Make It Merry Month Three

I anxiously awaited my Month Three installment to Make it Merry. I was having fun with this ongoing kit assembly and vowed I would not get behind. Wouldn't you know it, though. I was on travel to my daughter's family in Oklahoma from July 16th to July 25th. Month Three arrived two days after I left.  When I returned I had less than a week to prepare before I had a visit from my son's family of six from Denver. My sewing room would be commandeered for an extra bedroom.  I basically had a three week forced hiatus and would have to scrambled to make up that time.  A couple days after the last visitor left I got the notice that Month Four was about to be shipped. Life can sometimes get in the way of quilting. I really had to hustle to stay on top of this. But I did. Doggedly.

In Month Three the assignment was to make six Block #4's and two Block #5's. I cut out the fabric for the Block #4's and assembled them before cutting out the fabrics for the Block #5's. I will admit making 24 HSTs for six Block #4's was getting a bit tedious but I loved the fabrics, prints, and colors so much I forged on. Perhaps I felt the pressure of the soon-to-arrive Month Four breathing down my neck... ? The method of making the HSTs a tad oversized and then trimming them down, does take a bit more time but they come out so crisp and precise. The night before last, when I could not fall asleep, I got back out of bed, crept quietly into my sewing room, and trimmed down some more of those 24 HSTs. Around 3:30AM, the soothing, repetitive motion did lull me back into a zone where I could go back to my bed and succeed in falling asleep. I finished the remainder the next morning and lined them up on my Fat Quarter Shop trays. I just love those trays for organizing and prepping pieces.

Assembling the Block #4's was rewarding since they came together so exactly. All the points were where they should be and did not get nipped off. I also love the subtly of two very similar greens and two very similar reds. Dual colors add depth to the block and are worth the need to be alert and careful during assembly. I religiously followed the pattern's instruction for pressing direction for each seam. Some seam preferences were not as obvious to me, but I stayed the path, having faith it would make sense in the final assembly. 

Making 16 HSTs for the Block #5's went far more quickly than making those 48 HSTs for the Block #4's. That there were only two Block #5's as opposed to the six Block #4's was clearly the source of the relief. Here is a Block #5.

And here are the eight blocks from Month Three.

The six Block #4's and the two Block #5's from Month Three are near but not quite at the corners of the wreath. Can you locate them? Hint: The two Block #5's are on either side of the bow.

Note to the Grammar Police out there:
I realize that using an apostrophe with the Block # notations is incorrect since it shows a possession rather than a plural. Block #4s and Block #5s did not look right since it seemed to designation the block number ID as 4s or 5s. I suppose for consistency I could have also used the apostrophe with the HSTs, but in that instance, I decided for grammatical correctness over consistency. HST's had no plausible excuse to be wrong. If I can defy the Quilt Police, I can also defy the Grammar Police. Hmmm. I never considered quilting as a rebellious hobby.

May Roses and Pansies

The Pieceful Patchwork kit for May by Shabby Fabrics has a theme of Yellow Roses and Purple Pansies, a great visual combination since they are on opposite sides of the color wheel. I learned that these two flowers are also a great pairing for another reason. Roses and pansies require the same growing condition and so pansies are often used around the bases of rose bushes to lend color during the roses’ dormant season. Although it is quite common that many quilters also love gardening, I am not one of those. I have a black thumb. I learned the pansies-with-roses tip from a sookegardenclub link which asserts that to plant these two flowers as companion plants for fall and winter “is a winter marriage made in heaven”. My fabric roses and pansies were fun to make and came out so precise and cute.

When I think of yellow roses the song that comes to mind is The Yellow Rose of Texas. The version I remember most is the one sung by Mitch Miller Chorus in the mid 1950's.

I found this pansy song on YouTube. It is so juvenile I cringed when I listened to it, but I learned a lot from it. It is included in this post just for kicks… and knowledge.

Since this banner is for May, I also had to include the song The Lusty Month of May sung by Guinevere in the musical Camelot.

Now what's left to do is the backing, quilting, labeling, and binding. I am leaving those activities for another day and another mood.

