Making a Decision

I have recently finished several tops and I’m feeling the need to get some of them moved to the quilted pile. I’ve taken pictures and trying to decide. I think I have suitable backings for almost all of them. Any favorites you think I should start with?

Well they are ALL sideways!!!  Just tilt your head :). Some of these are old and some I finished the other day. Thanks for your help.
Karen

Student Work- a finished quilt

I got this picture the other day from Bonnie, one of the students in my class from Flying Needles Quilt Guild last February. This is a great interpretation of the pattern.  And she added a border to make it bed sized.  Great job Bonnie!

Have a happy stitching day.

Karen 

Teaching at the Flying Needles Retreat

It's almost hard to see me - I'm surrounded by Pickles - Pink and Purple!!  What fun I had as I spent two days at the Flying Needles Quilt Retreat in Niceville, FL and had the privilege of  teaching a wonderful group of women.  A special thanks goes to my host Kathy, who was also the Chairman of the quilt show and retreat.  Needless to say, she was so busy I didn't even get her picture.  But I want to share a few pictures of the classes.  

The first class I taught was this log cabin variation.  The committe had seen a picture of the quilt and asked if I could teach it.  I designed it using EQ7 -it's based on an Accuquilt pattern.

We were at the Northwest Florida State College.  I had a small classroom and a full class but we made it work and had a blast.  We had several mother and daughter sets which was very fun.

Below is a picture of the West Virginia group.  They were so productive and helpful - thanks for the tips!

I loved seeing everyone's color choices.  They made fun of me when they kept hearing me say "Oh, that's my favorite color" each time I saw their fabic choices.  But their projects were all so pretty and so different.  

Isn't it fun to see everyone's strips laid out?  They had quite an assembly line going.

My class helper Shirlee was so busy and I somehow missed getting a picture of her - sorry Shirlee.

On Saturday, I taught a class on Pink Pickles.  I made the class sample Purple Pickles last fall using some different techniques so they could get idea possibilites.

This class worked very hard as they chose which colors would go where and then learned the paper piecing technique. 

We spent a lot of time discussing different setting options.

How I loved spending the day seeing Pink Pickles hanging in the room.

Here are 9 of the 10 blocks done - I was so prould of all their hard work.

My friend Janan sent this picture of me teaching - I sure hope I was saying something important LOL!!

A big thank you to all my students - you were great sports and I hope you learned a lot.

Happy Stitching,

Karen

Checking In

I am not sure what has happened to the last few weeks.  When I used to think about what my life would look like in my 60's, I never pictured being quite this busy.  But even with the busyness, I have been productive in the studio with odds and ends.

This is a project for a class next winter even though these colors are soooo fall.

The feathers in the orange blocks don't show up real well, but they are subtle and very pretty.  I wanted the pale yellow center to be different, so I quilted concentric lines and I'm pleased with the result.

The big feathers in the yellow blocks were fast and fun to to.  I know everybody says this, but feathers really are so much fun to machine quilt.  The rest of the blocks got stitch in the ditch. That is NOT fun.  And as Cindy Needham says, ESS.  Yes Cindy, I did every stinking single seam.  I didn't even want to count the starts and stops.  But the binding is on and the quilting on this one is done.

Hope you had a great day,

Karen

Getting Ready

I'm getting ready to go on my first retreat!! I'm really excited. I'm going with my friend Kim, who is teaching one of the quilts from her book, Scrap Basket Surprises. In trying to get some projects together, I found these log cabin blocks I started a couple of years ago.
After making wedding quilts for both of my children, I decided I wanted to use the scraps and make a quilt for me. I love log cabin quilts but have never made one, so that decision was easy.

Since both the wedding quilts were signature quilts, I had lots of small strips of the fabrics left. As I fingered thru all the scraps, the name came to me. It's called "Wedding Memories Linger" for when I look over the blocks, my thoughts linger and I can remember working on each quilt as we prepared for the weddings (2002 and 2007).

I recently saw a post by Wanda in Exuberant Color of her batik log cabin and it reminded me of my stack of blocks. I have struggled with deciding which layout to use, which is why my blocks have languished in drawer for almost 3 years! But seeing her play with several different layouts, I was inspired to finish mine!

These are several different layouts I'm playing with. Knowing me, the finished quilt may not look anything like these, but at least I took pictures to remind me of which ones I really liked. I also bought a batik last year that I think will work perfectly as a border.

So my goal for this project at the retreat, is to finish the number of blocks I need for whatever layout I choose. Fortunately, I don't need too many. I've found the box of scraps and they are ironed and ready.

I've got a couple of other projects I'm taking too, but no time to take pictures. Wish me luck and lots of happy sewing :).
Until next time, make something beautiful,

Karen