Memorial Quilt

My friend Martha passed away in February. This quilt is for her daughter Katie. Last year at Katie's wedding shower someone asked her what her favorite color is and she said red. I was thinking of that when I chose this quilt for her. I hope she likes it. The machine quilting was done by Linda Aquavia of New Hartford, CT. See the Houndstooth quilt pattern here. 

Here it is, wrapped and ready to go. Sent USPS Priority, she probably received it yesterday.

Daffodil Quilt from Latvia

Pieced daffodil quilt by Ilze Shulya from Latvia and for sale on Etsy at Denim Cotton Quilts. It measures 12" square. I especially like the free motion quilting. This Etsy shop just opened in January.

Nice job, Ilze!

Donna Bruno's Fandango Blocks

Donna Bruno of the Hearthside Quilters in Harwinton, CT is on a roll making Fandango blocks out of 1" wide strips! We had a Fandango quilt workshop on Saturday and she made all this since then!

Nice job, Donna!

See the Fandango quilt pattern.

Pretzel Pincushion Winner

The winner of the pretzel pincushion is Dolores from Toronto, Canada. Her blog is True Blue Canadian. Your package will be in the mail this afternoon.

Photo: (No, this isn't Dolores' backyard. Just some gorgeous garden goodness to feast our eyes on. We could sure use some color here in Connecticut! We have snow on the ground and fog.)

New Quilt Pattern: Chain Quilt

Chain Quilt is a raw-edge machine applique quilt. This easy modern quilt goes together fast.

Take a look at my pattern for this quilt. No curved piecing. No stress, fun to make. 

Colorful Parasols

These pretty parasols were featured on Fabricadabra's Blog, a site full of textile inspiration.

Hearthside Quilters Fandango Workshop

The Hearthside Quilters of Harwinton, CT had a Fandango Quilt workshop yesterday 

despite the springtime snowstorm. I recently joined this friendly and talented guild. There were 18 participants, just six shown here. We cut one-inch strips and sewed them into these scrappy fans 

using the Fandango Quilt pattern. The first one is a challenge, but it gets easier with practice.

A good time was had by all.

Great Fabrics for Wheel Quilt

Close-up shot of Sue Spargo's quilt. Her quilts are so amazing. Look at the fabric selections here!

Happy First Day of Spring!

Happy first day of spring! This quilt is the creation of Arnout Cosman from the Netherlands. He offers free software for designing quilts. See more interesting quilts on his website. 

P.S. We're expecting 1-3" of snow today. 

Update: We've had 4"+ of snow so far. 

Pretzel Pincushion Giveaway!

Pretzel fabric and fancy pinsies make this a playful pincushion. Your comment will be your entry in this random drawing. Winner announced next Thursday. I will ship anywhere in the world.

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In your comment, tell us how many hours of sleep you need to feel your best. I think I need 8 or 9 hours. Seriously. Short naps are good too, but maybe I wouldn't nap if I actually got 8 or 9 at night.

Huge Carpet of Flowers in Brussels!

The Carpet of Flowers in the Grand Place in Brussels, Belgium is made from over 650,000 begonia flowers. Belgium is one of the world's largest begonia bulb exporters. This event happens every two years. The next edition will be August 2016. It takes a hundred experienced gardeners to put this carpet together in four hours! Looks like a big flower quilt to me. 

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Would you like to have a (virtual) green beer and view some awesome green quilts?

Green Nine-Patch by House of de Veer.

From Rengebatake blog featuring quilts from International Quilt Week Yokohama, 2010. 

Green Zig Zag quilt by Heather Larsen. She loves green. Her blog is Bitty Bird Quilts.

 Tree of Life quilt, c. 1880, from Greensville, New York.

Pickle Dish sold on eBay. Someone Pinned it, then it was removed from eBay. No source page.

It looks like an unfinished quilt top. Gorgeous.

Luxurious quilting by sewfarsewgood. She quilts for other quilters too!

Do you have any St. Patrick's Day traditions? 

I call my Mom and wish her the "top o' the morning."

Custom Quilt for Melanie is Finished!

