Design Wall Monday–May 28, 2012

Before I get back to machine piecing or quilting, I am preparing hexagons for another quilt that I hope to do by hand while watching TV in the evenings, or while waiting at doctor appointments and such. 

A week or three ago, I saw a quilt that immediately grabbed my attention, and I wanted to make it. The quilt is Patchwork of the Crosses and was pieced by Lucy Boston.  As a former children’s librarian, the designer/pieceworker added extra appeal. Lucy Boston is also the author of children’s books, among them the Children of Green Knowe and the rest of that series.  Green Knowe was based on the home that Lucy Boston and her family lived in. Though it was built in the 1130s, the home still stands today and it is possible to visit and see Lucy’s patchworks.

Here are a few of the hexagons that I fussy cut and sewed together. They will form  the center cross of the blocks. If you have a fabric suitable for fussy cutting, the centers can create some amazing  designs. Enlarge the photo to see some of Lucy Boston’s blocks on the book cover.

 

Linda Franz, the creator of Inklingo  has produced a set of  shapes to make this quilt, and has written a book about the quilt. With the book, you don’t need to use the Inklingo pieces, and she discusses hand piecing, English Paper Piecing and machine piecing, rotary cutter or scissors. You don’t need the shapes, but I don’t know why you wouldn’t use them. Use the shape collection to print out the pieces, then cut them apart. They are marked so that you can hand or machine piece accurately, they make economical use of your fabric.  Cut on one set of lines, sew on another-and the lines wash out when you are finished. The shapes also include some that are without a seam allowance, these you print out, cut apart and then they may be used as your papers for paper piecing. 

I have used this system before, most recently last fall to make all the HSTs for Orca Bay. Anything that can make HSTs simpler and more accurate is for me. Check it out at Inklingo.com.

Stop over at Patchwork Times to see what other quilters are up to.  Thanks for visiting!

David’s Delicious Dinner

All of my sons cook, and have done even as young boys that had to stand on a stool to reach the counters. Now that they are grown, it is fun when they  decide to cut loose in mom’s kitchen to feed the family.

This past weekend my eldest decided he had a menu that he wanted to try, and he wanted to do everything from scratch.

He made three loves of bread, one an herb bread to be dipped in EVOO and pepper. The two French loaves became croutons and garlic bread.

 

\The croutons went on the Ceasar salad with homemade Ceasar dressing.

The main course was blackened chicken Fettucini Alfredo. He combined the herbs and spices to make his own rub for the chicken. The he made two types of pasta for the Fettucini, one regular, one spinach and mushroom. The Alfredo sauce was also from scratch.

Dessert was a fruit tart.

 

I didn’t get pictures of everything, once things were ready, I was too busy savoring the tastes to bother with pictures!

Design Wall for May 21

The brick path top is finished. This one could have been finished in so little time if I hadn’t been distracted, and quite honestly, been interested in it. The fabrics in this are so different from the sample I remember (it was a kit) that I wonder if I didn’t pick up the wrong package. The sample was bright, spring like, fresh with a Kaffe Fassett flair. These are bright, at least some of them.  I hope to use it to  eventually practice my free motion quilting. Lots of other things to do first.

Meanwhile, next project on the cutting board for the impatiently anticipated new grandchild:

The mom-to-be saw a baby cocoon and hat that is Hungry Caterpillar and requested that. Her mom is making the cocoon, I’m doing the quilt.  Two crafty grandmothers in cahoots! 

Every Monday JudyL hosts Design Wall Monday  on her blog, pop over and see all the inspiration and talent of these quilters!

Design Wall Monday for May 14

I know it has been a while since I posted, but there wasn’t a whole lot different on the design wall to show. I have put together a few of the vertical rows, still placing the bricks for the others. Very simple, is fast when I get to work on it but have been doing lots of other things.

For some reason the photo has a yellow cast to it.

I did make some quilty progress, I finished the purple and green quilt for my son and his wife. He was so excited to get it, he made off with it before I could get a picture. I have been waiting for him to take some pictures on the bed and send them to me. I just received the pictures.

 

 

What the pictures don’t show, is that this quilt has a thin inner border of black, a 3 inch piano key border of the batiks and then a final border of black. Really makes the whole visual. The pattern is from Fons & Porter’s magazine. They offer a kit which happens to be purple and green, but I bought my own batiks as I wanted particular tones of purples and greens. If you are interested in seeing what the whole thing looks like, they call it Batik Magic.

The nicest thing, even more than my son’s enthusiasm, was the email he sent me after he got it home and showed it to his wife-she hadn’t seen it yet, and I was concerned that she might not like it.

“She LOVES the quilt, her eyes grew 3 sizes when I showed it to her and we put it on the bed and slept under it last night. Well she slept under the other one also (a quilt I had made for him when he was single), lol I don’t know how she does that. However, we have decided to go ahead and move everything into the larger bedroom (as we have been working on it this am. The quilt looks 10x better against the green walls. The purple seemed to drain the life out of the quilt, the fresh green seems to make it pop!!! once we get the rooms switched and cleaned (sometime in the next few hours I’m hoping I will take a pic to show it on the bed in the green room”

I’m so glad she likes it, and to sleep under two of my quilts in the Georgia temperatures puts a smile in my heart!