Life and Quilt Lily

Life …

Quinten gives his boys an aerial view of our house.

Scott enjoys a ride in Gabe’s newly acquired sailboat.

And now, Gabe takes it out for a ‘spin’(?).

This load of mulch is for the grandchildren!

… as a Quilter

I’m working now on the borders of “lily.” I’m needing to come up with a name. Do any of you have a good suggestion?

Cleaning, Finishes, Setting Sage, and Autumn Maple Quilts

Before I get to the “finishes” I want to tell you about …

Life …

We had our fall church cleaning today. Veronica ran the sweeper.

Angie washed windows.

And we had lots of other help that made the job go fast. I got to clean the sewing closet. It’s a walk-in style and big enough room to have a small Sunday School class.

In the big closet is the smaller closet where we keep finished quilts and comforters, batting, a box of scraps to be cut into carpet strips, and then on the bottom right are the tubs we use for our  communion and feet washing service.

I like these shelves that hold the fabric, backings, and projects in progress.

And now, it’s all clean.

… as a Quilter

Perry and Emily came this week. Perry to help with bean harvest and Emily to ... sew with me?

Remember how she started this little art quilt HERE and HERE? She added a tree and then spooled out thread for the leaves and covered the thread with tulle and stitched over it. 

And now it is finished!  She is calling it “Setting Sage.” It measures 14”X12” and is for sale for $99.00.

Emily also brought along her “fractured chevron quilt” and today got it all pin basted and ready to quilt.

I continue to work on my “lily” quilt.

I’m still trying to decide what color of thread to use on my lily, so I decided to make a small art quilt with a sampling of the thread on the black fabric.

I’m calling it “Autumn Maple.” It measures 12 1/2” X 12 1/2” and is for sale for $75.00.  SOLD

The back has “fast finished triangles”  ready for hanging.

The label.

Dana finished all 9 wonky blocks and is ready to sew them together.

Her twin sister Sarah came for a friendly visit today. They both have bubbling personalities and they both love cats!

Design Wall Monday and Guest

Life …

Uncle Edgar Strite from GA came for Edwin Knepp’s funeral and spent the night with us. I was so sorry that Aunt Evelyn didn’t come along.

… as a Quilter

See other Design Wall Mondays at Patchwork Times.

Dana got 3 more blocks sewn for her quilt and I did some machine stitching on my “lily” quilt.

I’m stitching close lines about 1/8” apart and I’m calling them “organic” because I can’t get them precise and even.

And then I got tired of stitching just straight lines, so after stitching a band 3” wide I changed my mind, stitch, and color of thread.

And now I’m going to set a goal  for "A Lovely Year of Finishes" to have all the quilting finished on this quilt by Oct. 30. I really hope to have it all finished, {as in done, finito, nothing more to add, ready to use/display/give away}.http://www.patchworktimes.com/2013/09/30/design-wall-monday-28/

WIP -- The Start of Something New

I began a new project with this piece of fabric for my background.

I cut out 1 1/2” squares and then shaped them like a lily, thinking I would fuse them to my background fabric. I placed a few of the cut out lily shapes onto the background flowers and thought they didn’t show up enough.

Then Emily took the little tiny leftover triangles and fused them on to a yellow background here, and I love what she has going on.

So, I decided to change my background too.

I added a border to make it bigger and then …

… proceeded to lay the lily shapes on the yellow background. But … I just wasn’t happy with the way it looked.

So … I went back to my original idea, the flower background and laid more lily shapes onto it. Now I think I’m liking it!

And now I've added borders and finished the background.

Wheat and Lilies

Life …

The men started cutting wheat today.

Ashton found this little critter yesterday on the weather boarding of the house. Later he hopped over to the front door and looked as if he wanted in. Today I saw his tiny fingers curled around the ledge of the dumpster. His beady popped eyes were peering at me over the ledge.

… as a Quilter

Remember the art quilt I started on Memorial Day? I decided to put some kind of a lily on it.

I quilted the background with a serpentine stitch from side to side.

Then using the Carolina Lily block pattern for inspiration I designed a bouquet, sitting in grass, framed with lily petals.

After I had fused the grass down and looked at it a while, I decided I didn’t like the grass. So, I heated it up again and pulled it off.

Then I cut out some more lily parts like the top and sides …

… and added them to the bottom and I liked that much better.

Then I stitched all the silhouette down.

I couldn’t think of a good name so I just call it plain “Lily.”

And then I thought, well, why not get a picture of ‘Lily’ with real lilies!

Here I can visualize the real lilies making the shadows on the quilt.

And Emily was with me for a day. She started this quilt around lunch and finished it up just after supper. I’m anxious to show you her finished project, but I must wait.

See other inspiration at Off the Wall Friday and Amanda's Finish it up Friday.