Throwback Thursday ~ Mom's Embroidered UFO Quilt

How many of you remember the Cross Stitch Quilt Block kits from way back in the day?  Did you make one?  Or did you start one and never finish it like me?  Mine is stored away somewhere deep within the sewing room, I think.  I might have tossed it or given it away.  If its here I haven't seen it in years.  This one was made by my mom.  She finished the embroidery way back in the 80's but never got around to piecing the blocks or quilting.  In 2013 she asked me to finish piecing and quilting it for her.

Mom was not a quilter but she had made a couple quilt panel quilts. The quilting bug never bitten her like it has me.  She was more of a seamstress, crochet fanatic and she loved to embroidery.   Before she passed I finished a few of her UFO's because she lost interest long before her battle with cancer.  I had only been frame quilter for about 2 yrs when I took on this project.  To be honest I was scared.  What if I ruined her beautiful handwork?  So I took my time and it came out beautiful.  My thought was to keep the quilting fairly light and simple because non quilters typically don't care for my quilt it death style.  We were both very pleased with the finish, that is until it was washed. The instructions to finish the quilt called for a larger seam allowance that was preprinted on the blocks.  Mom had assured me the preprinted lines would wash out so if I wanted to use the standard quarter inch seam it would be fine.  They did not!  The lines didn't even fade in the slightest.  I washed it several times and used many different tricks to try to remove the lines but they are still there today.  Oh well.  Maybe time will work it's magic. 

 

 One must find the positive and for this quilt it is that the back looks pretty cute and could it could be used as whole cloth quilt.  Of course the other positive is that mom made the blocks and I finished it with quilting.  It sure to be loved by one of the grandkids long after I'm gone.

In my eyes it's beautiful even with the dark lines.  Mom started teaching me to sew at a young age.  By the time I got into high school and was taking Home Ec classes I knew almost everything taught in the classes.  Ms. Coyle would often ask for help teaching the new skills.  She would be on one side of the class room with a circle of girls and I would be on the other side with my circle of girls.  The only thing I didn't know how to do was make quilts.  I hand pieced one fan quilt block in a class and swore I'd never make another. I took that thing apart three times and it was still wonky. However I did make a chicken scratch baby quilt for my final project that year.  When I turned in my quilt at the end of the semester I told her this is the first and the last time I'll ever make a quilt.  And here I am today totally obsessed with quilting.  

Until next time...

I hope you find time to stitch up something sweet!

Pin It

Throwback Thursday ~ Old Technique revisited

While putting the recently finished Quilt Doodle Design 2017 BOM quilt blocks on the design wall this week I noticed some fabric shadowing in my blocks.  What's that?  It's when the darker fabrics show through the lighter fabrics on the front of the block.  Let's hang one on the window so we can get a better look.  You really can't see it at a distance.

So let's get up close and personal with my blocks.  The green arrow is pointing to the white seam allowance, which is good.  The red arrow is pointing to the colored fabric that extends past the normal seam allowance, which is bad.  The excess seam allowance should have been dealt with before attaching to the background fabric.  No need crying over spilled milk, all I can do is get inside the back and fix the problem.

   Most quilters these days think if you can't see it from a galloping horse then don't worry about it.  Honestly most of the time I think the same thing.  But I've put far to much time and effort into these appliqued blocks to let  the finished quilt be ruined with something that can easily be fixed in an afternoon.  There was a time back when I first started quilting that it was standard practice when doing applique to cut away the excess fabric on the back.  This would reduce the amount of fabric when hand quilting.  Once you had the back cut away you could fix any shadowing.  Most quilters no longer hand quilt so this technique has been eliminated.  And I personally think there's a little marketing going on here also.  You can buy products to sew or iron into your project in advance to help with shadowing, but it adds more bulk and cost.  And most designers just don't worry about how it looks, its all about selling more fabric and patterns and meeting tight deadlines.  Where do you think the galloping horse statement originated?  Now let me say, I altered this pattern which caused the shadowing.  In the original pattern the center was to be curved pieced and with proper seam allowance there would be no shadowing.  So the above statements do not apply to Cindy's wonderful free pattern.   With that being said let's open this baby up!

