A Tulip Quilt for Sweet Alyssa

Years ago, we went on our first mission trip to Haiti, and a worker in our group was a sweet young girl, who was 16 years old.  In fact, if I remember correctly, I think she turned 16 while were were in Haiti.  Anyway, she has always held a special place in our hearts, and at the end of 2016, Alyssa got married.  The quilt that we are giving to her as a wedding gift is this tulip quilt:

The binding went on this week, and I love the flower quilting pattern that my longarm quilter used on it:

Here's another picture of it on my front porch bench.  It's a cloudy day, but it still looks bright and cheery draped over the bench:

We are rejoycing in the spring weather here in Michigan, and I do believe the snow is gone for good.  The birds are chirping their spring songs to me, and I am looking forward to seeing real tulips in bloom here soon.

Here's a picture of the lovely bride, and her sister, the matron of honor. Her veil was so delicate and beautiful, and she was so happy.  I love this picture!  Can't wait to put a label on this quilt and send it to her and her groom, to cuddle under.

Today is Monday, so I'm linking with Design Wall Mondays (Here)  and we will see what's on other quilter's design walls.

Also linking with Love, Laugh, Quilt's blog for "Monday Makings" (Here)

Spring Is Here At Last!

I am so glad spring is here!  We still have some snow on the ground, but with the calendar saying it is spring, it makes me glad.  The daffodils are a present from my hubby,  as a celebration that spring is officially here.

Lisa Bonegan started a free triangle blocks sew-a-long.  (link here - for instructions) and I saw lots of pretty blocks from their group on the internet.  I love triangles, and am easily drawn into a project using them, so I pulled out my box of small half square triangles, and began laying out some of the blocks.  Lisa is calling the project "Triangle Gatherings", and it was a lot of fun making the blocks, and so easy when the hsts are all made ahead of time.

Two days later, I have them all made so far, and I don't know what the finished quilt will be like.  But that will be decided later.  There are instructions for 21 blocks right now, and I think a block comes out each week.  My blocks are using triangles that finish at 1 inch, so the blocks are 4.5" x 4.5" unfinished size.

The three quilts that I sent to the machine quilter are finished now, so I just have to go pick them up, and put on the binding.  I can't wait.  One is a wedding quilt for a newly wed couple, and the other two are for my home.  (Pictures are coming after they are bound.)

This week I worked on an unfinished sampler quilt that was 90% finished in 2011, and for some reason, it never was completed.  The goals for 2017 are to finish some of these quilts, so it is now ready for the outside borders to be sewn on.  I will post some pictures when the borders are attached.

Today I took another picture of my design wall, with the Valentine's Day quilt up there.  It will probably be taken down soon, but I am still enjoying the process of adding another grid section of 10 x 10 squares.

Here is the design wall for "Design Wall Mondays"  as I like to link up with Judy Laquidara's blog to see all the design walls  (Here).  The three longer grids have the columns sewn together, but not the rows.  After sewing the rows, they will be as short as the grids on the left side of the picture.

A Little of This, A Little of That......

Quilting adventures this week:

Finished a small doll quilt by hand quilting it, and adding the binding.  It measures 9" by 12".  I added very small hanging corners on the back.  Here's the pictures of the front and back:

 

I may add another line of quilting in the middle of the outside border.  Always a critic of my own work, aren't we all?

Took three quilts to the long-arm quilter on Thursday.  That feels so good to get quilts on their way to being finished.

Made a laundry bag for when I travel.  In April, I'm going to Shipshewana for a retreat with some wonderful ladies, most of whom have finished a Jane Stickle replica quilt.  I don't know if you know this, but when a Jane Stickle quilt is finished, this group deems you a "Goddess".   Our table at this retreat usually gives us a "challenge" to make something for the next retreat.  Last fall, the challenge was to make a bag - Jane Stickle related if possible.  I am not very good at making handbags, and am afraid of zippers and buttonholes, so it took some thinking on my part.  I decided to make a "royal" laundry bag.  After a search of Google, I found a crown, and made my laundry bag.  It is about the size of a pillowcase, and I traced the crown from the free internet copy, using a lightbox and permanent markers.

 
        Close-up of the "royal crown"


Worked on two more blocks for the 365 Challenge quilt.  The dark square will finish at 3 inches and the lighter square will finish at 6 inches:

Started another row of the Valentine Quilt:

What is on your design wall this Monday morning?  It's snowing here, and as always, is a fine day to quilt.  I'm linking with Design Wall Mondays to see what other quilters are doing.  (Here)

Tiny Quilt Retreat

Today is the 6th day of my "Tiny Quilt Retreat", (me, myself, and I).  Hubby is in Florida golfing with a group of men, and I am quilting here at home, and having such a good time.  I pick him up at the airport tomorrow, and miss him very much, but my time quilting has been lots of fun.

Here are the things worked on this week:

The Valentine quilt:

The first two rows of grids are on the design wall, and all of the fifty+ baggies of grids are set aside for future assembly.  I am thinking about the wording at the bottom, and may spell out "Be Mine".  I will be taking it off the design wall soon, to get the 365Challenge blocks up to sort out the assembly and completion of that large quilt.

365 Challenge Quilt from 2016:

I worked on last year's Karen Kerr's 365Challenge, to make more of the blocks. It is almost finished, and I have only a few blocks to go.  I work on a week's worth of blocks at a time, and have about 5 weeks left.  This week I completed a week in November.  Here are some of the blocks made this week:

The rows of the indigo and shirting quilt are almost all assembled.  I have four more long rows to sew.  I will probably not sew a quilt top together this way again.  I thought it would be faster then putting blocks together first, 

but forgot to factor in the underwhelming task of pinning and sewing long row after row.  When I am underwhelmed, I procrastinate.  I have four more rows to sew.

Here's my little kitchen blackboard reminder that spring is coming soon.  The chipmunk cookie jar is one I bought before I was married - so it's over 50 years old.  I love chipmunks and yesterday started putting three pecan halves out on the front steps for my resident front yard chipmunk.  The pecans were there for a long time (my first day of treating him) and today they were only there about 5 minutes!  He's a fast learner!

Posting as usual at Design Wall Mondays at Judy Liquidara's blog.  (Here)