Magpie Quilts: November 2014

Saturday, 29 November 2014

Family Crafting Day

I live about 2.5 hours from my mom and my sisters, but I know we share a love of spending time with family and crafting.

Large room for crafting

A few years ago, we tried to find a day to just get together, visit and craft on whatever we had going on. We've managed to do this 3 or 4 times, and then skipped a year and this year were able to get a day together.

My mom crocheting an edge on a baby blanket

My niece just moved into a lovely house that has a large walk-out basement with a gorgeous view and lots of light, so we planned to meet at her place. There was plenty of place for the kids to play, we each brought a little something for lunch and we came from near and far to have a great day.

Hard at work? Or avoiding getting their photo taken?

As you can see, we have reupholstery, sewing, crocheting, beading and just playing with the toys happening!

Reupholstery and duplo

Do you get together with your family to craft or sew? With neighbours? Friends? How far would you travel to spend a day with others? Tell me about it!

--Ann

Wednesday, 26 November 2014

WIP Wednesday - November 26

This is what is on my design wall this week:

Four memory quilts made from the shirts of a customer's father. There's a mix of dress shirts, casual shirts and T-shirts in these quilts. I still need to add some borders to make them to the size wanted and the backs are going to be super soft Minky. I love Minky on the backs, just not the extra work required to ensure the quilt doesn't pucker and stretch while it's being quilted.

Memory Quilt 1/4

Memory Quilt 2/4

Memory Quilt 3/4

Memory Quilt 4/4

And a custom quilt made from Paris themed fabrics with disappearing 9-patch blocks randomly placed. This one will go to Marie from Blueberry Hill Quilts for quilting after it's pieced together.

What's on your design wall this week?

--Ann

Monday, 24 November 2014

From Garage Sale to Completed Quilt

Rainbow Blazing Star

This lovely quilt started as a kit found at a garage sale by my sister-in-law. The details are hazy due to the passage of time, but it somehow ended up in my closet as a UFO (Unfinished Object) or as I prefer, a PHD (project half done). It's been pulled out more than a few times, hung on the design wall and puzzled over how to best finish it.

You see, the centre of this beauty was stretched all out of proportion and when the points of the star were pieced together, the middle of the quilt was quite poofy - in fact, a small animal could have lived in that puffy space. So I ~~ripped~~ carefully took out the seams, just at the centre, took in the seams and finally ended up with a centre that was workable, even though it still had some puffiness to it.

I then added the gray background and it makes this vintage 70's quilt top look incredibly like a modern quilt.

My long arm quilter, Marie at Blueberry Hill Quilts picked a great pattern to quilt on it and did a terrific job at the centre - no puckers or excess puffiness. It is only because we have a good working relationship that I even asked her to quilt this one for me - it's not the long-arm quilter's job to quilt out mistakes that can be avoided by accurate piecing.

This quilt is now back at my sister-in-law's and I'm happy she wanted it back!

Do you have any garage sale projects to finish?? I'd love to hear about them!

Thursday, 13 November 2014

Christmas Stocking and a Christmas Quilt

A few years ago I made some stockings for a client in Edmonton (blogged here), and I had so much fun making them! When she received them, she had them custom embroidered with names on the cuff.

Stocking Front

Stocking Back

And then she returned the following year to ask that I make some Christmas quilts for her children's beds and supplied me with fabric panels and adorable gold and red reindeer fabric to make both the quilts and the matching pillowcases (blogged here).

Pillowcase

Christmas Quilt

This year, they added another little person to their family and I am so pleased that they asked me to make a stocking and bed quilt for this new person!

Piecing the Christmas Stocking

I dug through my messy closet and found the cardboard template that I used for the original stockings and was so happy to see that I actually made some notes on what I did and how I put everything together. It made making a matching Christmas stocking much easier and when I went into my stash of Christmas fabrics, I found I still had squares cut to size in the same fabric line that I used originally. So this new stocking is going to look right at home hanging next to the original ones!

Tada! Finished Christmas Stocking

I love the fabric panels that were chosen for the bed quilt & matching pillowcase. And although the original red & gold reindeer border fabric wasn't available, the new fabric chosen (and supplied by the client) with the Christmas hobby horses was a great pick and worked well with the panels.

Christmas Quilt

I am so happy to have finished these in plenty of time for holiday decorating season and would LOVE to see pictures of this client's Christmas house!

--Ann

Sunday, 9 November 2014

T-shirt Quilts finished!

Finished these two beauties for a friend last month! Although I haven't seen my friend for a number of years (I went to school with her sister), we have been out of touch for most of our adult lives and now that we are both empty nesters, it has been fun to catch up through Facebook and more recently, in person.

T-shirt Quilt

Although I sometimes think that technology has way too strong a hold on me and my time, I do love the way it keeps me in touch with people that I would otherwise not cross paths with on a regular basis.