My Threads

Two Christmas jewels

The Arizona Quilters' Guild hosts a small quilt auction that I have made a few purchases at over the years.  Two of them are Christmas quilts, or nearly Christmas quilts, and are very special to me.  They are absolutely beautiful, and the workmanship on each of them is remarkable.  The first one I bought, way back in 1989, was made by Mary Andra Holmes, and I keep this one on display all of the time. It's tiny, only 14 inches total.  I love, love, love it.  To this day.

The second one is also very special.  I bought it at the 2003 auction.  It was made by Laurene Sinema, founder of the Arizona Quilter's Guild, original owner of The Quilted Apple, author, teacher, and on and on.  She was probably one of the single most reasons that quilting became so popular in the Valley of the Sun back in the 80's.  Laurene died not long after this was made, so it is very special to me.  She called this one Stars, Hearts and Flowers. 

 
So this sums up my little Christmas quilt collection, not including the eight or nine that are UFO's.  Someday, I'll show those, but don't hold your breath.

Another Santa Quilt

One more Santa quilt is always on display at my house at Christmas time.  It's not done, yet.  Every year, I tell myself that I will finish machine quilting it (the border) before I put it away, and every year, it gets packed away with a promise of "next year".  It's my favorite Christmas quilt, and I know it will be even more special if it ever gets done!

Christmas quilts, continued

This one was one of my two favorite Christmas quilts.  I loved (and still love) the primitive red "plaid" fabric in this "Santa's Stars". In fact, I'm in the process of doing a scrappy Christmas Quilt that has some of this same fabric in it.  I was very sad to use the last of it...

 I was also getting better at machine quilting with this one.  And I do love to applique. 

Christmas Quilt Number 2

Today's quilt is one of my little primitive Santa quilts.  This was a super easy one, and we also did little ornaments that look kind of like the Santa on the quilt. 

These quilts had some of my first attempts at machine quilting, and it's not very good.  In fact, I left alot of the block unquilted.  I can't remember if it was because I'm lazy, or I wasn't very good...

We made a whole bunch of these, and they look really cute on the tree.

 

My Christmas quilt collection

Since I've been so bad in keeping in touch with my blog, I've decided to share photos of my Christmas quilts over the next several days.  I'll put a new one on each day (I hope) and get back in the habit!

Almost all of the quilts are from my years as a quilt shop owner from the late 80's and early 90's, and many are Debbie Mumm designs (very popular back then).

The first one doesn't use traditional Christmas colors, but I love the angels..

I'm still here

I feel like I've neglected this blog, but I've been really, really busy.  Mostly with work, but I have managed to do some creative things.  Back in August, before our trip to Seattle, I happened upon this website.  Diane Gaudynski does such beautiful machine quilting, and she had a nice little tutorial on Sashiko looking quilting.  I knew that I would be trying this soon.  Before we left Seattle, I went one of the local quilt shops to get a "driving home project".  I can't stand to just sit for hours and hours, when I can be making something.  I picked up a Pretty Posies pattern from Stitch Studios because it had some simple applique on it.  I had some charm packs to work with, so I was good to go.  The little quilt went together really fast.  I pieced it in Seattle, appliqued it on the way home, and then I started quilting.  And quilting.  I don't think I've ever crammed so many stitches onto a small surface like this - it could almost pass for a bullet proof surface.  Maybe not.  Anyhow - here it is.

This was my practice piece for the Sashiko quilting, and some feathers too.  It is, by no means perfect, but, if you stand back far enough, it looks pretty good.  Washing it after I was finished with the quilting helped alot too.  All of the spaces just puffed right up to hide my meandering stitches.  Now that I've done this small (40 x 40 inches) quilt, I'm not quite so hesitant to do more in the future. The only thing is, I now have another quilt with nowhere to go.  It doesn't go with anything in my house.  Why do I keep doing this?  Why don't I select things that work with where I live?  Well, there's always next time.

Aiden

My youngest grandson, Aiden, has been staying with me for the past week.  He has been living in Southern California with his mom for the past year or so, so it has been so nice getting to know him better during his stay.  He is such a sweetie!  He is so polite, and quite the conversationalist.  He'll talk about pretty much everything, and he wants to make sure I take part in the discussion.  Also, Ruby absolutely loves Aiden.  She has thrown me over for him!  And, Aiden loves her back. 

 
 

Heather's birthday

Just a few short years ago, I was holding this in my arms.

It's so hard to believe so many years have sped by.

In my mind, my kids are still "kids", so when we can't be with them on their birthday, it's a little bittersweet.  We were on vacation during Cori's birthday, and missed her celebration, and Heather lives many, many miles (and we've driven every one) from home.  It was good to have a little time together before Heather's birthday, but we still miss seeing her on her day.

Happy Birthday Heather!

Home again

We made it home from Seattle, via Salt Lake City last weekend, and we were thrust back into our work lives without taking a breath!  After a nearly impossible week at work, it's good to have a weekend at home to catch up with all of the little things.  We had a great time with Heather and Ben and the dogs, and we already miss them.  Ruby was in her element, having Andy nearly every minute for two weeks.  Believe me, she has been brought down to earth as well.  I think she has literally cried this week.  I see tracks of tears down her face...

One of the things I did in Seattle was to take my not so exciting blue quilt top to Krista for quilting.  Krista had done some tops for Heather, and they are lovely, so I decided that she could "pretty up" my blue scrap quilt.  One thing about the final touch of quilting.  It makes a huge difference in how I like a project.

I think it looks beautiful.  It took several tries to get a photo of this.  Ruby likes to be the center of attention.

Happy Birthday, Cori!

While we are enjoying the cool weather up in Seattle, my oldest child, Cori, is celebrating her birthday today. I'm sure she has celebrated this past weekend with her friends, but I still miss not being with her on her birthday.  She's my oldest - the one that taught us how to be parents - if a child can do that.  If any child could, it would be Cori.  We were so young when we had her, it's a miracle that she turned out as great as she has.  A testament to her survival instincts!  Happy Birthday, Cori!!!