The Year of the Sheep

I don't want to get embroiled in the controversy as to whether it is really the year of the sheep or the  goat. I'm just going to roll with the sheep! Here is the latest "Lamb for All Seasons".

 Can you tell that my Leprechaun lamb is step dancing? Makes me laugh. : )
I still may put a gold buckle on the hat.

 The Spring lambie needs something more. I may add some French knots in the feather stitching (which looked like chicken scratches to me).

Eight seasonal/holiday 12" lamb quilts have been created so far from Lisa Bongean's "Old Glory Gatherings" free pattern here.

Winter through Spring are just flimsies. Fourth of July through Christmas are finished.

The second block now joins the first for Buttermilk Basin's Mystery BOM.

More Buttermilk Basin stuff--I finally got up the courage to feather stitch around my mat from the  workshop with Miss Stacy. 

This is the last of the sheep in this post. : )

My heart pillow from the workshop is ready to assemble.

I redid some of the decorative stitching and trims and now I am happier with it. Probably no one else can tell the difference, but I can.

 This is my Mom quilting on what she says is the last quilt she will make.

 She has named it "My Happy Quilt," because the colors and design make her happy.

She hand quilts all of her quilts and her stitches are tiny.

You can barely see some of the piano key border on the left side above.

As always, she gave me the leftover parts and scraps and I used them to make some little quilts for my two daughters. The hexie flowers were made by Mom, as were the HSTs in the corners. The colored borders were made from the trimmings on her piano key border.

The backing, bindings, even the batting are from the leftovers of Mom's quilt. I also tried to replicate the quilting motifs Mom has used in her own quilt--and I hand quilted them. Now my daughters will have a little memory quilt of their grandma's Happy Quilt, and I have enough pieces to make one for myself.

Keeping family and friends that are in the deep freeze in my prayers!
Until next time,
Janet O.

Quilting (Quietly) with Kim

I spent Friday in Rupert, Idaho where my favorite not-so-local quilt shop, The Gathering Place, hosted a workshop with Kim Diehl.

Kim was gracious enough to pose for me in the display of her stuff at the store.

  This was what we worked on. Most of the class time was spent making the Dresden and learning her invisible machine applique technique to attach it to the background. The last 30 minutes of class she demoed her wool applique method and we could quickly try it on a wool penny to see if we had any questions.

This is Dresden Dish Garden. Pattern currently only available at workshops.

There were around 20 women in the class, and they were a focused bunch. This was the quietest group of quilters I have ever heard (or not heard)! There was much of the time that no one was talking at all, we were all concentrating so much on the work at hand. Can you imagine that--quilters not talking?
With all of that focused work, you'd think we would have accomplished an awful lot, but this is as far as I got before it was time to pack up and come home.

I'm auditioning wools to put the smaller penny in the middle.

 Kim is an excellent teacher, and I highly recommend her. She will be going along with Bonnie Hunter on her upcoming Caribbean cruise in November to teach a wool project. She is booked to teach through the end of next year and then she says she isn't planning on traveling to teach anymore. She will focus on her books and fabric lines. So if you have a chance to take a class from her, you might want to grab it while you can.




I was not able to do her Saturday class, but this is what they were going to be working on. I believe she said it is from her Simple Whatnots Club.




















This was something she had prepared for an upcoming class. It is very small, and she finished it with Big Stitch quilting. So cute.

This was what she taught at this workshop last year. This gal brought it back to show Kim and get some ideas on how to quilt it. It is very pretty. I love the darker backgrounds.










Other than this class, I haven't had much time to stitch since my last post. These are the projects that got a bit of attention during the week. My Fall themed "Lamb For All Seasons" is all cut and ready to fuse.

 And I have almost completed all of the square-in-a-square units I need in order to make the 6th border on my Primitive Gatherings Tenth Anniversary SAL project.

Once this border is completed and attached, there will be little wool applique flowers in the corners. This has been a really fun piece to work on. I have enjoyed the leisurely pace, and I always love Lisa's designs.We are supposed to be finished sometime in November, and I am really curious to see where Lisa takes us from here.

This week Carmen Geddes is coming to a LQS to share her technique for making traditional quilt patterns using her Easy Piecing Grid. The idea intrigues me. I've watched a couple of Youtube videos, but I am curious to see how it looks in real life, and since the fee was only $5, I figured it was worth seeing. I'll let you know what I learn.

Until next time,
Janet O.