Melanie asked for a quilt like the Serendipity quilt, 72" x 84," with fabrics that she  chose to go with a rug and ceiling painting in her home. This quilt will hang in her 2-story foyer. It should be there Wednesday.

Selvage Spider Web by Nicole Mallalieu

This selvage Spider Web quilt-in-progress by Nicole Mallalieu is from the blog: You Sew Girl!

The red areas look like stars. I noticed the circular webs second. 

Selvage Hexagon Pillow

Beautiful soft colors add elegance to this selvage hexagon pillow from X Factor admin on flickr. 

This would make a stunning quilt design too.

Selvage Spider Web Quilt by Chicken Julie

This colorful selvage Spider Web quilt is the creation of Chicken Julie of Los Angeles, California. 

Here's another selvage quilt by the same quilter. See her blog post about it here: From Three to Insanity. Nice work, Chicken! 

Pickle Dish Selvage Block

This selvage version of the Pickle Dish block was made by Barbara Cain of Pennsylvania. You can read her post about how she made this little sample quilt here: Modern Quilting by B. 

Wow, nice job, B!

Selvage Shoes

Selvage shoes by Michelle at the Firetrail Designs blog. 

Take a look; she has a tutorial with good photos. Nice job, Michelle!

Selvage Snowman

Cute selvage snowman quilt by Linda from Nova Scotia. Her blog is Scrapmaster. 

Ice in Connecticut Today

I took these ice photos today in Thomaston, Connecticut. It's 33 degrees. I could hear water dripping behind the ice, but I don't think I'll call these pics "Signs of Spring." Haha.

Lynne's Double Fat Jack

Made during a fit of royal fervor by British quilter Lynne. She shows how she made it on her blog: Lily's Quilts. Her Welsh husband calls Lynne "Lily," hence the name. This quilt measures 22" x 29."

Lose Quilting Time?

 Just take the hour from something else! 

Hurry up, Spring! Sadly this photo isn't from my yard, it's from Google.

This is the view from a window in my house. The snow is knee deep.

Fabric from Sweden

Textile design from Sweden from the blog: textile design projects. 

 I find that a fabric like this is hard to use in a quilt because it has equal parts dark and light but 

I like the interesting silhouettes.

Shopping Cart Giveaway Winner!

The winner of the shopping cart giveaway is Abbigail from Calhoun, Kentucky! Yayy, Abbigail!

Amazing Machine Quilting!

Martha Briese of Oregon did this beautiful machine quilting when Cindy Needham was the guest teacher for Martha's guild. You can see more about this project on her blog: Nana. 

Wow, I'd like to try this. It looks like flowing Zentangle!

Design Wall Today

Today I'm working on a quilt for Melanie in Ohio. She wants a 72" x 84" quilt to hang in her foyer that goes with her abstract rug and a custom painted ceiling. She emailed me some photos of the space. I mailed her a pile of possible fabric swatches and she chose her favorites including abstract prints, batiks, a few modern prints, and some solids. This quilt contains all of them. 

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I'm in the process of sewing the horizontal rows to each other. That's why there's a white space in the middle, but that will be closed up. And there will be a 6" outer border. Her inspiration was my Serendipity quilt. It looks so much different done all in solids vs. prints, doesn't it? 

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Back to the sewing machine. We have new snow and ice. Perfect for quilting!

Art Yarn

Hand-spun art yarn: Sitara by Yarnmantra on flickr. Wouldn't this look gorgeous couched onto a crazy quilt? Wow! Click on the link to see many creative yarns.

Tree of Life Selvage Quilt

This Tree of Life selvage quilt was made by Cynthia Fuelling. It is one of the quilts in my 2008 AQS book: Quilts from the Selvage Edge. I like Cynthia's version with the nice border! My quilt is shown below.

 See instant download selvage quilt patterns here: 

Red Zinger

Cane Weave

Button Box

Star Bright

Angela's Asterisk Quilt

A modern, light and airy version of the Asterisk quilt! This was made by Angela Pingel and featured on her blog: Cut to Pieces. I love that black block. Cover it with your thumb and the lights seem to go out in this quilt. Uncover it and it's snappy again!

Want to see lots of Asterisk inspiration? Click here then scroll down.

Want to see the Asterisk pattern? Click here. 

Happy quilting!