Quilting

2015 International Quilt Festival

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I attended Preview Night last night at the International Quilt Festival in Houston. I’ve been going for decades and this year was absolutely the best! It is so fun to go and shop and fall in love with the new quilt trends. But to do it with your great friends was the buttercream icing on the cake! Loretta and Toni moved away some time back and came to Houston to join Tina and Gwenn and me for an epic adventure.

If you have never been … let’s just say it is five days … 60,000 people from all over the world celebrating quilting. There are classes, quilt exhibits, demos, lectures, tons of shopping (1,100 booths) and more eye candy quilts that you have ever seen under one roof! I really should have taken more photographs but I was concentrating on those future potential projects to purchase.

Trends I noticed … lots of primitive quilts, modern, and so much more! I snagged Edyta Sitar’s “Elephants” quilt pattern and stencil (awesome design), a pillow kit for Fall, a cowboy boot quilt kit, and the most important was a chunk of Minion fabric for my grandson’s Jake’s future I Spy quilt.

The International Quilt Festival ends on Sunday, November 1, so get your walking shoes on and head on down to the George R. Brown Convention Center.

A quilt for Emma

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This is a story about Emma’s Autism quilt. If you look close, you will notice there are only two kinds of fabric in the quilt top. The one fabric brightly-colored with a puzzle piece design, the symbol for Autism. The other fabric, a solid, used to quiet the other. Emma is like the solid fabric in her quilt … quiet and encouraging. She has always offered practical ways to apply behavioral and social training encouraging those with Autism to thrive and belong.

It was earlier this year when Mary came to me with the idea for making Emma a quilt and two yards of the puzzle fabric. She wanted to in some small way thank Emma for years of encouragement, friendship, and her willingness to share her expertise while working her daughter, Michelle. Actually, Emma has over the years touched many lives in our community. How do you thank someone like that?

While my own daughter, Mimi, doesn’t have Autism, we have our own happy memories with Emma. Years ago Emma came to our home to care for Mimi so my husband and I could go on a date. Emma gave Mimi the nickname of “Meemers,” which is what many at the day center still call her.

Of course I was “all in” on the project! It took me a while to figure out a quilt block to complement the busy Autism fabric. I figured whatever quilt block we used, the black fabric would make it pop. The churn dash quilt block was simple enough and worked well with the busy Autism fabric.

Mary and I even scheduled some time together so I could show her how to piece a few of the blocks. Once the quilt top was finished we went to a local quilt shop, Quilts & Creations, and picked out a backing. The bright green worked perfect! Next we met with Kim Norton, of A Busy Bobbin, to pick out a machine quilting pattern. We all loved the variegated thread and swirly quilt pattern. Personalize It Kingwood made the quilt label and we were finally ready to give Emma the quilt.

After bouncing lots of options off each other, Mary came up with the perfect name for the quilt. “Emma’s Gift of Hope” was our way to say thanks to a very special lady who has spent a lifetime giving to people with Autism.

Nativity quilt … the rest of the story!

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The quilt sold at live auction!
Our Nativity quilt was one of the items featured in the live auction at St. Martha’s Fall Festival on Saturday. It was a wonderful event for the whole family filled with fun, food, games for the kids, craft booths and fellowship! And yep … this is my final post about the Nativity quilt!

The live auction started at 7 pm. For a few ladies who stood off to one side closest to our quilt, you could cut the tension with a heavy-duty rotary cutter! After a full day of working our craft booth, several of Martha’s Quilters were in attendance for the live auction. Finally, our quilt came up for bidding. Our demeanor turned anxious as our quilt was finally brought forward. The minimum bid was $1,000. I held my breath. Would anyone in the crowd even bid on such an expensive item? Five long seconds passed. Finally, a lady raised her hand in the front row. Then a lady on the second row raised her hand. They battled back and forth and when the dust settled … our Nativity quilt … the one seven ladies worked on for three months … 843 fabric pieces and over 250 collective hours … the same quilt I had dreams about … what if we didn’t get it finished in time kinda dreams … the auctioneer announced “sold” … for $2,200! A very happy ending to a long journey.

Check out Martha’s Quilters booth at Fall Festival

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Martha’s Quilters have been busy since July creating lots of one-of-a-kind handmade items for St. Martha’s Fall Festival. Our booth will be overflowing so come on by and check it out! Let’s see if I can list a few things we have for sale … college quilts (A&M, UT and LSU come to mind), lots of lovely quilts (fabric and crocheted), Christmas tree skirts, ornaments, seasonal table runners, fabric purses, felt purses, small rosary zippered bags, aprons, mug rugs, embroidered baby items (new this year and absolutely awesome), wine bags, designer fabric checkbook covers, rolling pin covers, and so much more we are going to knock your socks off!

St. Martha’s Fall Festival is this Saturday from noon to 8 pm in the church parking lot. Lots of food, drink, activities for the kids, and oh … there is a live auction where, among other items, our fabulous Nativity Quilt will be auctioned to benefit our ministry and the parish!

