Month: November 2021

Sandhill Tree Farm

Sometimes on our quilts-on-location outings, I plan the colors of the quilts with the anticipated background.  But sometimes, I just grab some quilts that haven’t been photographed lately and head out the door.  On our recent outing to the state park with the cypress trees (that post is here), I carried along a quilt with neutral colors.  

The beauty of the browns and grays colors in this landscape made me glad I had grabbed this quilt.

I love neutral color combinations, but Sandhill Tree Farm is one of a very few quilts I’ve made in that genre. 

As soon as I noticed the colors of the park office, I knew that quilt needed to pose on those rocking chairs.  The color of the building’s siding was a great background for this one.  

Walking down Squirrel Run Trail, we found more neutral colors..and a splash of blue popped in occasionally.  There’s a plan for a quilt I could love…all neutral browns and grays with a pop of blue.  

Sandhill Tree Farm posed nicely on the railing of the deck near our picnic spot, too.

This graphic quilt was oh-so-easy to make.  I used the “pine tree block” within the Tree Farm pattern I designed a few years ago.  By the way, all my patterns are now free.  If I have printed copies available, I will pop one in the mail to you if you ask for one.  Otherwise, I can send a .pdf file to you via email.  Again, free.

This pattern layers three or more fabrics, then you cut them apart following a preprinted pattern on freezer paper, shuffle the fabrics, and reassemble.  The original Tree Farm pattern is more complicated because there are other more involved blocks included, but if you just use the pine tree blocks, it’s a quickie!

I arranged the blocks on the design wall so the blocks having darker backgrounds formed a sort of border.  A quick vine for a quilting design, and this one was done!

I love how the natural light comes though the quilt on the railing.  For this quilt, I chose one of my go-to quick motifs for quilting, a meandering vine and leaves. Normally draped over a chair in our bedroom, this quilt enjoyed the outing.

Check out the publications tab at the top of the page for patterns, including this one.

The Playhouse Quilt

Here’s the story of my Challenge quilt for Heart of Georgia 2021, Playhouse in the Chicken Yard.

Participants were to channel the little girl inside, search our memory banks, and make a quilt reflecting some aspect of childhood.

Even though I wrote up the challenge description, I had no idea what my Little Girl quilt would be.  I had ideas….so many ideas.  That’s not unusual for me.  My first thought (and most pervasive for many months of the year) was a little girl in a swing.  

I started that…sketched a little girl, even made an image on fabric, painted the skin color, selected fabric to appliqué her dress…and then….

As I remembered the trees where Daddy hung my swings (there were several over the years),  I recalled my parents making me a playhouse.  On the eve of my 9th birthday (it was on a Saturday that year), they sent me to spend the night with a friend.  I now realize they had to scurry to get things done.  They enlarged a storage room in an unused building on our property to create a playhouse for me.  They added a cabinet, a stove, a bed, some dishes, and curtains to give me space of my own.

What a delightful surprise for my birthday gift! And now that I recall it, the time they took to arrange the surprise makes it even more special.

At some point in time, I came to realize that my playhouse wasn’t the romantic little image of a miniature house that some girls had in their yards, but I never thought about that.  It was mine.

You can see from the shape of the building that my playhouse was in a chicken house.  Earlier, there had been chickens running around, but that venture had been abandoned.  Daddy stored lumber in one end and I occupied the other.  My quilt has chickens running around as a nod to its original purpose…and to the fact that my mother still referred to that portion of the yard as “the chicken yard”.  Thus, the title of my quilt was born.

When a guild member asked if the chickens got in the way of my playtime, I explained that these were “ghost chickens” on the quilt.

My original sketch didn’t have a little girl in it.  I think my idea was that she was inside playing.  My husband and daughter insisted that there be a visible little girl.  So after the house was stitched down on the pieced background, I had to remove the back layer of fabric and insert a tiny door with a little girl entering.  The space was so small that I chose not to appliqué this feature, but to paint it. 

In my stash, I found the farm fabrics you see above. I knew those funky chickens had to roam around on my quilt.

There was a cow in a pasture to the left of the chicken house…but no room for this fabric on the front…so I put it on the back of the quilt.

I pieced the grass and sky (fabric overdyed with indigo) by machine, hand appliquéd the building, used raw edge appliqué for the tree trunks, leaves, and chickens.

I worked really s l o w l y on this project because I was having so much fun.  I spent an entire day stitching samples of hair to decide how I would create the stringy blonde pigtails you see here. 

Another day found me reviewing Sue Spargo’s drizzle stitch to add details to the tail feathers of the chickens.

This playhouse is still part of my life.  When we sold the property, we knew the buyers planned to demolish that building, so Jim rescued the door to my playhouse.  Our friend and expert craftsman, Tommy, built a stepback cabinet using that door as the back of the cabinet. 

