Touchdown!

This is another quilt on my Q3FAL list which is here. I finished the flimsy over three weeks ago, but the quilt had to take a back seat to my day 'job' for Island Batik, which was finishing the September challenge, my Bear Paw Dance, which I think I will be renaming 'Waltzing With Bear' thanks to jbetty's comment! Anyhow, Brady's quilt got finished and both snuggled under and slept under while he was here for a visit.

One of my good friends who we ran into at the Windsor Spitfires hockey game on Saturday night said that Brady has such a beautiful smile, and she's right. His eyes! How they twinkle when he smiles. He was over the moon, ha, over the posts à la field goal, with his quilt, especially the Minky backing.

A Quilt for a Little Boy

This was a DrEAMi! project. For those of you who are not familiar with that term, it stands for those projects where you just have to Drop Everything And Make it! They are also known as squirrels. All squirrels are urgent; some are fun; others are desperately needed. This quilt falls into the latter category; it had to get made because of a tragic event...
Back in the first of my final 15 years of my teaching career, at a Junior High in Sherwood Park, I taught a beautiful girl named Shannon. I soon learned that her dad also taught at the school, but little did I know he and I would become very good friends. This quilt is for his grandson, Shannon's son, who is just 6 years old.

The wind and the rain hung around all weekend; the quilt is not that friendly... 😄

Hands2Help Quilts Now Donated

This morning after my Mysore yoga class, I stopped in at the Sexual Assault Centre in Windsor to drop off the two lap quilts I've made for Sarah's Hands2Help Charity Quilt Challenge.  I just love these two cuddly quilts; carrying them in felt like carrying a small child or a small animal somehow. 
I don't know what it is about these two, but my heart is in them like no other charity quilt I've made.

April 22 - I got mine done really early this year

My sister, Linda, gave me the idea of making a quilt for a child who has been sexually abused.  Here I am earlier this morning:

Hands 2 Help Quilts Done

I am early to finish these two, but they may have spawned a third...

Hanging between Bacchus, or is it Dionysus, and another tree spirit, maybe a dryad? Jude's additions to our beloved American Black Walnut trees

A couple of days ago when I was looking for that perfect backing I knew I had in my stash for the No Bake Jolly Bar Shuffle, I came across a few other novelty prints that would be so great for kid quilts. Two of them, the fish one, and the camping one, struck me as great for boys, and so I know another quilt is asking to be born.

camping fabric left over from backing of nephew #'s baby quilt; fish bought with kaleidoscopes in mind

But let's take a look at these two sweeties, destined for two traumatized sweeties.
The first one I made is No Bake Jolly Bar Shuffle.  I saw this on Pieced Brain Denise's blog.  It was probably her pretty turquoise and grey combination that attracted me, but it was one of those "DREAMI" moments, a term I'm coining right now.  "DRop Everything And Make It."  I blogged about the flimsy here.  Interesting, because I mentioned in that post how this quilt talked to me during piecing!  It told me it was going to go to a child; I had definitely not started it with this in mind.

I knew I had a 10" stack of Amanda Jean Nyberg's Good Neighbors line from Connecting Threads, so I cut the stack in half to make my own Jolly Bars and this little quilt grew up in no time.

Here's the back:

I had no idea how I was going to quilt this baby, just had a vague meander idea, as I find meandering so relaxing.  (quilt meandering as well as brain meanderings, ha).  Loaded it, and realized I just had to do some custom quilting in those delicious blank white rectangles.  Couldn't let that go to waste, right?

And again, the quilt whispered to me...maybe I'm becoming a quilt whisperer, lol.  I seem to do better when I don't have a solid plan but let the quilt talk to me as I'm working on it.  Words.  Vibrations of love and hope and better days ahead, even though scars from sexual abuse remain.  Deep.  For a lifetime.  Some Dot to Dot in the alternating rectangles.

The sun was out, and then went in, grrr, but that lower left word is snuggle; "hugs" is visible at the top of the photo, and "play" is mostly cut off but lower right.

As I quilted the words, writing them first with a blue water soluble marker, I put my feelings into them.  I may be considered a little flaky, but I truly believe those vibrations of care and compassion will be in this little quilt for a little person.  I felt that child crumpling this quilt, snuggling with it, wrapping herself in it, saw her finding the words, maybe getting help from a caregiver to read the cursive writing.

