"ANNABETH"

I'm a Grandmother for the 4th time and blessed with a perfect little girl. Each son now has 2 kids each, 2 boys for Tim and 2 girls for Andy. Of course I was making her a quilt while we were awaiting her arrival. I left a space to embroider her name, weight and birth day once she came.

I attend a senior class once a week. When someone wants to rid themselves of unwanted scraps or stash fabric, they leave it out for anyone to take. Most of the reproduction flour sack prints in this quilt came from those donations. They were small squares, strips and cut flowers. Using some of the left overs from big sister's quilt, I had enough to make this quilt.

Collaborative Quilts

I.  Jigsaw Puzzle (designed by Alyssa Clancy)

Every year my church quilting group makes a quilt to raffle at the Women"s Retreat to support Women's Ministries at Pomona Baptist Church. 

The theme this years was "70's".
We went into our stash and combined
oranges, pinks and greens for this retro look.

II.  Chop Stix Strips

The retired teachers from my former school have continued the tradition of making quilts for retirees which we started while we were still working at South Pointe Middle School. We see each other twice a week to work on our own projects but also to plan and piece these two quilts.

Claudia, English and ESL teacher, is moving to Arizona. We took the colors for her quilt from the tile in her new house.

III.  Simply Cakes 1.2.3 (Me and My Sister Designs)

I found these fabrics that reminded me of 50's prints and knew they were perfect for my friend Marsha, who is retiring this year. She has been part of our teacher quilter's group from the beginning and has helped make all the retiree quilts. We will miss her since she will also be moving to Prescott, Arizona but we are already planning a gals quilting retreat to her new home.

"It's a Girl!"

Melissa and Andy have found out that they will have a daughter in November. I could hardly wait to finished a baby quilt for my first granddaughter.

The pattern, called Charmed Circles by Denise Sheehan at A Graceful Stitch, was designed to be done in 1930's reproduction fabrics. I scanned the cute child, animal, and flower images and enlarged them to fit in the white background. After tracing them in pencil, I embroidered using the same colors.

The machine quilting followed the circles and a zigzag for the almond shapes.

"Daisy, daisy. . ."

I have always considered my three nieces as my girls (complementing my 2 boys) and they love that I do things with them and for them. This quilt was made for Autumn, Abby's daughter, in 2007. The Retro fabrics and pattern were her choice.

I found this pattern in an old issue of Traditional Quilts, issue 57. “Appalachian Sunset”, designed by Paula Hammer was done in feedsack prints. A warning: I cut all my pieces using the templates provided. I didn't discover that one was reversed until I started sewing. Fortunately it was a background white on white print that didn't really show in the final product. MAKE A TEST BLOCK BEFORE CUTTING THE REST!

I paid dearly to have this custom quilted but the result was worth every penny.

The prairie points were not folded but backed, stitched and turned. This allowed me to use multiple strips of leftover fabric for the front.