I'm finally finished!

Here is my "Glory" quilt all finished after four solid months of hand quilting.

This was a BOM in my quilt group - Bound Together.  We called it 'Block in the Spotlight'.  If you'll notice the center block of the outside squares are all the same pattern.  You chose what you wanted for the center block.  Some used Rail Fence, some used previously made applique blocks, some chose Log Cabin.  It was all up to you.  

Then each month we would hand out a different pattern for the border.  We did hearts, hourglass blocks, Storm At Sea, Stars etc.  We only did it for a year so there were 12 blocks.  I chose to put mine together with this center star from American Patchwork and Quilting called 'Shades of Spring' from April 2008.  And, I added the hexagons surrounding the star.

This picture is a little fuzzy but it shows some of the other blocks.  There are 16.

And this is the backing (upside down).  A beautiful piece of yardage from French General that I found on sale.  The quilt measures about 80" square.

As I was sorting through stacks in my sewing room I came across some fabric I had set aside a long time ago and the pattern for a little quilt above.  It is found in the book 'quick-method QUILTS' by Leisure Arts 1994.  It was my first quilt making book.

As you can see I'm using a much paler fabric than the original.  It is from the line "Patterns of History" by Barbara Brackman around 2004.  

Here is the Ice Cream Cone border all cut out and ready to assemble.  I got lots of yardage on a clearance sale and so I used the lavenders, blues, and greens to make the quilt below.  And I saved the pinks for later.

It won't take long to assemble it now and then I can start the hand quilting.  It will be a take-a-long project.

I got my 'Mayfair' quilt back from the machine quilter.  It is made from Valentine fabric by Deb Strain.  Since it is a Valentine theme I named it after my favorite See's chocolate.

I need to trim it and add the binding and then it will be done after sitting in the closet for a very long time.   I found the top fabric - 2 jelly rolls, on sale at Material Girls. It took quite a while to make all those HSTs.   

-pieced backing-

  Then I found the backing fabric from a newer line by Deb Stain on clearance.  So with all this reduced price fabric it would seem like I made a quilt quite inexpensively. . .

But no, the quilt is 85" X 93" and I took in in to be machine quilted.  

They did a very nice job and it's not sitting in the closet any more.  I took this top in to be machine quilted because I knew I would never get around to hand quilt it.  I took in another quilt to be machine quilted when I picked this one up this week.  That's two rather complicated quilts that I won't have to dread quilting so I can get to work on the fun ones.

I've decided I need to stop making such big quilts that take hours and days and months to quilt.  Or I need to save my money so I can have someone else do it - ha!

Robin

Eventually. . .

 Just wanted to share some of my progress.  Hand quilting something is really a labor of love. 

 

This week it was hard to motivate myself to work on it.  But I'll finish another row tomorrow and there's only two more to go after that.  

Spring is trying to make an appearance here in this mountain valley.  It will be warm this week, getting up into the 70's but I don't trust that winter is gone.  Even though it's been a mild winter (as Rocky Mountain winters go) I don't think "Old Man Winter" has finished with us. 

 It gets warm enough for the fruit trees to blossom and then it freezes most of them  It happens every year. 

Robin

I sneaked a little project in

 Not much going on here.

I work 5-6 days a week on the quilt on the frames (in the column on the right).  I've been hand quilting it for almost 3 months so far.  It's turning out great.  My fingers and wrists. . . not so much.

I banned myself from the sewing machine for the month of February.  If I'm ever going to catch up quilting the closet full of tops, I'm going to have to stop making them.  (Where's the fun in that?) 

I decided to make a small quilt this month.  Just something I could do a little at a time, no pressure.  And I would only let myself work on it after I had done my daily stint at the quilt frames.

This is what I came up with.

It's from a pattern called "Brown Bird" by Renee Plains that I bought when I first started quilting in the early century. I've been wanting to make this and the pattern has been up on my cork board for the longest time. . . 

 I was going for a more primitive look with browns and neutrals.  I picked from my stash and got busy.

But, it was really ugly, no diluting the truth!  Even my friends, who were trying to be nice, had nothing good to say about it.

So I gave it some brighter colors and now it has an Easter Egg feel to it.  That wasn't my goal but it's appropriate for this time of year.  I'll go with it.  I'll quilt it by machine around the squares and by hand inside of them.  No hurry, I'm still concentrating mainly on the quilt on the frames.

Robin

What I've learned this past year

 I absolutely loved the post on Spiral's blog this morning.  You can just feel the joy in her written word as she describes things coming together after a long long year.

I don't really feel like 2020 was necessarily wasted here at my house.  I feel like I learned a lot about myself.  And I've accepted things about my personality that I've tried to fix or remove in the past.  I'm more focused on the things that are important in the long run.  I've stopped anxiously making my house ready for that unexpected visitor (that never came last year).  It is so freeing - is that a word?

