Hexie Weekend of Sorts

Since I've been working on that commissioned quilt, haven't had time to do much else, so I'd like to share with you one of my favorite blogs instead.  And she has hexies this time!
Kerry found these in New York city's Central Park.  Go here to learn her story.  Kerry has a wonderful blog with gorgeous applique (my other love) featured prominantly on it.  You'll see some fabulous work there - and she so graciously shares it with us.  Check out her tutorials, too. She makes it look easy.

No linky party this Friday, but you can link if you have a finish to my previous post for TGIFF.  I define a finish very loosely cuz I know how short of time we can be.  So a finish could be a block, a top - anything that moved you forward and let you feel progress had been made.  Like Kerry says, "making a quilt...one stitch at a time."

Charity Breeds Contentment + a Giveaway

        Hi, there - I'm taking a break from the commissioned quilt to bring you a TGIFF post for this Friday.One of my favorite quilting endeavors is making charity quilts.  When I started quilting in 1986 I made myself some quilts and then some for family as most quilters do.  But once I had a twin bed in my guest room piled high with all the ones I hadn't gifted,  I knew I had to find another outlet. That turned out to be easy - the Guild I belong to has community service projects:  quilts for kids, pets, Veterans, girls in Foster care, happy bags for children with Cancer, preemie quilts - you name it!  Most of them are small and easy to put together quickly.  After making these quilts, I realized I found a huge sense of contentment in creating and giving away these tokens of caring.  Also, there are quite a few advantages for me, the quilter, in making them, too.
 For instance:
  1. I test out new block patterns,
  2.  practice machine quilting,
  3.  diminish my stash,
  4.  try new techniques,
  5.  solidify friendships with fellow quilters as we meet to work on these quilts
to name just a few.  But the nicest feeling comes from seeing a quilt recipient's surprise and happiness recieving an unexpected token of solidarity. Below are my latest finishes (completed just before I started the quilt I'm working on).
This is a Veteran's Quilt - 36" by 45" made from 9 1/2" squares.  They are given to vets in our local Veteran's hospital for their bed or as lap quilts or when using a wheelchair.

Then there is this one for our local low income Mommy & Me clinic:

This is a self binding recieving blanket.  It took all of 10 minutes of sewing to make using two squares. You can see the tutorial by Jenny Doan here .  And as Jenny suggested, I used one of my machine's stitches to close the pocket left for turning.

Learning, crafting, sharing - that's what charity quilts are all about - and feeling good :).

Okay I'd like to invite you to share your finish on this TGIF Friday.  Below is the linky to let us view your eye candy.  I have 100 (3/4") hexagon paper pieces and a fat quarter as a thank you for someone who links up to my party.  You can try a new technique and maybe make your own charity quilt with them. Note: Link up those fabulous finishes below and don't forget to tour the other finishes and spread the comment love! Please include a link to my post so your visitors can come back here and see other fab finishes. Ends Saturday morning to give everyone a chance to link up. 


Thanks for stopping by and thanks, too, to Laura and M-R for starting TGIFF  (Look over in the right hand sidebar).  Lastly, visit Quilts are For Giving and St Anne's Sewdality for charity quilt inspiration.  The possibilities are endless.

Stash Report/Design Wall

1/4 yd for binding the Vet quilt. .10 yd -  bits  for Soupçon border, .01 yd for testing a block, commissioned quilt doesn't count as that was bought specifically for that project, so doesn't get counted in or out.

1/8th yard for making the April BOM blocks for guild -these are only 6" blocks finished. Then I used 1/8th yard to test the side blocks to the commissioned quilt - didn't want to get that wrong when I have just enough fabric. And now I've used about 1/4 yard testing the corner blocks - geesh! First too small, then too large inner unit - but finally I got it right and have only 5 more border blocks to do and all the blocks for the quilt will be made.  Here's my test sample of the side blocks.

This is not the fabric for the quilt - just a scrap I picked out of the piece shelf to make this unit.

Hope you all had a wonderful Easter!

I'm linking to Judy's Patchwork Times and Lyn's BOMs Away! See you next week  - hope to be quilting this top by then. Stash numbers updated on the right sidebar.

Alleluia - Christ is Risen this Easter morn!


Jesus Christ is risen today, Alleluia!

Someday I'd like to go here in Italy


This photo of Monticchiello is courtesy of TripAdvisor

Until then I may make a landscape quilt similar to this. Back to THE quilt.
Hasta!

Holy Saturday


Three days our world was broken,
the Lord of life lay dead.
"Take up your cross," He told us
who followed where He lead.
Would we now hang in torment
with thieves on every side,
our Passover shattered, our hope crucified?
Three days we hid in silence
in bitter fear and grief.
Three days we clung together
where He had washed our feet...

Good Friday


Were you there when they crucified my Lord?

Holy Thursday


I, your Lord and Master, now become your servant.
I who made the moon and stars will kneel to wash your feet.
This is my commandment to love as I have loved you.
Kneel to wash each other's feet as I have done for you.

Hexie Weekend

Back in the 90s, I bought some die-cut hearts to make my DDIL a quilt.  I decided to raw edge applique them to the blocks I was making and then sew around their edges.  The normal way is the iron on fusible interfacing to the fabric, then trace the shapes and lastly cut them out. I couldn't follow the normal sequence of steps with these already cut pieces. I had to come up with an idea to make them fusible, and I did.

