Monday, July 15, 2013

Working for Mom - her Masai quilt and her Anna hexagon quilt

I'm working away on quilting Anne H's (Mom) Masai quilt for a Mennonite Relief Auction quilt.


The quilt is in need of a good pressing with starch and then I'll quilt it for her so she can bead and embroider like crazy. She is still in her brace for her broken right arm and it will be another week and a half before we know if it is mending. She uses her right hand to move the needle through the fabric and then pulls the thread with her left. It is a long slow process but when you feel the urge to create it is overwhelming and one finds a way to do it. At least that is how it is for Mom and me!

My next task will be to machine quilt and large quilt for Mom. Last summer while on vacation we each made the same quilt top but we used colours that appealed to us. Like me Mom has a wide variety of likes when it comes to fabric patterns, designs, patterns and colours. The quilt is called Anna and it was designed by Karen Cunningham. It is a hexagon quilt and these re great portable projects. I had a good length of background fabric for Mom and she liked it so I gave it to her for her quilt. The next step was to select a fabric with a largish print that could be centred in the hexagon circles. She settled on a soft robin's egg blue with morning glories, dragonflies, butterflies and spider webs! This is a close-up of one of the blocks...it's a little taste of what's to come. There will be more pictures in the days few days!


It is just like this spider web in her garden!


And since many of you seem to like hexagon quilt blocks here is a close-up of a block from my quilt  Loopers in the Sky with Diamonds and the foundation hexagon I designed to make this star.

 
The centre of the hexagon was fussy cut and the border was made with this hexagon. I've written numbers on the hexagon foundation to show you the order of placement and sewing.
 
 
I use my machine and set the stitch length shorter. If you are new to my blog I have written about this technique. Some of the posts are May 30, May 31 and June 3.
 
A couple of years ago I wrote two instruction booklets that I had planned on selling. They are called Easier than Pie and Easier than Pie and Beyond. They explain how I do English paper piecing and foundation piecing on hexagons. I think one of my summer projects will be to dust them off, update them and post them so that you have a resource document to help you out! 
 
And now for a quick tour of the garden!
 
Balsam flower buds - aren't they unusual?

A little shrub, don't know what, is starting to bloom

Yellow trumpet vine
 
Oh look - what's that over there? Looks like two of the zebra's decided to go for a walk in the garden. I don't know if that's such a good idea since zebras generally travel in herds.
 

They stop to have a little chat about this and that!


 Zebra Girl takes the initiative and goes in for a quick smooch!

 
All of a sudden they hear something in the brush. What was that? YIKES!!!!! Zebra Fellow is shaking in his jeans but Zebra Girl keeps her wits about her!
 
 
To be continued.........
 
Until I post again, happy sewing!

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