Pillow shams......

I seem to have gotten away from my chronicle of past quilts and stuff. These are some of the pillow shams that I've made. Pillow shams are a handy way to try out an idea and at the same time give a change of decor to the living room :-) This is a variation of Birds of the Air pattern.....sort of expanded! I actually call it "Fire on the Mountain" because I think that is more what it looks like! The main fabric has a sort of story behind it. The first year I went to the Paducah Quilt Show I was on a bus trip. After the show we stopped at the huge Hancock's Fabrics.......1000's of bolts of fabric! I was so in "shock" at seeing so much fabric that I sort of wandered around in a daze and couldn't decide what to buy! I finally bought 1 yard of fabric that I fell in love with....this background batik! I can't believe that I bought only 1 yard of fabric! Probably never happened to me in a quilt store since!
Obviously I like the Snail Trail pattern! I think of these as my seasonal variations: Purple for spring, brown for fall (or most of the year), and red and green for Christmas!

I wanted to try some "Flying Geese". I wish I had done them smaller and think I will make a new version some day.....when I have time.

This was made from left over blocks. I started a Log Cabin quilt when I didn't really know what I was doing. The blocks were not all coming out the same size and I gave up on it. So.....one day I took some of the blocks and made this.

I saw a Simply Quilts show on making this rose and was experimenting. I later used the same idea on a couple of bags. I wouldn't mind making a lot of them and putting them on a quilt some day.

Sometimes I just use a single piece of fabric that compliments a quilt.

....or "cheater" fabric like this one that I just added borders and snowflakes to.

A Christmas "Rail Fence" to cover a long pillow.

And my Halloween "Boo"! I wish I had done the mouth differently. It is paint so I don't think I can change it. The boo on the header was cuter.....I made that one for my daughter, who probably doesn't even use it.

Flip and Sew runner instructions....2008

I took this as a workshop with a local teacher and do not know who to credit the original pattern to. I'm not very good on tutorial and didn't take enough photos while working on this, but my sister wants the instructions, so I may as well put them here for anyone else who might want to make one. They make great gifts and are easy to make.You need: A piece of backing 20" by 60"

This will make a runner with 6 sets of strips at each end and a finished length of 52". I have never made one that long yet.

A piece of batting the same size.

Your center square is 6"

The strips are assorted colors cut (2 apiece) 2 1/2" by 6" and 2 1/2" by 8"

How many you need depends on how long you want the runner to be.

Lay out the backing and batting and mark a vertical and horizontal line through the center on the batting in pencil. This becomes your sewing guide line. Pin all of this together well enough that you can move it back and forth to the sewing machine. You are quilting this runner as you make it.

I recommend laying out the pieces ahead of time to make sure you understand where everything goes and how to position it. If you place your first 2 strips on the wrong sides of the square you will end up going vertical instead of horizontal! You are at all times sewing through the top, batting, and backing.

Start: Pin the square in the center with the points touching your lines. On-point position.

Choose your first two 6" pieces and lay them on opposite sides of the square. Sew a quarter inch seam through all layers. Press them open. Now position the 8" pieces on the opposite sides and do the same. When the 8" pieces are sewn down their point should touch the horizontal line....this tells you if you are going straight or not! In this photo the 8" pieces are not sewn down yet and the points are not touching the line.

The inner border is 1 1/2" wide. Sew the side strips first and then the end strips. You lay the border pieces wrong side up right along where the pieces on each side form their "v" and sew a quarter inch seam.....look at the top photo to see where I mean. You can actually play around with the borders and do something different if you choose. The outer border is 3 1/2" wide.
I always lay my strips in a mixed up fashion, but many people prefer to use the same fabric for both the 6" and 8" piece in each stripe for a more symmetrical framed look. Bind the edges like you would any quilt.

The number of strips you use determines the finished length. If you want to try to get by with a 45" cut of fabric for the backing, you will only use 4 sets of strips. That will produce a runner that is about 41" long. This one has 5 sets and is a bit longer. Here is my finished runner! I made this one as a hostess gift when I went to Iowa.

The back. This runner is reversible if you choose a nice fabric for the back.

Des Moines, Iowa Quilt show....

