QUILTER JAN

Welcome to my blog!

Wednesday, June 29, 2011











Two new ones for Project Linus-------------two that were very fun to do. As always, Yellow Brick Road is fun . This time with batiks and my pile went down a little bit. Somehow I had built up a drawer full of batiks---they are nice to have, but I'm not used to using them in my quilts. I do like the way the 2 of these quilts turned out though.


The first one is Batik Pinwheels. This is a neat pattern from Fons and Porter that is really fun to do and easy, even though it looks hard. I'm sure it's in one of their books or magazines somewhere, but I got it from a magazine flyer that came free in the mail. They called it Pointy Pinwheels.



The second one is Batik Bright. I thought these batiks were especially pretty.


Everyone have a happy 4th of July. Don't get too hot and sunburned!




Let quilting help you make someone smile!




Jan

Monday, June 27, 2011

No melting here!

No pictures to show today, but I just wanted everyone to know that I haven't melted yet! Temps in upper 90's and 100 degs. for many days and still counting! I do my walking early in the morning and the humidity is still high!

I've been working on several things and have completed a couple that I can't show yet because they are gifts and I can't give away the surprise. I'm hoping to start soon on a Buggy Barn pattern of Chickens. Hope to be able to do it when I can really concentrate on it because it is a new technique to me. The people who have done one say it's fun!

Let quilting help you make someone smile!

Jan

Friday, June 17, 2011

Don't need this hot weather!!!!

This yarn was varigated and came out as striped with a ripple effect! Cool!!!!

This is "Flag Day. The colors don't show up as Red, Tan and Blue, but they are. The one looks a little pink!


I named this one "Batik Sunset" because that's what the colors remind me of----seems like almost all batiks go together---they are fun colors to work with!!!



" "A Tisket, A Tasket" a red and yellow basket." I thought some little girl would enjoy this quilt.



This one, with lots of turquoise in it has VW's and robots and some space ships in it so I thought a fitting name would be: "Robots and Slug Bugs."



It's really too hot to have a quilt on your lap and be machine quilting, even with the A/C on, but I did want to finish up these last few quilts, so I turned the fans on and put the petal to the metal and finished them!!!


Let quilting help you make someone smile!


Jan

Monday, June 13, 2011

Many quilts!





































I decided to go through my stock of quilts and well, take stock! I picked out a few that are bigger and I thought a teenager might like, so here they are. There are six of them in no particular order. Not all are the bigger ones, there's some smaller ones included, too.


The names I gave them are: I Love Music; Twisted Star; Fairfax County Fair; Red, White and Black; The Happy Farm; and Chocolate Is.

Hot and humid again today. It's summer like weather and it's not summer yet!!! WHEW!!!

We went to a wonderful 50th wedding anniversary party on Saturday and it was so much fun! I have never been to such a relaxed, sweet gathering! We celebrate our 43rd this week---only 7 more to go and we will have our 50th!

Yesterday I worked on a surprise for our granddaughters for when we see them in July. Can't show you anything because my daughter reads my blog!!! But it's something I hope they will enjoy!!!! Maynard finished quilting it yesterday!

Let quilting help you make someone smile!

Jan

Monday, June 6, 2011

Old Glory and PL Quilt

This is yet another Yellow Brick Road---you'd think I'd have it memorized by now, but I don't!!! I called it Lavender Blue. Anybody remember that old song that went, "Lavender Blue Dilly, Dilly, Lavender Green, You'll be my king, Dilly Dilly, I'll be your Queen."





"Old Glory" is a kit from Keepsake Quilting and I have the top put together. It was very challenging to get the blocks put together so they all matched up. I see I still got some of the same blocks top to bottom in a line. I learned that you need to use the same machine all the way through the whole quilt. I used the Bernina for part and the Featherweight for part and the seams were enough different that I had trouble with the blue part and had to do some "constructive" seaming to get it to come out right. They both have 1/4th" feet, too! But I'm happy with it and the quilt police haven't shown up yet so I guess it's all right!!!! Going to be quilted with shooting stars edge to edge.

We are having summer-like weather now----temps in high 90's. I've said it before and I'll say it again. Thank you God for the A/C.


Let quilting help you make someone smile!



Jan

Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Mystery Quilt



This shows the gold blocks in place as you first sew the blocks together. I used 5.5" charms for this part.



Cut diagonally on the gold blocks. There are three cuts.





Putting the puzzle back together so that the gold half blocks "frame" the quilt top.






The finished quilt.






If we will admit it, there are some quilts that we just don't care for as we are doing them, but we persist and finish them, I will have to admit that this is one of those quilts. It sounded like a plan when I was thinking about it--------------lavender and gold squares, with the gold squares as the "frame." But as I worked on it, I disliked it more and more, but what the heck, I was committed to it now and thought I would finish it. Maybe there's a girl somewhere who really likes purple and will like it!!! One never knows, does one???!!!



The pattern is the "mystery quilt." It is put together as squares with the gold (in this case) being placed in certain places. It is then cut apart and rearranged and sewed back together and the gold blocks turn into the "frame." This process is what I tried to show in the pictures.


Let quilting help you make someone smile!


Jan