Aurifil 2014 BOM

Do you remember the Aurifil 2014 BOM?  I had a lot of fun with it but never got past making the top.  It's been in a drawer since that December.

It had to go on my list for 2017.

I tried to step up my quilting game on this quilt.  Every block is done differently, the sashing has ribbon candy in it and there is some very dense quilting in the white triangles.  I like how it looks, but it sure increases the amount of time it takes to finish!

This is a finished for Q2 (click here) with Finish-A-Long

I'm linking to One Monthly Goal and  Crazy Mom Quilts

Kiwis (And Flies)

Date:  Early 2013 - August 2014

Size:

Pattern:  Missouri Star Quilt Company "Pheobe's Flower Box" YouTube video here.

Reason:  I needed to empty my green scraps drawer.  Irony:  My sister gave me a gift of scraps when I was nearly finished the top.  Half of them were green.

Fabric / Best Buys:  I'm fairly sure every single piece in the top is a scrap aside from the sashing and border.  I used darker fabrics wrong side out when I needed a lighter value.  The border is from the box my sister gave me.

Thoughts:  I really enjoyed this pattern.  I also loved improvising the back with leftover scraps.  There is a free class on Craftsy.com that teaches different methods.  That's where I got the idea.

My seven year old named this quilt.  I tried to shorten it down to Kiwis, but "Kiwis and Flies" stuck in my head.

The flower quilting took a long time.  I got really good at petals by the time flower number 600 rolled around.

Lessons Learned:  Do math better.  Buy more than I think I need.  I found myself a fat quarter short of a discontinued fabric.  I asked for help on Quiltville's FB site.  Someone immediately said she'd mail me what I needed free of charge.  Quilters are the best thing since rotary cutters.

Zachary's First Lesson

Date:  November 2009

Reason:  The birth of a cousin's baby.

Fabrics:  My mother-in-law gave me the bumper pads to pick apart for the fabric.  The blues were from my stash.  The colourful binding was from the bumper pad ties.

Cheater Wall Hanging

Date:  June 2009

Reason:  A friend who works at MCC gave this to me to practice quilting on it.  When it was finished, I donated it back to MCC for resale.

Marie's

Marie was the only person that got to choose her colours.

Thank You Table Runner

Date:  December 2008

Pattern:  This was adapted from Australian Country Threads Pg 42 - 1st Edition Collector's Edition.

Reason:  A thank you gift for being care group leaders for five years.  They were dairy farmers so I knew a cow theme was in order.

Lessons Learned:  Stuff cut on the bias is stretchy.  My Aunt taught me some triangle logic.

Thoughts:  A class in triangles would be a good thing.  Learning how to keep a decent deadline:  Also a good thing.  This took almost two years to complete.

Life is Precious

Date: 2008

Reason:  Applique Class

Fabrics:  The leaves and stem piece were provided by the class teacher, a friend from LBCQ.

Lessons:  Needle turn applique, piped borders

Thoughts:  This is one of my first attempts at machine quilting - I only had a walking foot back then.  I wanted to continue the stems and leaves into the quilting.

This is actually a bit of an emotional wall hanging.  The leaves that my friend provided were leftovers from a quilt that she made while sitting in the hospital at her husband's side.  Using the same pieces that my friend did during a very hard time in her life reminds me that life is precious.  I just can't take it for granted.

My friend's quilt (called Lifelines) and her story is in the book Little Bits of Comfort.

Jane's

Quilting for a quilter is always intimidating.  These are paper pieced

Dominic in the Dell

Date:  May 2012

Reason:  I have collected a lot of eye spy fabrics.  I wanted to put a little boy's quilt together.  I was also secretly hoping it would tickle the fancy of my friend who has a little boy.

Fabric:  I've been collecting fabrics from so many sources for so long.  Many of them have been precut to 4" squares for ease of use later on.

Lessons:   This is only the second piece that I've machine quilted using a darning foot.  I need to remember to keep the needle in the down position when shifting the quilt and to hold the quilt firmly in place when starting again to make sure it doesn't move.  There are a lot of little jaggedy lines that I'm sure will go away with practice!

Thoughts:  I love machine quilting!!  Must do more!!

Jen's

One Christmas, everyone got potholders.  It was when I first started quilting.  I wanted to practice making individual blocks.  It seemed like a good fit to make them all into potholders.  These are Jen's.  I enjoyed using DMC floss to quilt them.

Lessons in Blue

Alternate Title:  Privately I called this quilt "Evil Quilt of Doom".  I was pregnant at the time.  Tears came often.


Pattern:  I drew this pattern four times before I was happy with it.


Date:  Top finished 2006


Size:  64 x 80


Inspiration:  Precut fabrics were donated to LBCQ.  I finally had a sewing machine of my own so I volunteered to take them home and play.


Special Fabrics:  Some of the fabrics were starched, some were super stretchy.  My favourite was a green fabric with bugs and the yellow fabric with frogs.


Lessons Learned:  When sewing 2 pieces together, the bottom piece will stay the same, but the top piece can stretch out a little.

To match seams, put a needle through the 2 seams.

When designing a quilt, attempt to put together pieceable squares that can then be fitted together. ( I was working with pre-cut squares that I was doing my best not to further cut down.  This resulted in a lot of T-seams.  For a beginner quilter, it was very trying.)


Thoughts:  A member of LBCQ machine quilted this and it was sold at an MCC auction for approx $70.