The Old And The New

When I unpacked the quilts that I had brought home from my quilt show in Laconia, New Hampshire, I was especially cross with myself for not having gotten any pictures of my very dear friend, Wanda's quilt at the show. But since I had put on a hanging sleeve on it, I decided to hang it on display on the quilt rack in my living room.

It looks great there!

Wanda is a very special quilter who continues to sew and make quilts in spite of having suffered two major strokes that have left her without any control over the left side of her body. She is an inspiration to us all. Her quilts are not perfect, but they are perfectly beautiful!!! Thank you, Wanda!

I have been working on the old and the new today. About two years ago I had great fun making a ton of floral flying geese just for the fun of it. I had discovered the instructions of how to make a set of four flying geese over at quilter's cache.com.

Since I dislike counting blocks, I have no idea just how many sets I have done. They have been a UFO long enough!

Now I am pressing the stitched-together foursomes in groups of ten.

So that is the old project. The new project is to start a Sashing Star quilt that is called "Katie's Quilt" over on the Missouri Star Quilt Company's free video by Jenny Doan. I am using romantic florals mostly by Moda that I bought this summer. They came from a lady out in Ohio who was downsizing her stash.

I was a cutting frenzy yesterday, making 2 1/2" strips to sew together in pairs for making stacks of four-patches. I need 180 four patches if I've figured right, and of those, 144 will be sewn into 16-patches.

Now this should keep me busy for a while!
It was still too windy to use my driveway to layout that second Sister's Choice, but sunny enough to begin to dry these lovely wild  mushroom caps.

Marasmius oreades or scotch bonnets or fairy ring mushrooms are what "The Mushroom Trail Guide" by Phyllis G. Glick lists these as. Felix finished drying them in a slow oven at 215 F degrees.

Raven just likes that it is cool enough weather with our first hard frost to now be using the second quilt on the futon.

Phyllis Mae's Quilt

Two of the most fun and impressive quilts that influenced me at the Monadnock Show in Peterboro, New Hampshire were antique quilts from the Civil War era. Here is one:

The design is so simple; four patch alternating with an unpieced square to make a double 4-patch. Check out the detail as she patched the same fabric within one of the squares. Every tiny scrap was so precious!

And my very favorite quilt was this one whose legend I did photograph but it was too far away to be legible, groan! Anyway it is a 16-patch design, I think it was listed as "Soloman's Crown"? If anybody out there can correct me if I'm wrong, I hope you will.

It was a big quilt and the blocks had been enlarged by a frame like one round of Courthouse Steps with lights and darks.

These HST's are so little!

Just look at that poison green up above! Click on the picture to enlarge it.


I also got my mojo back to make those last four Sister's Choice blocks.

I'm getting bolder with my neutrals!

Each of the wings on the 9-patch is a set of 8 matching greens.

I wish that I could lay all 48 blocks out on my driveway to be sure to have good color distribution, but today is just too windy to do it!

What I did work on was the hand hemming of the scrappy binding of Phyllis Mae's quilt for her 90th birthday.

Didn't it come out great?

Here is a little shot of the scrappy bindings:

Now to just do a label for it!

The Monadnock Show

Yesterday morning I received an email from Sue Trask over at The Quilt Patch quilt shop in Bedford, NH, reminding me that it was the final day of the Monadnock Quilter's Guild Fall Festival of Quilts!

Thank you, Sue! I would've missed it completely if it weren't for you. It is held in Peterboro, New Hampshire which was 127 miles round trip for me.

I went. I walked my feet off. I had a ball!

The featured quilter was a man named John Burnham who is a retired truck driver and does beautiful piecing and quilting.

His quilts filled a room and this is just a sample of what was displayed under his name.

I wanted you to see a close-up shot of the fabrics Burnham used in the quilt on the above left.

Amazing, huh? I had to tear myself away to go look at the other quilts in the show done by the general membership. In this presentation, I have tried really hard to give proper credits to the quilters. But I'm not perfect and I apologize if I have any errors.

Remember, you can double click on any photo to enlarge it to read it better or see the fabrics.

Whenever I go to a quilt show with so many beautiful quilts representing months or even years worth of work, I am awed.

The above happy-looking little quilt was a group project comfort quilt made by their guild.

Who  among us doesn't love the universal appeal of the bright rainbow? Whatever color is your personal favorite, "It's in there!"

The tag on the above quilt was just a hand-lettered "Garden Fresh," legend with no credit to the maker or designer. It shamed me because I own all these garden fabrics and have never done anything with them. Whomever she or he was, they did a great job!

The above quilt truly impressed me with its luminosity and feeling of transparency, even though my first love is for scrappy quilts. The color selection and placement was perfect!

This homespun stripes quilt had a very understated elegance that appealed to me greatly! Sorry it photographs rather blah, but it is lovely.

The linear quilting on this poppy was magnificent, and surprise, another quilter had tackled the same pattern and also had breath-taking results!

Here is a size reference photo:

Hope you enjoyed the show as much as I did! When I left, I was 50% inspired and 50% intimidated. I guess that is a good mix, right?

Lastly, Happy Thanksgiving! to all my very dear Canadian friends. It is also St. Joseph's Day, the patron saint of Poland, so we're having keilbasa and Mrs. T's Pirogis. Yumm-o!