Pansy Finishes

This post is dedicated to Linda who listens to everything I say and remembers all of it--even all the little boring details! When we were chatting on line tonight, Linda asked if I had posted a picture of my pansy table runner yet. I replied that I hadn't. I mentioned that I was behind on so many of my posts. Linda suggested I talk about the pansy series of projects that I finished, and the connection to pansies in my family. So Linda, here it goes! *VBG*

Back in May 2008, my aunt, my mother, and I took a girls' only road trip to Oregon to visit a part of the country that we had a family connection to--somewhere my mother had visited previously with her father. See the post here:

http://silverthimblequilting.blogspot.com/2008/06/girls-road-trip-fabs-meet-for-first.html

and here:

http://silverthimblequilting.blogspot.com/2008/06/girls-road-trip-part-two.html

We did some fabric shopping at Joann's in Roseburg, Oregon. I fell in love with a fabric collection by Debbie Mumm that featured pansies. Pansies are a flower that links the women in my family. Pansies were a favorite flower of my grandmother, my aunt, my mother, and myself. My grandmother painted pansy pictures for each of us and I always think first of my grandmother when I see pansies.

I recently finished four projects from the pansy fabrics.

The first piece was a table topper that was gifted to my aunt for Christmas this past year.
The second piece in the pansy series was a Disappearing Nine Patch that was gifted to my Mother this past Christmas.
The final two pieces in the series were a lap quilt and table runner for myself.

I am so finished with winter and I am so ready for spring. Rather than put the table runner away until the weather improves and spring actually arrives, I decided to put it out now. It may not be spring outside, but I can make it feel a little like spring inside.

The road trip I mentioned above was where I first met two of the FABs in person--Cher and Pam. So in honor of this meeting, the backing fabric for all of these pieces is purple. After all, purple IS the FAB colour!

These four pieces bring together a lot of symbolism--pansies for the women in my family and the two FAB sisters I met in Oregon that have become such an important part of my extended family, purple to celebrate all five of the FABs which includes those that live in WI and AL, and a wonderful memory of a girls only road trip.

Current Projects

Although I have not been posting to my blog lately, I have been busy.

I finished a fall table topper for my mom. We purchased these fabrics at an Oregon Wal-Mart this summer. I have enough fabric to make myself one of these toppers as well. I have only finished one so far and that one is currently on the table in my mother's kitchen. Maybe I will have mine done for next year. I have been busy quilting customer quilts and it seems that I don't get an opportunity to work on quilting my own tops much. This fall, I have started inserting my own projects between customer quilts so that I can move my own projects forward. This plan seems to be working so far. This picture was taken Friday night and it is a top made from strings foundation pieced onto dryer sheets that I finished piecing August 1st.

I am also working on the binding on my Daffodil BQ2 quilt. I only have one corner of the quilt's binding hand sewn to the back of the quilt so far. If I am looking for a handwork project this is the one I can pick up.

These are the fabrics that I recently purchased to start a new project. I fell in love with the floral fabric and coordinating stripe. The light green fabric in the middle will be used as background--a departure from the usual white or off white background that I usually gravitate to in a project.

These fabrics will be used to make a Terry Atkinson pattern, "Got Stripes?" from Terry's new book, "Time Out Quilts".

I work on the reward system to stay motivated as I work through some of my UFO's. The reward for working on a UFO or other challenging project is to work on something new. Working on Got Stripes will be the reward for the next while.

Having several projects at various stages of the process also helps to keep things moving forward. If I feel like piecing or quilting, or doing handwork, I have something ready to go.

Two More Flimsies from Pansy Fabric

I spent today piecing two new flimsies. Both tops are made from the pansy collection of fabrics I purchased in Oregon when I was there over a year ago. This fabric seems to go on forever as I continue to piece projects from it in an attempt to use it up.

This first flimsy is a table topper. I made this one from 2 1/2" strips instead of the usual 3" strips. This one finishes at about 27" across. The purple fabric on the outer edge really looks blue in this picture. This next flimsy is a table runner from Terry Atkinson's book, Let's Do Lunch. This one finishes at 16 1/2" x 66" - nice and long. Terry calls this one Seven Layer Salad. Even after piecing these two tops, I still have more of this pansy collection left!

