When Bonnie Hunter comes to your guild, you sign up and take both classes that are offered, right? I wasn't UFO shopping, but just couldn't resist. Bonnie came to the guild, and was a really fun, and interesting speaker. Her quilts are so beautiful in person. Photos just don't do them justice. She brought 100 lbs. of quilts to show! After the meeting, she taught her String Spiderweb. You can see my meager start in the photo. We had to shorten the class length due to a very scary incident at the meeting. Bonnie wrote about it on her blog. Our class, therefore, ended up being just a couple of hours. I know, I know, I could have finished more than this in two hours time, but I'm pokey.
The next day was a full day class for the Pioneer Braid. This was really fun to do, too. I was a bit afraid of it at first because it seemed as if it would be hard to keep square, but there is no problem at all. I find that the unusual pieces of fabric in my collection look great in this. You know, the multi-colored fabrics, or kinda strange? If you find that you have an abundance of "who snuck this into my stash" fabrics, then you may consider this pattern. I think it's going to turn out dandy. I auditioned different colors for the square. Bonnie recommends red solid. Well, I tried poison green, black, brick red, and they just didn't work. I ended up with this red with a strong black polka dot. Sometimes nothing works but red. It just does things that no other color can quite do.
Recently, I bought this from Fat Quarter Quilt Shop. It was my first order with them, and I was very pleased with the way they do business. Really fast shipping, and nice packaging. Highly recommended! I just love this pattern, and will be shopping the stash soon to start this one!
Well, as expected, I just couldn't strip piece these light blues for the irish chain. It may not take much longer to piece as individual squares, and will probably follow the piecing plan from the Atkinson pattern. This is just a preview to see if I liked how it was looking, and you can see the odd choice for the chain. The colors here are quite accurate, so don't blame your computer! It is a browney-green, and I quite like the unexpected look of it, and am ready to start sewing!
These are birthday blocks for our quilting buddy Bev. You may remember that we piece blocks for each other when a birthday ends in zero. This will be the last time that we make blocks since we all have received them - with ages ranging from 40 to 60! This time Pat chose this block for Bev, and asked that we use three fabrics per block, including a lightish background. We all like reproduction fabrics, and Bev is partial to florals so they were added into the mix.