Here is a link to an album of photos from the Des Moines, Iowa quilt show. Some of these are quilts from the main juried show and some are special exhibits and some are a local quilt show that was also part of the big show! Lots of quilts for all tastes!
http://share.shutterfly.com/share/received/album.sfly?sid=0JZNnDRq3YsXU&startIndex=0&fid=4c97c5da0c7a708c9a16dcf07a6807f9

Festival of Quilts at Grouseland in Vincennes, Indiana

This was certainly a busy week for quilt shows! I went to the Des Moines Quilt Show on Wednesday and then after getting back home, Melissa and I went to the quilt show in Vincennes on Saturday! This quilt show is in conjunction with Grouseland, the home of William Henry Harrison, the only president of the US from Indiana. We toured his home, but were not allowed to take photos. (clicking on any of these photos will bring them up for study) The quilt show featured mostly old quilts or quilts that looked old fashioned. Very nice! I won't lable every photo. They had a special contest called the Old Tippecanoe Quilt Block Challenge and showed the winners.....but again, I was not allowed to photograph them because the magazine sponsoring them as first rights to publish.

Beautiful quilting on this one!

I heard this called a "Cheddar, butter, cream" quilt. I had not heard that before but see why with the colors!

This is my favorite! I would love to have a Drunkard's Path quilt in this pattern, but do not have the patience to make all those curved blocks!

I like to show the quilting some times....this one was very nice.

An interesting pattern for an old quilt!

This is so old the green has faded completely!

Tiny perfect stitches!

This was one of a pair of Trip Around the World quilts for twin beds.

A beautiful whole cloth quilt.

This was a lovely show and I enjoyed seeing the old-fashioned quilts. I love art quilts, but there is so much beauty in these as well.

Mary's Quilt Thoughts #4....

Mike just bought us a new gadget....a GPS for the car. He bought this so when we travel it will aid us in navigating. Actually, I think he bought it because it is a cool new "toy". I wasn't real excited about it until all of a sudden it dawned on me that this is not a GPS, but a QSF...."Quilt Shop Finder"! Now, when we visit a new city and I look up where the nearest quilt store is we will not have to search maps or ask for directions. We just plug in the address and the GPS....I mean the QSF....will lead us right to the front door! Wow! Suddenly, I'm as excited about this new toy as he is! Sometimes quilting is like this. You buy a piece of fabric and put it in your stash. You look at it over and over and maybe even wonder why you bought it. Suddenly one day it is exactly the piece of fabric you need for a quilt you just started! A new perspective on something.....seeing it with new eyes and a new idea. Some day every piece of fabric in my stash will end up in a quilt.....I just need to keep looking at them until one day I suddenly have that new perspective I need.

Quilt guild buys....

Last night we had our Quilt Guild meeting and we had an auction to benefit 2 charities. Raised $2000! I bought the following 2 items.A little Fall table topper. She did a nice job quilting the leaves on it. The back fabric is pretty, too, so I can turn it over if I want.
This is a large pincusion, fabric covered box! Don't know what I will put in it, but I figured I would find some use for it in the sewing room.

My Fall wallhanging went for $50! More than I would have paid for it! My sister-in-law, Melissa, bought it, but someone else was bidding, too. Melissa also bought 3 quilted purses....I should have taken a photo of the "bag lady" with her loot :-)

May Basket.....2003 to 2007!

Another of my experiments with 3-D flowers! I started this in 2003 and didn't finish it until 2007. As usual.....I had an idea :-) I saw a quilt with 3-D flowers, so immediately I wanted to play with that idea. I wove the basket (badly) and made a small 9-patch grid to put it on. Added a piece of lace and made the roses. Than it sat for years. I machine quilted through the diagonals of the 9-patches and sat and looked at it a long time.
I can't stand having "UFO"s laying around, so eventually I went back to it. By this time I no longer liked some of the fabrics that I used in the roses.....I didn't have much stash when I started and no batiks or anything beautiful like that! I decided it needed more, so I started adding those whispy green leaves which were a pain to blanket stitch, because I kept getting the thread caught on the roses!

Then I saw a technique to fuse 2 pieces of fabric together and that is how I made the blue flowers. The yellow ones were just an experiment, because I thought it needed more color! Finally I embroidered the little "babies breath" white flowers and their greenery.

Quilting it was a nightmare for me, since I'm not much of a hand quilter! I did some flowers in the plain blue areas and there are roses in the corner areas. That was a lot for my limited hand quilting talents. Declared it finished!

Made a basket block and hunted up similar looking flowers on fabric and stitched them on.

Chose a horrible looking piece of fabric that I had no use for to put on the back and was happy to be done with it. Then I started on the "Roses and Old Lace" quilted piece that I already showed.....more 3-D flowers, but done better! My early pieces are full of mistakes and things I would change. It is hard for me to want to post them! I did like this, however and even though it is not perfect, I like the over-all concept.