Reverse Sewing

I began a quilt for my daughter on Christmas Eve, and lately have been working on it again. I chose the Stone Cottage design from Judy Martin's Log Cabin Quilt Book. The queen size Stone Cottage measures 99" x 99", which is the size I made. But I've since realized that I should have made it smaller to fit my daughter's bed.

SO, I'm reverse sewing! (Quilt speak for picking out stitches...) I'm removing 3 rows off the side and one off the bottom. The new reduced size will be 81" x 93". An added bonus is that I can use a standard queen size quilt batt now, whereas before I would have needed a king size batt.

Our weather has been awful: cold, wet, did I say cold? It freakin' snowed on Sunday morning. Seemed like a good idea to get back in the studio.

The Bed Quilt Club 11

The Club met on Wednesday. Pat, Doris, Marg and I were the only ones out of 8 members who were able to attend. The weather certainly didn't cooperate! Think Northern Ontario in the winter. I needn't elaborate.

The Nine Patch block exchange came first. To recap the rules:

1. 3" finished size blocks, 1" finished squares.
2. No solids or whites.
3. The dark squares are at the outside corners and centre.
4. Blocks will be 2 fabrics: light and dark.
5. We have to include every block from the swap in our quilts.
6. We can add as many extra blocks as we want to our own quilt.

These were the 9 Patch blocks for today's swap

Next, Marg showed the pillow shams that she has made to go with her daughter-in-law Darbie's quilt. She shows us how she lined the back of the flying geese patchwork so the shams may be washed without fraying seams.

And finally, here is a progress photo of the quilt I began for my daughter Sarah just before Christmas. Sarah loves authentic Japanese fabrics, including those lovely neutral blues, taupes and greys. All of the fabrics in this quilt are from Japanese companies. The pattern is called Stone Cottage, from Judy Martin's Log Cabin Quilt Book. I hope to have the quilt top completed for the next meeting!

The Bed Quilt Club 9

The Bed Quilt Club met yesterday; the 2nd meeting of the season. It was wonderful to see old friends again. Pat, Marg and I were the only ones available but we had a good time nonetheless! Pat's Country Quilter shop was a busy place and Pat had to keep running to help customers. So we invited the customers in to visit with us too!

Marg showed her Lemonade quilt top, which is truly a one-of-a-kind. She had purchased the red fabric, then mistakenly treated it with a product designed to removed colour that runs and stains white fabric. Unfortunately, her red fabric bleached out to gold in many areas. So Marg cut the gold areas seperate from the red areas, sewed the strips end to end, and made a Faux Log Cabin. What do you make with a lemon? Lemonade.

Marg also brought a box of half square triangle blocks that she had sewed since last spring. She is working on a Friendship Star quilt which requires 2040 blocks. There are over 300 in the box, which brings her count up to 1539.

NOTE: Marg emailed me to say that the product is called "Dylon Run Away". It is made to use on white fabrics only.

Friendship Star Quilt blocks

Pat has made progress on her Kentucky Log Cabin quilt blocks from Judy Martin's Log Cabin Quilt Book. She groused just a little bit on the log sizes: 1 1/4" strips. It will be worth it in the end - the smaller the log size, the richer the quilt.

Doris has finished her quilt top but couldn't make the meeting as she is on the Danube this week.

I showed my newest design; a wall quilt and matching twin bed quilt hot off the sewing machine. Alas I can't show you any photos - the project is for a magazine.