Have you all been over to Park City Girl to see the virtual quilt show!  It’s amazing.  She’s asking everyone in blog land to post about their favorite quilt–and there are over 500 up on her site already!  A virtual quilt show.  How fun.  

Now asking me to choose my favorite quilt is a bit like asking a mother to choose her favorite child.  I’ve agonized over this since last night.  I considered my Lewis and Clark Redwork Quilt, the Anna Lena Quilt (Dearest Brother) and many others, but, in the end, it has to be Butterflies in My Garden.

It was VERY early in my quilting career that I made this quilt.  I took a class from Constance Rathfon at The Stitchin’ Station in Astoria and learned how to make the butterflies.  I put it together with my own setting and when I got my first Gammill quilting machine, it was the very first quilt I put on and quilted.  I tried a variety of things on it and it really turned out nice.

Thanks to Amy for the virtual quilt show.  You might also want to check out the posts at My Quilt Village.  The group of shop owners/designers who have that site have been posting about their first quilts!  This was my first quilt.  You can read all about it here.

It’s wonderful to have talented friends!

For more than ten years now I have belonged to a Redwork Club.  It started when I had the shop, and we continue to meet each month.  It’s really become more than a Redwork Club.  We do all kinds of embroidery and while we often have a projects, we love to share show-and-tell of anything needlework that we’re doing.  This is some of what was shared at our meeting.

Linda W. has taken the Through My Window panel and added her own special touches to it!  Not only is she embroidering the whole design, for each month she is adding a little something extra–black eyes on the snowmen, satin stitched hearts for February, a green shamrock for St Paddy’s Day and a purple Easter egg.  Don’t you just love them!

Ethel K. has completed our last years project–Playmates.  She made it for her great-granddaughter, Ellie.  

I’ll share more next month!

Mr. Roosevelt’s Neck Tie

Here’s the third block in the Village Garden Free Block of the Month from My Quilt Village.  I love this block.  It’s so colorful, and was sooooo easy to piece!  Click here to see the completed quilt in bright fabrics.  If you want to make it in Wash Tub Prints like my sample, click here for a kit.  Here’s what the three blocks we’ve done so far look like.  As you can see, I haven’t done my final trimming!  

If you’re making these block of the month blocks, I’d love to see your photos.  Please share!

My new fabric line has arrived. Yeah! This is my first line with Timeless Treasures Fabrics, and I’m soooooo pleased with it. The colors came out just like I wanted. I’ve been designing 1930′s repro prints for a while now, and with this line we’ve gone a little more hip with the colors. They’ll still work for those people who want to recreate the look of vintage quilts, but they are also young and fun and chic! The blue is a little bit dusty, the orange is true (that’s me, true to my orange!), the green is a little bit apple-y, the purple not too red and not too blue and the yellow is sharp and crisp. I’d love to know what you think of the colors.

As always, I’ve done a panel, but this time, it’s not blocks or a wall hanging, it’s an apron panel – the Saucy Circle Apron! Circle aprons are so flattering, and I think this one is adorable, although while I was trying to arrange the ties for the photo, I kept getting images of the Trix bunny in my head!

It’s done with the Daisy May print and has the Duo Dot for the apron strings. You can make this apron from the pre-printed panel. All you need is a little piece of fusible interfacing for the waist band, and everything else is printed right on the fabric – including the instructions!

If you want to make it reversible, you can buy two panels or an extra yard of fabric and have two aprons in one! It took me just an hour and a half to stitch this one up. Here are some photos I took along the way.
I used one panel of orange and one of green, stitched them together, turned them right-sides-out and top-stitched.

Then I did the same thing with the apron strings. The top-stitching is important so the apron still looks good after you wash it, and it doesn’t take any time at all. (If you’re not doing the reversible version, you only have to hem the edges!)

I don’t have a lot of experience garment sewing, and it always amazes me that you can stitch something round to something straight and it works! Here I’ve pinned the waistband to the apron. The anti-pinning voice in my head says, “You can do it without pins.” But the anti-ripping voice is louder and says, “If you don’t want to rip, pin!”

Once that’s stitched on, it’s just a matter of flipping it over to the other side and stitching again. More pins, please.

Almost finished! It’s just a matter of slipping the apron stings in the end of the waistband and top stitching everything.

Wasn’t that easy! If you’ve been thinking of having a handmade Christmas, think about a few Saucy Circle Aprons!

I’m Karen Snyder and I approve this message!