At a stand still…….

Have the 'clothing’ quilt tops finished, one on the frame ready to quilt….. and what happens?  Again, the quilter is not playing nice.  I finally threw my hands up and today a tech will be out to work on it.  Wonder if he can give it a flu shot that will keep it healthy for a year??? well, it’s a thought!

Okay, on to some pictures:

Girl quilt #1.   Her grandma had already started to cut up pieces so everything had to be patchworked or appliqued.  Second row, right – the booties must have been cut off bottoms where the footies were included.  The tops were raw edge.  I took out the elastic and zig zag stitched to hold the gathers in place.  I used a very light interfacing and stitched around the entire applique, split the interfacing and turned right sides out to create the applique.  I did learn from this experience that I will never do another ‘clothing’ quilt without the clothing being intact!

Girl quilt #2.  Her clothing was intact!  The red target fabric was from what I believe to be a pair of pajama bottoms.  The pink w/black dots was from a cute outfit that I believe was home made (very well done, also)  The blue check is from a shirt that was used when she painted something.  I included it, paint and all.  I also have the pocket from the shirt incorporated.

Now this: was hard for me to cut up.  It was the cutest little dress with lace trimmed panties and the bonnet.  I removed the yoke from the dress, cut the bonnet in half and appliqued it to the background.  The small floral print on each side is from the skirt of the dress.

Boy quilt #1.  Again, a lot of his clothing had been cut.  The “skydiving” block (2nd row right) was in two pieces.  I used a fusible web to applique anything that was a jersey fabric.  The plaids in this quilt are from his shirts.  I also kept his shirt pocket intact.

The pockets are things I will need to be aware of when I start quilting.  I don’t want to close them.

Mom’s quilt.  She had included the kids’ ‘home from the hospital’ caps and T’s.  At first, I was very hesitant to cut those tiny T’s, but I realized that they weren’t something her own children would use for their children when the time came, as their children would come home from the hospital with their own caps & T’s.  Mom had also included some of her T shirts to be included.  The stripe blocks are made from the sleeves cut off the children’s T shirts.  This lady did not have any specific requests for these quilts other than that her favorite color was purple.

The center of mom’s quilt.  I embroidered little name tags for each of the kids’ caps and attached them to their blocks.  The bottom block with the knit cap…. the tie around the top was done using paper curling ribbon.  Because I wanted these quilts to be washable, I removed that ribbon and replaced it with satin ribbon and secured the ribbon with a few tack stitches.  I was fortunate enough to have the same color satin ribbon as the curling ribbon.

There is one more boy’s quilt but it is on the frame awaiting completion.  He must have been very athletic as there were several team T’s that I was able to use.  Most of his quilt is a more traditional T-shirt quilt.

And because of the quilter being down and having these tops done, I decided to make up a few more blocks for my Christmas quilt.  I think I’m really going to love this quilt when I get it completed:

Before the quilter went down, I had someone bring me a small quilt to quilt.  I did have to end up finishing the quilting on the regular machine…. ah, I am so spoiled by the quilter!

This was made by a non quilter.  We have a mutual friend who had prepared for retirement by buying fabric, notions, gadgets, books, you name it…. Her retirement dream was to learn to quilt.  Unfortunately, this dear woman is losing her eyesight and asked my friend to make the quilt for her.  So together I think we did a nice job and I hope it brings our friend joy.

That’s it for now (as if you aren’t bored already!)  I have g-son’s ball game this morning and the machine tech this afternoon.  I so look forward to some quilting time without frustrations…..

Katie