Cat Table Topper Update

The cat table topper that I made for my aunt has reached its destination. Here is a picture of the table topper on my Aunt's table. Have a look at the cute flower arrangement that she and my mom put together to go with the topper.
The cute cat tea pot was already in the possession of my aunt. My mom got the idea to put some flowers in it and use it as a centerpiece. Very cute!

As a thank you for making the toppers for her, my aunt gave me this addorable pewter pin. I have always admired the sewing/quilting themed pewtewr pins that some of my fellow guild members have. Now I have one of my own.

And because I have been talking about them, this is an updated picture of my Mom (left) and my Aunt (right). Looks like the weather is sunny at my Aunt's house.

Table Topper Flimsies, 60 Degree Angels, and IIWII

Last weekend was not that productive in the quilting area as I would have liked. However, I did manage to finish a lilac table topper for myself to the flimsy stage. This was a project that I started a year ago. I also finished one of these toppers for my Mom and my Aunt--only they got their table toppers over a year ago! http://silverthimblequilting.blogspot.com/2008/06/table-toppers.html


Hopefully, it won't take me another year to get this one quilted for myself!


The colours don't photograph as true as they are in real life. The purple in the lilacs is looking a little blue--you will have to take my word for it--those lilacs are really purple!

This next topper was a disappointment. My mom found this cute watermelon fabric while we were in Oregon last May. I found a pattern called, Wagon Wheels by Stitchin' Friends of IA that I thought would be perfect for this fabric. http://www.newleafpatterns.com/Patterns/Pattern_Images/StitchinFr/stitchinfr.html


I can tell you with certainty that I will never be making this pattern again! I am fed up with 60 degree angles, templates, and trying to get things to match up where they are supposed to. Some patterns are better left on the designer's studio floor and should never make it to the cute little plastic bag hanging on the hook in the quilt shop stage. Don't get me wrong, some designers know how to design and publish great patterns. One designer in particular who you can trust is Terry Atkinson of Atkinson Designs. Terry tests her patterns before publication on "real quilters". IMHO, this is a designer that not only knows what she is doing, but is interested in repeat sales of new designs and patterns to quilters who have previously purchased her products.

One of the FABs challenged us to include some things in our "bucket list" this year that we would like to try or conquer. I have not committed my bucket list to paper - partially because I may actually have to deliver on those items and partly because if I decide I don't like something, I can just abandon it and deny that it ever was a bucket list item. However, that same FAB has known of my triangle phobia for some time and has encouraged me to try different piecing methods in order to conquer my fear of triangles. I am wondering if piecing all these 60 degree angles counts towards piecing triangles. Maybe I should quickly add this to my bucket list so I can just as quickly strike it off that list! LOL

I started the first triangle piece of this topper in the morning, got so frustrated with the piecing technique described in the pattern and quickly abandoned the project for the day. As I hate to waste anything, I headed back down to the studio in the evening and decided that IIWII (it is what it is) and I finished it. So, here it is with all its imperfections. I am sure once it is quilted I will be able to find a home for it. Lucky for me I have fabric leftover and I can make another topper in a "friendlier" pattern.

Come to think of it, I should add IIWII to my bucket list and then I can strike two things off the list!

Cat Table Toppers

I finished off the binding on two table toppers tonight.

Both toppers are made from cat fabrics that my aunt fell in love with when we were fabric shopping in Fabric Depot last year.

This is the first topper - a spiderweb design.

Have a look at the cute kittens and puppies on the fabric that is on the back.

I was originally just making one topper but I had enough fabric leftover that I could make a second topper.

And more of those cute cats on the back.

International Quilting Weekend

Saturday, March 21, 2009 was National Quilting Day in the US. I noticed another Canadian blogger who referred to Saturday as INTERNATIONAL Quilting Day and I feel a little like her and think this should be more than an event limited just to the US. Given all the good that quilters do worldwide for their communities, we should be recognizing quilting world wide and the day should be changed to International Quilting Day!

