New Border for Feathered Star Quilt

Here's another design option for the border for the feathered star quilt I'm making out of the men's shirts. I was looking through "Pieced Borders, The Complete Resource" by Judy Martin and Marsha McCloskey for something with a little more "wow" factor than the plain plaid border in my earlier post.

This is called the "Big & Little Zigzag" border. The image shows it in all one blue, but in reality the border will be a mix of blues. And maybe not red for the little triangles, but that's the fun with envisioning it ahead of time. I might choose to do those in browns, or maybe greens.

I started on feathered star block #2 today, before it got too hot to iron the small pieces. I'll post a pic of the new block when it's all done.

Staying Cool with Swatches

Whew! Outside temperature here in Spanaway, WA was over 90 degrees today. I hope all of you out there in blogland are staying cool!

I wasn't venturing outside if I could help it, so I decided to spend some time cutting and gluing shirt swatches to some cardstock. This was another great idea from Laura (thanks, Laura!!), who still has more shirts in her stash! These three 8-1/2 x 11" sheets show 58 shirt swatches (if you count the little neutrals on the side).

I didn't really put a lot of planning into how these were put onto the cardstock - I'm sure Jinny Beyer would have been better at making the colors flow wonderfully from one to the next. I just wanted the ability to grab a card if I'm shirt shopping to be sure I'm getting colors that are new.

I was using Elmer's glue to secure these swatches, so you might notice the glue spots that hadn't dried yet on the fabric. I still have the neutrals to lay out, and there are more shirts to come. I'm going to slide these into sheet protectors and keep them handy in the car for those unexpected thrift store retail therapy sessions! :)

Disappearing 9-Patches on Their Way

I had a lot of fun sewing up the disappearing 9-patch blocks for Aunt Pitty Pat's swap. Here is a photo of them before I mailed them off.

I used a Moda charm pack (I think it was called Recess, but could have been something else) for some of the blocks, and some fabrics from the Bees Knees line from Maywood Studio. A few 30-ish repro prints were used to spread out the cheer.

I can't wait to see all the blocks in person that APP has been receiving and posting on her blog.

I may actually use a different layout than the standard given in the tutorial. I quilted a customer quilt who used this technique and then set the blocks with a sashing. It was really wonderful in Mary Englebreit prints. I'm going to play around w/ EQ5 and see what I can come up with. :)

Shirt Quilt Round One

Okay, so here's the plan I have for the shirts Laura and I collected to save into quilts. The first quilt will be made with my favorite block, the feathered Radiant Star!

I have made so many of these blocks in the past I can make them in my sleep. I decided that shirts, while humble, can still be recycled into something great - like be in a quilt like this! What do you think? Will it work?

To try it out, I had to make a sample block. I can make one block from scratch in 2 hours - now granted, I'm pretty quick at these because I like them so much and have made probably 50 in the past 2 years.

So, I took 3 shirts I liked (teal, rusty orange and yellow). I cut and pieced them into a wonderful block. But I wasn't too sure if I liked the end result. My mind was expecting more "scrappy" than "planned" but I was planning the colors.

And, using muslin as the background. I'm not sure I like the muslin by itself. Maybe need to use one of the neutral shirts we picked out. But I need to be careful not to have too much pattern - the eye needs a place to rest!


It took me a long time to get the block created in EQ5 for the quilt layout above. The EQ5 file is so complex that Internet Explorer kept closing the program on me. After several attempts I was able to finish a block drawing to make the quilt layout. My block sample is based on a 15" feathered Radiant Star, while the EQ5 quilt has 18.5" blocks.

I'm still debating on the right sashing for this quilt. I am thinking of using either flying geese blocks, hanging diamonds or squares, or leaving it as shown with Ohio Star blocks set in the sashing.
I told my friend Laura that one block didn't even make a dent in the 3 fabrics from these shirts so there is plenty of fabric left for the second (and third!) projects... Second quilt planned is a Burgoyne Surrounded. Third project is still to be determined!

Since I've recently finished up my other projects, it's off to the cutting board for feathered star #2!

Veggie Quilting

My customer, Jada, made this bright and vibrant garden quilt for one of her co-workers who is retiring.

What a wonderful use of color! There are so many wonderful prints in this lap size quilt.

I was lucky enough to quilt it for her. When I saw it I immediately knew I wanted to do an allover veggie quilting design. Well, not all veggies because there are a few apples, peaches, pears and strawberries thrown in for good measure.

The first photo is the top after quilting.




The second photo is the back of the quilt. (Sorry, the photo came out a little fuzzy.) Jada decided to use a solid green as the backing to better showcase the quilting design.

We used a wonderful variegated thread from King Tut and the quilting was inspired by Laura Lee Fritz. She has a couple of books on her technique and she does fantastic freehand quilting. I have used her ideas as starting points for a lot of quilting.

I kept thinking as I was quilting along - "Wow, I'm having a quiltin' V-8!" :D

Sisters Quilt Show (and Some Fun Shoes!)

