Customer quilt.....

So I've had this quilt on my machine for the last 7 weeks!  In that time frame there were many days that I didn't work on it.  I have 43 hours invested into it...It was pieced by a friend in Las Vegas who I have quilted quilts for in the past.  She is a wonderful piecer and makes beautiful quilts!

 

The front looks good but.....I think the back is the amazing side!  This is where you can see the 43 hours of quilting.



Flower Power

Block Number 8

(5 more blocks to go)

 

Hoping I can find the new Quilter's Newsletter today....

 

 



Flower Power

 

Well I zipped off blocks 6 and 7 quite quickly, have had them done for about 6 weeks.  Block 8 is sitting waiting for me to hand stitch....The October magazine will be showing up shortly, I'd better get on with it!

 

 

This block with the browns, I'm not overly happy with it?!  I used fray check in the corners of the flowers to prevent fraying while I was stitchin' and on the dark brown flower you can see the sheen of the fray check....still debating on re-doing that flower.  It's not as noticible on the other 2 flowers.  Hmmmm...

 



My Cheater Apple Core

 

Quite some time ago (like probably 3 years) I bought 2 different Quiltsmart packages.  One was the Apple Core quilt and one is the Double wedding ring.  Well I decided last week that I would finally do the Apple Core.  A traditional apple core quilt is hand pieced, so that is why I called this a cheater apple core.  It may be a cheater but it was still a little time consuming!

 

So the product is a printed, fusible interfacing.  So you cut apart all the pieces (110), cut a cross in each piece,  then pin the apple core to the right side of your fabric piece.  Sew around the solid line then cut along the dotted line.  Then flip them all inside out, I would do this while watching t.v.

 

Then you have to peice the background which will create all the alternate apple cores when these get ironed onto it (I know it sounds confusing, but watch it works)

 



 

Laying out the apple core pieces onto the background.

 

Slowly ironing all the apple cores in place.  I seriously got "iron" elbow doing this!  Probably took me about an hour to get them all on.

 

Ta-Dah!  I wasn't sure I was going to like it when it was done, but I think it grew on me.  Now to get it quilted......

 

 



Flower Power Blocks

Yay!  Finished blocks 4 & 5 before the magazine came out!!  Picked up the new magazine a few days ago now I have 2 months to do the next 3 blocks.

Block #4

Block #5

(so happy with my 1/8" bias stems)



Flower Power blocks

So many tiny little points...very tedious, but I'm happy with how it's turning out.  Only 10 more blocks to go!

Block #3

IQA Raffle Quilt

Back in May of 2010 my very good friend and fellow HQ Educator Linda recommended me to a friend of hers to quilt the IQA Raffle quilt.  The friend is Martha Norstrand who had been asked to design the IQA raffle quilt for 2012. 
 Martha is amazing with stitching and hand applique and has designed many patterns over the years.  Also involved in the project was Stevii Graves who has been involved in the quilting world for many years.  She has been a juror and judge for many quilt shows in the U.S.  She is also president this year for the IQA (International Quilt Association).  She is also a very talented quilter herself. 
So I was asked by Martha if I would be interested in quilting the 2012 IQA raffle quilt!!!  Wow!  I was very interested and at the same time VERY terrified!  The quilt arrived at my house around May of 2011.  I had to have it quilted before we moved out of the country at the end of August.  It took me weeks to even load it onto my machine, because I was so terrified.  Once I got started on it I started to relax and away I went.  It took me about 80 hours to quilt it and there are over 1 million stitches in it (thanks to my handy stitch counter on my HQ Fusion).  I'm a freak about stats on quilts that i work on :)
When it was done and shipped off to Stevii who squared it up and stitched on the binding.  It looked awesome all done!  The IQA decided that they would enter it into The Road to California show and if it won any money it would also go towards the raffle ticket pot.  It ended up getting Honorable Mention, I was thrilled.  Then in the March edition of Machine Quilting Unlimited it was put in an article about balance in a quilt.  It was sooooo cool to see it in a magazine!
So this year the quilt "The Yellow Rose of Texas" will be travelling to the International quilt shows in the States and they will be selling raffle tickets on it.  It will then be raffled off to a lucky winner at the Houston Quilt Show in November. 
So that is the story of how I got to quilt this amazing quilt and be involved in the project.  What a great experience!