Ending The Year At A Run

It has been quite a busy year. I retired from my job working in a Jr High School Office this year. I thought retirement was supposed mean a slow down in your life. NOT! I have been busier than ever.A few of the things I have done this past year are, attending a retreat in Utah at the Handi Quilter Head Quarters to learn how to use Big Momma ( my HQ 16) better. It was so much fun. I met a great group of women there. Went on several trips with my wonderful Husband. Attended several car shows as a vendor selling my car themed quilts. Went to Illinois to help my daughter host a baby shower for her best friend. And of course spending more time with my sweet grandson. Wow the time just flew by.I am looking forward to more family time, quilting and adventures in the new year. But first I will post pictures from this last year.

Mike's Quilt

This summer my son ask me for a new quilt as his quilt from high school graduation was falling apart. So the question was what style and what fabrics. Think, think, think. I wanted to make something meaningful but simple for him. Something usable. While playing on the Internet one day I came across a link on my local quilt guild's site for jelly roll races http://www.bakersfieldquiltguild.org/sharing.html . Boy did this look like fun. So out to the sewing room I went. I collected fabrics from my shelves that represented memories of my son. Into the quilt went scraps from shorts I had made for him as a child (he is 30 years old now, goes to prove I never throw anything away. LOL) . Some of the themes were cub scouts, boy scouts, fishing, soccer, music, army, fabric from his wedding quilt, left overs from the quilts I made for his son, my grandson, and in between I place strips of muslin to record memories and important dates for him. I sewed the strips in chronological order rather than the way the video showed though. What a great way to express memories through quilting.

This is something I would be willing to do as a special order for others.

Car Quilts

I love going to car shows so what better way to enjoy them than to make car themed quilts and taking them to car shows to sell. So this summer I made quite a few quilts from car fabrics. My nephew Chase helped me set up my booth for the very first time. He's one great kid. This is a picture of the first quilt sold that day. Luckily I have fabrics to make another one just like it. All of the car quilts are quilted in a flame pattern that my Son-in-law drew for me. Totally original.
Here are a few of the quilts I still have for sale. The first one has a center of piece of fabric from Alexander Henry. It has an old fashion drive-in with girl car hops on roller skates. It is surrounded with hot rods flying the American flag. The outer fabric is red, white and blue flames. It measures about 72 inches square. A great gift for any patriotic car person.
This quilt is make with a collection of Hot Wheels fabrics. Didn't all car fans start out with Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars. It is about 72 inches square. Great gift for the person who still plays with cars or a kid just beginning to fall in love with cars.

Love this fabric. Chevy El Caminos. Have two of these, one has the outer border of checks and the other is the same except the outer border is flames.

Handi Quilter Retreat

Here I am all ready for my first day at Handi Quilter retreat in my new Vans tennies. They are patchworked. Officially my new favorite shoes.



Here I am picking up my thread kit. We learned to work with threads I would have never tried on my own. The teachers were great. I learned so many new techniques to help me with my machine quilting.
Here is our class picture. There were ladies, and a few men, from all over the U.S. and one from Canada.

1 UFO Down and 100 left to do.

At last my son-in-law Wesley's Spider-man quilt is finished! My daughter designed, pieced and stenciled the quilt top a few years ago. At first my daughter wanted to hand quilt it. That thought didn't last for too long. She is great at designing, picking fabrics, piecing, but she just does not enjoy doing any of it by hand. It was so big though that trying to quilt it on a regular home sewing machine just seemed impossible. The quilt is 92" x 102". Why that big? Because Wesley is 6'7" tall and very rarely finds anything much less a quilt/ blanket long enough for him. I've quilted large quilts on my home machine in the past, but boy does my shoulders and back hurt afterwards. So with the addition of "big Momma"( my HQ 16) to my sewing room this last year it was much easier to do. I quilted it with a spiderweb design in variegated black and red thread. Put the binding on it by machine also.

It was great for us to be able to give it to him today. Wesley is a huge Spider-man fan.

I think the red blocks with the stenciled spiders are my favorite part of the quilt. Jenny hand drew the spiders on freezer paper and made a stencil from it. She then painted them in with black fabric paint.

The back of the quilt is so soft. It is mostly spider-man flannel with red minkie fabric all the way around the edges.

Time Sure Does Fly

I can't believe it is already February! Where did January go to? It's true, the older you get the faster time flies. I didn't get much sewing done last month. We did get to take care of our very cute grandson several times though. : )

My wonderful husband did build me a new ironing center in my sewing room. I was using a regular ironing board. It was a mess because you just can't store anything around it neatly. And trying to iron a large piece of fabric on a regular ironing board is so awkward with one end wide and the other narrow.

What a mess!

I have always wanted a rectangular ironing board with storage underneath. So after looking at every affordable organizing system I choose to purchase 5 Closet Maid shelf units.

Then my wonderful husband cut me a top from MDF, 22" by 60". We covered it in 4 layers of cotton quilt batting and heavy canvas.

It is great! I love it. And it looks sooooo much better.