I had a lot of fun visiting the Sisters Quilt Show in Sisters, OR last weekend with my friends Laura and Mel. There were a lot of people there, and it was a lot of walking. My friend Melody saw John Flynn but we didn't see any other "celebrities."

I know some folks took oodles of photos and there were so many quilts to see. Here are some photos of the quilts we saw. I wanted to post pics of the ones that were the most interesting to me personally.

The Snail Trail quilts in the first photo were really neat. I particularly like the scrappy ones, but the planned colorways are nice too. I have the Snail Trail as a To-Do quilt this year. (I'm not sure I'll get there, though, because it's almost August already! I have a great pattern in one of Marsha McCloskey's books for a scrappy one.



This second photo is the side of the Stitchin' Post. I liked how they hung the quilts all the way up to the roofline. My friend Laura brought binoculars in case there were some too far up, but we didn't actually use them at all.

We went into the Stitchin' Post to check it out but didn't score any really great deals. However, I picked up a Dear Jane software pack for my EQ5 and hope it will help me make those tricky little blocks in the quilt. Hm - I need to get the software loaded in order to use it! LOL

The third photo is a very nice quilt made from, you guessed it! Shirts. This quilter was inspired by Bonnie Hunter's approach of using recycled shirts. I liked the scrappy (yet planned) look. I'm not sure if she sewed these blocks on a foundation or not, but it would be a nice quick way to make blocks. Laura and I noted it as a possible pattern for all those shirts we have.

We stayed in a hotel in Bend and when we arrived Friday afternoon, the 4th photo shows what was waiting for us!

We thought, OMGosh - is this from the hotel front desk?

Laura's mom Ellie met us at the hotel because she was taking Laura's daughter for the week. She lives outside of Medford, OR where the Harry & David complex is. So, she surprised us with this huge gift basket - it had chocolates, crackers, Moose Munch, smoked salmon, a basketful of goodies to eat all weekend!





We didn't really make a dent in the basket of goodies though. My favorite was the peppermint malted milk balls. Yummy!

It was really so sweet. There were cold beverages and handmade snacks too. Ellie had thought of everything!


The last photo is kind of fun. I went to Sisters and I only saw "THESE SHOES" - just kidding, but I couldn't resist taking a picture of these funky, sparkly shoes in a consignment shop there.





I don't think a true gypsy would wear these as they're not practical at all, but like a crow thats disposed to bright and shiny objects, I took the photo so I could remember them...I wouldn't have bought them. (1) they were too large for my feet and (2) I have nothing in my wardrobe that would match! :)

During our trip, we made some pit stops at thrift shops and quilt stores. Scored more shirts and fabrics. All in all, it was a fun, memorable time and we're planning to go again in 2010.

We're going to make quilts to enter next year and we've already brainstormed a couple of patterns. But that update will have to be in another post. Can't spoil the surprise!

Hope everyone is staying cool this month! We've been hotter than New York City this July...now that's saying something for the Pacific NW!

Craft Hope Quilts Ready to Mail

Here are the finished quilts I made for Craft Hope's Project #3. I would have made more, but with the upcoming Sisters Quilt Show trip and the deadling for Craft Hope to receive by July 25 I wouldn't have made it!

2 of these quilts were made using the I-Spy pattern that I provide on my blog. The middle quilt was made with brights to use up some of the fabric I scored at our thrift store shopping. They all turned out wonderful and fun!

I ended up using a very thin Warm & Natural batting for these quilts. Flannel was too thin for my taste, and I was able to quilt them with freehand loops on my longarm machine. I know they will be cherished and I was happy to contribute!

Can You Say "Shirtzapalooza?"

There was only two of us last night, but my friend Laura and I had a few hours of fun cutting up some of the shirts we scored last weekend (and on some other thrift store trips). I had to take a photo of Laura's shirts - she had a total of 25!

We started cutting them apart and found that it's not as quick a process as we assumed. There's yokes and bulky seams. There's sleeves with inserts (never seen that before). There's different cuffs and button plackets.

We're saving the shirt tags to add to the back of the quilt (or quilts, since I think we have enough fabric to make at least 3!) and the buttons.

Some of the shirts have great pockets that will also be saved for the back. They'll be great to put notes in about the quilt when it's finished. One of Laura's shirts had the coolest flap pocket (it's a
Levi's shirt) and will be a fun addition to the back of one of her quilts. Two I saved have velcro flaps.

Another shirt gave us over 2 yards of fabric. I took a picture of my daughter in it - XXXXL. She's a size 0.

After taking the shirts apart, next will be to separate the fabrics into light and dark values. Laura has some wonderful red and brown plaids and terrific teal blue shirts. The shirts I found were more muted, so they all complement each other.

We decided on a pattern from a quilt magazine (sorry, I don't remember which magazine) but it's a nice nine-patch and split rail variation. I'll see if I can replicate it in EQ5. It gives us a good start for cutting pieces out of the shirts and for planning on how to sew all these plaids and stripes together.

We didn't get to all the shirts - after a few hours I'm not sure we even got to half of them. Who knew it would take as long? But I'm excited to keep going.

I have other projects in the works this weekend. I'll post another update tomorrow.

Happy and safe holiday to everyone!