Catching Up!

Mercy!  I just realized it's been nearly three months since I posted!  I kept meaning to catch up, but I guess life got in the way....

Anyhow, I've completed several quilts/quilted items in the past couple months, most of which were Christmas commissions.  I also did a few charity quilts and wall hangings AND some things for a crafts show. Plus I made several quilted Christmas gifts...

NOW I remember why I haven't posted:  TOO BUSY SEWING!

Here are SOME as finished products...  sorry, no in-process pics were taken.

I made 2 sets of these scrappy strip placemats for Christmas gifts.  (This is my daughter's dining room.)  I also made but never photographed a set of solid woodgrain-quilted placemats and a runner for Christmas gifts.  Both sets were reversible.  WHY didn't I take pics???

This is one of the commissioned memory quilts.  It was for Pat Spann,  a local restaurant/pub owner, using tshirts representing the 30-plus years he's been in business. This quilt measured 110" square; the largest I've ever done!  I had a blast doing this one; it brought back lots of memories!  I've whiled away quite a few hours there, beginning way back in high school, when my dad forbade me to go!  In fact, it was there that my hubby asked me out for the first time...

Here's another memory quilt commissioned by two daughters of a departed Harley rider, for their mom.  Each shirt was from a different state.  I can't wait for us to have time to really travel on my husband's Harley and collect shirts like these!

And another memory quilt...  This was for my husband's cousins, whose sister lost her battle to breast cancer a couple years ago.  They presented the quilt to their parents for Christmas.  This was a bit of a challenge, as it combined tshirts and woven blouses.









Here are a couple of the charity quilts.  They were small; about crib size.

         

Baby quilts...  The golf themed one was a commission; the modern one was for a dear girlfriend of our daughter.  The modern one has wood grain quilting I learned from Lori Kennedy at The Inbox Jaunt. http://theinboxjaunt.com/2014/11/18/woodgrain-a-free-motion-quilt-tutorial/.  She posts new tutorials daily.

I made OLAF just for fun; had been wanting to play around with strip piecing and quilting with wavy lines. I learned wavy lines from Megan at Canoe Ridge Creations.
http://sewsweetness.com/2011/09/back-to-school-free-motion-and-other.html.   I also quilted in some snowflakes.

This next two items were for ME!

I did the pillow cover out of suede cloth; my first attempt at quilting feathers in a circular pattern.   I learned (and am still learning) this technique from Ivory Spring.
https://ivoryspring.wordpress.com/2012/06/26/thread-talk-from-my-sewing-machine-37/.

I learned the Icicle Lights quilting design on this embroidered and quilted wall hanging from Leah Day at The Free Motion Quilting Project.  http://freemotionquilting.blogspot.com/2011/03/day-264-icicle-lights.html  I've learned MANY techniques through Leah's blog!   She has a new tutorial nearly every day!

Before Christmas. my sister sent me a picture (below on the left) of a Star of David quilt,.along with a request that I make one for her. http://quiltingafterdark.blogspot.ca/2013/03/star-of-david-finished.html.  When Christie came to visit a few weeks ago, just after Christmas, we made the quilt on the right while our hubbies watched college football.  We hadn't been able to find a pattern, so we used her photo and a 60 degree triangle template to work one out.  Christie counted all those triangles and figured out how many of each color to cut and then laid them out in order for me to sew.  I sewed and she ironed.  We make a pretty good team!  I quilted most of the stippling, but she tried her hand one a small section.  You can't see it, but we quilted a scripture from Zephanaiah 3:17 into the white border...  She did the first 3-4 words and then went home to Alabama, leaving me to finish!  I quilted a simple swirl wave into the blue border. It turned out very nicely, we think!  Thanks to Angelina Kendra for the inspiration!  http://quiltingafterdark.blogspot.ca/

WHEW!  Now that I'm caught up with blogging, I can go back to sewing.  I'm working on a girly quilt for my daughter in law; can't wait to share it!

Catching up

It's been AGES since I've posted!  With the holidays and the birth of our first grandchild, blogging has been low on my list of priorities.  Now, though, things are settling back into a normal rhythm, whatever that is...

Here's the last tshirt quilt I finished just before Christmas.  It was a commission by my friend Donna, for her son Greg.  It is by far the biggest tshirt quilt I've done, measuring a whopping 100"x90" (nearly king size!)  I had to take it down to our church to baste it; there's not that much empty floor space in my house.

Greg's shirts came from his high school and college days.  My favorite block is on the far right column, third one down.  Several shirts only had pocket logos, so I appliqued eight of them onto one of the shirt backs. 

 

 

 

I used a tiny gray chevron for sashing and a coordinating geometric print for the back.  It is quilted in a large meander with a charcoal gray cotton thread.

A FEW TSHIRT QUILTS

A FEW TSHIRT QUILTS

In this post I will share a few of the several tshirt quilts I've done in my brief career as a quilter.  I've come to love doing them because they seem to bring such joy to the recipients.  Each person is so pleased to have special memories of happy times captured in a warm, comfy quilt.

Keith's Quilt is one of the first commissions I took.  Keith and his wife Donna were colleagues of mine in the local school district for many years.  His shirts chronicle his undergrad years, his coaching years, and special events during his years as a school administrator. 

A few of the shirts had only a screen print on the chest pocket area, so I incorporated a column for them in the center of the quilt.  Sashing for Keith's quilt was done in black Panther Paw print, while the backing was a deep royal blue geometric print.  I did the quilting on my Viking Topaz 30 with royal blue meanders.  I am pretty sure he was happy with it because his wife has commissioned me to do one for their son now!


Here is my daughter Cathleen's quilt.  It chronicles her high school and college years.  This on was a bit of a challenge because I failed to tell her NOT to cut the shirts apart before bringing them to me.  As a result, I began with a hodgepodge of sizes and shapes!  Cathleen did the layout through her artistic eyes and I must say, it does make for a very visually interesting quilt...  but piecing it was a real bugger!  Cathleen did a good bit of the piecing herself.

Sashing was done with a mustard polka dot; the border is black chevron.  We backed it with gray chevron and quilted it on my Topaz with a gray meander.  This was definitely not one of my favorite tshirt quilts because I desire symmetry and order, but it was right up my daughter's eclectic alley!

This is my most recent finish, a commission done in trade for a photo session for our soon-to-arrive first grandchild, Baby Jack.  The tshirts are Ansleigh's; her husband David is a very talented photographer. 

Ansleigh's memory tshirts included several supporting precious little Creed, who lost his battle with cancer, along with some from her high school years, her undergrad years, her bachelorette party weekend and some post-high school softball playing days.

Ansleigh selected a black and white color scheme for sashing and backing.  The sashing is polka dots while the back is a gorgeous black and white damask.  Quilting was done with black Aurifil on my new Viking Platinum 16 midarm.

One word of caution if you plan to try a tshirt quilt:  be sure to stabilize the shirts prior to cutting them into squares.  My lesson learned on Cathleen's quilt was related....  because I failed to ask her to bring the shirts to me intact, she "gave me a head start" by cutting out designs from her shirts. We were thus left with very little surrounding fabric. Getting those pieces stabilized without having an adhesive-covered ironing board was a real challenge.  But hey, this blog is about lessons learned, so there ya go!