Christmas

I've given away a couple of quilts as Christmas gifts so far this year, and tomorrow (Christmas day) I will be giving away two more. I love giving a quilt as a gift!! It always means so much to me to give a quilt to someone. It is something that I have worked so hard on, putting a lot of time and effort into it to make it just right. Here are a couple of the quilts that I have made for Christmas this year.
This first quilt was a joint effort. Back in 2011 I participated in the Back To School Sewing event with Quiltmaker Magazine, see link here... http://www.quiltmaker.com/blogs/quiltypleasures/2011/09/introducing-nicole-brouillette-a-back-to-school-sewer-for-quiltmaker/
The ladies that participated in this with me are all really close still, we talk on Facebook almost daily. One of them, Carole,  recently learned that she has breast cancer. I couldn't get it out of my head. I wanted to do something for her!! So I was talking to Valerie and we decided to get together with all of these other ladies and make Carole a quilt. We each made a row of 6 - 12" blocks, everyone sent them to me, I assembled the rows, put the borders on, quilted and bound it, and sent it off to Carole, all without her knowing a thing! This is the finished result:

Isn't it great? I used a pattern called Tickle on it:

Thanks to USPS tracking, I knew exactly when she would be receiving it in the mail and it was so exciting to see her reaction to it on Facebook. I hope that the quilt brings her comfort when she needs it.

I gave another quilt to Jenny. I went to high school with Jenny, and we were friends in Drama class. She is always so nice and friendly to everyone. Recently she became my step-sister-in-law! Jenny has Cystic Fibrosis and makes frequent trips to the hospital to help her lung function. I wanted her to have a small quilt that she can take with her to the hospital to keep her warm and comfy. She really seemed to love it when I gave it to her.

It was my mom's 50th birthday on the 11th of this month. Admittedly this is not a Christmas gift, but it is Christmas themed so I thought it would be ok to post it anyway! Mom is currently building a log cabin house and I thought that this quilt would fit perfectly into the theme of it! She loves it and has been showing it off to everyone that has walked through her front door! (PS I originally made this quilt to be used as a sample in my local quilt shop, that is why the picture is inside of the quilt shop)

 

I made this next quilt to be given to one of my husband's customers as a thank you. It was a surprise for her as well. I got the sweetest voicemail from her saying thank you.

 

This quilt was made with a jelly roll and I used a new-to-me method called "tube quilting" It was a lot of fun to try new things! Due to my very talkative and inquisitive child, I knew that Mary's favorite colors were pink and green and she loved polka dots so I knew this line of fabric would be perfect for her. I used my plummage pattern and a wool batting and I think it turned out just great!

I have two more quilts to give as gifts tomorrow morning (christmas!!!) They are going to the two most important people in my life, my husband and daughter. I'll share photos once they have opened them!

Merry Christmas everyone!!! And happy quilting.



All in one place!!

This is proof that sometimes all it takes is one happy customer to grow your business! Maurya has had me quilt a few of her quilts for her. She is really great at sharing her love of quilting with those around her. In this case, three of her co-workers worked on quilts to give as gifts for Christmas and she referred all of them to me for the quilting! This first one was made by Melissa. It is a beautiful modern quilt! I love all of the batiks in the quilt!



 

I used my Arabesque pattern on it and it showed up really great in the solid cream background fabrics and didn't take away from the gorgeous batiks that she so carefully chose.

The texture that this quilting pattern creates is awesome! I love running my fingers over it.

This next quilt was made by Anne. She actually made one for each of her daughters, but somehow I didn't take a picture of the second one...doh!

I put a great butterfly pattern on it and it really showed up great on the minky fabric that she used as backing!

The next quilt was made by Wendy.

The batiks are gorgeous and the fabrics are cut large so that you can really see the patterns in the fabrics! I love this quilt!!!
I put a new leafy pattern on this quilt in a chocolate brown thread. This pattern is a penny and half per square inch, and I can't wait to use it again!

Since there were so many quilts from one place, I decided to make a "work call" and deliver them all at once to the ladies. It was like Christmas for me, all of those ladies spread out their quilts on the table in the conference room and admired their quilts and each others quilts. Fun all around. Thank you all for letting me work on these quilts for you! Let's do it again!
I have some more really great quilts to share with you all, but I want to wait until the owners get their quilts before I share them with everybody else! Stay tuned...and Happy Quilting!

Christmas Time

The Christmas rush is in full swing around here! I've been really busy quilting, but I wanted to take a moment to show you some of what I have been up to!
This quilt was made by Gloria for her sister.

She used some pretty batiks with a lot of tropical floral prints on them which gave me the perfect chance to try out my newest pattern "Caribbean"



 I used a light purple thread which showed up really great in the lime green sections and on the dark purple backing!

This next quilt was made by Becky. She used those adorable Dr. Seuss fabrics! When I first looked at the quilt the circles all over the fabrics jumped out at me so I quilted a large pebble pattern all over it.



 This next quilt was made by Carol.

She told me that she has pieced this quilt a few times, never finding quite the right balance of fabrics. One day she was looking through a quilting magazine and she saw these applique flowers, she knew that she had to put them on this quilt and I think that the results are stunning! It made an ordinary log cabin quilt extroardinary! I quilted Plummage, an all-over feathery pattern onto it using a yellow thread and I think it turned out great!



Allrighty, back to work! Merry Christmas and Happy Quilting everyone!