Quilt Wrap Up - 2021

As has been pretty darn obvious, I have been away from the blog for a few months. Life just got crazy and I had to make decisions on how to spend my waking hours. Blogging was put on the back burner, and I'm ok with that. 

When I made that decision, I vowed to post some pictures near the end of the year to share some of my projects. I guess I can't get any nearer to the end of the year than this, can I?.  hahaha 

So here it goes... lots of pictures and some explanations and in no particular order. There were other projects, but I chose a handful to share. Here's to hoping 2022 is more blogger friendly for me.  :-) 

Isn't this beautiful?

These sets are just one side of a pattern I recently tested for Myra of Busy Hands Quilts. Let me introduce you to Belle!

I have to say that I fell in love with this quilt while making it. I love all the fabrics and how I was given free rein to place them as I wanted. I will admit that scrappy, even controlled scrappy, is not always easy for me. I am working on that and beginning to enjoy the process and results more each time I do it. 

I made a few other quilts for Myra and have enjoyed them all. Patterns are available for all of these. Here's the link to her website - Busy Hands Quilts

This is Forever Stars. This is a very easy quilt to construct and I love the results. I've made two of these for Myra and one that I gave away as a Quilt of Valor. Do I have pictures of those? Of course not. I guess my picture taking was put aside like my blogging. 

This is a queen size Brick Cottage Lane 2 and it is beautiful. There is a consistent white background fabric, but everything else is a variety of batiks. As with all of Myra's patterns, the pattern includes multiple size options. This pattern also provides instructions for two different construction methods - strip piecing, which I used, and cutting and sewing a zillion individual bricks.  

This next quilt is also queen size and since I didn't have a large enough space to take a picture, I folded it and am only showing one quarter of it. (My quilt holder/namer/helper - AKA Jack, wasn't available to help with this. 😊) This is Calliope. I love this color variation, but it is also stunning in other colorways. Be sure to check out the samples that Myra has on the website. I am kind of partial to the quilt that is dark blue, mint green, and red. 

This next picture really does not do the quilt justice; and for some reason, I didn't take any other pictures of it. Shoot! I'll share one of Myra's pictures so you can see it in all it's glory. 

This is My Farmhouse and it is beautiful! Do you recognize the fabrics? These are the same ones used in Belle that I shared above. The background looks like it's black, but it's really a beautiful navy solid. 

 

Who doesn't love taffy? There is a funny story that I have with my sisters that involves taffy and our mom. It's too long to share here, but let's just say that they often have taffy available when we are going to spend a lot of time together. 

So what does taffy have to do with quilting? Well, ever since our oldest sister Kathie turned 60, the other sisters make a quilt for them to celebrate their 60th birthday. We have always tried to make the quilt relate to the sister, so this year my clever sisters made me a taffy quilt! 

The pattern is called Taffy Twirl and I just love the quilt. Doesn't it look great on the bed? This has been used every night since I received it. 

A little break from my quilts...As many of you know, I am one of the organizers of the Ohio's Amish Country Quilt Festival that is held in September each year. After a very revised event in 2020, we returned to the event center, made adjustments to the layout, number of vendors and attendees, and opened the doors for an event in 2021. The facility is HUGE, which was great to accommodate the new spacing we needed to have. It still amazes me how we can go from this empty building... 

to this, in just two days of setting up booth, hanging quilts, etc. 

I was very happy with the results and attendance and am looking forward to returning to a "normal" event in 2022. 

As you know, I love to test patterns for Tammy Silvers. I think her patterns are fun and well-written. She introduced a new pattern named Jester back in the Fall, along with a signature fabric line for Island Batiks. I loved the fabric and pattern. 

Tammy was coming to an event at Chestnut Ridge Sewing and we needed a one-day project for her to do, so I suggested that we make a table runner or placemat version of Jester. She was on board with that, wrote up the instructions, and I tested them for her. Here are my versions, using scraps that I had on hand. 

Like many of you, I have projects that have been set aside for a variety of reasons. This next quilt was one of them. I know why it was set aside many years ago, but I could never bring myself around to finishing it. It was one of my first quilts started and while I had big plans for it, I just fell out of love with the fabrics. Every time I pulled it out to work on, it would end up back in the bag and set aside for another day.

Fast forward to this past October when I pulled out the bag (again!) and told myself that I either had to finish the project, give it away as is, or throw it away. Well throwing it away was not really an option and I wasn't sure that I wanted to hand this off to someone else to fix my mess. As you can see from the next couple of pictures, I think my fabric choices were questionable (quality as well as colors) and I really didn't pay attention to the "rules" of quilting. I guess 1/4" seams, proper pressing, and lining up fabric correctly were just suggestion that I chose to ignore. :-) 

I bit the bullet and got to work. I had to throw in a couple of additional fabrics to make up for some really poor quality ones and this is the result. 

While finishing this, I decided that I needed to make another one of these quilts. I still liked the pattern and felt I needed to "do it right" this time. I made a three color version and used only four fabrics. I love the results! 

I designed and made the Amish Shop Hop quilt and like the results. As with so many other things, the fabric was delayed in arriving so the quilt had to be made in a very short period of time. I was very happy that the layout and construction was quite simple this year. The quilt is 91" x 91" and I love the scallop border. I used the Krista Moser scallop tool, which made it simple to do.  

I told you earlier that I was embracing the scrap quilting process and to that end, I made a Wonky Wishes quilt. This is a Bonnie Hunter pattern and the construction is easy, but a bit time consuming. I don't have a picture of the finished quilt, but here it is prior to adding the sashing. To be honest, the quilt is still just a top because after putting it together at this size (my revision, not Bonnie's), I decided that I want to make it larger. I will be teaching this quilt at Country Fabrics in Feb. so the top is hanging there until then. I'm making additional blocks that will be used as step-out units for the class and then I'll add those to the top to make it larger.

Do you see my Brick Cottage Lane 2 strips on the left? I was working on both of these quilts at the same time.   

I know this was a lot of pictures, but I hope you enjoyed it. 

Happy New Year and here's to more blogging in 2022.