Quilts

Happy New Year! 2023

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Happy New Year! Welcome to 2023. I hope your year is off to a good start. We have celebrated the new year with a wonderful church service this morning and a glorified Sunday afternoon nap! I love a good Sunday afternoon nap!

This new year finds me more thankful than ever to be alive and having health to do the things I want to do. It is a new chance to do things that are fulfilling and give life meaning. It is a chance to start over. The past few years haven’t been much fun for most of us. But here we are at the beginning of a brand new year once again. This year holds all kinds of positive possibilities that bring us hope that things are going to get better.

A new year. A new start. A “do over” so to speak. I’m all for that!

This is the year I hope to start a king sized quilt for my bed. I have PLANS y’all! This quilt is going to be made from the Nantucket Summer fabrics by Camille Roskelly. I love the blues in that line of fabric (see the picture below). I have done a good bit of dreaming about this quilt but have yet to get going on it. I have most of the fabric that is needed but it is patiently waiting for me to get started.

Some of the Nantucket Summer blues that I plan to use in my king size quilt.

As far as a pattern for this quilt, I am thinking of using the Swoon pattern. I love how other people’s quilts turn out in this fabric. I am afraid it will mean a lot piecing (meaning it will be slow going) and I guess that’s why I haven’t picked it up to get started yet.

I have started another quilt though! I actually have a few other works in progress, all in various stages. Mostly, I am working on some lap sized quilts for the couch. I want to have something new for after all the Christmas decorations are taken down. I am hoping to work on a house refresh tomorrow.

This is my current project. This pattern is named “Sweetcake” in the “Oh Happy Day!” book by Corey Yoder of @Corianderquilts. The Fabric is called “Happy Days” by Sherri and Chelsi from @aquiltinglife.

(above: Sweetcake piecing all cut up and ready to sew!)

Last year, after a serious house disaster, I had to leave the Christmas tree up most of the year (there was no place to put it if I did take it down). My tree was decorated for Valentines day and Easter before I could find a way to take it down. It was a joy to have the lights up for such a long time. Last year’s Christmas tree took on new life the longer it stayed up and it was fun to re-decorate it for each season. We will see how long it takes to get the Christmas tree down this year; I am in no hurry again!

That tree getting extra chances last year reminds me of how God offers us renewal in each season of our lives. He carefully rearranges and redecorates our lives with things that matter most; family, friends, “Framily”, endurance in trials, comfort when our hearts are broken and on and on. And about the time we think it’s over, He gives new babies to remind us that life is still worth living and should be cherished.

I am thankful that the Lord gives us second and third chances. We can have a new start by coming into relationship with Him. He offers forgiveness of past mistakes and wipes the slate clean and keeps giving us chances to start new. Scripture says that He will ultimately make all things new when we get to heaven and I am looking forward to that!

2 Corinthians 5:17 says He also, right now, offers to make us into new creatures. He wants to give us that coveted fresh start. “If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.” The old passes away. What a promise!

Psalm 103:12 says that “as far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us.” We are created anew when we come to Him with an humble faith asking to be made new. That internal renewal is offered and accomplished at the point we choose Him and, thankfully, every day after that forever. If you don’t know who Jesus is, you can read about Him in the book of John in the Holy Bible. That’s a good place to start in getting to know who He is.

We all have a chance to do things differently now that it’s a new year. I hope that you will choose to do it with Jesus in your heart this year.

2023 used to sound like it would be so far off in the distance! But this is where we are today! May the Lord bless you this year as you choose to start anew. And, I hope you are starting the year with fresh desire to create beautiful new things! I plan to do that with quilts!

The Brother Mike Memory Quilt

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The Lord instructed His children to remember the things He had done for them – the WHOLE way. (Deuteronomy 8:2). We are humans with minds that leak. We just forget to remember things we REALLY should remember. 🙂 I use an endless list of to do’s on my phone, sticky notes and alarms and still manage to forget things. When it comes to really important things, I have to be creative.

I hope it won’t sound odd to you, but a quilt can help us remember. Quilts made for me by my grandmothers help me remember them and the love they had for me. Quilts can also bring comforting reminders of those we have lost.

I recently made this memory quilt for a dear friend. The stars in this quilt are made from her husband’s shirts. It was a way to honor his memory. This was her second Christmas without him. I was hoping to send some comfort her way.

This turned out to be a Queen sized quilt adventure. It is my first Queen sized quilt and the first one that I have had long-armed. Which, by the way, is the easiest way to go with a big quilt. So far, I have done a quilt as big as a twin size successfully on my small domestic sewing machine but it is quite the wrestling match. This quilt deserved a better outcome than what I can do with straight line quilting. It was the right choice.

The quilting pattern is called “Baptist fan.”

The quilt pattern is called “Quilty Stars” by Emily Dennis at Quiltyloveshop.com

Lessons I learned from this quilt:

*It takes longer than you thought it would take. Always. But it is worth it in the end.

*Starch those men’s shirts like crazy. This will help them behave the way you need them to. Try to use shirts with 100% cotton or at least a good portion of cotton.

*Men’s shirts are not quilting cotton. It is not as thick. Proceed with care.

*I used a 100% cotton sheet to back this quilt but I won’t likely do it again. I am afraid the sheet is too thin and I am worried about how it will wear over time. To be clear, I had seen my grandmothers use sheets for backings when I was a kid, but I think the sheets made then were a little better quality.

*I learned to persevere with this quilt! Wherever I could find 10 or 15 minutes, I hopped in there and sewed a little more. Every little bit helped get it done. And it was fun.

*Contrast is important; it makes the fabrics in the block pop! I used a white background quilting cotton for the piecing of the blocks which gave it some sturdiness. The white played nice since the shirts I used were mostly blue.

Also I would like to thank Cathy Martin from the Catbird quilts. She has a Youtube channel that is full of great info about how to use men’s dress shirts to make the most fabulous quilts. You can find her: @thecatbird on Instagram. TheCatBird Quilts on Youtube.