Tuesday, February 27, 2024

Symphony in Brown

I have dubbed this collection of charity quilts "A Symphony in Brown". My friend Nancy Cohen Tomases showed up one day with a huge box, a garbage bag, and a bolt of fabric for comfort quilts. Oh boy (not). As I went through and sorted, it was obvious she was getting rid of browns, which she HATES. She tells me it was not all hers, but there sure was a lot of brown in there! I decided the best plan of attack was to cut it all into strips of various widths and make different patterns using a second color. I did brown with peach, brown with aqua, and brown with yellow, and then at the end I did brown with all 3. After 4 months of pretty much only working with browns I've called it quits for now. Gotta get them quilted!(I still have a good size box full of brown strips left over}. Enjoy!

Binding--Ugh

Oh How I Hate Binding! I am really good at making tops, pretty good at getting them quilted and EXCEPTIONAL at putting off bindings! I have had a pile of 5 quilts that just need the binding sewn down by hand. They've been there almost a year! I'm down to the last one of mine which is a bed size. I use the excuse that I don't have a comforable place to sit with good light in my house. What I do enjoy is a nice day on my porch to sit and stitch. However, a big quilt is too much! Excuses excuses. This story begins with a quilt started by my ex's mom, Cindy. She has been my Massachusetts mom, quilting buddy, and friend for a very long time. When she died suddenly last June, I inherited her quilting stuff. One of the UFO's was a quilt she started for her daughter Priscilla. I said I would finish it, thinking "no problem". Well.... the 11 finished blocks ended up needing work and pressing. I needed to make 14 more blocks. Then there was the lack of fabric to finish it. Shopping! And the hundreds of 9-patch and 4-patch blocks I had to make. I have never had to rip out and resew so much in my life! Well, it went to the longarmer and finally came home on July 3rd. On the 4th I pressed all the binding, trimmed off the edge and got the binding sewn on. (Took all day to get around to it) Didn't hand sew a stitch till today, the 6th. Instead, I managed to make 25 bookmarks, a rope bowl to display them in, new signs for the new items for Market, pressed the entire pile of stuff on the pressing table, cut borders for 3 tops, worked on a scrappy top, vacuumed, cleaned the bathroom, and probably a few other things that didn't need to be done just to avoid the binding!
Did I mention this is a King Size? That's 40 feet of binding!!! So far I've done 2! I promise to post this with pictures when I am finished. People think I am so prolific!! Yeah, when I'm doing what I like!