For special people - General quilts

Looking through the list of quilts left to document, the next category seems to be quilts made for specific people.  This one is a bit long, but I'll try to keep the stories short.

These two patterns by Silver Linings were for two co-workers from Pier 1.

When my dad owned a large home he had a many nativity scenes inside and outside each Christmas.  When he sold the house and moved to a retirement apartment, he gave away all of them to friends and family.  He had always loved decorating for Christmas and several years won the prize for his yard decorations.  He was sad that those days were over.  So for his birthday, I made him a nativity quilt and told him it didn't take up much space when he put it away after Christmas.  But he left it up all year and was very proud of the quilt.  I hang it now each year in my own home. 

Mystery quilt for Coleman.  I wanted to participate in a mystery quilt along with friend on About.com quilt forum, so my son picked out fabrics and this was the result.

A dear friend in my VOS quilt group was going through serious health issues so we decided to send her some small quilts to let her know we were thinking of her.

My niece asked for a bed quilt in black & white with red.  So I made her a Warm Wishes quilt with fleece backing - very cuddly.

My sister purchased a flannel quilt kit online and asked if I would help her make it on a visit.  I ended up doing all the sewing and cutting and she did the pressing.  While we talked and laughed.  

A work friend jokingly commented that she wouldn't ever get one of my quilts because she didn't have kids.  She however had several cats, so I made her this fun pattern.  Desiree's Psycho cats

Kathy's Bowties.  I wanted to try a scrappy pattern from a book by Bonnie Hunter.  This is the result.  I gave it to my freshman college roommate who is still a dear friend.

Rainbow Kitties.  I made two of these quilts and had six blocks left over to make a small one for me.  The pattern was brought to my attention on FB by a friend who "shows" Siamese cats and has even written a book called the Crazy Cat lady. I met this friend through another college roommate who loves cats but hasn't been able to have one for years.  So I decided to make them both a rainbow cat quilt and surprise them.  They had no idea I was sending them anything - I asked the other for the address and told them it was a secret.  The reactions when they each opened their quilts were so much fun. I love making quilts when they are loved and appreciated.

Vickie's shadow cats.  A friend at work knew I collected novelty fabrics and send me a link to a batik fabric with cats.  The fabric was lovely but not really something I could use in an I spy.  But it was such fun fabric I decided to purchase some and make my friend her own cat quilt. I used a very simple pattern to showcase the shadow cat fabric.

a close up of the fabric.  I also used a little bit of mice in the corners.

My daughter wanted to make a baby quilt for a  good college friend of hers.  I helped her with the cutting & pressing but she did much of the sewing.  She did not enjoy it and says never again.  Oh well, I tried.

Alex's pinwheels.  Alex is one of my daughters very best friends.  We often call her one of our second daughters.  In high school she asked me to make her a purple quilt.  This is the result.  The pattern was from a Kim Bracket book.  I had tons of purple & orange triangles left over that I used in a couple of mini quilts but I still had left overs.

Alex's Owls.  One of my quilting friends from About.com (Judy in Ohio) used to do very intricate cross stitch work.  In cleaning things out, she asked if anyone wanted these lovely owls.  Knowing Alex loved owls, I took the cross stitch and made it into a wall hanging for her.  She was thrilled and has it hanging in her home.

Marion's Llamas.  My daughter has been crazy about llamas ever since the movie Emperor's New Groove.  About the time it came out, we moved to a new home and there were llamas in the area, including a couple on our street.  The owner let my kids come feed them and ever since she has been collecting llamas.  When I saw this pattern by Elizabeth Hartman, I knew I had to make it for her.  Fortunately I like puzzles because it definitely was like putting a puzzle together with 1000 pieces.

A friend from church asked me to make his wife a Texas flag quilt for Christmas.  She is suffering from dementia but still loves the Texas flag.  It was fun collecting the various fabrics to put this together using 2" squares.

Rebecca's Braid.  A young woman who was our church pianist and sang in a ladies group with me decided to devote herself full time to her piano career and so resigned.  We had a going away party and I decided to make her a quilt which included music themed fabric (the borders).  I had wanted to try making a braid quilt.  She cried!

