March CSQ meeting

Hi Quilty friends, have you been using this *snowed in* time to be making tons of  4-patches?
Bring them to the Tues. night meeting March 10, along with your sewing machine if possible.   There are lots of different ways to set them together, I will show 3 options, so hopefully we can make at least 3 quilts for Veteran's.  Oh I know we won't get 3 completed on Tues. night, but we should be able to get a good start and possibly finish on Fri./Sat. sewing on the 13th & 14th, and be able to hand them off to Vicki for quilting.
If you can come early, about 6:30 that would be great, we can get set up and ready to sew by 7!.

Crazy Quilt

Miriam was busy at Saturday Sewing and in addition to binding a Veteran Quilt she made her cotton block for the Crazy Quilt we are making for another Veteran Quilt.

She purchased fabric with the lines printed for foundation piecing.

Foundation piecing with cotton fabrics.

Almost finished...



Miriam is also making a set of blocks using fancy fabrics,

and embellishing with decorative stitches. 

 

Miriam, will you please leave a comment with information about where

you got the foundation fabric? This is such a good idea and others

 may want to start their own Crazy Quilt using printed fabric.

 

Cold days are good for sewing!

 

 

UPDATE:  Miriam just called to tell me she tried to leave a comment and it didn't work.

 

The foundation fabric by BENARTEX is called "Foundation by the Yard" and comes in several block designs. It is sold by the panel. She found it at Patchwork Plus in Dayton, VA and is going to get enough for us to each make a FANCY block, in addition to our cotton block. Won't that be fun!  Miriam's fancy blocks are very inspiring!  See below.

 

You can see all the Benartex foundations here 

 

 

 

 



Veteran's quilts 7 & 8

When I post these counts these are only the quilts I've quilted. There are lots more veteran's quilts made. I'm just keeping a count of the ones I quilt for no other reason than it's my nature to keep a tally!

Here are the 7th and 8th quilts for 2015. I think it's pretty easy to guess that Betsy made both of these.

 

I think you know that I load one wide backing and batting and can quilt 2 quilts. I pair up the quilts so that I don't have to change thread between them. Tan thread was going to work perfect for these 2 quilts. I did a panto on the first one.

 

Quilting was never going to show on this quilt do I did my wavy crosshatch for some very fast quilting.

 

 

I have 8 quilts in waiting and have them paired up for when their turns on FloMo arrive.

 



Two More Veteran Quilts

Annie (member from Vashon Island, Washington) sent us two more quilts for veterans. I took them to Friday/Saturday sewing to share and I also got labels sewn onto both of them.

1st quilt is a Kaleidoscope pattern using a beautiful assortment of repro fabrics.

Fleece on back - beautiful quilting!

 

Annie's other quilt is a star pattern she drafted after seeing an antique quilt.

 

Here's a close-up of the block.

The block is composed of basic elements including 4-patches.

Betsy liked the quilt so much she sketched the block and I won't be surprised if we see

her using this design in one of her quilts.

 

Flannel on the back of this quilt and more pretty quilting.

 

Annie's quilting is done by Terri Watson in Michigan.

Check out Terri's blog to see the quilts she's working on:  Threadtales.wordpress.com

 

A big THANK YOU to Annie and Terri

for continuing to support our Veteran's Quilt Project.

 

**************

 

Vicki posted pictures to our CSQ Facebook page on Friday and Saturday while we were sewing - be sure to look at them to see what everyone was working on.

LOTS OF FUN STUFF!

*********************************************** 

 

Last but not least: SOUP!

 

Thanks to Nancy, we made soup and baked bread while we were sewing.

Miriam and Vicki brought yummy chocolates! 

 

Sewing together is really a good time.

 

 

February Block of the Month

Karen shared 4-patch quilts at our January Show & Tell. See them here. Karen is quite prolific with making 4-patch blocks and turning them into such great donation quilts. She made all these in a few weeks, and also machine quilted them. They are just the right size to make them do-able on a home sewing machine.  They are great quilts to be given for children in need.

Karen is encouraging us to "get back to basics" - sewing accurate 1/4" seams, and learning how to adjust our machine and our method to do that. 4-patch blocks are so easy to make, so this month we are going Back to Basics and making 4-patch blocks. Notice the S on the word block.

The basic 4-patch block dates back to some of the oldest quilts and is easy to sew and still a very good design element, with many possibilities.

If you are sewing with Leaders and Enders, please consider using your sewing to actually make something:  4-patch blocks, instead of just sewing over strips of fabric - like I had been doing for a long time, even though Karen has been encouraging me to sew something useful!

Leaders & Enders

 

2-1/2" Charm Squares - light and dark fabrics 

  

Cut your scraps into 2-1/2" squares and keep them next to your sewing machine.

Sew 2 squares together and when you get a nice little pile of them

you are ready to sew them into 4-patch blocks. 

 



With very little effort I have 4-patch blocks -

they should measure 4-1/2" - 4" finished size.

 

Let's all make a bunch and give them to Karen next month.

I know she will put them to good use.

 

HAPPY SEWING!

 

 

2015 Veteran's Quilts (1 - 6)

I started quilting veteran's quilts again in January and just realized that I haven't shared any of them on the blog! Here are the first 6 quilts to be quilted for this month. I have 2 more ready to quilt and ready to take more!

 

This one is from monthly blocks. I practiced some continuous curves on this one. All it needs now is a volunteer binder.

 

 

Estelle made this one and it will look familiar. It's the third quilt that she's made with a big bag of parts that a blog reader sent to me.

 

This is another one made from monthly blocks. Miriam volunteered to bind this one.

 

Miriam made this pretty one. It really called out for feathers so that's what I gave it.

 

More monthly blocks and this one also needs binding.

 

I needed to get these last 2 done quickly so I quilted some springs on a straight line. It was fun to quilt and only took an hour to quilt the whole quilt.

 

 

Becky had some leftover blocks but not enough for a whole quilt. The solution was to set them with some black rectangles. I might like this one netter than the "original". It's also begging for a binder!

 

More embellished straight lines on this one. These quilts are going to be extra cuddly because I didn't get carried away with the quilt as I tend to do.

 

Next up are quilts made by Betsy and Peg.