  I used my sharpest pointy scissors to poke a hole and start cutting.

  

Snip, snip, snip...it was not hard and went pretty quick.

Now that I'm in here there's two options.  Option one is to cut a large circle of fabric and slide it behind the seam allowance.  I'm using paper for demonstration purposes...I'm cheap!

It would be tucked up under the seam allowance and be carefully tacked into place.  

The second option and the option I chose is the old fashion way of dealing with shadowing.  Just cut away the excess.  I snipped a few of the stitches between two of the dresden blades to make it easier to start cutting away the excess.

This really is the fastest, easiest and cheapest way to deal with an unsightly little issue of shadowing.

TADA! Finished all twelve blocks while I watched the noon news.  

This will look so much better in the finished quilt.

 And I won't need to borrow the neighbors horse to look a my quilt and be happy with it.

The best thing about fixing the shadowing is now I have some pretty low volume scrap to add to the scrap bin.  A happy mistake indeed!

~ Lea Anne ~

Pin It

Throwback Thursdays " In the Pink" Series quilt #1

Since this is Breast Cancer Awareness month it only seems appropriate to share a few of my pink quilts.  First let me do a little shout out to Krista for hosting the Throwback Thursdays for quilters.  You can find the link up at KristaQuilts every Thursday.  It's been fun seeing the quilts that have inspired quilters over the years and seeing the changes in quilt styles.   Hearing the tales of quilting woes and how they fixed them also seems to be a weekly theme.  I invite you to join us in our weekly walk down memory lane, you never know when you might be inspired or find some good quilting advice.

My "In the Pink" quilts are gifted to a Cancer survivor/patient.  Not all the quilts are pink, but the tradition of me making a quilt for cancer patients started with a Breast Cancer Quilt. 

Now let me say... this quilt was made long before my blogging days.  My photography skills were worse than my quilting skills.  Anyway...Mom had requested a quilt for a co-worker that survived breast cancer.  The pattern is Pink Ribbon from the Quilterscache.  If I were to make this quilt again the ribbon block would be reworked with fewer pieces and I think an Irish Chain block would look nicer as the alternating block.  Many different issues happened during the quilt construction.  I can't remember all of them, but I do remember being glad to finally finish and send it on its way.  One of the problems was cutting and piecing the flying geese blocks.  I cut all the pieces for these block in one night, and I cut them all the wrong size.  Just to make things worse there wasn't enough fabric to re-cut.   If you compare the quilt blocks below with my quilt blocks you'll see that mine has fewer geese and a smaller center.    All I remember is cussing a lot and reworking the block.  What you can't see in the fuzzy picture above is the machine embroidered words on each ribbon....Faith, Hope, Cure, Love and a couple more that slip my mind.  At this stage in my quilting life I didn't know how to FM quilt so the quilting was a simple outlining the shapes using my Domestic Machine.

See you next Thursday when I share my 

"Flying into the Pink" quilt.  A great quilt with an even better story.

~ Lea Anne ~

Pin It

Throwback Thursday Quilt #3

If you been following along in the last few weeks I've been linking up with Throwback Thursdays @KristaQuilts.  It's also no big secret that I love scrappy quilts.  From my very first quilt to my most current, almost all have been scrappy.   And more often than not there's no pattern or kit, just an idea that pops into my head.  Of course the internet has helped to fuel and inspire most of my creations.  Occasionally people influence the design.  Which is exactly how the quilt below came to be.  

This quilt was inspired by Mr. Podunk who said "Do you have any fabrics that aren't bright?"  Well I do but they rarely make into my quilts.  I'm an emotional quilter(and eater if the truth be told).  Quilting with brights helps to keep my sunny disposition in check.   So I started digging into the stash for just the right muddy fabrics to make Mr. Podunk a quilt.  There just wasn't much to work with in his color pallet. But I could make it work with a few scraps leftover from quilt one and two.  If you missed them you can find them here and here.   I can remember struggling with quilting this quilt.  I was new to quilting on a frame and needed the practice, but didn't want it to look too girly.  I also remember about a year after making this "Manly quilt"  someone wrote a quilting book called "Quilts for Guys" or something like that as the title.  Mr. Podunk had no idea he would be such a trendsetter.   