Tricia's Moose.  A dear friend suffered for many years with brain cancer.  She loved everything Moose.  When I saw this pattern, I decided to try fused applique and make it for her.  It was a fun process and she loved the quilt.

Loraine's homespun.  After making the Texas Sampler for my father in law, I had a bunch of homespun scraps left over.  His sister in law had visited him frequently when he was living with us during his struggle with cancer.  She was always bringing treats.  After he died, I decided to make her a quilt as a thank you for how much she had helped all of us.

Mrs. Pendley's quilt.  As a class project for my son's second grade teacher, the kids each drew a picture which I then transferred to fabric and made into this quilt.  We presented it to her at the end of the year.  And she cried.  You know it's a loved quilt when they cry. 😀

Some Lessons Learned - General quilts

This post is a group of quilts where I learned something significant.  It's all a journey.

Texas sampler, pattern by Veda Whilhite.  I love applique, who knew?  This quilt was made for my dear father in law who loved his Texas home.  I fell in love with the pattern at a local quilt shop but was worried about the applique.  But I tried it and discovered I really enjoyed it.  This quilt got me started.

Batik stars or how not to press flying geese.  And setting blocks on point and adding sashing makes it bigger very fast when you are tired of making the blocks.  There are sixteen flying geese in every block,  I used the four at a time method so they went pretty fast but they never came out the right size.  I was so frustrated until a quilting friend pointed out I was stretching them as I pressed.  Wish I had known about making oversized and trimming.  

Bears in Berties Cabin, pattern by Ricki Tims.  I've made this a couple of times but on this first one I learned  Watch out for twisted blocks BEFORE it's quilted.  And yes I fixed it anyway, I couldn't stand it being wrong.

Stack & Whack tree skirt - contrast is important.  There was a lot of fabric killed in the making of this tree skirt.  I kept the scraps for years but finally tossed them last year.  On the floor under the Christmas tree it really doesn't look as interesting as it does in the photo.  The pattern needed to have more background, bigger figures to really be effective.  

Fractiles or why I don't like pineapples.  This was originally going to be at least a throw sized quilt, but after sixteen blocks I decided I was done.  I do love the wall hanging though it kind of makes your eyes twitch.

Two colored New Mexico Star - after doing lots of scrappy quilts, two fabric quilts are so FUN and FAST.  Also "modern" quilting isn't as easy as it looked in the sample.

Christmas table topper.  Contrast!  Stand back and look before you cut.  The focus fabric is so busy you can hardly see the piecing.  But it made a good tree skirt for my daughter later.

Betty's Fracture Jewel - pressing direction is important.  And those darn flying geese again.  And my quilting was awful, but my aunt loved it anyway.  And how fun are secondary patterns.  And Tri Rec rulers aren't as easy to use as they seem.  This is such a fun pattern, I really should try it again.  Bet I can figure out those Tri Recs now.

Hearts of Fire  made for my red loving daughter.  A simple pattern can still be very fun and dramatic.  And even if the colors aren't my favorite, using up left overs from Aunt Betty's quilt made for a great quilt.  I also tried to be interesting with fabric placement.

Circles in Batik - sewing curves really needs pins regardless of what the pattern says.  Despite not a single point matching, this quilt gets more comments than any other.  It's fun to just stand and watch it move (or appear to).  Laying out the fabrics took week, but it was worth it.  Just wish the points were better.

Twisted Daughter - paper piecing using freezer paper is much more fun than tearing off the paper.  My daughter and I both love bright colors with black.  I thought this quilt was for me, but she took it for her room.

Bible Stories quilt - be careful of fusible, especially with batiks.  You get it too hot and the glue solidifies and doesn't hold.  Raw edge applique is a lot like paper dolls, but don't volunteer to make two.  I worked on these at football games one season while waiting for my daughter to march at half time.  Lots of interesting looks and comments. I need to try another fusible project, the paper dolls was pretty fun.

Well another group of older quilts down.  I'm having fun going down memory lane.  I hope others will find it interesting too.

