An Estate Sale and More Finished Quilts!

Today I went to the estate sale of a 95 year old woman who had recently entered a nursing home.  She had been an avid seamstress, and I was invited in for a preview sale, along with a few other members of my doll club.

 

Just look at this basket of deliciousness that came home with me!

 

11 different fabrics and many, many packs of vintage rick rack and bias tape

 

Most of the prints are vintage repro fabrics

 

Vintage rick rack galore!

 

Five different rick rack brands represented here, from jumbo to teeny-tiny size.  When's the last time you saw rick rack for 15 cents???

 

Four different bias tape manufacturers

 

And one package of twill tape.  I love this stuff.

 

The fabric was $1 per yard, and rick rack/bias binding were 25 cents each.  What a deal!  I really don't NEED any more fabric, but for that price, who could pass up this deal?

 

I spent all day up in my sewing room yesterday, and finally finished up my son's quilt.  I posted pictures of the pieced front before, but if you remember, my sewing machine BROKE right before I could quilt the layers together.  So I showed it to him at Christmas and promised him that he would receive it just as soon as my machine was up and running again.  Well, guess what?  After four, long weeks of waiting, the repair man finally called me with the bad news...the circuit board had fried and there was no fixing it.  Ugghhh!  But now, the good news:  My wonderful husband knows how important my sewing is to me, so he suggested we go out right away and start looking for a new one.  I was hesitant to spend the money, but I was curious to see what might be out there.  After doing a bit of research and talking to the repair man, I settled on a Pfaff Ambition.  I love it!

 

One of its best features, I think, is the built-in walking foot!  It works perfectly. 

 

So here's another picture of my son's quilt, this time all bound and quilted:

 

And here's a picture of my daughter-in-law's quilt which was finished when I gave it to her, except for some extra quilting around each square:

I just love the colors in this one!  Pinks and yellows together are my favorite.

 

Close up:

For now, I just do simple, geometric quilting.  My desire, however, is to learn how to do free-motion quilting.

 

The estate sale today also had about a million quilting magazines which they were begging us to take away for free.  Well, maybe not a million, but at least several hundred.  I grabbed a few.  So now I am off to browse through some issues, and maybe get some inspiration for a future project.  Have a nice evening!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Quilts and Pillowcases

When I taught myself how to piece a quilt over 15 years ago, I made it my goal to create a personal-sized quilt for each of my children.  A quilt they could drag around, cuddle up in, take on long car rides, or just keep on their beds for extra warmth.

 

 

Son #4 has been asking when I would make his quilt, ever since I completed son #5's quilt back in December.  He complained many times that he didn't think it was fair that his younger brother got a quilt before him.  He was right.  And I didn't really have a good answer for him, except that I really liked the fabric I had picked out for his younger brother, so that's the one I was excited to make first.

 

Anyway, I finally got the urge this past week to start on his quilt.  And it just so happened to be on one of the hottest days we've had this summer--over 100 degrees.  And my sewing room happens to be in the one part of the house that doesn't have air-conditioning.  Yeah.  I don't know what I was thinking.  There was lots of sweating.   But once I got started on it, I couldn't stop.  The colors all came together beautifully.  It's hard to tell from the pictures, but the light colored center block has a wild west/cowboy theme.  The pattern is from the July 2003 issue of THE QUILTER, and it's called Garden Steps.  I added more squares so that it would end up the size I wanted--approximately 4 1/2 x 6 1/2 feet.  Like all of my quilts, it is backed in a cozy flannel for extra warmth, and this one also has two layers of cotton batting.  It is machine quilted in diagonal rows, and most importantly, every single piece of fabric for this project came from my stash. 

 

I had just enough fabric left over to make a matching pillowcase.  Here it is, hanging up against the back side of the quilt.

 

And while we're on the topic, here's the quilt I made for son #5 back in December.  I used a pattern from the book, BLENDED QUILTS II, by Marsha McCloskey.  It also has a cowboy/wild west theme.  The cowboy print is on a beautiful, blue background, and the fabric strips along the edges have tiny horse heads on the them.  Too cute.

 

Another matching pillowcase against the flannel back of son #5's quilt.

 

This is son #3's quilt--one of the very first quilts I ever made.  It's a very simple pattern from the book MORE QUILTS FOR BABY by Ursula Raikes.  I pretty much learned how to quilt from this book.   I quilted it by stitching "in the ditch".  I remember how proud I was when it was finally completed.  I'm almost embarrassed now by how simple it looks, but my son loves it.  LOVES IT.  He has used it nearly everyday for 13 years, and it shows.  The binding is threadbare, and there are many holes scattered throughout the quilt.  I have offered to make him a new quilt, a more grown-up pattern, but he won't hear of it.  I suggested that we could use this quilt as the batting in a new quilt, but he only stared at me in horror.  I guess I should feel good that this 18 year old son of mine has such a fondness for the fabrics that I pieced together for him when he was only five.  This quilt has been LOVED...to pieces.  So now I've been re-evaluating it, thinking about how I can give it some new life which will still meet my son's approval.  Perhaps a new flannel backing, binding, and some patches to the holes?  Hmm, now that I'm thinking of it,  I might have better luck with this conservation project when he's not around!

 



Two New Projects

Son #2 is in Afghanistan right now, serving with the US Army. I am super-proud of him, but not a day goes by that I don't feel a little anxious for his safety. We get to talk to him maybe twice a week, and it's just so wonderful to hear his voice. The last time we spoke, he requested I send him a pillowcase in his next care package, and this is what I came up with. Of course, I couldn't just go out and buy a ready-made one...what fun would that be? So I exhausted a little bit more of my fabric stash and whipped up this cute case. The Mickey print is flannel; the other two fabrics are quilter's cottons. I hope it brings a smile to his face and a sweet dreams when he sleeps.

Remember the little doll bonnet I crocheted a short while ago? Well, this is the matching dress! Unfortunately, that bonnet was too big to fit this doll, and this dress was too small to fit the other doll that modeled the bonnet! Oh, well. I am mainly doing these little doll projects so that I can get more proficient at crochet. But didn't it turn out cute? It actually made up pretty quickly, and only took me a couple of afternoons.
The back closes with two, tiny buttons. The neckline turned out a little wider than I would have liked for this doll, so if I try it again, I will adjust that. But for the most part, I am very happy with how this turned out. There are matching panties for this outfit...I may try those tonight, and maybe try to make a smaller bonnet, too.

I have a dress almost completed for my youngest--I just need to attach the shoulder straps and side ties. So hopefully, that will be my next post. But my little model has been under-the-weather for the past couple of days, so I'll need to wait until she's ready to try it on for me. Dresses always look better on a real, live child than hanging on a hanger. And all the beautiful sun we had over Easter weekend? GONE. So we may end up taking pictures indoors (not my first choice), unless we get a good break in the rain. Ah, the joys of living in the Pacific Northwest!