Finished!

Yes! I finally finished the first quilt—based on the triangle shape—Genevieve’s Recovery Quilt. Making a label (below) and sewing it on marks the last step. I drew sunflowers, Genevieve's favorite flower, but they look more like daffodils. Oh well--flowers are pretty and the quilt is done. Hurray! She will actually get to keep the quilt after I show it at my quilt guild meeting next week, so I gave it an August 2010 date. I will also rinse the quilt in the washing machine, since I used quilt basting spray to help hold the layers together during quilting.

Three views of the finished quilt, below. On the porch ... on the floor ... and a close-up.

Chemotherapy ends

Once again I have been caring for my daughter Genevieve and granddaughter, Danica. I am very happy to tell you that I took Vieve to her LAST chemotherapy treatment at Siteman Cancer Center (Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis) ten days ago. Below, Genevieve rings the bell, a tradition which lets everyone know that she finished.

This event was more emotional for both of us than we anticipated. The volunteers, nurses and patients applauded, and Vieve got a “Survivor” T-shirt. Naturally, they hope never to see her again. We got a grip on ourselves and then we went shopping—what else? I bought Danica a new deluxe stroller at REI so I can take her on walks with me, and we went to Whole Foods for wine and cheese. I had to skip my favorite quilt shop—The Quilted Fox (on Clayton Road)—because rush hour was fast approaching.


Genevieve’s recovery now begins. The first week after a chemo treatment is always up-and-down as she copes with the effect of the chemo drugs and the massive dose of steroids they give her. This past week was no different. Sometimes she is awake and interacting with us all day; other times she is in bed. I have been cooking and baking a lot (we celebrated my youngest daughter Libby’s birthday AND my husband’s birthday this week). And therefore cleaning up the kitchen a lot, to the tune of two dishwasher loads a day.


And, yes, I am almost finished with Vieve’s Recovery Quilt. I free-motion quilted the edges (below). Sewing on the binding took several days (I hand-sewed the binding to the back of the quilt), but I finally got it done. Too many interruptions and too many dishes--I've got to quit this cooking-from-scratch thing! I will make a label tonight and it will be finished at last. Tomorrow: the finished quilt.

Visiting my quilts

I had a terrific time helping put on a Colorado ranch wedding for my sister's stepdaughter. Now it's back to sewing and blogging. I "visited" three of my small wall quilts owned by my sister in Colorado. It's terrific to see your work displayed and enjoyed in someone else's home.

This is a very southwestern take on "Exquisite." See Gwen Marston's original book on "Liberated Quiltmaking." Do you see the 7 red butterflies? (Machine pieced and hand quilted.)

A log cabin quilt in the straight furrow set--with applique. (Machine pieced and hand quilted and appliqued.)

Square-in-a-square. Hand-dyed fabrics (but not by me). This quilt looks very good against a log cabin wall.(Machine pieced and quilted.)

Porch days

Quilting on my sister's porch is great relaxation after a hike up the mountainside at 6,000+ feet! Below, the view toward Pike's Peak.

Finished quilt top

To finish putting together my new quilt top, I un-sewed the strips of squares where necessary, rearranging them until I had 20 rows of squares in the correct pattern. Then I numbered the rows with a pencil on the back of the first square on the left of each row. I pinned the loose squares together and re-sewed where needed. At this point all the seams were pressed in the same direction. I took the odd rows and re-pressed the seams in the opposite direction. This is important (I have learned this the hard way). When you sew the strips of squares together, the seams need to nestle into one another, and so they need to be pressed in the opposite direction. I sewed the 20 strips together, pressing the seams open, and had the center of my quilt. The photo below is the back of the quilt, and you can see the seams in each strip of squares pressed in opposite directions.

I chose 3 of the fabrics for a simple triple border. I have been hoarding the red fabric in the final border, using it sparingly in this and that project. I decided I finally had to use it liberally in a project for myself. My hand quilting will show up on this fabric, since it is less busy than some of the other fabrics in this quilt. I plan to quilt the center in a simple grid pattern (easy to do while traveling), and the border in a braid. See the final quilt top below.

