The Grand Finale!

So happy to report my Diamond Jubilee Quilt is finished!  Friday evening the final stitches were added to the binding, and that was that!  My hope was to finish this celebration quilt of my 75th year of life before year's end and as it turns out there's time to spare.  And it is aptly named "Stitched by an Aging Hand."  

The weather over the weekend was terrible with high winds and rain, though nowhere near what others in the south were experiencing.  We were fortunate not to suffer any wind damage beyond some branches down, closer to town there were huge old trees down along with power outages.  Anyway, though today is bright and sunny, it's still far too windy and muddy to attempt any outdoor photos, so these will have to do.

The only photo of (nearly) the entire quilt, taken before washing since I needed to use the small available floor space in our living room.  The day was dark and dismal, as reflected in the muted colors.

The next day was brighter, and after washing and a quick spin in the dryer I laid the quilt out on the guest bed to complete drying and more photos.

Three inches in both directions were lost in the quilting and initial washing process.  The final dimensions are 80x80 inches.

The hand quilting was pretty straightforward and simple.  I used a couple stencils in the blocks, some outlining and in the setting triangles and borders a simple 1-1/2 inch cross-hatch, using my favorite Aurifil 12 wt. thread.  

Tried marking the borders with Crayola washable markers though none showed up very well on that dark background, but I'm happy with the outcome.  And really pleased with how that vintage fabric brightened after washing. The next photo shows that fabric the closest to its true color.

The backing fabric is an older Edyta Sitar fabric, I think it is called Indian Summer.  It's been in my stash for several years and there was just barely enough to cover the back.  All the fabrics for this quilt came from stash or the scrap bins, and make-do was the order of the day when several of the block backgrounds required piecing smaller pieces to make the background square large enough.  

So happy to have this one finished!  My first post about making this was in May 2020 here.  I guess as larger quilts go, especially the hand quilted ones, this was finished fairly quickly.  Though it would have taken a week or two longer had I not come down with a cold and spent an entire week sitting in the recliner quilting the setting triangles/borders, since energy to do anything more strenuous was nonexistent.  I guess one can be thankful for a few sick days after all!

So there remains one quilt on my wish-list of finishes for the year - the Quilty 365.  Not going to happen, of course, though I've made considerable progress.  Next year for sure!  Still have the little Christmas table toppers to finish, and I really, REALLY want to have a mini ready this month for Janet's "baggie mini challenge."  

As far as Christmas goes, we pretty much realized a week ago that getting a full size tree this year was out of the question as hubby had a medical procedure coming up (which went well) and a general lethargy set in about any indoor decorating.  Still, while he was in the hospital I did get out a couple boxes and found these old calico Christmas trees.  The fabrics are all from 1982 or earlier, since my mom and I made these together while I was expecting my daughter and mom spent a couple weeks visiting us in Alaska that summer.  We ended up making five of these, and at least four of them are still around.  I have these two, and have used them every year since 1982. They've survived 8 moves, several of them cross country during that time!  

Til next time, Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays!

December's Mini quilt

 December's mini used up the last of all the cut-off flippy points of the stars from last year's Christmas quilt, below

Here's December's mini

which very closely resembles last January's mini

and February's 

Now the swiffer box of tiny red and white triangles is emptied, as well as all those much-loved  bits of Quaker red prints used in the borders of each of the minis.  I'll link this post with Wendy at The Constant Quilter when she posts her month-end roundup of mini quilts.  Thanks Wendy for another year of fun little quilts!

Now, on to the new year ahead!  

A little charlie brown Christmas wallhanging

Speaking of hanging, we're hanging in there (or is that hanging out here) in a state of suspended animation, the dreaded virus having come to pay a visit.  Hubby was tested for it last week Monday and we learned the test was positive late afternoon on Thursday.  He is doing very well, no real symptoms beyond the first couple days, no fever whatsoever, no cough or congestion, etc.  However, he is quarantined until the 16th, but my quarantine has to extend 14 days beyond that.  So, though I'll be freed from house arrest in time for New Years Eve, there's nowhere to go anyway!  It is a rather weird feeling that even though we had no plans to go anywhere, now that we can't it just seems very strange.  Very thankful we have some acreage so we can get outside when we want to.  

So, the Christmas decorations are all up, the demon kitten hasn't (yet) knocked the Christmas tree over though awhile ago he tipped over my floor hoop holding Quilty 365 and has mastered the art(?) of climbing the drapes.  The outside tree and the big star over the barn are lit, freezer and frig well stocked except for eggs, and all is well in our little universe.   

