Explorers

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Explorers

April 2024

These cute little explorers were among the fabric I received from Jocelyn over at Happy Cottage Quilter. I fussy cut them, and then dug into my scraps bins to make the string and four-patch blocks. The backing fabric is a print of boats, telescopes and compasses – everything an explorer needs for a grand adventure.

As a sailor, backpacker and general fan of the great outdoors, this saying speaks to me:

“Not all who wander are lost”
                            — J.R.R. Tolkien

Well in my case, not always. There was one backpacking trip when my husband and I were lost, but only for a little while. While training for the John Muir Trail (JMT) back in 2009, we hiked Canyon’s Cottonwood and Marble Canyon Loop trail in Death Valley, a 28-mile cross country hike. For those that aren’t hikers, cross country hiking means that there are no posted route signs marking the way, and you must rely on the topo map and compass. We did have a SPOT GPS tracker with us in case of an emergency.

We went in January, when the weather is nice – not too hot during the day, and not too cold at night. It’s also a time of year when there are fairly reliable water sources along the trail. The first day was pretty uneventful as the trail follows mostly along a 4 wheel off-road trail. Day 2 is when the cross country navigation begins. We did fine until the afternoon, when instead of going over a ridge and dropping into Deadhorse Canyon, we turned too soon and began descending into a dry slot canyon, mistaking it for Deadhorse Canyon. We were probably a half mile down the hillside when the rocks and boulders became nearly impassable and we determined that we had taken a wrong turn coming off the ridge. While we may have been able to scramble down the dry slot canyon back to the prior day’s 4 wheel off-road trail, the risk of hiking a dry slot canyon was not one we were willing to take. These canyons are extremely dangerous in the event of rain: in the desert, they become dangerous, raging rivers. We decided to turn around and head back to the ridge – the point where we believed we had gotten off course.

It was late afternoon at this point, and we felt it would be safer to set camp and get a fresh start in the morning. As the sun was setting, we saw wild horses on the ridge, not a 1/4 mile distant. It was an amazing sight, and had we not gotten temporarily off course, perhaps a sight we would not have seen otherwise (not saying being lost was a good thing, just seeing the horses was pretty cool).

The next morning we headed back to the top of the ridge and found our way to Deadhorse Canyon, which led down through Marble Canyon (pictured below) and back to our car.

I have no plan yet for where this baby quilt will find its forever home. I’m looking into local charities that serve kids in need.

Betty B

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Betty B
March 2024

My very first blog post over ten years ago included Aunt Betty’s 9 Patch quilt that had been started by my Great Aunt Betty, many, many years ago. I inherited this as a “flimsy” sometime in the last millennia (wow, that’s fun to say), and, based on the fabric, I would guess that she had made it sometime in the 1940’s. It was twin size, and unfortunately, wasn’t very well sewn. At that time, I disassembled down to the block level, selected the best of the 9 patch blocks and reassembled into a lap size quanket. 

Fast forward another ten years.

This year, I’m making an effort to rid myself of all the offcuts that I’ve accumulated from making quilts for the past ten years (somewhere approaching 150). The remaining blocks from Aunt Betty were still sitting in my “whatchagonnadowiththis” pile, so I disassembled the remaining 9-patch blocks down to the original 9 squares, and recut everything to a consistent 4″x4″ size. As I was ripping seams and re-cutting blocks, I thought a lot about how much easier we quilters have it now: when Aunt Betty made this, she didn’t have a rotary cutter or a grid line cutting mat. She would have used a template, shears, and relied on a steady hand. My prior comment about not being “sewn well” is humbled.

I didn’t have enough 4″ squares from her original flimsy to make another lap size quilt, so I pulled from my scraps and stash to fill in the gaps. The backing fabric was some I received from Jocelyn over at Happy Cottage Quilter back in 2022. Her sending me the box stuffed full of fabric goodies is like the gift that just keeps on giving!

