Memory Quilt and more

 March has been a busy month for me! I have been working on a few behind the scenes projects. Some I have finished and some are still ongoing. 

I previously mentioned my colleague and friend's sister who passed away a few years ago and left her 3 children behind. I offered to make quilts for them in memory of their mom from some of her clothes. I previously finished quilts for her 2 nieces. You can see them here and here.  I had one left to make for her nephew. I wanted to make a more masculine quilt so I decided to highlight the textures in the clothes and frame the squares with coordinating cottons. 

I cut 12" squares and stabilized them (like making a t-shirt quilt). I tried to get 2 squares from each article of clothing but a few I could only manage to get one. Once the borders were sewn, I arranged the squares in a pleasing and balanced order. 

The quilt was machine pieced and mostly straight line quilted (4 blocks FMQ). Each block has different quilting depending on what spoke to me. 

The back is a large piece of backing fabric: black brush stokes. The binding is in Kona Glacier.

I delivered it to my friend at school this past week. She was deeply touched and said it would be appreciated and loved by her nephew.

I labeled it with this poem.

Maker photo! Finished size 48" x 64"

Here is another one of my quilts from 2024 that escaped getting attention on my blog. 

Wish Upon a Star is a wallhanging quilt that was made following the @Craftymonkies retreat. The class was from Collage to Quilt and was taught by @SarahHibbert. At the retreat I made a collage out of paper scraps. Once home, I pick this collage to make into a quilt.

Sorting through my stash I found fabrics that would work nicely to replicate the collage.

Using the technique that Sarah explains in her book (From Collage to Quilt), I enlarged the image to the desired size. 

Once it was pieced, I quilted in straight lines with coordinating thread colors. Then I stretched it over a canvas frame using the method taught by @victoria_vanderlaan (another teacher at the retreat). I am so proud of this accomplishment!

Maker photo!

A flimsy and other progress

 I put together one of my RSC 2021 quilts! I even had time to sandwich it yesterday! 

The pattern is called Joy Luck by Miss Rosie's Quilt Co. that I purchased many years ago. I hope to get to the quilting this week. My job at school has slowed down a bit and I have the week off from babysitting my grandson. My SIL landed a new job and starts next week so they gave me the week off. Hopefully I will be productive (if I'm not called into work.)

Linking to Scrap Happy Saturday, and Patchwork and Quilts

I added some peach blocks to my RSC- Wonky Shoo Fly blocks.

I also made charity blocks for Covered in Love. Kat introduced the Nov/Dec CiL block drive which are textured blocks. Other than sensory quilts, I had never seen a textured block/quilt. I was intrigued with a few of the patterns and made these.

gathered strip

undulating tucks

pintucks

I tried something new while I still could find a few flowers around. It is called flower pounding on fabric. I gathered some flowers that had some good colors and a few green leaves and laid them out. 

I covered the flowers with parchment paper and taped it down. 

Then with a rubber mallet, I pounded the flowers until I could see moisture/color released from the flowers. Some flowers released more color than others and the leaves were resistant. (Marigolds and geraniums released the best.)

Here is the result. After cleaning up the remaining parts of flowers, I ironed with a hot iron to set the colors. I'm not sure how colorfast this is so I may use a salt or vinegar fixative. I'm not sure how I will use this but I may add some embroidery to enhance the flowers and add texture.

Finally, here is my finished October calendar journal. 

Hope you have a good and productive week!