So nice to be quilting again

forgot what a stress reliever it is for me.

Although, having a pile of quilts waiting to be quilted can be stressful...go figure.

One less to do now.  

I'm going to put the binding on it tonight. I will probably have to machine it both front and back as my left thumb is on the verge of splitting again and I know hand stitching the binding down will do it in for sure.

A while back Carol over at Brown Quilts emailed me with a project idea. She wanted to make a quilt top, send it to me to be quilted and then have me donate here in the Pittsburgh area.  

 I thought that was a great idea.  

Carol sent a beautiful top made with soft flannels.

I quilted an all-over wave-y swirl. 

Tomorrow I will be dropping it off at the Community Outreach chair for my quilt guild.  There is a new shelter opening this winter and they've asked the area guilds for quilts.  

This one will keep someone in need very warm indeed!

Thank you, Carol, for reaching out so generously!  

When I drop off our quilt, I'll be picking up some more Quilts for Kids tops that need quilting--yeah I  gripe that I'm so busy, but I'm healthy and have more than I need--shame on me for the gripes whether out loud or in my head.

For your viewing pleasure...

...and the continuation of my documenting my quilts.
 This little wall quilt I made in 1995, it's hand appliqued and the bow was attached after the quilt was finished. This is the 2nd one I made.  The first one my SIL made such a fuss over-I was compelled to give it to her.  This is one of those quilts that never seem to lose its appeal for me. I just love seeing it every fall.

This is an oven mitt.  I never use is, just hang it on a cabinet knob every October and put it away when the Christmas decorations come out. It was a project from a LQS in 2003, called The 3rd Saturday of the Month Club. You paid a small fee in January and got your first little project. Then as long as you brought the completed project into the shop the 3rd Saturday of the following month; you got the next month's pattern free.

This is the quilt on my bed right now, made in 1997.  It's all flannels even the backing.  The pillow panel at top is cottons.  I machine appliqued those using a loose zig zag stitch. This was before I had a machine with the blanket-stitch. There was no way I was doing all that by hand. It's one of the few quilts I've tied. 

This is a lap size 'raggy seams' quilt I made in 2004.  The front is all homespun's, the back is mostly denim from the kids' worn out jeans. It was amazing how little usable denim is left from kids jeans after removing seams and holes in the knees etc.  I had to go to a thrift store and buy some large men's jeans to make up the difference.

This is a Little Quilt (literally and patterningly as well). It is only 13" x 17". I hand quilted it.

I just love this little guy too. As I've started to document these quilts.  I'm finding some of them haven't been labeled... GASP!  Bad, Diane, bad. 

And in this process am seeing first hand why it's so important.  --It's a pain in the butt to go through 4" ringbinders of patterns and notes to try to find the date that I took a class (that quilts further down) or in this little quilts case looking back through my quilting photo albums.

Much easier to just flip the bottom up and read the label. 

This is another Little Quilt, scrappy 9-patch made January 2004.

This little winter door hanger I made in 2005.  The pattern was in Amer. Patchwork Mag. in 2004. 

 He hangs on our door almost all year.  Annie will use her nose to ring his little jingle bell to get our attention when she needs to go out.  Our 1st westie, Haley, taught her that, but Haley rang the sleigh bells  on the hinge side of the front door.  It, too, was a holiday decoration, that stays up year-round.  

Annie will hit the big ones first, but if we don't jump up within 30-40 seconds.....she'll start flipping the snowman.  Sometimes we just watch her do it, cracks us up. 

And finally, my no diamonds Lone Star. It's made with HST.  I think 5/2005 is when I made it.  It doesn't have a label, and the class notes just have 4/29 on the top of one of the pages (in my hand writing).  I don't remember and didn't have a picture of it in my photo album.  Wow, I really dropped the  archival ball on this one.

The "design wall"

This is my design wall the little maple leaf quilt is ready for quilting, I will probably just do it quick on my 4.0, I've never tried the built-in stipple stitch. I got this little kit on my quilt bus tour and am glad another project I bought is getting done. 

The 3 embroidery blocks are up there only because I found them in a drawer a few weeks ago.  I made a bunch of these while oldest son was in Iraq, I think the 1st time.  I had more of them (all with different little sayings) but used them for gifts, pillows etc.  These are what's left.  They'll probably get taken down and put away again, until inspiration strikes.  

The other 2 blocks are orphans. 

On Saturday I finally loaded my Spring Journey sampler quilt on HQ but have yet to start. I figure I can work on it a little, while waiting for the dang turkey to thaw. haha.   I've marked the huge setting triangles with the spines for feathers and will probably quilt the blocks and sashing "as the quilting spirit" moves me as I go along.  I know once I start on this, I won't want to stop.  (Its an illness, I know.....)

A few fall quilts

I've always taken pictures of my finished quilts. I'm getting close to 200 quilts in my 20+ years of quilting. (I'm counting everything here--anything quilted).  And I'll bet there are only 1 or 2 that I didn't snap a photo of.   Now before our house joined the digital camera age, and that was only a few years ago; I would take some pictures of a completed quilt with my 35mm, have to wait until they were developed and then sometimes the results weren't so hot and I'd either say 'oh well' or do it over again. How wonderful it is to take a picture and get to immediately delete a bad shot.  I have 2 photo albums with all my quilts and a little description along with each quilt.  But now I'm trying to get them all in the computer.  I've tried scanning them in but they are so grainy I've never been happy with the results and I don't know if it's my pictures, my scanner, my computer....and frankly I don't have the patience to figure it out.  So what I've been doing is as the seasons change and I rotate the quilts I'm taking new pictures,  I thought I'd just post a little fall quilt show here. I think most were made in the last 8-10 years. This first one is a Little Quilts design.  I think is was called For the Bears.

All the little triangle squares that were cut off from the flying geese on the pumpkin runner I used in the pinwheels topper.  I just couldn't throw them away.

This is from Little Quilts. It's one of my favorite quilts. The colors in the photo are a little washed out.

This is a Pat Sloan "tall and skinny"

This is a Little Quilt as well.

This is a Thimbleberries design. 
I could look at quilts all day.  Not just mine, anybody's!  But I think it's time to start this day.  I'm taking my in-laws to a doctor appointment this afternoon.  I have twin nieces who are graduating from high school in the spring.  They are both excellent swimmers. Their mom gave me all their swimming t-shirts.  They would like quilts.  Just "generous twin-size".  Their mom doesn't want a traditional t-shirt quilt. She's thinking something that looks more like a collage. That's a good thing since there are 2 boxes for each girl and 50+ t-shirts each.  (They've been swimming since birth, well not quite but dang early).  I want these done before Christmas.  I'm very bad at putting projects like this off.