Charity quilts

We make a lot of quilts for those who need them here in Poland.  Often people use heat in their homes from October through April.  This past winter was pretty mild, so heat wasn't as big of a deal, but we do use our heaters!  In our case, we have a wood stove, and my husband and son keep it going.

I had about 100 quilts ready to give out by the end of 2013.  From January through March we gave away about 50 twin sized or larger quilts and myriads of smaller ones.  A friend who lives in Arizona keeps us supplied with lap/baby sized quilts that we can give away. While using a baby quilt is a common thing, it isn't yet a common thing for someone to use a lap sized quilt as a decorator item in a house.  We are trying to introduce it as our friend always sends along beautiful quilts!

In years past we've given away some Christmas presents to area needy and in conjunction with that, we've given away quilts in the form of a drawing.  We've had various people win--always they were excited.  Until the summer of 2012, I tied these quilts. Starting in 2012, I decided to use these quilts to improve my quilting.

Here is a picture of some of the stacks of quilts previous to the time I started quilting by machine.  Once I started quilting by machine, I needed to buy a little bit thinner poly batting as I was having a hard time quilting by machine the poly batting that is 150 gram weight. I switched to 100 grams or 120 grams max and it works.

Here are some of my helpers.  Here are two neighborhood kids and my son, Daniel (on the left.)

Here are Julia (neighbor) and Lydia, my daughter working on a Spiderman top. I bought several panels off of Ebay back when and then added  borders around them in order to make them into twin size quilts. They were/are very popular.  

They got drafted into helping quite a bit but I don't think they minded too much. They were very fast at tying!  We called Lydia 'lightning fingers" but Julia could keep up as well.

If you happen to have any tops and wanted to donate them to us here in Poland to finish, we would be happy to do so. Please write me.

It's a QR wedding quilt!

My son nr. 2 is getting married in June and I made this quilt for the new couple. 

If you've got a smart phone you should be able to scan this quilt for the message that is embedded in the quilt.

Making this kind of quilt is tedious, but not necessarily difficult. The only scare I had was after it was put together and we couldn't get it to scan. My husband and son at home were helping me try to get it to read. I hadn't added the white border around it yet and it just wouldn't scan. Then my husband said, "Go add the border and see if it will scan."  Instead, I put a white sheet underneath it and it scanned without a problem!  I was so relieved.  Then, I sandwiched and quilted it. 

I finished Moda's "Simply Woven quilt" a few days ago.  Here it is:

I found the pattern here: http://www.modabakeshop.com/2012/10/simply-woven-quilt.html

Hint: it isn't that easy, but it isn't that hard either. I've not been a fan of the "make a square and chop it up" style of piecing, but this is what you do here.

I made it queen sized. Finished size is about 96" square as each block is 12" finished (the block was supposed to finish at 12.5" but when you sew them into the quilt they are then 12" square finished.

Try it!  I used a lot of my 2.5" strips from my big bag of scrappy 2.5" strips.

I made the binding "scrappy".

It's bright!

It turned out a bit brighter than I thought it would be!

My sister, owner and operator of The Coupon Clippers www.thecouponclippers.com asked me to make a quilt for the Anchorage, a camp in NC who will be having a Ladies' Retreat in September, 2014. This quilt will be a door prize for the ladies who come.  She and the ladies who are organizing the retreat sent me a picture of a quilt they liked (actually they chose one from among several that I sent them) and I tried to make it similar.  I think the original called for 4.5" squares, but I used 5". The original pattern called for a small quilt, but I made this one larger. It is queen sized.

This quilt is the quintessential traditional quilt using simple 5" squares, 1.5" sashing and cornerstones, put on point. Really, really simple, folks. At least in theory.  Working with long strips and then those little cornerstones wasn't so simple, but on paper it sure seems like it should be!

Here it is:

Because I  currently live in Poland, we will be taking this with us when we travel back to the states for my older daughter's graduation from college (and number 2 son's graduation with his master's degree and then wedding).