My Great Aunt Betty was married to my paternal Grandmother’s brother. While I don’t remember much about Aunt Betty and Uncle Harlan, I do recall that when they visited (which was always a surprise visit, much to my mother’s chagrin), he would give us kids the “spare change” from his pockets, and his pockets were always heavy with change! I also recall that Aunt Betty never divulged her true age.

“One should never trust a woman who tells one her real age. A woman who would tell one that would tell one anything.”
— Oscar Wilde

Funny. I’m the exact opposite. I have no qualms telling my real age (go 63!) and I probably share way too much of my truth (I just find it makes it easier for me to keep the story straight). Aunt Betty avoided telling her actual age for so many years, that in her later years, when dementia set-in, even she didn’t know how old she was. I kind of like that.

All Star

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All Star

February 2024

For the past two years, I’ve been making an effort to use only my stash and scraps for making quilts and quankets, as I have no shortage of either! I do bend this self-imposed restriction when my artistic-self tells me that purchasing that ‘just right’ fabric is necessary.

Last month, my design of Homecoming began with orphan blocks and was then rounded out with scraps. This quilt – All Star – also started with orphan blocks that I had received from Jocelyn over at Happy Cottage Quilter. She had given me two blue and two beige/golden strip blocks that got me started. I then made 28 more from my scraps: strip blocks are a great scrap-buster. The darker red border was also inspired from a few random orphan blocks of mine. I dug into my scraps boxes to make enough to complete the border.
TIP reusing dryer fabric sheets works great for backing/stabilizer for strip blocks.

I decided to bend my self-imposed ‘no new fabric’ edict, and purchased a fun dark blue with white stars for the backing fabric. I quilted an echoed star design – done on my circa 1950’s Singer domestic sewing machine. Figuring the math for quilting a star was taxing, but who doesn’t love pentagon geometry with 72 and 108 degree angles! (me, that’s who). I used 1.5″ blue tape as my quilting ruler. The lines aren’t perfectly straight, but perfect is overrated don’t you think? Here’s a look at the back: I quilted one star with a gold thread in the bobbin and all the echoes are done in a dark blue thread in the bobbin.

I have no plan yet for where this quilt will find its forever home. I’m looking into local charities that serve kids in need.

Homecoming

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Homecoming
January 2024

Since receiving a box stuffed full of various fabrics from Jocelyn over at Happy Cottage Quilter back in 2022, I continue to incorporate her scraps where I can. The box she sent was stuffed to overflowing with small scraps, a few orphan blocks and a few larger backing-sized fabrics. I’ve featured two of her orphan pinwheel blocks in the center of this baby quilt and made two more of my own to complement her two. I then used other orphan blocks from past projects of mine, including some from, Onshore Breeze and Palahdee. I think that all these orphan blocks have joined together quite nicely into this “homecoming”.

My plan is to set this aside for now to include in this year’s Hands2Help Challenge, which is usually hosted by Sarah over at Confessions of a Fabric Addict.

Walk in the Woods

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Walk in the Woods
January 2024

I finally finished my Jacquelynne Steves Secret Garden BOM from Summer 2022! While I had completed the top in 2022, I spent most of 2023 looking for that “just right” backing fabric, but was having no luck. I finally got the push I needed to get this off my UFO rack when a local group was wanting donations for the holiday season for the Good Shepard Shelter, a long-term treatment and education-based shelter for women and their children who are healing from domestic violence. So, I gave up looking for the “just right” backing fabric and finished this as a quanket (fleece backed).

The main character of the quilt pattern was supposed to be fairies, but I decided to use a gnome as my main character instead. However, I did give a nod to the fairy with my small blue fairy in the bottom right corner. I used fabric paint for the center pieces, and the butterflies were pre-made appliques. A funny story on those: my nephew received them accidentally with an order he got from a big name online retailer. The retailer told him to just keep them (cheaper than shipping back), so I lucked out and he gave me five boxes full of colorful applique butterflies! I thought they worked perfect with the woodlands theme. 