~  Lea Anne ~

Pin It

Throwback Thursday Quilt #2

A couple of weeks ago I shared a scrappy quilt made with every fabric in my stash.  Every fabric I had at the time.  If I were to try this now the pieces would be very small in order to keep the quilt a manageable size.  There were tons of scraps  because there was no plan, no math, just cutting and cutting.  We'll call it Improv quilting, just to make it sound like I had a clue. 

 The original quilt was given as a gift to a dear friend.  When her mother in law saw the quilt she wanted it.  For some reason this batch of mishmashed fabrics gets everyone's attention.  It's not one of my better quilts, but everyone seems to love the no rhyme or reason color pallet.  So when I found out her mother in law wanted the quilt what could I do but make another quilt from the leftovers.  Let the scrap play begin. The white used in this quilt was also scraps from another project.   My first plan below.

 The first quilt was a snowball quilt made using the flippy corners method.  This method always produces HST scrap.  Might as well use them too!

Oh these were the good old days of pinning a quilt sandwich.  A process I don't miss now that I have a frame quilter.

The quilting was simple because that's all I knew how to do back then.

And the binding was made from more of the scrap.

And a few more scraps on the back.  My BFF's MIL loved the quilt.  As far as I know it's still draped over the foot of her bed.

If you'd like to see more quilts from the past, head on over to Krista Quilts for Throwback Thursday.    I'm writing this post early so you may need to click on her home page at the top of the blog to see today's list of Thowbacks.

Oh if you haven't signed up for the giveaway here on my blog you can find it here.

Lea Anne

Pin It

Throwback Thursday Quilt

Morning, Quilty Friends!  Are you ready for a quick trip down my scrappy memory lane?  For the next three Thursdays I'll be sharing quilts made from this batch of scrappy fabrics.  But first let me do a little shout out to Krista@KristaQuilts for hosting the Throwback Thursday Linky Party.    

Hop on over and link up some of your oldies but goodies or just be inspired.

My quilt for this week was made because I wanted to make a quilt using every print fabric that was in my small stash at that time.  The plan was for a simple quilt that looked vintage.  So I pulled out the paper and calculator and started drafting something simple.  After doing the quilty math  a 2.5" strip was cut from each fabric.  If my memory serves me right, this is the first quilt that using the flippy corners method.   You know the stitch, clip and flip.

As each new block went on the design wall the excitement grew.  LOVE LOVE LOVE scrappy!  Mr. Podunk however said "that quilt is chaos".  My response 

"It's the Beauty in Chaos"  And that's how her name came to be

 "The Beauty in Chaos"  

Not only has my quilting improved greatly since these pictures were taken but so has my photography skills.  What you can't see is the quilting in each block done by my embroidery machine.  The straight line stitching was done on my Domestic Machine.  And some of the leftover HST's from the flippy corners were put into the border.

The Beauty in Chaos quickly became my favorite quilt and everyone else's favorite.   There were many requests to take her off my hands but I just couldn't let her go.  My best friend since 7th grade, Barb, had expressed her interest in it many times but I couldn't let her go.  I offered her any other quilt but not this one, nope she wanted my Beauty.  We've been through so much together, the good, the bad and boy was there some ugly moments when I wanted to strangle her, but our friendship has survived.  She's the sister I never had.  So when we found out there was a tumor the size of a grapefruit in her uterus the quilt was the least I could do.  Yep she owns My Beauty.  No words were spoken when  covering her with it at the hospital after surgery.  I loved this quilt but I love her more.