Looking w-a-y more innocent than his drapery-climbing adventures would suggest ...

Over the weekend I finally got out a smallish Christmas panel and made a futile effort to straighten it. The entire panel was printed off grain and even the margins around the blocks could not be coerced into a true rectangular shape.  Added a narrow border, gave it a quick overall quilting and it now hangs in all its humble charlie brown Christmas glory on the door to my sewing room.

One more bit of fabric out of my stash and now in the finished column!   A close-up showing the quilting, Jester's Hat that we learned during the 2012 FMQ Challenge.  

It's snowing lightly now, and we're due to receive 4-6 inches later in the week from the storm currently in the midwest.  This is what it looked like just before dark. The birds are happy. Winter is upon us.

Christmas Quilt Finished

 So happy to say the final stitch was added to this quilt shortly after noon today.  And it was a cold but sunny day with wind gusts upwards of 30 mph, but what could be better than an outdoor photo shoot?

Our snow from earlier this week still persists in the shady areas of the yard and on the hillsides above us. But so good to feel the sun on your back and see blue skies.

I'm generally pleased with how this quilt has turned out, wonky machine and hand quilting notwithstanding.  Since the fabrics had not been washed before construction, the shrinkage should make any wobbles far less obvious, I hope.  And anyway this year who will see it up close and personal  except the two of us?  

I ditch quilted all the major seams and around each of the green squares, then did a bit of free motion quilting in the light triangle corners.  After that was finished the binding was attached in an attempt to stop the batting from shredding any further.  The binding took quite a bit longer than usual with all those points at the outer edges but I think overall I managed to not lose too many.

After the binding, the quilt was put in my hoop and a bit of hand quilting ensued, inside each of the 66 red squares.  Big stitch quilting with Aurifil 12 wt. thread and done at last.

 

The biggest disappointment and worry with this quilt is the batting I used.  A couple years ago someone gave me an older 100% cotton batting by Fairfield called Soft Touch.  The stuff shredded at the outer edges during the quilting process and the needle and thread moving through the quilt also brought up numerous tiny puffs of cotton on both the front and back of the quilt.  After binding and before doing the hand quilting I ran a lint roller over both sides to try to clean it up, using 6 sheets of the sticky roller material.  It looks nearly as bad now, with just the additional handling during hand quilting.  Hoping after washing it shrinks up a bit and tightens all the stitching holes enough so that the batting stays where it belongs.  I'd definitely not recommend this batting for any quilt with dark fabrics...

And here is the back

An odd choice for a Christmasy quilt, I know, but this fabric has been languishing in my stash for several years and just needed to come out and play.  And so it has, and I love it, though those tiny white puffs of batting showed up even more on this side while it was being quilted. 

So, for the rest of December it's play time!  There's a small 12 Days of Christmas panel in the stash that I might layer and machine quilt; we also could use a few new placemats, and there are several small swiffer boxes with leftover HST's for scrappy fun.  And in the evening it's back to hand quilting Sing the Blues, which by my guess is about half done now.  Not much chance it will be finished before the end of the year, but maybe a first finish for the new year?

Til next time, I hope you're enjoying some pre-holiday stitching, taking things slow and easy.  

50 Shades of Autumn is a Monthly Mini!

 I finished quilting and binding my 50 Shades of Autumn this afternoon.  This is my version of the Humble Quilts fall quilt-along this year.  Thanks Lori for an easy and fun design!

I'm happy with this little finish, from all the browns on the front, to the wonderful backing fabric found in my stash from unknown years ago.  It's from a collection called Nature Studies by Benartex.

And I love the binding fabric, with just barely enough to complete this quilt with a narrow strip left over.  It too is an older print, and seemed to blend well with both the front and back of the quilt.

I machine quilted the front to an all-cotton batting, and the back was separately quilted to a layer of insul-brite, and the layers united only by the batting.  I think this method will make it a good hot dish mat as requested by my son and DIL for Christmas.  They wanted one large enough to hold a lasagne pan on their new countertop.  Hopefully there will be time to make a couple of large potholder-side mats to coordinate.  There are plenty of brown scraps around here, as well as a little over half yard of that backing fabric.  

I'll link this post with Wendy at The Constant Quilter when she posts her end of the month mini round-up!  Thanks Wendy for hosting this fun event every month.

One Monthly Goal and a Finish!

This week I completed my One Monthly Goal for October which was to finish 4 more sunflower blocks for my Diamond Jubilee Quilt.  This brings my total to nine blocks!  Here are the newest four:

I'll link this post with Patty at Elm Street Quilts One Monthly Goal Finish link-up, where you can see what many other quilters have accomplished during October.  Thanks Patty for continuing to host this fun goal-setting activity each month!