If you are interested in making a similar quilt, the digital pattern can be purchased from Jacquelynne’s online shop at https://jacquelynnesteves-shop.com/collections/digital-patterns/products/the-secret-fairy-garden-block-of-the-month-quilt-pattern-digital?fbclid=IwAR1iBfZzpry0eykKsxWs2mPy34OofqrWOiagABhnHDNux1lmurKDbuylaUU

 

Humpty’s Tulips

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Humpty’sTulips
December 2023

This year has been a year of many changes. Back in January, my Dad relocated to an assisted living facility that is 200 miles closer to me than where he had previously lived: he’s now about 15 miles away. With him being closer, I now not only get the time to hangout and visit with him more often, but I’m also available to help him with his doctor’s appointments, which are abundant. As such, my time has become much more limited this year for my hobbies — sailing, sewing and gardening.

But, this wasn’t the only “change” for the year. At the beginning of September, while doing some landscaping with rocks* to create a border in my garden, when positioning a rock, it unexpectedly shifted on me, and it ended up crushing the distal bone in my right ring finger. Yeap, unfortunately, I’m right hand dominant. So, no sailing, no sewing and no gardening for over two months. Yikes, that’s an eternity.

Five fragments broken off the distal bone required two surgeries and five pins to put Humpty back together again. And, lots of occupational therapy, which still continues. I was able to begin <slowly and carefully> sewing and gardening in November, and in addition to this quanket, I was able to get some tulip bulbs planted in my garden.

I decided to create a memory of this year’s journey, and tie my love of gardening and sewing together by making this tulip quilt. It’s not a bad memory, but just a “life happens” memory that I want to document here in my blog.

Most of the fabrics I used are from my scraps bins. Some, including the heart fabric used in the top and bottom borders, was some I received from Jocelyn over at Happy Cottage Quilter. I finished this as a fleece-backed quanket and it has been donated to the Good Shepard Shelter, a long-term treatment and education-based shelter for women and their children who are healing from domestic violence.

I also want to acknowledge all the help that my husband provided during the time that my right hand was out of commission. He took on the full roll of being chef and sous chef – we usually work together as a team to get dinner on the table. He was also great at taking instructions on gardening chores that needed to be tended to – if you’re a gardener, you understand that some things need to be done, regardless if your hands are working or not.

And, fret not, we returned to sailing in November as well. We won’t have as many ‘sail days’ as last year, but heck, that’s okay. I’m always thankful for any and all the sail days we get!

*rock or boulder, that is the question – it seems that boulders are rocks that are >50 pounds. I believe my “culprit rock” is somewhere in the 40-50 pound range. I’ll never know, as I have absolutely no intentions of handling that rock any further to determine its weight!

Seashore Treasures

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Seashore Treasures
June 2023

I made this Simply Serene quilt using scraps from my scraps bins and scraps that I had received from Jocelyn over at Happy Cottage Quilter. While I missed the cutoff to include this quilt in this year’s Hands2Help Challenge, hosted by Sarah over at Confessions of a Fabric Addict, I plan to include this with the other three quilts I’ll be sending to Little Lambs Foundation in Utah. Little Lambs Foundation provides backpacks full of comfort items for children from newborn to 17 who are transitioning into foster care, emergency shelters, or hospitalization. This year’s Hands2Help Challenge generated over 625 donation quilts!

The backing fabric is one I’ve had in my stash for a long time. It’s a beautiful turquoise color with seashells printed in white. The manufacturer name on the salvage is Leon B Rosenblatt Textiles LTD. The company dates back to the 1950’s and appears to still be in business, based out of NYC. I inherited this fabric from my Granny and would guess that it is from the late 1960’s – early 1970’s, but that’s just a guess.

