2 Big Projects Done

I’m here, really I am. I have been very busy, recently.

 

 

Isn’t this a beautiful quilt? It is 72 x 84 inches and titled “Waterfords Fields and Forest”. It is the opportunity quilt for the Waterford Quilters Guild. I have put approximately a billion stitches in it with many of the other guild members. I started last winter… maybe November by doing some of the Redwork embroidery on 2 blocks. The Cardinal and the Prairie Rose. When I got those done I volunteered to do one of the borders. All the blocks measure 12” finished.

I did one of the side borders, which measured some-where around 60

inches long. The picture on the right is just 3 of the border motifs, and the other is a close up of the one of the motifs. Each border has 2 different embroidery motifs that make up the 6 total.

The Quilt Committee worked hard getting the center blocks set and once the borders were done added them. And then the quilting began. This quilt is about 80% handmade. Some of the pieced blocks, I think were done by machine. The quilting on the entire quilt is done by hand. I quilted a block as well, and I think it was the rabbit, but I am not sure. I was so concerned with keeping the dog hair off, that the quilting part is a blur.

   

 

The last big hurdle was getting the binding on the quilt. “The Quilt Mom”, our member that took on getting the quilting done and keeping the schedule and getting it from one member to the next, called to say the binding was on, but still needed to be stitched to the back. I suggested that she come over, we’d put it on the cutting table and each take up a side and stitch until we got it done. Took the 2 of us a bit more than 2 hours to get it done. It was a very pleasant afternoon!!!

My next job was another large task. Every year we display the quilt and sell the tickets at several handcraft fairs, the largest and most exclusive being the Waterford Fair. The guild participates every year and most years there are requests for the pattern of the quilt. The pattern this year was designed by a guild member with the embroideries hand drawn of the plants and animals that are found around the little village of Waterford Virginia. So this year we have a pattern too. It was a group effort, one member did the directions for piecing the Virginal Star block, another member did the drawings and I formatted it.

The specifics of the pattern are: complete piecing instructions for the block, all 15 of the graphics you see on the actual quilt plus 4 additional graphics if you are not fond of one or four of them, all the graphics for the border and suggestion for the quilting. We are making it available in both the paper format (16 pages graphics must be enlarged) , above or a PDF format on CD or via email. The PDF is the paper patter plus all the graphics full size (40 pages). The Pattern is only $5 plus postage $1, (CD or paper). And if you are more interested in winning the quilt I can supply you with a ticket $1 or 6 for $5!!! Please just email me at baquilter (at) gmail (dot) com (fill in the missing symbols) for either a ticket or the pattern.

Oh and the drawing for the quilt will happen late afternoon on October 5th.

As Always- More Later! Beth

The Chicken Dance

I am still getting ready for the Thread Painting class in September. I have the elephant done, the flower basket done and the 3 flower piece done as far as it will be going…. Until after the class. I am toying with one more idea- either painted or done with TAP paper (to cheat and not have to paint)…. But before I could do that I had to finish a really fun project that I have been working on for a year. Really a little longer than that… because I started it in late 2009, but the original plan did not work… so it waited until I was ready to make it into something else.

You will remember this part, I posted it … as a top in June 2013.

 

It done and has a name… I have decided to call it “Foul Play on the Dance Floor” and it now has a label, too. The red and white checker board did not work very well with the Chickens. So I turned it into this quilt, which while it reminds me of a chess/checker board, has nothing to with Chickens, but we can still have fun with a name! The Foul in this is, aside from the design errors, the thread I used to quilt it…. OMG, I will never use this brand again… break break break… while Free Motioning… the thread did not mind the Accufeed, (Janome’s name for the walking foot) at all, though. Too bad my construction was not quite spot on… Oh well… I just didn’t want to waste the fabric… so I made it work!

and now Part II of the original design has been finished too.

The whole time I was working on it, it brightened the room. I am beginning to think, I like bright…. bright, bright!

It is titled “Foul Play at the Chicken Dance”. Anyone that has been to a wedding had done the Chicken Dance (or at lease seen it performed). There was some foul play along the way… like, after having my sewing machine service, the tech did not wipe down all the areas where grease (black grease), did not belong. So I had to remake 2 of the borders Also on the back is the leftover chicken that did not make it to the front. He has a broken heart, because as is often a case –or as so many novels and movies portray, a new relationship …. may end and another bloom at a wedding. Another foul, I did not consider… was that the wool batting would not block the front from showing through… Oh well… I wanted to use wool because I have it… (you can see the front… coming through).

I sent it to a long armer for quilting. It does make me want my own long arm even more!

       

Two of the chickens… and a bit of a border.

I was going to bead the chickens, but they really didn’t become any more special with the beads, so I removed what I had on it.

And to end… while I was trying to get some pictures of the Chix…. Linzi decided she wanted to be photographed and a not so great picture of Axel, with his totally healed ear!!! Hooray!

      

More Later-Beth