Here is laugh and hugs

I bound this one with the Green Daisy print.  I hadn't planned on that, but serendipity struck again: the leftover backing got placed on top of the leftover green daisy print, I saw how closely the two greens matched, and that decided it.  I also stitched it down with the wonderful variegated thread that Preeti gave me a while back, and I absolutely loved it.  I tried stitching the binding to the back of the quilt and turning it to the front, trying to see which method I prefer for machine binding;I think what I did on No Bake.


Quilt Stats:
Pattern: No Bake Jolly Bar Shuffle by Pieced Brain
Size: 31 7/8 X 39.75" after quilting; 30.25X38.25" after laundering
Fabric:  Good Neighbors and Kona Snow
Batting: 100% polyester
Quilted: on my Avanté
Threads: pieced and quilted with Essentials thread in white; So Fine in the bobbin



The second quilt is Kimberly Jolly's No Bake Jolly Bar.  Tish and I made this quilt together this month.  Unofficially.  I love sewing with her.  It's really wonderful sewing with friends.  Period.  In person as well as virtually.  We each are giving our quilt away to someone in need.  I made mine smaller than the pattern because I wanted it to be the partner to the Shuffle, and I wanted it kid lap quilt size.  The link will take you to her version, also with Connecting Threads fabric.  Cat Lady!

I gave you a peek of this one fresh off the frame a few days ago.  It's meandered with three flower motifs, a daisy to echo that in one of the prints, a flower from years ago I saw in American Patchwork & Quilting, and Vicki's flower motif I saw last week, and loops.

Here is the back:

I bound this one, also by machine, with the Short Lines print from Good Neighbors, available at Connecting Threads (no affiliation).  I love the effect, but then again I do love a striped binding.

Remember I mentioned that Lotta Dots was not as soft a hand as Kona?  After washing, the same: lovely and soft.  I'm glad because I have more of it, as well as another one of their Quilters' Candy fabrics in white.

I plan to donate these to the Sexual Assault Crisis Centre here in Windsor to be given to children.  I have to call them today to find out if they do accept quilts.  For kids.  Failing that, I will give them to Children's Aid.

Quilt Stats:
Pattern: No Bake Jolly Bar from Fat Quarter Shop
Size: 36.25 X 44.75" after quilting; 35.25 X 43 3/8" after laundering
Fabric:  Good Neighbors and Lotta Dots from Connecting Threads
Batting: 100% polyester
Quilted: on my Avanté
Threads: pieced and quilted with Essentials thread in white, binding stitched down with Essentials variegated in greens; So Fine in the bobbin

Linking up with:
Confessions of a Fabric Addict
Crazy Mom Quilts
TGIFF at Fleur de Lis Quilts
A Quilted Passion 

PS I also washed and dried Blue Skies, and love how it came out.  Still no Etsy shop, but I hope to have a not-taken name and shop by this weekend!

You'll have heard about this in QBL already, and I did mention it on my last post, but there is another great deal or a hundred to be had at Craftsy this weekend on classes.  So many are on sale at 50% off or more, both recent and not-so-recent ones.  I am a self-taught longarmer, and all I learned I have learned through Craftsy classes, along with Leah Day's Free-Motion Quilting Designs. 

From these two quilts I've posted today, I would highly recommend Angela Walters' Dot to Dot, her Free-Motion Quilting With Feathers (Blue Skies), and her Small Changes, Big Variety, both of which I reviewed here.   I'm hoping to find time to watch my latest addition to my classes repertoire, Christina Cameli's Wild Quilting.  If you are just starting out quilting and would prefer to use your walking foot, Jacquie Gering's Creative Quilting With Your Walking Foot is also on sale.  Go to Midget Gem Quilts for a great review on the class.  Remember there are a ton of free classes too; one I particularly love is Mandy Liens' A New Look At Longarm Quilting.  Lots to choose from, right?  And remember there is way more than just quilting....gardening, cooking, scrapbooking, knitting, etc. etc.

Speaking of cat lady....or rather cat servant to Bella...

She is downstairs at the moment, calling me.  That's what she does at various times throughout the day...and night, erk!  Yowls.  For a 6.5 pound cat, she has one set of lungs in her tiny chest.  This was yesterday, calling me at 5:33 pm precise (date/time stamp on photo), to come upstairs and feed her.  Other times, like right now, it's, "Come down and sew, Sandra!" or "Come down and let's play!"  How can I resist?