Another girl's fairy quilt

This was the second flower fairy quilt completed this year, made for our youngest granddaughter, now nearly two years old.  Her dad was the inspiration for these quilts, when he called to say their expected baby would be a girl, he added "she's going to need a fairy quilt."   I had just seen some of Michael Miller's gorgeous flower fairy panels and fairy frost fabrics and was only too happy to oblige!

This one, completed in March, provided a perfect opportunity to practice the first three months' tutorials from SewCalGal's FMQ Challenge, with Frances Moore's leaf motif, Ann Fahl's meandering loops and flowers, and multitudes of feathers both within the borders and the panel, courtesy of Diane Gaudynski's excellent tutorial.   A few detail photos:

 

I especially liked this sparkly, fun polka dot fabric used in the top and bottom panels, providing a bit of glittery accent, since the fairy frost fabric was only used sparsely in this quilt.  The soft peachy-pink border fabric was found at a local yard sale, as were the large central panel and the smaller side panels - lucky finds!

This was much fun to make and to quilt, especially the feather practice!  Quilting for both fairy quilts was accomplished on my 1942 Singer 15-91 machine, using Aurifil 50 wt in both top and bobbin, with the exception of the small fairy panels shown above, for which I experimented with YLI silk 100 wt. thread.

I arose this morning in time to see a beautiful pale orange full moon setting in the western sky.  It appears we're about to have several days' reprieve from the seemingly endless rain and fog this month.  In a day or two the garden catalogs will begin arriving in the mail, and we can begin seeing the daylight hours increasing once again!   The robins will be back in a week or two to eat all the pyracantha berries next to the front deck.  Can spring be far behind?

2012 Finish - April

This year's resolutions included finishing all the UFO's stashed in various corners of the sewing room, and other places in the house, and taking the pledge to complete SewCalGal's Free Motion Quilting Challenge.  Now, just over halfway through the year, I'm happy to report completion of four bed size and one lap quilt, one wallhanging, and one toddler quilt will be finished later this week.  Now, that doesn't amount to much by many quilters' standards, but for me this is an all-time high!  I'll start posting some of these finishes as time allows, and some won't be made public until after Christmas.  There are now two remaining UFO's, both queen size, one of which has been in the hand quilting hoop for more than a year now and may not make the goal.  But then that quilt has been aging gracefully, probably more so than its maker, for the past fifteen years!  What's another year or so among friends?  That's the problem, we're no longer friends, that quilt and I, and I'd gladly chuck the whole thing were it not for the many hundreds of hours already invested in intricate piecing, hand-appliqued Rose of Sharon border, and over half of it laboriously hand quilted.  It HAS to be finished, and we will drag ourselves to the finish line ... one of these years.

Enough of that, on to a 2012 finish.  This is a quilt begun nearly two years ago after my daughter had casually mentioned she would really like a queen size "summer quilt".  Her last quilt was made for her early college years, over ten years ago, and while it has held up well considering its constant use, it doesn't fit the queen size bed she now has.  After completing three months of the FMQ Challenge I decided to attempt free motion quilting this huge quilt on my old Singer 15-91, using the designs we learned during the first months of the Challenge:  the leaf design taught by Frances Moore, Diane Gaudynski-style feathers, and the loops and flowers meandering designs taught by Ann Fahl in March.  Moving the bulk of this huge (84x106) quilt through the machine proved to be a real challenge but also a great learning exercise.   Entire quilt took nearly a month to quilt and bind, and was finished two days before our trip.

Photos had to be taken indoors as the weather was cold and rainy when this was completed.  Still is, for that matter.   The finished quilt was delivered to its new home with my daughter in early May. 

Fabrics and the pattern are from Wilmington's Natural Splendor line.  Hobbs 80/20 cotton batting and Aurifil 50 thread for quilting, both top and bobbin.

Feathers quilted in the border of each large flower block.  Freehand feathers were also quilted in the outer borders.  They did not photograph well with my little camera but actually show up quite well on the quilt despite being quilted over a flower print border. 

Most of these photos were taken after the quilt was washed, all nice and soft and crinkly.

Hopefully the toddler quilt will be ready to post in the next few days.  Have a safe and happy 4th!

A few of my favorite (sewing) things

Do you have a favorite sewing collectible?  Vintage rick-rack, laces, 1930s feed sack fabrics, etc.?  My vintage Singer collection began about 15 years ago when we were out looking for an inexpensive bedside stand, and DH spotted a suitable table with Queen Anne legs in an upstairs corner of a local second-hand shop.  We soon discovered said table was a sewing stand complete with a vintage black Singer machine inside.  Priced at $20.25 (everything in the shop had that 25 cent extension).  We asked if the machine was in running condition and the proprietor obligingly carried it downstairs for us since there were no electrical outlets in the upstairs of that huge old barn.  We plugged it in and it purred.  Sold!  That machine turned out to be a 1951 Singer 201 Centennial edition - often reported to be one of Singer's best models.  Still my favorite go-to machine for piecing and general sewing, it was later joined by a 1952 Featherweight, then other Singer models ranging from a 1907 treadle to the early 1960s 401 and 503 Rocketeer models.

So, how to decorate a sewing room housing all these vintage beauties?   More vintage Singer, of course, plus other vintage textile related lovelies!   Here are a few of my favorites:  vintage magazine ads, early postcards, needle cards, etc.

Page from McCall's April 1929 issue, featuring the Singer Library Table with a new electric Model 101 machine.

Needle cards ranging from early 1920s through 1950s.

Early Singer postcards with vintage lace mounted on fabric, with 1950s frames from my parents' home.

Full page ad and close-up, Good Housekeeping April 1945.  Love this ad!

So, do you have a sewing or quilting collectible?  What makes you smile when you walk into your sewing room or nook?