Hand Pieced Treasures - General quilts

 Going back through my spreadsheet list of quilts that haven't been documented, I see several of my most treasured quilts.  These quilts are either hand pieced, hand appliqued or both.

Several years ago there was a lady on the About.com quilting forum who volunteered to teach people hand piecing.  She even sent everyone a little kit and sample needs.  I enjoyed it so much I made several of them in two sizes.  Then I put them away as I couldn't figure out how I wanted to finish them.  Some time later I went to the first VOS retreat (a group of quilters in Arizona from About.com).  They had a block raffle for black/white & bright blocks.  I didn't win, but loved how the blocks looked on the design wall.  So I made some of my own, using patterns from Quilter's Cache (another About.com forum member).  They looked great with the bright stars.  I then asked for suggestions for borders.  Another quilty friend suggested a vine border.  The hand piecing took a year, the border another year (soooo many leaves), and the hand quilting a third year.  It hangs in the place of honor in my studio, even though it's fading a bit from the sunshine.  I love looking at it and answering questions about it.  It reminds me of all the lovely years spend with my long distance forum friends who taught me so much.  Definitely one of my favorite and most loved quilts.

About the same time I was making the black & white blocks, I was having fun hand piecing Christmas blocks.  I had read somewhere that if you tested blocks using Christmas fabrics, eventually you'd have a Christmas sampler.  I was using a background fabric that Joann fabrics had carried for several years, and I had several yards.  But of course when I started doing the sashing, I was 2 pieces short.  Frantic I asked my quilting friends online if anyone had some, and one of my VOS retreat friends had a yard.  I love putting this quilt out each year.

At one point I thought I might try making a Dear Jane quilt, but rather than following a pattern I wanted to pick out my own blocks from various sources.  After making two dozen four inch blocks using blue and green batiks with white background, I decided I was done.  So I put them away for a while. Later thinking about how I could finish them out, I saw a setting idea on the cover of "Precision Piecing" by Sally Collins.  I liked the effect so I started piecing a Carpenter's Wheel pattern around each of 20 blocks.  By the end I was heartily sick of Carpenters wheels.  Then I decided to do a very narrow sashing with a pieced border.  And of course since it was all hand pieced, I had to hand quilt it too.  After all this handling, several of the blocks were dirty, so I decided to wash it and block it.  And of course even though the batiks had been prewashed, some of them bled.  Sob.  I lived with it for several years until I ran across an article called "Save my bleeding quilt".  I tried it and it worked - HAPPY DANCE!  I dearly love this quilt and it hangs in our dining area where I can look at it from the kitchen & my office. 

 

Several years ago there was an exhibition of red and white quilts which I would have loved to see in person.  But I bought the book and enjoy looking through it regularly.  Since my daughter's favorite color is red, I decided to make her a red and white quilt using Red Batiks.  I had some Hawaiian patterns for hand applique and decided to pair them with paper pieced sawtooth sashing. After my experience with batiks and bleeding, I prewashed these red batiks six times before piecing.  I then used the "dawn bath" after the quilt was done.  There was still a little bit of pink in that water, but NO bleeding!  The quilt was hung in my daughter's apartment over her sofa, which means all her zoom classmates during Covid were very familiar with this quilt.

And another red quilt for my daughter.  I talked about this quilt in Feb 2021 in detail, but since it is one of my favorites that I'm most proud of, it needed to be here too.

Since I was loving applique so much, I decided to try reverse applique.  This pattern from Eye of the Beholder was so much fun.  Originally a table runner, my husband wanted it to hang over some electrical cords in the den.

I have to mention my Christmas Frames quilt.  I've posted about it separately a couple of times, but it definitely is one of the quilts I would grab if my house was on fire, so it should be included here.  Some day I'll stop talking about it all the time, but I do so love this quilt.  And it won two ribbons, how cool is that!