This afternoon I finished binding my Joseph's Coat quilt and can now put that one in the finished column - yay!  The dog and I braved the cold almost-November gray, dank and windy afternoon in an effort to get some finished photos, with only minimal luck.  

The outer borders could have been improved upon if only there had been more of that wonderful batik that I'd also used in the alternate vertical strips.  There wasn't, and the black batik inserts at top and bottom were necessary to stretch what little was left.  It doesn't look as goofy in person as it does in the photos, thankfully!

I chose this cheery almost tropical print from Connecting Threads for the back.  I love the way the colors of the hand quilting add to the fun of this back.  I used Aurifil 12 wt. thread in about 15 different colors to quilt this, mostly freehand organic lines except for the bright yellow alternate strips where I used a stencil.  

A closer look at the front.  These batiks really mimic the gorgeous fall colors we saw a few short weeks ago.  As of now a few hillsides still have their late autumn russets and golden brown leaves, all the brighter maples of early fall are now bare except for a few Norway maples in more protected locations.

Helping - not!  When I brought out Joseph's Coat II that was completed earlier this summer the winds had really picked up.  Trying for one good shot of them together.

Finally!

For the time being both of these quilts will live here, for the grandkids to use for sleepovers, though I'm thinking this new one will have a place of honor on the back of my recliner until it's time to pull out the Christmas quilt.  Snow in the western states this weekend, hopefully will stay far far away from us for at least a few more weeks!  Til next time, happy quilting!

p.s.  I'm going to try Barbara's trick at Cat Patches and leave the first comment, and check off the box to send all followup comments to my email, since Blogger seems to have forgotten how to do it.  If I've missed replying to anyone's comments recently, my apologies!  

Ballerinas and Butterflies, Gifts and Squirrels

Greetings!  It has been one of the most beautiful falls in many a year, as if trying to make up for all the angst we've endured in the past many months.  Today dawned bright and clear, and Gibbs and I went outside before the sun rose over the mountain to photograph this latest quilt, finished last night. Our weather was forecast to turn very windy today, and as soon as the sun rose, it became quite gusty.  We're expecting to see the remnants of the latest hurricane by tomorrow evening or Monday.  

 This is Ballerinas and Butterflies, a little quilt for a beautiful nearly two-month old granddaughter of one of our church members. One of my October squirrels which seem to be nesting in the sewing room, fabrics were chosen on Tuesday at our quilt ministry meeting, taken home and washed and pressed. On Wednesday the squares were cut, arranged and rearranged on the design wall, substitute fabric (the luscious purple batik) found in the stash and cut to replace one initial fabric that just didn't cut it when mixed with the pinks and dark brown.  Top pieced on Thursday, quilted and bound on Friday!  Fastest finish ever for this very slow quilter!

Here is the back.  The rather muted light at 7 a.m. rendered the colors a bit darker than they really are. Not to mention the dark squares of the front casting their own shadow.

A closer look at the very simple loop and leaf FMQ.  This was the very last bit of the older ballerina fabric from my stash that has backed several baby quilts in the past.  Wish there was more, it has grown on me over the years.

We wandered a bit more before coming back inside and the quilt had its beauty bath and a quick session in the dryer.  All ready now for a label and gifting.

We know for certain that summer is long past when the last home-grown fresh tomato is used up, and that happened last evening with the final four roma tomatoes becoming our last tomato-basil pie of the season.  Tomato pie and salmon patties makes for a festive Friday feast!

I've been the very fortunate recipient of some quilty love in the past couple weeks.  My good blogging friend Barbara of Cat Patches decided recently to gift some of her completed quilts to friends and readers.  This beauty is now hanging in my sewing room. 

Barbara knows me well, this is her antique sewing machines quilt which took a blue ribbon and best of category at the 2014 Oregon State Fair!  I still can't believe that she could actually part with it, and I'm honored to have it gracing my quilting space now.  Here's a closer photo. 

Julie of Quilts and Costumes participated in the recent Orphan Adoption event and I was the lucky winner of this partially completed quilt top.  She had already completed four of the Jacob's Ladder blocks and pieced many more components.  I've finished stitching the four-square components and will be piecing blocks as my next leader-and-ender project in the next couple months.  Depending on the size when all blocks are completed, I'll be looking for some suitable border fabric, and this will become a donation quilt for our quilt ministry. Thanks so much Julie!  

Til next time, I'll leave you with the latest photos of the squash thief.  Enjoy your weekend!