Sea of Quilts 2015

The third weekend of September is my guild (Coos Sand 'N Sea Quilters) quilt show.  This year I entered four quilts and received a blue ribbon and a red ribbon!  The blue ribbon was for my Blue and White Stars Quilt in the Large Quilt, Professionally quilted category.  You can read about this quilt here.

I was really thrilled to win a ribbon on this because I put a lot of time and effort into quilting this one.  The ribbon was lovely, a handmade flower with ribbon streamers.

The red ribbon was for the Pink Heart quilt I hand quilted.  I don't think I have blogged about this one yet, so I will have to make sure I do that!

This was was in the Group Quilt - hand quilted category.

I thought that the categories were a litle baffling this year.  I didn't really consider this quilt to be a group quilt just because I didn't do the embroidered blocks, but I suppose that one could classify it that way.  At any rate, I was pleased by the ribbons, and by the goodie bag I received.  The best part of it was the Aurifil Thread pack I received - four big spools of neutrals!  I will definitely put that to good use!

Good news for the day is that I think I have conquered those crazy valances.  I plan to press them and make sure all the stray threads are clipped and deliver them tomorrow.  Hurrah!  And another project has had the fabric approved, so I can start getting that one out of the way.  I'm excited to be moving forward on these so that I can get to more quilting - there has definitely been too little of that lately!
I can't wait to show you some of the quilt plans that I have in the works :)

Ribbons, Binding and another Block of the Month

Today was a productive day - despite a couple of unusual events that had things a little off-kilter.  Woke up to several piles of kitty vomit...my poor Scamper kitty was definitely not feeling well.  He has pretty much just laid around all day looking pathetic.  He seems to be a bit more perky tonight, so hopefully we won't have to make a trip to the vet tomorrow.  It seems weird to have our little one cat entertainment system down.  He definitely keeps us busy with his crazy antics!

The second unusual event was a fan blowing up on us!  My husband turned the fan on in our spare bedroom this morning and it went bang and even had flames coming out of it!  The smell was horrific, we've had the windows open upstairs all day to get rid of the stench.  Thank goodness it happened when he was right there to unplug it and get it outdoors right away!

So...after all of that I did manage to finish the binding on the Wall hanging I made out of the Block of the Month Blocks!  Whoopee - another one down!  And this evening I finished hand sewing the binding on the Butterfly quilt.  Tomorrow I'll finish machine quilting stitch in the ditch around the butterflies and it will be ready to get back to the owner - double whoopee!

I made up another quilt block, this one was from 1996.  Double T is the name of the block.  I had all the prints cut out, so just needed to cut out the white blocks and sew it together.  Easy as pie!  Cute block - hard to believe it's been waiting almost 20 years to be finished.  Guess I'm a little slow!

I also finished re-sewing all the pickups on a wedding gown.  It came out really well, I think the bride will be very happy with her shortened dress!

Last, but not least I picked up my quilts that I entered in the fair.  I got four blue ribbons and two red ribbons!  I'll share some pictures of those later this week.  For now, I need to go to bed and get some sleep - I have a lot I want to get done tomorrow, too!

County Fair Results!

I got my quilts back from the fair yesterday and am very pleased at my results! I got 5 blue ribbons and 3 red ribbons. I won a special reward for the miniature category which was very nice - a $25.00 certificate from Threads That Bind. So maybe I won't end up owing my whole paycheck for a change!

I didn't get to see the exhibit, so I'm not sure how much competition there actually was, I am in the professional division, but I look at it as less competition (of a higher level!) We all know each other, so it's fun - especially trying your hand at something you know someone else is fabulous at!

I love that there are so many categories to enter in, there are 6 different categories for miniature quilts alone, so I may have to make a few extra for next year. These are the three larger quilts I entered the yellow one is Party Mints, it was entered as a lap quilt. The blue one is Baby Blues, it is a baby quilt, and the fall one is Grandmother's Flower Baskets and it is a sample for a pattern I am working on.

Then I entered an assorment of smaller items. The Eiffel Tower Journal Cover got a red ribbon, and my quilted postcard got a red ribbon. The rest were all blue, including my two miniatures! The yellow and blue miniature I finished the morning that the fair items were picked up. The scalloped binding was a last minute decision and not as well done as I would like it to have been, but it still qualified for the blue ribbon so I am happy.

It was a pattern from a Miniature Quilts magazine, but I made it in different colors. I love the blue and yellow combination, so bright and cheery. I ran out of fabric for the border, but had one in my stash that I loved, but didn't want to use. So I ended up running to the fabric store to look for more, and found the same thing, plus the cheery fabric I used for the back. I am going to make myself a quilters wallet out of the border fabric that I have left now!

Saving the best for last, the happiest thing I got from the fair is a commission to quilt one of the loveliest vintage grandmothers flower garden quits I have ever seen! It is a fabulous quilt and I know that not everyone is as thrilled as I am about getting to handquilt something like this, but it is such a wonderful quilt!

Yes, that is a quarter in the center of the flower! Each of the flower petals has a design from the fabric centered on it, and the green path around the flowers makes the whole quilt beautifully straight, not slightly skewed like most of these are. I think there is a special name for this variation, if you know what it's called let me know. It is in pristine shape, not a spot on it. I am so honored to be able to put my stitches in this quilt, I cannot even tell you! What a joy this will be!

More Fair Results...2006 Coos County Fair

My other blue ribbon winner was Butterfly Pond. I got some really nice comments from the judge, so I am really happy with that! I've been using the scraps from this quilt to make some really neat postcards. I have some for sale, just check out the quilts for sale link on the side of the page.

I'm also working on a tote bag from the scraps (I had a lot of left-overs from this quilt, and they were so pretty I figured I had to make something out of them!) I got about half of it machine quilted last night, but was really struggling with thread breaking. 

After some internet research this morning, I think I am going to give my machine a good cleaning, check the tension settings, change the needle (yes, a novel concept for sure) and do a test run. I suspect part of it is that I am just using good old Coats and Clark thread and my Juki does regular sewing ok with it, but doesn't really like it for quilting. But, I do like the colors I have and want to finish with them. Last time I was having this trouble a good cleaning did the trick, that was just last week, though. You never can tell though. All it takes is one stray thread to throw everything off!

Coos County Fair 2006

Last week was fair week. I entered 5 quilts, and a pirate costume I made for my daughter last year. I got two blue ribbons, and two red ribbons on my quilts, and a red ribbon for the costume. I won the special award for miniatures with my paper pieced lighthouse quilt- "A Light in the Storm" It is made from a commercial pattern, which was very nice - all of the paper piecing patterns were included, and there were a lot of them! I need to figure out how many pieces in this quilt because there are so many. I had a lot of fun making it, and decided to hand quilt it because according to the rules at last year's quilt show it was too large to be a miniature (or so I thought). According to the applications for this years show it just makes it as a miniature - yeah!! Anyway, the machine quilted category for wall-hangings is huge, but there were only a few hand quilted ones last year, so I thought by hand quilting it I would stand a better chance of winning a ribbon on it. Oh well! It won at the fair, so I hope it does well at the show in Sept. The one thing about the show is that the ribbons are awarded by public voting, so it's not always the best technical work that wins, but the most eye catching. I try to enter something in the miniatures every year - it's a small but competitive category! Plus, I just like to make them, so it gives me a good excuse to come up with yet another small quilt.