Quilter's Patch - the Grand Finale

Let's face it - I work to deadlines. The quilt that I quilted on Friday was to be picked up on Saturday. It's for publication so I'm not sharing at this time. So after my meeting yesterday, my plan was to put the binding on. I received an e-mail that she wasn't coming because of the weather. Guess what? I didn't put the binding on!  Well - I didn't put it on yesterday, but it's on now and technically that's finish number TEN for the year.

When I went to look at my list of finishes for the year, the last entry was January 23 and what have I done since then? Oh yes - I finished the Charity Challenge quilt for Quiltcon - so that's ten so far and I have to finish one more today.

And what did I do with the rest of the day? I had loads of plans, but I decided to take it easy and I read through some magazines and did a bit of handwork which I hope to share with you tomorrow.

But I'm already trying to make up for the time I "wasted" yesterday.  The next customer quilt is loaded on the longarm and like I said, that binding is on that big quilt. Yeah! I have a few plans for today - it was supposed to be a Sit n Sew day but with freezing rain in the forecast, it was postponed by a week. So I'm going to be in the studio and pretend that everyone is there!

It's time to share the final pictures from the Quilter's Patch class.

This quilt is from the book by Edyta Sitar (Laundry Basket Quilts). It's a really good book with lots of techniques so if you want to learn a whole bunch of different techniques - it's a great one, but there is a LOT of work in this quilt.

We didn't have that great of a turnout at the last class, but here's what we saw.

Paulette\s version

 I think she was going to think about something in that big space at the top of the quilt. You can see her applique stem curving around the top.

Marion's version

 Notice that Marion has started to add in a vine with some birds sitting on it. I love that and I do believe the vine is going to curl around and meet up with the vine on the side.

Joy wasn't at the final class, but she sent me a picture. Notice that she added extra flowers in that empty space between the butterflies at the top.

Joy's version

Jennifer was making great progress on her quilt, but it wasn't quite together yet. Here is the bottom section with her PINK poodle.

Bottom half of Jennifer's quilt

And here is the top half and I love what she did on the left border. Instead of putting the rake, she designed her own bird feeder. I love when people get creative with the pattern - that's what it's all about. And I should mention that she found the poodle pattern on the internet, but it wasn't the right size, so she had to resize that which isn't always the easiest especially when there are a lot of little pieces.

Top half of Jennifer's quilt

She pieced some extra butterflies into the top border. I like that and those butterflies are simple to make. I might steal that idea from her. And I really like the bird feeder, but I also like the rake.

Butterflies in the extra space

Here are a couple of close-ups of the vine in Jennifer's flower border along the right side. It's not attached to her quilt yet. I think I mentioned this before, but that hand embroidery is amazing. She used up a bunch of different shades of green floss. When one ran out, she chose another and she blended them together. So as she stitched, she had two or more different colors in the needle.

Jennifer's hand embroidery

More of Jennifer's hand embroidery

Some other people chose to make a different animal than the pieced cat. I'm not sure who did this block.

Cute little doggie

 And then there are my girls - Lexi and Murphy. Like I mentioned before, I want to remake the block using different fabrics for Lexi's face and the background. Now that I have more background to play with, I can remake it, but I'm working my way through the other blocks on Monday and I just haven't got back to redoing this one yet.

Lexi and Murphy

 Then we had other show n tell that day as well.  Let's have a look.

Here's a thimble quilt by Jennifer. I'm not sure if she cut these using a template, by hand or with a die cut, but this is one that's on my list of quilts to make. I love it!

Jennifer's thimble quilt

 Rose brought in an apron that she had completed. I had someone taking pictures and some of them are a wee bit blurry! Got to fire that photographer and get a new one!  I want to say that this was made with laminated fabric?  I really need to post the pictures right after class so I can remember. It's been several months since we had this show n tell.

Rose's apron

 Now, this next one is gorgeous. A nice modern quilt and I do NOT remember whose quilt this is. Sorry for that.

Blue and white modern quilt

 Here is Shelly with a zippered bag that she made. Matches her shirt? Her hair?   Oops - turns out that this is Ronda's pouch (I should have known - it's purple) but it truly matches Shelly's shirt. Ronda was the photographer!!!!

Shelly and the zippered pouch

 This next one which I'm sure a lot of you will recognize is Nancy's. This is the mystery quilt by Cantik Batiks that happened last year. It's the Canadian version and it's stunning.

Cantik Batik mystery quilt - Canadian version

 Here is one of the blocks - probably Nova Scotia?

Detail of block for the Canada quilt

 And here's what it looks like on the back. She used a zig-zag on the buffalo block (Manitoba?), while in the lighthouse one, she used a straight stitch. I can't remember why or maybe I'm imagining things.

The back of the blocks

 A while back, Nancy had alluded to a project that she was working on for her son. I asked her to bring it in because I'm fascinated by pixelated quilts.  Look at what she's got done so far. These blocks are so much fun. I'm guessing you don't need me to tell you the theme? Super Mario in case you didn't figure it out.

Pixelated blocks

I'm back in from shoveling the driveway. How many days in a row does that make it now? At least I don't have to worry about building up my upper body strength! I feel like I could arm wrestle a Sumo wrestler. Just kidding - at the moment, my arms are a tad fatigued.

I made it to the gym yesterday for my weigh-in for the start of the 60-day challenge. I'm ready. Got my goals set and I just have to work out my schedule to get my butt there 4 times a week. It's doable - hey - I gave up that darn refined sugar cold turkey so I know I can do this!

And now I'm off to the studio with my imaginary friends to sew all day!!

Have a super day!

Ciao!!!