He built it so the elements of its construction are visible.  He even placed the hook used to secure the door where I can see it as I arrange my collection of small things.

The cabinet is in our breakfast room where we see it every day.  I hang small seasonal quilts above it – so made this quilt the width to fit on that hanging rod.  Here you see the quilt is at home above the door.

Sometimes quilters like to “play chicken” with a spool of thread…you can see here that I won, but just barely.

As I planned this quilt and began working on a drawing of it, many childhood memories surfaced. I found myself planning another quilt (larger than the 29” restriction on this year’s challenge) with more Little Girl memories.  I’ve already begun translating some of those memories to fabric.  And, I might eventually finish the little girl on the swing…

Dots in the Cemetery

This is the time of year Jim and I frequently ride past the cemetery.  We are keeping a check on our gingko friend whose leaves provide beauty against the blue sky.  

We decided it was time to go with cameras and quilts yesterday.  The color was nice, but the carpet of leaves I like for spreading quilts on the ground was a bit sparse.  It was crisp and cool and glorious.

I’ve written about our visits to Rose Hill Cemetery before.  The posts here and here include more images and some history of the place.

I carried several quilts, but Dots and Vines was one of them.  I posed her on a bench near the big gingko tree. 

Then I looked behind me on another bench and there was a serendipitous find – more dots.  Someone left her paint palette behind…just waiting to pose with my dots!  

We took more quilts…I’ll share those later.  And, I haven’t forgotten the story of my challenge quilt….it’s coming.

Little Girls Challenge

Our quilt guild’s annual challenge quilts were revealed last week.  You may remember the challenge this year was Little Girls.  Members were asked to turn back their inner clocks to days of their childhood and make a quilt representing some memory from those carefree days.

While I was working on my entry, I hoped everyone was having as much fun with their creation as I was.  Every idea that came across my mind prompted memories I had long forgotten and the actual construction of my entry made me giggle like a little girl.

As the quilts were revealed, it seemed that others experienced some of the same thrills I did.

As the Challenge leader this year, I made the ribbons. I had loads of fun painting these little girls on fabric, appliquéing their dresses, and attaching streamers from my stash of fabric and rickrack.

Our procedure is to bring our entries in plain brown paper bags with nothing that will reveal the maker’s identity. This year, contestants were asked to write a sentence or two telling the story behind the quilt. Volunteers hang the quilts and assign numbers to them. Members vote on their favorite and play “Guess the Maker” – using knowledge of individual styles of quiltmaking to assist in identifying the creator of each quilt hanging.

Votes are tabulated as the business meeting is conducted, then ribbons are awarded. Every maker then shares the story behind the quilt she entered while participants check their guesses of makers’ identities.

Quilts in this Little Girl Challenge were especially precious.

Carol shared that her two daughters had input into her creation…one said you have to include sequins..another insisted she include a very decorated birthday cake. Looks like I’m not the only one whose daughter has input.
Susan was able to attach meaning to the fabrics in a piece she made using English Paper Piecing techniques from a designer she recently discovered…aren’t those unending connections priceless?
Helen’s piece, With Love 2 Grandmothers, included photos of her grandmothers and won the 3rd place ribbon.  Helen even had a historical backing on hers – a collage of doilies and laces she collected at a flea market.
Gladys, our gal from Texas, couldn’t resist including a state map though she knew it would give her identity away – and on her tag she wrote of sandwiches from fresh tomatoes on the farm.
Marie may have embraced the little girl inside more enthusiastically than most…she made three entries.  One, Windows to the World, used photographs printed on fabric and pieced in a landscape variation of a log cabin block.  Assembled, they reminded her of window panes in her childhood home.  This quilt was the second place winner.
In another entry, Marie’s Starlit Cabin was a tribute to the memory of a quilt pieced by her grandmother and quilted by her mother. Marie carried the quilt and the love it held when she left home for college.
And Marie’s third entry was Lily Learns to Sew.  Last summer, Marie spent time teaching a young girl in the neighborhood who wanted to learn to sew.  Marie painted sewing notions on fabric using watercolor; then used rail fence blocks (the same block she and Lily included in Lily’s first quilt) to surround it.  And what little girl doesn’t love red polka dots?
Another quilter named Carol depicted memories of hopscotch with her friends. She used a coloring book as a basis for her appliquéd little girl.
Shirley’s entry depicts the love she and her mother share of growing flowers in the yard and of beautiful embroidery.
Sally’s Grandmother’s Flower Garden block is a tribute to her maternalgrandmother.  Sally even connected the background quilting to her lattices in her grandmother’s rose garden.
My piece, Playhouse in the Chicken Yard, was the lucky winner of the blue ribbon.  I’ll share details of its story and its construction in the next blog post.

Even members who didn’t get their quilt finished for one reason or another had stories to share.  Becky told of hanging blackout curtains over their windows during WWII and of coloring on the papers that their dry cleaning came in.