Poppy

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Poppy
June 2023

This quilt has been in process since late 2021, when I began hand embroidering the flower design on the red poppy print blocks. In early 2022, I completed piecing it (on sewing machine). Since I wanted to hand quilt it, by the time summer came around, I had little interest in having a quilt draped on me while hand quilting. By October, the weather had cooled enough, but it still took a few months to get it across the finish line. I finally finished it earlier this year, but hadn’t taken time to write a post about it, as I was more anxious to see it on the bed for which I had intended it!

During the hand quilting stage, I made a makeshift quilting frame by attaching a curtain rod to the wall (immediately below the window in picture). I used my ironing board to other side to create the side-to-side tension. Being the first time doing hand quilting, I had no frame of reference (nor quilting frame – haha) for how to go about hand quilting, but I thought my makeshift set-up worked pretty well and I was happy with it.

The red poppy print fabric was some that was handed down to me from my Granny. I’ve had it in my stash for many years, knowing that I wanted to make something special with it. I’ve also wanted to make a redwork quilt for several years, and this seemed to be the perfect place to use the fabric. I purchased Kona cotton in wine and ivory colors to compliment the print. The quilt pattern was part of a 2014 Quilt-a-Day calendar, and is called Underground Railroad Quilt by Debby Kratovil, © 2013. While the calendar had the pattern notated as such, I personally wonder if it had been a typo, as it doesn’t look like a traditional Underground Railroad Quilt, but closer to a modified version of a Jacob’s Ladder quilt.

This Teal’s on Fire

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Donation Blocks for This Teal’s on Fire
June 2023

Once again, Kate over at Tall Tales from Chiconia is preparing an Ovarian Cancer charity quilt for the Trudy Crowley Foundation fund-raiser to be held later this year (in Australia). The theme for this year’s donation quilt is This Teal’s on Fire, a play on words of the Bob Dylan song This Wheel’s on Fire. The idea is to create the impression of a flicker of flame on teal ‘wheels’ across the quilt.

I’ve been wanting to try my hand at making New York Beauty blocks, so this gave me the perfect opportunity! I have to say, I got a lot of enjoyment out of making these blocks. I haven’t done curved piecing before – other than in garment sewing – nor have I had much experience with Y-seams. Both were a new and interesting learning process. I consider myself fairly proficient at math, but the geometry involved in arcs wearies my brain! The first block I created was the one that needed the Y-seams, so in addition to trying to get a handle on the geometry for the arcs, I also had to get the Y-seams lined up correctly. Yikes. There was a lot of time spent with Jack. However, this wasn’t the only block that required adjustments, and readjustments to the seams to get everything to work out. Alas, I have to say, I learned quite a lot along the way, and feel a bit more confident in making New York Beauty blocks.

I participate in this group quilt project each year in honor of my sister who had breast cancer and her sister-in-law that had ovarian cancer.

And, TADA! Here’s This Teal’s on Fire.

Raggedy Ann

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Raggedy Ann
May 2023

I made this quilt for this year’s Hands2Help Challenge, hosted by Sarah over at Confessions of a Fabric Addict. During last year’s Hands2Help Challenge, Jocelyn over at Happy Cottage Quilter suffered a shoulder injury and asked if I would finish some baby quilts on her behalf. When she sent the baby quilt tops that I finished into Polka Party 1-4, she also sent a box stuffed full of scrap fabrics and remnant pieces. One of the remnant pieces was some Raggedy Ann and Andy fabric, which I’ve incorporated here.

Raggedy Ann (and Andy) are a fond memory of mine. When I was four years old, my Granny taught me to sew – much to the dismay of my Mom as she was concerned I would be impaled by a sewing needle. When I was around 12 years old, my Granny helped me sew the Raggedy Ann and Andy pictured below. After fifty years, aside from some thinning of the black fabric for their shoes, they’re in pretty good condition!

I will be sending the Raggedy Ann quilt to Little Lambs Foundation based in Utah, who are one of the handful of recipients of this year’s Hands2Help challenge comfort quilts. Little Lambs Foundation provides backpacks full of comfort items for children from newborn to 17 who are transitioning into foster care, emergency shelters, or hospitalization.