~Lea Anne ~

Pin It

Throwback Thursday Quilt

Well I'm a day late on my Throwback post, it totally slipped my mind.  This is quilt #3 of my own little throwback story that you can find here.  If your interested in the other quilts of my little mini throwback series you can find them  in my blog archives for this month.   Okay this quilt was made for my oldest son Derek.  It was a real adventure from the word "Go".  We ran from store to store, covering 3 counties to find just the right red print fabric to suit Mr. Picky.  And wouldn't you know I ran out of the red print due to a cutting error.  So again we took to the roads looking for more of the special red print.  I bought all they had and still needed to add the huge black border to suit Mr. Picky.  

Oh I give him a hard time over this quilt but it was fun to make the quilt and the memories that came along with the process.   

The pattern was from this book.  I think it was called "The Double Pinwheel".   This was my first real quilting book.     When I purchased it I can remember thinking I'd never need to buy another quilt book.  101 patterns who could need more than that!    HAHAHA!   Even then I designed most of  my quilts or found freebies online changed them up a bit to make them my own.  Not much has changed, I still buy books, look at the pretty quilts, but never make them.  It is what it is, I've tried to change it and fight it but that's just my quilty style. 

So do you have some older quilts that have story to tell?  If so hop on over to

 Krista Quilts and link up for Throwback Thursday.

Pin It

Throwback Thursday- Ignorance is bliss

A couple of weeks ago I shared a quilt my first scrappy quilt.  You can find it here.  It was stitched full of memories for my kids, and they wore it out.  In my effort to save the quilt I offered each of my 3 kids a new quilt of their own, any pattern they wanted.    Since my daughter was living in another state we decided she would be the first to pick a quilt pattern.  What a shock it was when she requested a Rebel flag quilt.  Just what in the heck is my daughter doing one state away!?    I understood what this symbol meant to some people but did she understand?  Maybe I was being overly sensitive, but I won't quilt negativity. After some questioning I realized that my little girl had absolutely no idea what this symbol meant.  She thought it meant she was a country girl, a tomboy who liked driving big trucks, fishing and living a little bit old fashion.  When we discussed its real meaning she said and I quote "Well it may mean that to them but it doesn't mean that to me, that's stupid, it's just a flag."  Her ignorance about the symbol satisfied the MOTHER in me and I made the quilt, not just one but two.  When her first baby was born she requested a baby size.  

EDITED...    I DIDN'T USE A PATTERN.  I APPLIQUED THE BLUE AND WHITE X AND THE STARS TO A RED FABRIC THEN ADDED BORDERS.

A couple years later a young woman at work saw my baby flag quilt and requested one for her newborn.  Again I had to ask why she wanted this flag.  She too was just a clueless young woman that had no idea the negative meaning that some attach to the symbol.  So I made another.  Over the years I've had many more requests for this quilt from people who I felt attached negative meaning to the symbol, they didn't get one or any other quilt.  

This quilt may offend some of my readers, that's not my intention.  If I made a quilt with a skull and cross bones would you think I was a witch mixing up bad potions, casting spells, drinking blood and doing animal sacrifices ?   Maybe all those star quilts I've made are Satanic symbols!  You see it's all about perception and intention.  So please don't leave negative comments.  This post was to share older quilts I've made and a little history behind them.  My daughter cherishes this quilt because to her it's means she's a country girl just trying to survive in a world gone crazy.  She lives a simple life with no cable, no TV black box, no internet, she doesn't even read the newspaper.  Totally clueless of the turmoil this symbol has created in the media over the last year.  Yes ignorance is bliss, she's living a life that most of us could never imagine.   

I'm linking up today with Krista Quilts for Throwback Thursday.

~ Lea Anne ~

Pin It

Throwback Thursday

Are you ready for another blast from the past?  Before sharing my throwback quilt today I'd like to invite you to share your own over at Krista Quilts.  It's a brand new linky party and we're having fun sharing the quilts at the beginning of our quilting journeys.