Early on I wanted to try hand piecing hexagons.  I cut a bunch (and I do mean a bunch) of scraps.  I pieced lots and lots of hexagons, then struggled with how to put them together into something that made sense.  This is what I came up with.  I'm not in love with it, but there certainly is a ton of work in this quilt.  Even the border is fussy cut and hand applied down.  The whole thing doesn't look like as much work as it was.  This one isn't a favorite, but I'm including it here because of all the hours it took. 

My sister who lives in Albuquerque went with me to a quilt shop when I was visiting.  She loved this pattern and I agreed to make it for her.  The applique was easy, but getting those wedges even and the center circle actually centered was a big challenge.  I ended up gluing them, then sewing down.  And those very narrow contrast borders were much harder than they looked.  But I'm proud of how it all came out.

The Early Years - General quilts

 In my last post, I mentioned I keep a spreadsheet of information on my quilts over the years.  I happened to filter on blog dates and realized there were a number of non-novelty quilts that weren't documented (other than the spreadsheet & photos).  Since I'm no longer keeping a physical binder scrapbook, I've decided to add some posts to document those early efforts.  

I'll start with my kids baby quilts.  Technically at the time I didn't really consider these quilts.  Both of these were remade when they graduated to big kid beds, so the fading is worse in the center section.  I removed the binding and quilting, then added additional fabric to make them twin size.  I was surprised how much the binding had worn, even though it was doubled & bias.  I also had used poly batting and it definitely had worn in places.  I guess that's what happens with frequent washing.  Both these have been very well loved and are still favorite cuddle blankets.

Both my kids also wanted to try making a quilt when they were in elementary school.  My daughter's is music themed.  As I recall she ended up only picking out the fabric and was afraid to use the sewing machine.  For my son's quilt, he did sew the rail blocks and I was worried about him getting speeding tickets once he learned to drive.

My earliest true quilt is one I call "first and almost last".  I had gotten a VHS tape from a crafters book club titled "Lap quilting with Georgia Bonesteel".  I loved the piecing part of the process, but got very bored with the hand quilting.  No one had warned me not to make a king size quilt for my first.  About half way through the quilting, I packed it away.  Years later when I was introduced to quilting using rotary cutters and templates, I pulled it out and finished it.  I DID not like putting the quilted pieces together and have stayed away from quilt as you go projects ever since.  Several of the fabrics have faded from black to dried blood red, the red bled on the white, and the puffy poly batting hasn't worn well.  And of course by the time it was finished, I really didn't like it any more.  But it is done and gets used as a packing blanket periodically. 

After discovering quilting using rotary cutters and templates at a church sew day, I went looking for a local quilt shop.  There I saw this pattern which used fusible grid & 2" squares.  For years this was just a top with no quilting, but eventually I felt kind of silly that it wasn't truly a quilt.  So I added batting, quilting and a real binding.  I still hang it each Christmas. 

One of the early books purchased is called Sensational Scraps and is all 2 color quilts using half square triangles.  It's a fun book and I still have it though I've only made one quilt from it.  This quilt rides in my car and my kids think it's the softest quilt I own.

I tried to figure out this next pattern from a photo in a magazine before I knew anything about paper piecing.  I don't remember how I managed those corner pieces but I'm guessing I drew them out using my drafting skills (before I was an accountant, I was a draftsman).  I had gotten a number of fat quarters from the LQS special new years day sale.  As I remember there are a number of eyelashes on the back in the quilting.  My niece has this hidden away somewhere and I'm sure if I saw it in person now I'd been itching to fix it.  Looking at it now, I'm a little impressed I was able to figure it out without a pattern.

This one isn't "early" but it doesn't really fit in any other category so I'll show it here.  And it isn't really a true quilt either - very minimal quilting.  In 2014 my son decided he wanted the Softest quilt in the world.  So I made him a quilt from boxers (purchased new in XXXXL and washed) and backed with microfiber.  He didn't want much quilting as the thead reduced the softness (he words).  It was very soft, but it's not held up well.  The backing has pilled and the boxers have ripped.  But he still loves it. 

Isn't that a great smile!  My kids have been very patient about my quilting habit.  And my daughter continues to go with me to quilt shows, even one year to Houston.  She still doesn't like to sew but appreciates every quilt I make for her.