Quilts for Grandsons

Once in a while, I need to put my sewing for Magpie Quilts on the back burner and make a quilt for someone close to me. Last November, we welcomed our 3rd grandson into the family and I made him a quilt from a panel my husband bought in Fort McMurray while there on business. I am sorry I didn't take the time to take a decent picture of the whole quilt, but I'm sure I'll get a chance sometime!

Originally I had set aside some ivory Minky for the backing, but for some reason, it didn't quite seem to be the right colour for this quilt. I finally went and bought this sky blue Minky dot and it worked perfectly!

And the newly minted big brother and middle child requested a superhero quilt for his big-boy bed and while I've had the fabrics for quite a while, I only recently figured out what pattern I was going to use and finished his quilt top and it's now at the quilters. Pattern is called "Six and Ten", I don't have a link or a source, but it was easy enough to do. 

The blocks finish out at 10" square, so for each block you need a feature fabric of 6.5"x10.5" with a 2.5"x10.5" strip of the background on either side. Make as many of these as you need (I made 42 for a 6 block by 7 block quilt) and alternate the blocks one horizontal, the next vertical. Sew together!

So, sometime in the near future, I'll have full photos of these two boy quilts for you to enjoy!

--Ann

 

Blog Anniversary! Top 10 quilts to date!

To celebrate four years of blogging as Magpie Quilts, here in no particular order, are the ten quilts that I have sold (or still have for sale!) that I love the most! Enjoy!

Tiny windmills

Almost antique sawtooth

Dresden Star

Sampler patchwork

Bearspaw Quilt

Irish Chain quilt

Kaleidoscope quilt

Baby Quilt

Baby Chevron Quilt

Chevron Quilt

Which is your favourite? I would love to know!

--Ann

A Couple of Angels

I found these little angel cross stitch pictures while I was rearranging and cleaning out my storage cupboard early this year and found a scrap of purple fabric that matched and made this cute little wallhanging. Not sure where the pattern was from, but if I find a copy of the magazine, I will let you know the source. 

Little angels - Love is Kind - FOR SALE HERE

--Ann

Disappearing Friendship Star

At my Monday night guild last month, we had a lovely trunk show and class from fellow member Linda Hurd and her husband, Wayne Kollinger. Linda is a lovely lady and accomplished quilter - her machine quilting is amazing! Wayne is a pattern designer (Tuxedo Park Designs) and has been published in magazines and has a few books too.

The class was on taking a traditional block (in this case, the friendship star) and cutting it into 4 pieces and reassembling it into something new. The quilt it is based on is here in Wayne's Sketchbook Blog - a lovely blue & yellow quilt.

I looked through my stash of fabric and decided on quite a different colour selection - a muted pallet of greens and golds with some brown and red thrown in.

First, the original blocks are made - two with one colourway and two with the same fabrics, just different layout.

Wayne & Linda's instructions have details on how to press seams to avoid bulky seams at the end, but you can just press seams open for the same result.

Four simple blocks. Now the fun part! Cut each block into four pieces as shown.

 Take 2 pieces from one block and 2 pieces from the other and combine to make a new star block as shown.

And combine your four new blocks into a quilt top. I haven't added borders yet as I think this quilt turned out a little more green than I had imagined it would.

When I have a top that I can't decide how to finish, I just put the assembled blocks and related fabrics aside, come back to it at a later date and finish the top when I know what I want to do with it.

Thanks to Linda & Wayne for a great project!

--Ann

Antique Quilt Top to Finished Quilt

Last year I bought an antique butterfly quilt top from the shop "A String or Two" on Etsy. The top was in really good condition, with only a spot that looks like maybe a scorch mark from an iron, but not too noticeable.

Antique butterfly quilt

 I used a plain muslin backing and sent it off to Marie of Blueberry Hill Quilts to be quilted. She chose an all-over butterfly pattern that is just a subtle hint back to the appliquéd butterflies in the quilt top. The binding is a 1930's reproduction that is ok colourwise, but a bit too small a pattern for the prints used in the butterfly appliqué.

Butterfly Quilt close up

Although many antique quilts are rarely used, I intend to put this one on the guest bed and to show it off there if I ever get my guest room back from my youngest son! In the meantime, this quilt is hanging on the quilt rack in the dining room and I'm enjoying looking at it every day!

--Ann

Auditioning Sashing for a Scrappy Quilt

Yesterday I showed you the lovely scrappy eight patches that I was making for a comfort quilt for our guild's Stone Soup Day.

Today, I want to show you how I audition different fabrics to finish a scrappy quilt. Sometimes I will know what I want to use as a main fabric before I start, but with the variety of scraps I was working with this time, I knew I wanted to save this step until after I had the centre eight-patches completed.

Here's some of the fabrics I pulled that I thought might work, in no particular order:

Option 1: Olive green with stars

Option 2: teal blue

Option 3: tan

Option 4: bright blue

Option 5: Print on light tan

Option 6: Print on light brown

Option 7: light tan

Let me know in the comments below which option you like best! 

--Ann



PS So, after laying these out & taking photos, I actually did the math to figure out how much fabric I need for the sashing. Turns out that I don't have enough of any of these fabrics, so a trip to the fabric store is in the works. Stay tuned to see what I actually decide!

Scrappy Goodness

At least once a year, one of the quilt guilds I belong to (Dalemead Quilters Guild), gets together to make comfort quilts that go to one of three local organizations. We call our sewing day "Stone Soup Day" after the story of the soup that starts with a single stone and as everyone contributes what they are able, they have enough to feed everyone. 

When that same principle is applied to quilting, some people bring fabric, some sewing skills, some batting, some quilt, some put on binding and finally some sew on labels. And the end result is a pile of quilts!

 

 

 


This year I saw a quilt pattern at another group I sew with called "Crazy Eights" that I thought would make a great comfort quilt for our Stone Soup Day. I did a quick search when I got home and found the pattern over here at Fons and Porter. I didn't order the pattern as it looked simple enough to figure out and I didn't want to use strips, but the overflowing pile of 2.5" squares I've been cutting and saving for a very long time!

This is what is left after sewing what I needed - this bucket was full!

So on what is called "National Quilting Day" down in the states (not sure if it's called anything here in Canada, but we'll celebrate with our southern neighbours!) I packed up my sewing machine, 2.5" scraps and headed off to sew with a lovely group of women for our Stone Soup Day.

Sewing four-patches into eight-patches

After a full day (well, it's not a sweat shop, so I didn't put in a full 8 hours!), I had enough of my scraps sewn together into four-patches to make the 80 eight patch units that are needed for this quilt!

A lovely pile of scrappy eight-patches!

Tomorrow I'll show you how they look with a variety of fabrics for sashing and what I chose in the end! Till then, happy quilting!

--Ann