My quilt this week isn't the one I wanted to share.  It just happened to be the first older quilt picture I came across while searching my old picture files.  Mom started this quilt when I was pregnant with my daughter back in 1987.  Well like mother like daughter, it became a UFO for 20 plus years.  This is what it looked like when she gave it to me to finish for my first grandchild.  All I can say is UGGGGGLY!  It needed a bit more character.  At the time I had a full time job that left little time for quilting, so it was laid aside and forgotten.

A few years later while rummaging through the ever growing UFO pile I ran across the hand embroidered blocks that I had removed, washed and pressed.  It was time for a shopping trip!  I took the blocks with me to the LQS and found that the colors mom used in the hand embroidery matched very well with 30's reproductions.

Luckily I was able to find a muslin that matched perfectly with the fabric she had used over 20 years ago.  The quilt pattern was a freebie called Hugs and Kisses.  Moms embroidered blocks had to be squared up and enlarged using the muslin.

I didn't have a frame quilter at the time so I did some straight line stitching to secure the blocks for quilting with my embroidery machine.

Instead of giving this quilt to one of my grandchildren I gave it back to mom on her birthday in 2011.  The label reads

Embroidered 1987

by L.F. Mason

Pieced and quilted 2011 

by L.A. Brummett

It's not very often that my grumpy ole momma gets teary eyed but this put a lump in the grumpy Gerties throat.  Not the reaction that was expected...but better.  

~ Lea Anne ~

Pin It

Throwback Thursday

This is a first for me, two post in one day.  It's not something I like to do but  since I just learned of a new link up...why not write two posts.  The new link up is called Throwback Thursdays.  Yep its just that easy, share some of your first quilts.  Unfortunately I don't have pictures of the first quilt made in high school or the small wall hangings made in my 20's.  But I do have this, my first bed sized quilt.  There was no pattern.  Just sewing together scraps until I had a piece big enough to cut into a square.

The fabrics were leftovers from halloween costumes, curtains, and various home decor sewing projects.  As you can see there was very little quilting.  Boy have I come a long way, now they get quilted to death!   This quilt was the beginning of my obsession.  My kids fought over who could sleep with it, and they wore it out quick.   There's a lot of memories in this old quilt for my kids.  I wanted the memories to last and not be torn apart by over usage.  So offered to make each of the kids any quilt they wanted so this  one could be put away.  Over the next few weeks I'll share with you on Thursdays the quilts they chose.  In the meantime how about hopping over to Krista Quilts to link up your first quilts!  It'll be fun to the changes over the years.

Pin It

Throwback Thursday

Every year Mr. Podunk takes a couple of fishing trips back to his home state of PA.  On his way back last week he stopped by his sisters.  She loaded up his truck with 3 bolts of decor fabric, 1 large garbage bag of fabric and this box full. His sister's not a quilter.  They were given to her by a friend who's mom had recently passed.  She knew just the gal that would appreciate them...ME!  Most of it was things I would never use, so they were donated to the Goodwill.

Free fabric is always fun to receive, but the old quilting books and magazines are the best!   Most of them were dated from the early 70's.  But I saw a few things that looked really familiar.

It makes me wonder how a quilter can put a copyright on a pattern.  We seem to be copying what has already been done several times and several ways.

And the hexie craze we see today...well it looks like someone else thought of that also.

Funny how the more things change the more they stay the same.

At last something original.  I had to really look at the picture below, I thought it was a rock.  Can't say that I've ever seen anything like it before, have you?  I know that all of you are just dying to make one for yourself.  So just leave a comment and I'll send you a copy of the pattern....wink wink.

The one thing that you won't find in the older books and magazines is quick quilting tricks such as making HST's from 2 squares. It all templates and graph paper drawings that show you how to draw your own.   

The best thing in my box of goodies was the quilters notes and templates.  It's a shame that in her passing the family found these useless.  While reading through the papers I found a name on a receipt, I'm assuming it was her name.  So as I continued  reading  I tried to put a face to the name and wondered if she too was obsessed with quilting or just a crafty woman that enjoyed sewing.  Seems kinda silly to feel a connection to a woman I've never met, but I did.  So I'll be adding these to my vintage sewing collection...priceless.

~ Lea Anne ~

Pin It