"Stitch and Pitch"

A friend helped make this "yarn bomb" at the Seattle Mariner's baseball park.    It's up for today only, in honor of "Stitch and Pitch" night.  They're encouraging participants to bring their knitting, quilting and hand-sewing to the game tonight!  Now, THAT's a baseball game I'd like to attend!

Quilted!

I spent the week quilting this and learning new skills. 

"Winter Solstice"  68" x 88"

Pattern by Gwen Marston in her book, Liberated String Quilts.

                                                       

I thought I was learning feathers, but they turned out to be hearts.  Oh well.  I like hearts too.

I never thought I'd say this.  FREE MOTION QUILTING IS FUN!  (With plenty of dark chocolate.)

Now, off to shop for binding fabric and baste the next one. 

This just may be the summer of fmq for me!

Back to Sewing!

I've been away from sewing for awhile, working on a home improvement project.  Thankfully, it's mostly done and I can start sewing again.  Feeling a little out of the swing, I needed some inspiration to get going again.  

I  became intrigued by Beth's post on "low volume" quilts.  Many quilt bloggers are making these.  There's a flickr group here.   What is it about white?  For me, it reminds me of the old quilts my great-grandmother made, those cool to the touch, lightweight quilts I slept with during the summer as a kid.  

So I started playing around with my "low volume" scraps.  But, being who I am, I just had to add some red.  Then I realized it's looking a lot like a quilt that Bonnie made.  She worked on hers at my house a few years ago.  After that, I noticed that even Victoria is getting excited about white!  It's amazing how ideas get planted, and you don't even know they're there!  

Bonnie's quilt

Yesterday I went to Buffy's house for more inspiration.

Tennessee Lightnin' got a border!

  Buffy said, "We really go out of our way to use outrageous fabrics."  Yup.  She's right!

Here's one of the corner stones.  Mary very generously sent me an old bark cloth curtain panel she had. I was going to border this quilt with it, but I'm hoarding it for another project.  By the way, you'll enjoy visiting her today and seeing the amazing quilt she's making from a Nancy Crow workshop!

And I basted "Winter Solstice."  Can't wait to start quilting this! 

It feels great to be back in the saddle again!