he likes it!

Remember the baby quilt I was working on for my friend Jenny and showed you all the stages of it's creation here on my blog? Well, I delivered it early last month but forgot to get a picture. Jenny, of course, has had plenty of things to occupy her time besides taking photos. Until yesterday. She emailed me some pictures last night and the quilt looks pretty good if I do say so myself. Thomas is pretty cute, too!

coming together

I finished the embroidery on Saturday and then soaked and washed the finished blocks to remove the storage dirt and transfer lines. I also washed and ironed all the fabrics I'll be using for the quilt. On Sunday, I started cutting and sewing. So far, each block is surrounded by a strip of the green pindot (Recess by American Jane - Sandy Klop for Moda) and a corner square of the brown dots (Michael Miller Dumb Dots). The corner squares were not on my original sketch but I thought the quilt needed more brown and it solved the problem of matching dots (nearly impossible to get right) in the corners.



I love the tiger with his little coral flower. But I really love the raccoon eating the coral berries and it was a good opportunity to practice my satin stitch.



The monkey holding a banana is also very sweet. They're all so darn cute that it's hard to pick a favorite block.



Next up is a wider strip of the coral stripe (Timeless Treasures # Daisy C) and larger brown dot corner blocks. That will tie all the embroidered blocks together, then I'll see how much room I have on the border. I may do a thin strip of alternating brown and green squares but I haven't decided yet. Lots left to do!

Jenny's quilt

OK, the baby quilt.

My friend Jenny had just painted her guest bedroom coral and then she found out she was pregnant. And didn't want to repaint so the baby's room will have coral walls. Blue or pink is so traditional, but I love people who do the unexpected when it comes to decorating! And I had (I thought) the perfect thing to make a baby quilt with—a vintage baby sheet with ducks. I'd begun the embroidery last year and the feet were coral and a perfect match. But, then she found out it was going to be a boy. And suddenly the ducks didn't seem very "boy". Hmm, what to do?


A partially completed block.

So, we looked through all my embroidery projects and found a set of quilt blocks with animals. That didn't help much with the coral but it was a start. We couldn't find anything suitable in my stash of fabrics (everything with coral was too flowery) but the very next day I received the Hancocks of Paducah catalog in my mailbox and I found the perfect coral striped fabric. It also has pale green, light blue, turquoise, and brown—since many of the animals will be brown, that works well. I also ordered a green fabric with white dots as the secondary fabric. That's backordered but I suspect it's not going to match very well. But I have an alternative—Michael Miller's Dumb Dots in brown. She tells me that the furniture will be dark wood so I think this will look better.


The fabric and some of the embroidery colors.

Except for the second fabric choice, things were coming together. At least enough that I could start the embroidery. I'm sticking with realistic colors for the animals, the leaves will be green to match one of the stripes, and the flowers (there are just a few) will be done in coral. I got to use a little blue for the water the hippo is sitting in, but there won't be much opportunity to use that color again. I'm saving the words for last and will do them in coral or turquoise (or perhaps a combination) to work in a bit more color.


Another partially completed block—the only block with water.

I have a long way to go but I'm trying to get an hour or so of embroidery done every day and it's coming along. This is the part that will take the longest. I don't anticipate problems with the fabric piecing but I haven't decided how I'll quilt it yet. I'd like to do it with brown top-stitching, or by adding flat brown buttons in the corners (although that's probably a no-no for a baby quilt). If I run out of time, I'll hand-tie it. I have until Christmas, which seems like a long time. But I'm still wondering how it got to be halfway through September already?


I'm working on the leopard spots now.

I'll update on my progress as I go along.

the best for last

This is by far my best find at last weekend's show. I had picked up some fabric and aprons and was waiting for the vendor to finish with some other customers when I spotted a box on the table with some patchwork peeking out. Opening it, I discovered the makings of a patchwork quilt. Some blocks were done, some were combined into rows. There were envelopes of templates, the original printed patterns, and lots of cut out pieces. At the bottom there was even extra yardage of each fabric.



My heart skipped a beat. Then I thought, "no way will I be able to afford this." But it never hurts to ask, right? So I did. $35. Can you believe it! I saw the person standing next to me ear's perk up and I grabbed that box so fast it wasn't funny.


A completed block


Four blocks combined

On further inspection, everything seems to be there to make a good-sized quilt. What's done so far is hand-sewn. And everything is really clean and just about perfect.


such neat hand-stitching


A closeup of the print

The only problem is that I can't figure out the pattern. I've looked in all my quilt books and I'm coming up with nothing. I know that some creative quilters designed their own patterns but this appears to be a commercial one. And not one that appeared in a newspaper—there's nothing on the backs of the patterns. I'd love to know what the pattern is called so I can do some research to determine how old this is. Can any of you quilters help me out?


The block pattern


The diagram for arranging the blocks

Road Trip: Shupp's Grove Flea Market

Each weekend, the Shupp's Grove Flea Market in Adamstown, PA has a theme weekend. Sellers have the option of bringing things to fit that theme knowing that there will be buyers looking specifiically for those things. For the three years I've been going to this, I've always gone on the Textiles-Linens-Buttons weekend. No surprise there, right?

That's next weekend. This year we decided to try one of their 3 day extravanganza weekends and I'm happy to report that from my perspective it wasn't much different. The same booths I like to shop at were there and the same things I like to buy were there. So I had a good day.

I always look for buttons and I found some great ones (look for them on my web site soon). I got lots of aprons (one with an unusual use of rickrack that I'll show you in a future post) and a couple with chicken scratch embroidery (still another post). The handkerchief lady was there and I bought a bunch with pretty crocheted edgings in bright colors. I'll layer these under all those print hankies I got this spring.



For myself (as opposed to for-the-business purchases) I got a white painted vintage step stool ($25) and two vintage painted folding chairs ($8 each). And my husband surprised me with a vintage painted shelf that he'd found while browsing ahead of me. I think he's starting to "get" what I like :)

The best find of the day? This quilt top (for $25) with what I think may be 1930s fabrics.



I love the brightly colored prints that were used on the edges and inner borders—they're actually three colorways of the same fabric.



I'll have another road trip post in a few days. We're heading to Lambertville, NJ tomorrow and who knows what treasures we'll find there!