place as I’ve been carrying this project around in my car for nine months! I chose Anna Maria Horner’s Pretty Potent fabrics for the project and the more I sew the more I love it.

I’ve got 22 blocks finished, which is about half of them. It was fun to lay them out and see how pretty they all look together! I used a variety of swiss dot fabrics for the backgrounds, and I really love that element as well.

It’s been great to have something to keep me busy when I’m sitting in carpool lines at schools or waiting for practices and lessons to end. It will be fun to finish the remaining blocks and decide what my next hand sewing project will be!

Jennifer Linking here

6 comments quilting, sewing

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