I hand-basted the top, batting and backing together late last night. I will be tired today, but I don't plan to get too far tonight. A new road trip! I do love to travel. I will look for quilt shops and inspiration as I go, blogging “on location” as I can.

Busy week, new quilt

I have had a busy week after arriving back home with my daughter Genevieve and granddaughter Danica in tow. My husband and I took Danica floating on the Current River last week and had a fabulous time. Thank goodness for sunscreen! It was hot, but we didn’t get burned. Genevieve had another chemotherapy session and is doing well this time, thanks to the massive dose of steroids she is now getting with the chemo. She even felt well enough afterward to eat pasta and a sandwich from the Whole Foods deli and do a little “retail therapy” at the Galleria mall in St. Louis. I’ve cooked all week—whatever Genevieve feels like eating. And then there has been laundry and garden-watering, and even a little sewing!

I haven’t finished quilting Genevieve’s recovery quilt—that’s going to take a while. But I decided I had to have something new, easy, and fun to hand quilt during my next road trip, which starts tomorrow. My daughter Anne and I are headed to Colorado to help my sister put on her step-daughter’s wedding. I turned to the simplest of shapes—the square—for a fast project, and to my 1930’s reproduction stash for the fabrics. Working with these fabrics makes me happy—the prints are SO cheerful, and I’m frequently reminded of my grandmother’s quilts.

I began by choosing 24 fabrics, mostly fat quarters I hadn’t used yet, and arranging them in a sort of “color wash.” Each fabric has a bit of color in common with its neighbor so that when they are placed adjacent to each other, they begin to run together. See my fabric choices above. I eventually eliminated the two fabrics at the bottom right.

The template for Kaffe Fassett’s “Boston Common” quilt is a 3-inch square, but I wanted a much smaller project I can work on while traveling. I cut two 2-inch strips from each fat quarter and sewed them together, carefully keeping them in order to preserve the color-wash effect.

I created a new striped fabric and pressed the seams to one side, all in the same direction. I then cut 2-inch strips—squares by the strip! See the photo below.

The squares in “Boston Common” are arranged in a rectangular pattern, which I tried with my squares. But I wanted to keep my project small and quickly realized I would need a lot more fabric to accomplish the “Boston Common” look. So I arranged my squares in a stair-step pattern, with my favorite red fabric in the center and the black print slightly off-center. The black print is so strong that it immediately attracts the viewer’s eye, and I did not want it to divide my quilt down the middle. I decided on a size of 20 by 20 squares, which are 1½ inches finished, to give me a center medallion of 30 by 30 inches. This size, with borders, will be large enough for a table topper, but small enough to quilt while traveling.

In the photo above, you see the process of arranging the strips of squares in a pleasing stair-step pattern. Tomorrow: the finished top.

"Quilt as desired"

I always chuckle when I read quilt directions that say “quilt as desired.” I usually want a little more help than that because I’m afraid I’m going to ruin my beautiful quilt top, that my quilting will not be nice enough. In the case of my “Recovery Quilt,” I decided that complicated quilting would be lost in the busy fabrics. The directions for all three triangle quilts in Simple Shapes Spectacular Quilts say to stitch-in-the-ditch around each patch, and that is exactly what I am doing with my triangle quilt, starting with the diagonal lines and then the grid lines. I plan to do free-motion outline quilting on the sunflowers in the border.


But there will be a temporary break in the quilting action so I can drive Genevieve and Danica from their house in Tennessee to mine in Missouri—a four-hour drive through the beautiful Ozark mountains. Wish me luck on the road. Heaven knows how many stops I will have to make with a chemo patient and a 4-year-old. Maybe they will sleep all the way.

Danica and the "Postage Stamp" doll quilt I made for her.