For one of my current hexie projects, I have these leaves I want to add to the top.  I cut them out and fussed with them to finally find where I wanted to put them around each hexie flower, and then I was going to cut them for the method above. However, I quickly realized I didn't have enough scraps of green to cut them one more time.  That's when I thought of those hearts again.  Here is how I solved my problem then and now:

1.  First I got a piece of paper towel. On it I placed the leaves face down on the towel.
2.  Then I cut a square of steam-a-seam 2 and placed it over the leaves, and fused it on. (about 5 secs)
 3. With a light source behind the sandwich illuminating the leaves, I carefully cut them out (leaf on left). Then I removed the paper towel layer from the leaf and cut off any fusible I could see while it was backlighted. (middle leaf).  Then I removed the paper and my leaf was ready to fuse in place (leaf on right).
4. Here are the leaves already fused and ready to machine stitch.  Problem solved.

The winner of last week's 100 paper piecing pieces is the Animated Librarian!  I've sent her an email for her address so  I can send them to her.  Thanks for all of you who linked up your eye candy.

I was going to have another giveaway this Friday, however, I've been commissioned to make a quilt and am going to take a break from blogging for a month or so to get it done on time.  I need all the time I can get with all the other things I have to do.  So if you don't hear from me, that's what I'm doing in between babysitting and everything else.  So I leave you for now asking the Lord to send you blessings, life treats you gently, you have time to quilt and your Guardian Angels look after you.

Applique Tuesday

Well, I did it - got the border that is Part 5 of my Soupçon variation done!  Here it is:

I learned something with this part. Firstly, I can't seem to make templates that are the right size.  I downloaded Karen's page for these diamonds. I checked the size and they were an oh so tiny smidgen small. So I went with them. Then I traced them on card stock studier than paper, but not by much. Then I cut them out and glue basted to make my diamonds. Then I laid out the top row to see how they fit on the line I drew as directed by Karen. They were too big!  How could this be? They fit when they were just templates and the hexie flower.

I took one of the small diamonds and put it on top of one of the templates on the sheet. It was bigger! Here's how it added up. Since they were a tad small to begin with, I cut just outside the line to make the paper templates.  Then I laid them on the fabric and cut my piece 1/4" bigger. I glue basted them. And there lay the problem. By cutting right outside the line or even in the middle of the line, I added 1/32nds to the pattern. Then when I glued the fabric around the template, I added another 1/32nd - 1/16th to the measurement. With all the pieces, I added a whopping 1/4" or more to the total length of the templates, and thus they didn't fit. Moral of story for me is cut inside the drawn line when cutting out templates. Because of my leaves, I still had to add a little curve to my corners, but I like them.

So how's your project coming?  Leave me a comment, and I'll come by and see what lovely you have working on. I'm linking to Esther's WOW and Connie's Linky Tuesday Party - lots of goodies there.

Bye for now - take care!

Idea for a back...

go here   Scroll down to #4.

Happy Quilting and destashing.

Floral Friday

I thought you might be interested in that Octopus succulent and how its yellow flowering stalk has developed.  Must be 20 feet now.


Those little black specks you see on the flowers are bees mining the goodness of that Agave.  If you'd like to see what it started as, go here.

I'm linking to  Copy this image and its link to place on your blog
Click here to see more beautiful flowers.

Hexie Weekend again!

Friday's seem to come around faster and faster! Where did the week go?  First off, the winner of last week packet of  the 100 paper hexie templates (3/4" sides) is Sally of Sally's Quilts.  Congratulations, Sally.  I'll send you an email shortly and once I have your snail mail, I'll send them out to you.  I have another set ready to go to another linker to this week's linky party.  If you can't use the 3/4" sided hexies, give them to a friend and start them off on their hexie journey.


I got a little farther with my Souçon quilt.  I decided my part 5 was going to have diamonds in the border. Hmm. I wonder if it is significant that I'm working on both part 5s of LE and Soupçon?


Anyway, I discovered that I had to change my glue sequence in order to make it easier to turn the seam allowance on these babies.  Instead of going around the hexie  I need to do two opposite sides as you see here.

 That template was part of an ad and that's why it looks oddly colored, but it worked fine.
 Then to do the other two opposite side, I placed my finger nail where the template reaches a point in the acute angle tip and cut the triangle off just after my fingernail.  You don't have to cut at the other angle as it is an obtuse (greater than 90) and the seam allowance won't be a problem. Apply the glue at each corner going toward the center and fold over.  You'll have very little to turn under with your needle to make a sharp point. See photo below.

So this is what I decided to do with my hexie flowers and the diamonds:

What do you think? The corner concerns me, so please let me know,  and be sure to link for the giveaway.   You don't have to do a new post - any post with eye candy will do - we love eye candy.  The linky is below; ends Monday, midnight. Good luck in the giveaway.
I'm linking to Richard's Link it up Friday and Sarah's Whoop Whoop Fridays. See you there.

SAHRR Round 5 and 6

  Ready to show rounds 5 and 6. Actually, the prompt for 5 was make 4 of something. So I chose four patch, and actually since that made my q...