Leaves and Friends

Our city's quilt guild has an outreach committee that makes charity quilts from donations. The chairperson gave me a few blocks, a few pieces of white fabric, a couple of copies of a pattern, and some backing with, "Here, fix this." I did not have fabric that would work with the colored parts of those blocks, but did have white that would help build them into something. After lots of trial and error, this is the result. It is about 58" square, a little less.

With several people making the blocks, they were not all the same size. A few were too small, or crooked, or sewn with dark thread, etc. so it was a challenge. I ignored the pattern and played with the pieces, adding bits here and there and taking apart parts of some blocks that were wonky. Lots of chopped off points, but it turned out better than expected. I need to put 2" borders on the sides, then quilt it... another challenge. Likely outline the birds and flowers, etc. and put leaves in the white spaces. I'm glad this one is nearly finished.

Scrap Improv

I've two more quilts for refugees finished and given to them. Story another time, but what a joy to bless people whose stories are mind-bending, even life-changing. They have been through so much, and for years. And I complain if someone cuts me off in traffic.

One quilt that I made a few weeks ago had some tiny pieced rectangles left over. (See that quilt here) As I played with them, this is what came out after adding a couple of fat quarters. It is about 24" wide, not large but fun to make after doing several queen-size monsters. As you can see, there may not be enough to do the borders that I'd like, but it will get finished this week and quilted.

I also put together some tree of life blocks that came to my local guild as a donation. There were ten of them and I was asked to make something of them. I didn't have any fabric that would work to make more trees, and didn't want to anyway. One of the ten had cut off corners, so I set it aside, grabbed some wild backing (also a donation) and this is the result. There is 1" sashing between the blocks and 2" border around the nine of them. I cut two large squares from the backing and then cut them in half diagonally. There is enough of that fabric left to do the backing. Also, the binding, which is cut, pressed and ready to use. This is 74" square, a nice size.

The question now is: How do I quilt this? Any suggestions are welcome. Right now, I have no clue. So I'll work on the little one until the answer arrives in the comment section or wherever!

Two Finishes, lots happening

Finally. My TO-DO program keeps reminding me to post, but I tend to procrastinate progress reports in favor of finishes. Sigh.

Anyway, this is a queen-size, long because the man is tall, and these colors because his wife wanted a bit of pink in it, with grey and white solid. They read solid anyway.

The other one is a quilt for a 4 year-old boy who has an abundance of energy, likes bright colors, and enjoys the alphabet. It is 38" x 56" and was fun to do. 

This is a refugee family who fled their home because of death threats. The boy was born after that an has spent all of his little life in one room. Now they are free and he is learning about the big world outside of that room, and his parents are learning new parenting skills!