Magpie Quilts

When I first discovered Bonnie Hunter of Quiltville.com and her scrappy quilts, the Scrappy Trip Around the World quilt was one of the ones I wanted to make.  While I was cleaning up and sorting and folding my scraps, I began to cut 2.5" strips for making this quilt.  I didn't take ANY care for which fabrics I chose or didn't choose. Anything went. So, there's a real assortment of fabrics in this colorful quilt and it makes me happy just to look at it! Every time I added a few more blocks, I played with the layout.  Originally, I thought Option A was the layout I would end up using, but. . . in the end, Option B was the one that I like the best. Our granddog was right there when I went outside to take a photo of the finished quilt.  All the colors look fabulous! The full effect of this quilt is exactly what drew me to this pattern from the start. Ready to keep someone warm by the firepit on a fall evening. Just look at those colors pop! This quilt is destined to be a

Every sew often, I have to do a little cleaning up so I can find what I'm looking for. These drawers are from IKEA and came with their own stand, but my handy husband made frames for them so I could use them in the walk in closet in my sewing room. Often when I clean, I find fabrics that I think go good together and will set them aside in a baggie to make a quilt at a later date.  Above are my pinks and reds all neatly folded and easy to see what's there. And below is a stack of fabrics that have similar shades. That pretty floral is a remnant from my sister's sewing for her daughters. (So, about 25-30 years old?) I don't start with any particular pattern or design, but quilters are nothing if not resourceful and I decided on a few stars with some alternating blocks. I cut everything out and had just enough of the floral to make the nine block centers.  The pinks look great in a quilt together even if they weren't exact matches. It also makes the blocks more interes

Often I get requests to finish something started by another quilter from the past and this year I received a collection of pre-cut stars and some assembled blocks from a client's grandmother. I was unable to use the blocks that were already pieced together as the center points didn't match up, they weren't all square and they didn't lay flat.   I was really sad that I wasn't able to as someone had made a lot of effort to match up solids and prints to make a large quilt. So I took the pieces that weren't already sewn together, trimmed them down slightly to make the pieces accurate enough to make pretty blocks. My centers weren't all perfect, but they are pretty close! :) Then I needed to find a border and sashing fabric to bring all the different stars together.  Pink. Teal. Light Blue/Gray. Orange.  The customer ended up choosing the teal blue and it looks so great; modern and vintage at the same time. An edge to edge feather quilting design just adds to the

Ii have a repeat customer that loves quilts and quilting but is unable to do it for herself because of chronic health issues, so every so often, I do a commission quilt for her. This time it was a Hello Kitty quilt. I selected a few designs and adjusted the colors on the embroidery to the purple my client requested. I chose bow tie blocks because Hello Kitty is always with a bow on her head. I had a fat quarter pack of some purple prints that I thought would work great as a piano key border, but it just felt too busy and took away from the Hello Kitty designs.  The plain purple cotton solid was a much better pick. And I ended up having all the bows turned the same direction. I quilted 1/4" echoes around the bow ties and stippled some free motion around the embroidery.  I added a few hanging loops and it's ready for my customer!  --Ann