I also accomplished a lot toward organizing my boxes and boxes of family history that I inherited when my mother died 22 years ago.  It was a mammoth project but luckily I had a whole year to devote to it.  I'm in the process of writing a short biography of my mother (just 10 pages) and then I can box it all up for the next generation.  And, they will be in a lot better shape than I was when they go through it because most of the pictures are LABELED.

I have also compiled and transcribed all my journals so they are all in one (well, three) notebook.

The only thing I have left is one box to go through, sort it in 6 piles for my 6 children, and pass it on.

I've tried to use the time to learn, to improve, to be a good companion to my husband.  I'm not perfect, (that's still going to take some work) but I've tried to be better.  I've learned more about him too because we've had the same schedule day after day.  He's still interesting, annoying, and wonderful.

I'm a little anxious to go out into the world again.  I'm an introvert by nature, so going out in crowds has never been one of my favorite things.  But, I think I'll find more things to appreciate, more smiles, more laughter, more freedom, more variety, more hope.  I think I'll even cherish the sad, the dirty, the uncomfortable because it means we're together.

What have you learned this past year while you had to stay home?

Robin

As I went through my pictures from last year to find a few to put in this post. . . they are almost all just quilting pictures.  There are not very many pictures of people, 5 maybe.  I think that's really telling of what the year was like.

Heart Day

Taken at Santa Monica Beach 1946

                           Today is the 75th Wedding Anniversary of by parents;  Bill and Colleen

It was always a special day at our house because we all got to celebrate.  My dad would buy those little heart shaped boxes that have chocolates in them.  Then he would take out the chocolates and fill them with M&Ms, take them secretly outside and place them on the porch, ring the doorbell, and run.  You remember kicking Valentines?  Anyway, we would run to the door, find our heart, and the fact that Dad was coming in the backdoor at the same time never clicked.  

Hope your day is nice and that you'll be able to hug the one's you love.

Robin

I had a friend that called this "Single Awareness Day".  But I think it's for everybody because we all love someone.

Antique quilts, suppositions, and Maxfield Parrish

 I am still going through papers and pictures I have inherited.  Look what I found today.

I found an inventory of household goods that had to be sold to pay off debts from my great great grandfather  Daniel N. Davidson 1821-1893.  He lived in Hendricks County Indiana.

In the picture above, about 1/2 way down you can see 12 quilts listed  with 10 Comforts above and 9 sheets below.  (a goodly amount of bedding)  Also, if you look across the page, the quilts are valued at $4.00 and sold at $2.00.  GASP!

This was back in a time when only men owned property and so it seems that my poor great great grandmother had all her household goods sold out from under her.   The list also included a cook stove, lamps, bedsteads, a sewing machine, clocks, tables, and a rocker. (Lots of other things. . . . )

(Just realized my great great grandmother died two years earlier.  Makes me feel a lot better than she didn't have to loose all her possessions.)

In this picture of the list is 1 organ.  It wasn't sold.  I'm not sure why it wasn't sold but it makes me wonder if there were other things that were not sold or not on this list.  I don't know how heavy-handed those making the decisions were about what she could keep or what needed to be sold.  It could just be that nobody wanted it as it was valued at $10.00

Anyway, I have inherited that organ and it is pictured below.

Oh, I just noticed there is a small "x" penciled in next to the word organ.  As I looked down the list there is a small  "x" next to Comforts and next to the Quilts and at the very bottom of the list next to the Gold Watch.  Hmmmmm?

I do have an old Indigo and white feathered star quilt that I have wondered if this great great grandmother made it.  I think it would have been made during her lifetime.  

Elizabeth Dent Davidson 1830-1891

There are so many things to learn from old papers and photos but usually they create more questions as well as answering the original ones.

I

Today we had a morning sky right out of a Maxfield Parrish painting.  Quite lovely~

Robin

Closer to being done and aching joints

 I've been working on the Comfort & Joy quilt since November.  I finished the inner part today.

It's smaller than I was expecting at 47 1/2" X 62".

It needs a border and the one on the pattern has more applique.  Between hand sewing in long stretches and the side-effects of my Covid shot,  my hands are really sore.  Well. . . . all my joints are sore.  So this little quilt isn't going to get an appliqued border.  

One idea is to sew three borders on it.  First a stop border, then a border of 2 1/2" assorted squares of the fabrics used in the middle, and then a larger border of the same fabric as the stop border.  I was hoping to use up my box of Christmas scraps from my mother's 90's stash but you know how that goes!  I think I have more than I had when I started - ha!

I don't have any pieces of fabric that are large enough for the border so I'll have to do some shopping.  I was going to go find some today but I've got a fever so I figured I better stay away from others.

I had Covid in June.  I've heard those that have had Covid 19 have a more difficult time with side effects from the vaccine. My son, who is a teacher, says the teachers that he works with, that had Covid, are having a harder time.  Not good news but it helps to know what to expect, I guess.

Robin