Nativity paper-pieced quilt – part nine – it’s done!

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We are finished with the Nativity quilt! Lots of detailed quilting was added this week. Check out the donkey’s mane and the manager! We certainly have some talented ladies.

Two of our paper-piecing ladies were not present for our group photograph … Liz and Lynn. Marie and Maria joined us for the group photo. They did not participate in the paper-piecing part of the quilt but were such a great help with hand sewing the binding and hiding the thread tails.

The Nativity quilt will appear at all Masses in the narthex this weekend and will be auctioned in the live auction at St. Martha’s Fall Festival on Saturday, October 3.

Martha’s Quilters also has a booth with lots of wonderful handcrafted items at the Fall Festival!

Nativity paper-pieced quilt – part eight – Sally machine quilts!

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Sally took a turn at machine quilting this past week and we are loving her results! Lots of detailing in different areas like giving the sheep and dog texture, detailing on the kings, manager, fencing, donkey and cow. Did you notice our cow actually has a nose? I’m sure I missed pointing out some of the areas she worked on. My eyes were glazed over on Wednesday in admiration of her work! I didn’t get a tally on the hours Sally spent quilting, but she still has it for a few more days.

I also included a photo of Noreen’s sky quilting that I believe I left out a couple of weeks ago. Stunning!

Many thanks to the lovely Maria who spent several tedious hours this week “hiding” the threads! It is a thankless job but it has to be done!

Clara will get the quilt next week for the final round of quilting. Also completed this week … the binding is made and ready to be sewed on when the machine quilting is finished. The sleeve for the back of the quilt is also made so the finished quilt can be hung. Finally, the quilt label has been planned, Sally will embroidery, and we are nearing completion on an amazing project that has been a labor of love.

Our Nativity quilt will be auctioned on Saturday, October 3, at St. Martha’s Fall Festival.

Nativity paper-pieced quilt – part seven – machine quilting!

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Our Prayer Quilt Ministry’s Nativity quilt is now being passed around to those who are machine quilting the three layers together at home. Noreen took it first and did some lovely quilting of the sky, angels and the palm tree. The detail work turned out amazing! The quilt was handed over to me last week. Talk about being nervous! I haven’t machine quilted in a long time! I outline quilted for ten different small areas which included the three kings, a couple of sheep, the camel and Joseph. You should see this quilt in person!

Noreen spent 16 hours machine quilting and I put in 12 hours. Sally has our quilt this week. I can’t wait until next week to see her progress!

Nativity paper-pieced quilt – part six – A basting we will go!

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Our paper-pieced Nativity quilt entered a new phase this week … basting! For non-quilters out there … a quilt isn’t a quilt until the quilt top is sandwiched and secured with batting (the fluffy stuff) and a fabric backing. After basting is complete, the machine quilting part will take several weeks, so you might not see a Nativity quilt post for a short spell.

Noreen, our fearless leader, encouraged her mighty paper-piece team to watch a couple of Sharon Schamber’s videos on YouTube a few days before we were to baste our quilt. Sharon was a guest speaker at a recent Kingwood Area Quilt Guild meeting and also held a workshop. Noreen and Sally attended the class given by Sharon and were impressed. We were going to use her technique to baste our Nativity quilt. The first video is eight minutes and the second video is a little longer. Sharon showcases a herringbone stitch basting technique and shares basic tips. Our huge quilt was perfect for Schamber’s technique. It only took a few hours and we were done!

For the next few weeks, the quilt will travel from house-to-house for machine quilting. First stop … Noreen’s house.

Nativity paper-pieced quilt – part five

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In just a few short weeks, seven very busy ladies, from our Prayer Quilt Ministry, finished piecing the top of our Nativity Quilt for St. Martha Catholic Church’s Parish Festival. When completely finished the quilt will be auctioned on October 3.

My last assignment was a section for one of the angels at the top of the quilt. I have to admit I’m getting pretty good at paper-piecing!

Thanks to our fearless leader, Noreen, for taking all the many sections of the quilt and sewing them together. It turned out stunning! Our seven ladies collectively sewed 833 pieces of fabric which took 170 long hours. And that is just for sewing the top together. Noreen then pulled all the little pieces of paper from the back of the quilt!

But folks … we are not done yet! Next comes basting the backing, batting and top together and quilting the top! Stay tuned for further progress … and pray for us!

Nativity paper-pieced quilt – part four

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Our nativity quilt sections are coming together nicely. One more week and we should have the quilt top totally finished. Lots more to do after that!

Today we laid out the finished sections to get a sense of what our final quilt will look like! There are still a few sections left to piece. I am loving this quilt!

The lovely Clara holds the holy family, which she pieced along with Noreen! Some of the fabric pieces are very small. Check out Joseph’s mouth. The holy family is my favorite section of the quilt. I just love the colors of the fabric and the design.

My assignment this week … the angel. Wish me luck!