Sunday piecing before Gwen's class

I am finding March to be even busier than usual. The next two photos are what I made before my class with Gwen. One is basted, the other I have started hand quilting. In fact, that one is the one I showed Freddy Moran and she loved it. I knew she would. ( it has the polka dot border)

Did I mention that Gwen liked all of these? And the two quilts I brought along; K is for Kindness - her comment was the big stitch was great in it...especially the spiral I quilted and a smaller one that hangs in our living room, she liked the curves I had put in. Sorry, I am too lazy to give you the link to backtrack in my blog and show those.



I have Alice's quilt up to the hand stitching of binding and the hand quilting I want to try.
Yesterday I went over to the Gladstone Community Airing of the Quilts and it was a fun show.
Anyone can enter so you had a chance to see every possible kind of quilt. It was great.

Once this is posted it's work on taxes time for me. I have been dragging my feet but put tax work on my calendar for today.
We are looking for a new coffee table and carpeting for the living room- we ran out to Ikea this morning but our trip did not yield anything for the living room, though we had a lot of fun finding other stuff we couldn't live without :-)

Next post: what I made in Gwen's class and a few photos of other stuff done by classmates.

Saturday night kick off

I have done several small fun scrappy quilts and so to warm up and get into the spirit of being liberated and playing - I did this one after we were all settled in and I was set up and ready to sew.
I want to hand quilt with perle cotton all the quilts from this time in Sisters. So I am hand basting them as I go along.

This is 11 inches by 12 inches.

The white fabric started as a fat quarter- and jumping off from a quilt in Gwen's book suggested for our class, Abstract Quilts in Solids I did my idea. I fussy cut the designs to gain the impact I wanted.

Think tone on tone = solid and it works perfectly.

A perfect warm up- just the right amount of time spent and then it was bedtime.

More coming!

P.S.
I am doing Tonya's Amish Abstraction class...I think this small quilt would also work for that class, don't you?

I do have something more from the book she recommended however that will serve as an inspiration too...

the beginning of Sisters and class with Gwen

most of the photos are uploaded- however..I am going to take my time and several posts to share the most wonderful experience so far this year in my quilting adventures.

A view from the front yard of our friends home we were staying at while we played in Sisters. Too bad I waited until the last morning as the clouds block the other two mountains of the trio of mountains that are so stunning to look at. It is their "vacation" home and doesn't see as much use as they would wish, we have a pretty open invitation to use it whenever-my immediate response was we could drive up every other month easily for a weekend. I had the huge dining room table for my sewing space and the small sun room as my ironing station. I used the kitchen granite counter as my cutting area and the quilting went extremely well. I neglected to take any photos while I was working there, but imagine a colorful mound of scraps which I then organized into similar sizes and the sewing was a joy.

And a photo of Gwen Marston and I. She is the most warm and friendly woman...a fabulous teacher and a lovely person. She gave M and I a huge group hug and was just tickled to swap stories with us.

The next post will feature what I created that first night in our new home. That would be Saturday- class began on Monday.

Kirstin of knitonequilttoo was in the same class and will be sharing photos as well in due time.
It was so delightful to spend time with a fellow liberated blogger and meet her friend Sarah too.
And, there was also a fellow facebook quilter in class with us as well- I knew her name was familiar but didn't connect it until I was back home..thanks Kim! for the post to help me sort that out. It's a very small world sometimes...

quilting into March

I am telling ya, the days are just flying by! Last Friday night Alice came to play and sleep over. On the drive to my house, she announced she wanted her dinosaur quilt today. She has been playing and sleeping with the fabric for several months, I could understand her feelings. And, it turns out I actually had just finished making the backing for her quilt. So...here she is after we spread it out (it's for her "big" girl bed) on the living room floor and she announced she loved it ! whew, averted a big disappointment and bought more time as I explained quilts take a long time to make.

Once she went back home the next day, I cut and stitched on her top- pinning it together during this last week and managed to get it about half quilted the other night. Tonight as I was shifting it to get ready to quilt the other direction I found a surprise. Clearly, I did not get everything off the sewing table surface I needed to. And, I never noticed my machine slow down or anything! I think Janome should snap this photo up in a great ad about how strong this machine can stitch. I have removed it and will repair the stitching I had to undo. My goal is to finish up the center of the quilt so I can hand quilt on the one or two long sides...another time I will share a photo of what I used for my dinosaur template ...it's pretty funny.

We are leaving Saturday and I have been asked to pack up my machine tonight- which is no problem as the FW is strictly straight stitching only. I want to bring along Alice's quilt for hand work in the evenings. I know what I want to bring, and I am vowing not to over pack. I have a nice selection of scraps and solids to bring and the big quilt to quilt on. We will be back on Wednesday. I really need to upload my other photos on the 2nd camera...I know I have more to share but these two photos will have to do for now. Obviously I am not blogging much right now, but, I am enjoying a creative flow - ah the joys of playing with fabrics and your own ideas.

have a joyful time..Cher