I told my mother that it was International Quilting Day and she asked me what I was going to do. I told her that I was going to quilt of course! And quilt I did. I joined http://catsnqlts2.blogspot.com/ in a Move It Forward Challenge. We challenged one another to pick a UFO and move it forward from pieces of fabric sitting in a box on the shelf to at least the flimsy stage.

Friday night I had put the finishing stitches in a quilt that Linda and I had worked together on previously - on Super Bowl Sunday in 2008. As I quilted Linda's quilt I thought about the fun we had making our quilt tops together--Linda in the southern US and me in Canada, connected only through our computers and the Internet. What fun we had planning our quilts and working together through some of the challenges of the pattern. We ended up with a flimsy each. I quilted my Bargellobowl quilt last weekend and this weekend, I finished up Linda's Bargellobowl quilt. Linda's quilt is large--approx. 90 inches square. This quilt was so large that my daughter's arm span was not large enough for her to act as the official quilt hanger. So for the picture, we put the quilt on the floor. As you can see, Joey is walking the border, doing his customary quilt inspection.

Once the pictures were taken, I packaged up the quilt and headed off to the post office. Linda's quilt is now on its way back to her. It still seems surreal that the quilt that had only existed as pictures on the Internet up until now was actually in my hands, thousands of miles away from where it was pieced. Linda's quilt is full of memories--there are fabrics in there from the FAB stashes, her Mom's stash, and it now has my quilting stitches holding the sandwich together. So I started the Move It Forward Challenge by helping a fellow FAB move her flimsy one step closer to being a finished quilt.

The next project I tackled was taming the overflowing unruly box of string pieced rectangles that I have been working on over time. When I am looking for a mindless project to do where I don't have to match anything or concentrate much, I work on string piecing scraps to used Color Catcher sheets. Once I have a stack, I trim them up to 4" x 9" .

These are the stacks of blocks that I trimmed up on Saturday. Each stack is at least 3" high. Linda asked me what I had planned for these blocks. I was just going to sash and cornerstone them into a simple top. Linda asked if I had thought of making a Railroad Crossing quilt.

After searching the Internet for ideas and swapping pictures of quilts back and forth, I came across a quilt with pink and tan alternating squares that I fell in love with. It wasn't long and Linda sent me this EQ drawing of a quilt similar to the one that I fell in love with. With this drawing it is easy for me to figure out how many squares of what fabric I need and just how many of the string pieced bits that I need. It is obvious to me now that I have enough string pieced bits to make about three of these quilts!

This is very typical of what happens when Linda and I get together and start discussing quilts and quilting. We start with one idea and the next thing you know the pattern ideas are flying back and forth over the Internet and we both have a few more quilts added to our Quilting To Do list! It is great to have someone to bounce your ideas off of.

The UFOs that I decided to move forward were my Easter table toppers. This first topper is for me. It was previously just a flimsy and Saturday I managed to get it quilted. Sunday I machine stitched the binding to the front of the quilt. That pink strip around the perimeter of the topper is the binding ready to be hand stitched to the back of the quilt.

This second topper is for my Mother. The fabrics are those that my mom bought while we were on our recent trip to Arizona. I managed to piece and quilt this topper on Saturday. This topper is also ready for the hand stitching of the binding to the back of the quilt.

This is a picture of the cute fabric that is on the back of both toppers.

The members of my local Monday night quilt group have decided that they would like to make some quilts together. We have picked Bonnie's Scrappy Trips pattern. I have decided to make my quilt out of fabric in my stash. I have a huge collection of floral fat quarters that I am cutting 2 1/2" strips from for this project and 4 1/2" strips from for a future project - Terry Atkinson's
Daisy Chain. While putting together this first block on Sunday night, I remarked to Linda that maybe I should make the center squares on my blocks out of green fabrics in order to tame some of the chaos caused by all the florals that I am using. I was asking Linda what she thought of my idea.

Before I knew it, Linda had drawn up this diagram in EQ to give me some idea of what my idea might look like.

So, what started as National Quilting Day ended up as International Quilting Weekend! It is great to celebrate time to quilt together with friends - no matter where they live!