My dad didn’t have much time left, and our hearts were breaking. I borrowed my Mom’s sewing machine, and picked up some Christmas fabric on sale and spent my evenings in the hotel room putting together a lively tablecloth for my Mom.
Dad died just before Christmas. It’s not my best effort, but I was glad there was some gaiety to be had. I didn’t put any batting in this, just backed it, so it is light and easily washed and dried.
My friend Shirley and I were bored, and we challenged one another to this quilt. We had the patternm by Mimi Shimp, but we both changed it dramatically – I wanted the blocks in the order they were sung, so enlarged them all to 18 x 18. We also used the beautiful duppioni silks readily available in Doha, and other more difficult fabrics.
The main motif was totally hand appliqued, but the minor motifs were machine appliqued.
We had given ourself 6 months to get the blocks finished, and another year to hand quilt the resulting top. The reality – after 2 1/2 years, I machine quilted the finished top just to get it done. I am not unhappy. I love this quilt, and I will hang it for one month every year, from December 6th – the Feast of St. Nicholas – until January 6th, the Feast of the Epiphany.
I made this for my son and his new wife. It was a very fiddly quilt to make, and I was never really happy with how I bound the scalloped edges. I swore I would never make another, but I am SO unhappy with this one that I might have to just to get it right.
I had promised Nathalie a fish quilt, but young people change their ideas. It’s a good thing I checked with her, she said she wanted cats, in pink! in purple! in turquoise! and waiting in my stash was a perfect Laurel Burch fabric with pink, purple and turquoise cats. You can see it in the middle and the inner forder.
I wanted to distract her from her evacuation from Beirut during the 2006 Israeli invasion.
I made a series of three quilts from another wild fabric I totally loved, lap quilts for dear friends and a new baby quilt for one of my former students. I still love this fabric. You can see the original fabric in the border; but the whirligigs look totally different!
Huh. I guess it’s a pattern. I hadn’t thought about it. This quilt I also made for my sister. I was making it for myself when we talked on the phone, and she said “if you were going to make me a quilt, I would want it to be one about the beach.”
I was in the middle of cutting this one out for myself, so I cut two, and I pieced both together at the same time, but mine remains just a top, I still need to do the applique shells and the hand quilting of the waves around the border. I do love the colors, and the top hangs on my project wall just so I can look at it. We all love the beach, and working with these seaside-y, sun faded colors was a treat.
There’s also a great story behind finding the fabric, which I love love love. When my son was getting married, I decided to scout out a fabric shop in Panama City. As I was looking at fabric, I heard someone say “I think I know you!” and I said “I don’t think so, I spend most of my time overseas,” at which point she shrieked and grinned and said “Germany! I know you from the quilt guild in Germany!” and I remembered working on a project with her and her telling me about her dream of owning her own quilt shop. And here she was, she owned her own quilt shop Quilting by the Bay. Woooo Hooooooo, Sandeeeeeee!! Good on Ya! If you go to her website, be sure to download her fantastic newsletter. Her shop is amazing.
I used a pattern to make the quilt top, called Seaside Cottage, I believe. It had an applique flower border, and I changed it to a hand quilted wave border with applique shells, to my mind, more in keeping with a beach theme.
My son and and his wife were married on a beautiful beach, barefoot on soft white sand. I wanted her to have a bag to carry her shoes in, because she would need them as we danced the night away!
My sweet friend Evelyn had made me the most gorgeous Victorial stocking, so I knew exactly how I wanted the bag to look, and Evelyn gave me pointers and even shipped me fabrics from her collection to add to mine. Thank God for quilting friends!
Baby Liam was born just after my Father died, and is all the more precious to us for it. I love bright baby blankets, and machine appliqued this one with a solid satin stitch to withstand the countless washes a really-used-baby-blanket will get. 🙂
I knew exactly what I wanted, that prickly beauty of the pineapple. It was also the perfect symbol for my very hospitable friend, departing, as expats do, for her new life in Texas. I knew I wanted to do a modified log cabin, with shadings, and I knew I wanted to do tufts coming out the center of each cabin. Fresh pineapple is plentiful and delicious in Doha.
February 2006, One bag for a friend going through a divorce, the other for a cleaning lady having a birthday.
World in Stitches 