Marsha had memories of milk bottles being delivered to her house and hopes to make a quilt depicting that yet.  Life got in the way of her putting those milk bottles on a textile piece in time for the challenge.

Carol won the “Guess The Maker” competition. Her reward is a fabric covered Little Girls Journal where she can record memories of making this quilt or more memories from her life as a little girl.

Cypress Trees, A Covered Bridge, and some Quilts

Glorious fall days are made for exploration and photography.

One day last week we took a ride to George L. Smith State Park, loading the car with cameras, quilts, and picnic paraphernalia. The cypress trees here are gorgeous any time of year, but now their leaves are golden and red.  And the tannin in the water enhances their reflections, so the beauty is doubled.

Above is an image of a cypress “knee”, a structure thought to be a buttress to the tapering trunk in soft muddy soil. Cypress trees growing outside of a swampy area do not form these knees.

I loved photographing the natural beauty and the covered bridge is a great background for a few quilts.

We photographed quilts inside and outside the bridge and perched them on other spots in the park, too.

Dots and Vines is a graphic quilt you’ve seen in other posts.  It may be my most photogenic quilt – I grab it most every time I head out the door.  I love its bold colors in contrast with the weathered wood.  

Likewise, Heaven in a Wildflower has posed in other settings, too.  Like Dots and Vines, the blocks of solid color are especially vivid in natural surroundings.  Note to self:  make more quilts from solids.

The quilt above is not one I made, but one I was given.  My dear friend Mary Ellen is a most prolific quilter and sent this star beauty on blue to me.  She’s the inspiration for all these quilts-on-location shots.  She and her photographer husband Bruce live in Minnestota and they set the bar for photographing quilts in rustic locations.  I’ve written about her photo journey before here.

We weren’t the only ones enjoying this serene spot on this glorious day; I caught this flash of color out the window of the bridge.

And it was picture day for a some four-year-olds from a nearby preschool. Here they wait in line to head to the playground.

This has been a busy week.  I took more quilts on this trip so there will be more posts to follow sharing those.  And, my guild had our Little Girls Challenge this week – so that’s coming, too.

More details on the Dots and Vines quilt can be found here.

More details about Heaven in A Wildflower are here.

And, we’ve visited other covered bridges with quilts here and here.

Going in Circles

We left home to run a few errands and I grabbed some quilts.  The day wasn’t especially light filled, but I’ve learned that if I don’t have a camera and quilts, the perfect stage presents itself.  

We visited Seventh Street Salvage in their downtown location…and what did we see but a cart sitting in front of circles?  Well, well, well….I just happened to have a few circles in the car.

Even though I had written about 108, I wanted a photo of it in an outdoor setting.  I had grabbed it and a couple of other quilts with circles and thrown them in the car.  

After we did our shopping inside (the garlic/olive artisan bread is delicious, by the way), we got permission to snap some photos and brought out the quilts.

I love the stars in the circles, the repetition of them in mass (like quilt blocks that way), and I am descended from Wheelers, so there’s that, too.  The stars in the circles are impressive, as well.  I may need to find some quilts with stars to bring back to this spot.  And, make a quilt with stars inside circles???? oh, my, the ideas just won’t stop!

The lone magenta quilt is one I haven’t written about before, Going in Circles.  In 2018, our guild’s challenge was “2”.  We were challenged to make a quilt using only 2 fabrics.  As always, I explored several options, experimented with a couple, but decided to do something totally out of my normal “look”. 

I spliced thin strips of a multicolored batik in a modern sort of piecing layout with a Cherrywood solid fabric.  I drew intersecting circles all over, planning to quilt each defined area with a different motif.  But when I got the circles stitched, I liked the clean look of it, so decided just to add some pearls at the intersections.

To continue the clean modern look, I didn’t bind the quilt, instead faced it with more of the graphic batik.  The backing is a hand-dyed fabric in soft muted colors.  

This quilt hangs on a rack in my sewing room and I see it every day.  But writing about it makes me realize that I need to do more of this kind of piecing.  It was fun – and I love the graphic result!  

I’ve written about the quilt in the center, Dots and Vines, before, and linked to it recently.  But in case you missed it, its story is here.

And, the blue dots on brown is my previous post, 108.

Seventh Street Salvage has appeared before in photo shoots, too.  Here, and here.

A note about the photos. My signature appears on most of these photos, but it is a collaborative effort at our house. I have learned to take photos and do a bit of post processing. But sometimes Jim and I swap cameras depending on where we are standing and which lens we need….and sometimes we forget who took what. And now there’s the issue of a new camera whose photos won’t import on his older computer. But I don’t have some of the processing software he has …so on this shoot more than ever, we’ve passed digital images back and forth to make this wall and the quilts impressive! His masterful touch in the digital darkroom makes everything look good!