Making Merry!

If a seam a day keeps the blues away, then I'm positively giddy!

Better photo of Laura's quilt--this was made by Lauri as a gift to her live-in MIL.  The nice thing about the flannel design wall is that even something as heavy as this quilt can be put up with just a couple of pins and smoothed out to lay nice and flat for photographing.  I'll be delivering this back up to Lauri in a couple weeks when I go up to the next guild meeting.  Laura has been living with them off and on for the last couple of years.  She's a great lady and is an amazing help to the family as both "kids" work; she's there to help with laundry, cooking, cleaning and watching her grandson when he comes home from school.  It's hard to believe that just a couple generations ago, extended families living together was not the anomaly as it is now.

Here's a better photo of Kathy's sampler quilt.  She's the mother of my best friend from high school, who lived next door.  Kathy has been quilting for decades longer than I, having done quite a bit of professional quilting herself back in the day, but has started hiring out her quilting to longarmers.  I believe that this was a sample from a class that she taught a couple years ago.  I hope she's not going to mind that I used a different backing fabric--I couldn't find the one she gave me (initially), so I substituted a lovely tan floral with some green overtones that go well with the darker green on this top.

I was on such a roll, I put another quilt top on the frame and started quilting this one as well.  This is one of two quilts that will be given as baby gifts.  The pattern is called "Arrowhead" and can be made using two squares of fabric cut in particular ways and re-assembled.  Unfortunately, this technique creates bias edges on the blocks, which I wasn't keen on, so I redrafted it to use squares and strips and it leaves straight-of-grain on the edges.  It quilted up very quickly and I know that I will be able to do the other baby quilt just as quickly, although the deadline for the second one is a few months off.

You may be able to see a peek at the next quilt to go on the frame--yes, it's upside down--which is a top made by my MIL, presumably for Nate, my nephew.  It's got penguins on it!  The backing fabric is loaded up...just waiting for batting and to pin on the top.  After that one, I have two more in line, besides the second baby quilt, and I will be all caught up with hired projects...at least for the moment.  These things always arrive in waves, don't they?

Yesterday I made another 20 blocks for the 9-patch project.  I'm getting down to the bottom of this pile of squares and the variety of lights is declining sharply, so I spent a bit of time today cutting up some light colored fabrics from the scrap bin. I know I have another baggie of them...probably within a few feet of where I'm sitting, but I need to unearth them.  Gimmie 10 minutes and I'll probably find them, making all the cutting and sorting today completely unnecessary.  (Searches for several minutes.)  No results.  Found some 5" squares but not 3 1/2".  Ah well.

Tomorrow is going to be a hectic day--have to buy some supplies for the Girl Scout meeting, will be racing around picking up and dropping off, orthodontist appointments, and, if I have the enthusiasm, an SCA meeting in the evening.  I really should encourage the Baronial folks to sign up for the Ithra that's happening in a couple weeks.  We're nearing the break-even numbers...if we triple the numbers who have signed up.  Sigh.