In January, 2005, I took a class from Sharyn Craig on how to make the Glorified Nine-Patch with her techniques. It was such fun! I spent some time machine piecing some blocks and then drafting the setting triangles, and in a week I had the top finished. Then I waited for inspiration on how to quilt it. I finally decided to put feathers around each block, but I ended up waiting more, since I was contemplating buying a new sewing machine and didn’t want to begin quilting on one and finish on the other. 😉 After buying the new machine, I waited some more while I got acquainted with its new capabilities. So this is the first project I’ve quilted using my then-brand-new Bernina 440QE, which has a stitch regulator. I finished it in April, 2005, and it measures 37″ x 37″. I’ll use the quilt as a spring table topper in my little dining room.
And here is the second piece from a Pam Holland class at Quilt Camp in the Pines in 2005. This one is also drappliqué; the gazebo itself is machine appliquéed in place, but all of the plants and pots are drawn onto the fabric with the same special pens as were used in the landscape quilt. I machine quilted this one, too, with flowers in the blue borders and leaves in the green cornerstones, stippling the muslin background. It measures 23 1/4″ x 26 3/4″, and I finished it in September, 2005.
Our granddaughter was going to start preschool and needed a quilt for nap times, of course. I found a panel of a fairy and added borders before quilting it. Here’s the quilt:
I did a lot of free-motion quilting, outlining all of the motifs in the panel and adding some clouds and leaves in some empty spots. Then I quilted feathers all around the borders.
The quilt measures approximately 31.5″ x 50″, and I finished it in February, 2010.
This quilt was for our only granddaughter. 🙂 I’d purchased the fabric for this several years earlier, but it was too feminine for the four grandsons who arrived in the meantime. As soon as we found out that the next grandchild was to be a girl, I dug out the fabric and started the quilt. I machine pieced it and machine quilted it with lots of hearts and flowers. I finished it in February, 2007 (the baby was due in May <g>), and it measures approximately 39″ x 48″.
Here you can see some of the floral quilting.
Gabriella Jacquelyn arrived on May 1, 2007, weighing 5lbs 7oz. Here’s a picture of our new granddaughter at two weeks old, resting on her quilt:
I took a class in January, 2009, from Sharon Schamber on how to make various background stipple patterns. She’s such a good teacher! We got a good start on the piece in class, and I finished it at home shortly after that. The little quilt measures about 15″ square and is an excellent reference for future projects.
In January, 2008, I took a machine quilting class from Sue Nickels. It was wonderful! I’ve enjoyed all of the classes I’ve had on how to do feathers, and I’ve learned something new from each; this time I was finally successful in being able to draw feathers so as to be able to draft feathered motifs to fit a specific space. As part of the class, we all had to design a feathered quilt, and this is the one I designed:
I finished it in February, 2008, and it will probably become a quilt for one of our dogs, since I messed up the back during the basting. 😉 It measures approximately 23″ x 23″ and was quilted with lavender thread. Here’s a detail of the quilting:
This table runner was the result of playing with paint sticks at our local group in November, 2009. I made three painted blocks and then decided to set them into a table runner.
It measures 43.5″ x 15″ and was machine pieced (what little piecing was necessary!) and machine quilted with lots of my favorite motif: feathers. Here are some details of the quilting, finished in January, 2010.
This is another quilt that came to be as a result of our guild’s challenge. We were to use an identifiable piece of a certain beautiful red batik (no problem there!), as well as a heart on the front of the quilt. The theme was to be heart’s desire. I had an idea for my entry in July, 2011, though the challenge wasn’t to be until January, 2012, so I went ahead and made it while my idea was fresh. I used a pattern from Carol Doak’s 300 Paper-Pieced Quilt Blocks (block #126), resizing the blocks to 3″. Then I transferred tiny photos of the faces of our family members to the center of eight of the nine hearts that would make up my quilt. The ninth heart has a plain center, on which I wrote Family in white. The sashing and cornerstones are 1/2″ wide, and the borders are 1.5″ wide, as are the corner blocks.
The quilting motifs, which I did by machine, were tiny white hearts on each side of the heart points, with red loops in the heart “bumps”, and the feathers I like so much in the borders.
The quilt measures 14″ x 14″, and I finished it in July, 2011. Update: The challenge competition was in January, 2012, and my quilt placed second in the paper-pieced category! 🙂
This is the second quilt I’ve made specifically for Mike. It started in a class with Jackie Robinson at Quilt Camp in the Pines in 2003; that’s where she taught the pattern for the top. I’ve made this one in what she calls a lap quilt size, though it’s the biggest lap quilt I’ve ever seen. 😉 It measures approximately 70″ x 87″! After I’d finished the top, it sat around for a long time while I debated how I was going to quilt it; I knew I wanted curves and that the curves would probably have to be feathers; but I was put off by the prospect of having to mark all of those feathers for quilting. However, Kathy Sandbach then taught a class (the Infinite Feather) at Quilt Camp in 2004, and that was what I needed. I now knew how to do feathers without all of the painful pre-marking. I quilted feathers in matching threads in almost every section of the quilt except for the parts that look like trees; those were quilted with a tree motif — sort of. 😉 I also did different motifs in two of the teal/turquoise sections. The cream log cabins have feathers in undulating rows; the aqua stars have feathered wreaths; the purple log cabins have rows of single feathers; the cream feathered star points have feathered sprays. The quilt was machine pieced and quilted, and I finished it in October, 2004. Here is the front:
And here are a couple of details of the back so you can see some of the quilting:
for Mike, from a class with Jackie Robinsonfor Mike, from a class with Jackie Robinson
Another embroidered appliqué quilt, this was designed and digitized by Claudia Dinnell, though I did omit the title from the top border of the quilt. It measures approximately 25.25″ x 25.25″ and was finished in November, 2017.
All of the quilting is free-motion ruler work, using diagonal lines that join in the center of the borders with a zentangle design.
Update: I entered Enchanted Pumpkin into our local show in March, 2018, and it won a third-place ribbon!
