One of the things I enjoy in life is receiving hand made gifts from friends.  Knowing how much time it takes to make something, I appreciate the fact that these people have taken the time out of their lives, when they could have been doing something possibly more fun, to make something for me.  I enjoy using the gifts because when using, I feel loved, for if they didn't love me, then they wouldn't have taken the time to make the project.  Here are just two of the recent gifts that I have received.  The first is a runner that a friend made for my birthday.

I have a hump backed trunk that this will fit perfectly on.  This gives me the incentive to move all the books off the top of the trunk in order to use the runner.  The colors work perfectly with the colors in the room the trunk is in.

A friend made me this lovely sachet.  It is filled with lavender.  I have plans on making a sewing case that will be large enough to place this inside so that each time I open the case, I will not only have everything inside smell good, but I will also have something lovely to rest my eyes upon.

There are many things that I love to use.  One is baskets.  When my husband was recovering from heart surgery, I needed some time away and signed up for a basket weaving class.  Here is the very first basket that I made.

As much as I enjoyed making the basket, I realized that it would take quite a bit for me to tool up to make more.  Also, it is something that I would only do outside for I found the soaking of the reeds a bit messy.  After much thought, I have decided that this will be the only basket that I will ever make from reeds and slats.  I have decided that I will spend my time making rag baskets and rag rugs until all my old clothing is used up, then I will decide on whether or not I will do more baskets like this.

January 21, 2012

This sampler quilt was made a few years ago through a Block of the Month program, which was held at my local quilt shop.  At the beginning of the program, we were given fabric and a pattern for one block.  At the next monthly meeting, if our block was all sewn, we would receive the next block fabric and pattern, free.  If we didn't have the block sewn, we would have to pay to get the block for that month.  I love this quilt, all black, white and grey with just the touch of red.   This quilt was machine quilted.

January 19, 2012

Both of these wall quilts are pre-printed panels which I  hand quilted.  The one with the boy, I might go back and quilt a bit more, for I like my things heavily quilted.  I was in a hurry to get it hung before Thanksgiving one year, so did just what I had time to do.  The girl sweeping the snow is my favorite.  I did quilt that heavily. 

The boy quilt I hang from October to December 1.  The girl quilt I hang after New Year and keep it up through March, then I switch it out for a spring hanging.

January 16, 2012

I made this tree skirt for my daughter.  The pattern was a free leaflet from a fabric store that closed about 35 years ago.  A long time ago, I found this pattern on the net, but I don't know what the pattern is called so that you can hunt it down.  Since it is just stars and square blocks with triangles on the four corners, it wouldn't be too hard to draft out to the size you would like your tree skirt to be.  Or even substitute some other block you would like for the stars.  I don't have the skirt any longer, so I can't measure out the squares for you to know what size these are.

I am thinking of making another in generic fabrics to use on my dinette table.  Of course, not cutting the hole in the center.  I think it would look very nice with a vase of flowers in the center, or a bowl of fruit.  Maybe use some other block instead of the stars.  How would it look in red, white and blue for the fourth of July?  Now if I can just find the pattern in all my stacks of clutter.

January 15, 2012

Kimono quilt

When making this quilt, I used the pattern called: the Disappearing Nine Patch.  About two years ago, this quilt was the rage because they are fun and fast quilts to do.  Here is one of many websites that give tutorials, as well as YouTube videos. 

http://sew-fantastic.blogspot.com/2009/09/disappearing-nine-patch-tutorial.html

I started out with 4-1/2 inch cut squares of an oriental print. I wanted the print to be framed in white, so here is how I arranged the patches to be sewn.

Row 1:  print – white- print,

Row 2: white – print – white,

Row 3:  print – white- print. 

This gave me a print patch, sashed on two sides in white, with a corner square of the print that was so small that it looked different than the large print squares.

I used 4-1/2 cut size squares, but you can make your cut squares any size you wish.  You also don’t need to have a controlled fabric.  I am presently working on a Disappearing Nine Patch as a scrappy quilt.  There are other design layouts that you can do by playing with the arrangement of the blocks, the one shown in the tutorial is just one of many. 

Here is a website where the woman did a cut block in a different way.  Dividing of sewn blocks opens a whole new world of design.

http://outsidethelinedesigns.blogspot.com/2011/01/disappearing-9-patch-variations.html

Do a search of your own on The Disappearing Nine Patch and see what more you can come up with.

I hand quilted this quilt in the ditch.  I always use white or off-white muslin, in either plain or a white on white or cream on cream print, when I hand quilt.  When I put that much work into a quilt, I make sure that I can see the stitching when done. 

This pattern so intrigues me that I have been thinking of other ways to make the quilt.  Why not embroider designs in the uncut squares?  Or, make 4-1/2 inch blocks and use those for the uncut squares? With either one, I would end up with a focus block already sashed with a corner stone.   I am also playing with the idea of using other nine patch type blocks and cutting them to see what kind of other designs I could come up with.  One of these days I will go into my EQ7 and play around with the nine patch blocks to see what will work. 

Here is another picture of my Remington lying on a quilt.  All my quilts are Remington magnets.  

January 9, 2012

This quilt is a scrappy quilt.  I took an online class with a group where the lesson we were to learn  was to loosen up in our quilting.  We cut our strips, placed them in a paper bag, then we picked the fabrics to be sewn together by pulling, sight unseen, from the bag.  The only time we could toss the strip back into the bag, is if we already had that strip sewn.  We made several strip combinations of not more than seven strips sewn together.  We then proceeded to cut the strips using the 45 degree angle on our rulers, which made a strip of diamonds.  We then laid the cut strips out so that no two alike pieces were side by side.  It was really a lot of fun and I will say, this quilt is one of my favorites.  I can look at the fabrics and remember what I made from each piece.  Many of the fabrics were scraps from clothing I made for my kids and myself.  Even found a couple of pieces from shirts that I made for my husband. 

I machine quilted the diamonds by quilting in the ditch and the black outside border, was machine quilted with a cable design.

This exercise was very good for me, for I find it hard to be spontaneous in my work.  I am too rigid.  Give this method a try sometime, it isn't as easy as it sounds, for the temptation is there to find a matching strip to the fabric already in hand.  It was very hard for me to sew two strips together that looked horrible together.  But just see how pretty the quilt turned out in the end.