Sewing with Granddaughters

While my 11 year old and 9 year old granddaughters were visiting rom Colorado they made a couple projects under my guidance. The older granddaughter, Vivian made a tote bag with lining and grosgrain ribbon handles. Her younger sister made and stuffed a pillow. Both girls now know the sequence of needle down,  pressure foot down, pressure foot up, needle up, snip those threads. The also got good at stopping and pivoting at the corners of their projects. 

Vivian picked two images out of a kitten panel I had, and selected a coordinating lining fabric from my stash. She made the front and back of the outside and the front and back of the inside all the same size based on the kitten image size. She did all the rotary cutting herself. She picked pink grosgrain ribbon for the handles, decided how long she wanted them to be, and stitched them on the outside for the first step. She sewed the two kitten images right side together on three edges. When she stitched the lining I showed her how to leave a gap at the bottom edge for turning. Then she joined the lining and outsides together with right sides facing in circular seam around the top edge. Voila! She smiled at the "magic" when she turned the whole assembly right sides out and tucked in the lining to show her completed bag. She will use it to carry books, those items she is never without.

Vivian's younger sister Lillian liked the same kitten panel and chose to make a pillow out of her favorite image. Her favorite color is pink and so she chose the fluffy white kitten with the pink bonnet. She rotary cut the image and the lining the same size. She sewed around all four edges leaving a short opening the width of her had for turning and stuffing. Last time she was here, she had to sit on my lap while I operated the foot pedal. Now she is tall enough she could reach all by herself. She did remarkably well with speed control on her own. She stuffed the pillow independently to her custom desired softness. The previous time I'd sewed with these girls was in February of 2023 so they have grown. 

Their younger brother, now 7, also asked to sew something, but sadly I had to tell him "No". This was not sexist on my part but merely a time concern. William did not show this interest until a half hour before the family was to leave for the airport for their return flight. "Next time, William, I promise". Instead I sent him home with a wooden truck model to assemble, decal, and color.

Otter Tote Bag

Sea otters are a common sight in Monterey Bay. The bay's climate and rocky shores, along with the abundance of kelp forests, provide an ideal habitat for them. There is a marvelous exhibit of them in the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I remember visiting with my daughter-in-law and how she was so enamored by their playful antics.Where better to buy fabric featuring these cute little critters than in the town of Pacific Grove on the Monterey Bay? Back Porch Fabrics is a local quilt shop, in Pacific Grove. In a recent trip to Back Porch Fabrics in May I bought some otter fabric and planned to make my daughter-in-law a simple tote bag. On a previous Back Porch Fabrics trip in September 2023 I had purchased a simple tote bag pattern designed and printed by Gail Abeloe, the owner of Back Porch Fabrics. I planned to use that pattern with the otter fabric. For the bag lining I chose a green speckled and wavy fabric that made me think of kelp, similar to what the otter is holding.

This bag is not bulked up with stabilizers and zippers and all the neat options of ByAnnie's type bags. Although those bags are lovely, I wanted something light weight that can be folded up and tossed wherever convenient, until needed. As a lightweight and washable option to add sturdiness, I inserted a removable mesh bottom, covered with the otter fabric, which gives the base of the bag some stability if desired. 

I also personalized the otter bag with a name label and added a fussy-cut interior pocket. The second photo is a view of the inside of the bag. The finished dimensions are 24" wide x 13" tall,  not counting handles.

Here is my daughter-in-law with her tote bag and her daughter.

I have used the Turn It Into a Tote pattern several times before with other novelty fabrics. I made a bag with a knitting theme, one with a boudoir bath theme, and one with a sassy lady theme. It is a great use for that novelty fabric I just cannot pass up. I used to say every novelty fabric is another quilt, but now, with this go-to pattern, it does not need to be. I can indulge my craving for unique fabric without fear of impulsive quilt proliferation.

Jacqueline de Jonge Class

While I was visiting in Oklahoma, my daughter and I took a three-day class from Jacqueline de Jonge on Monday July 21st through Wednesday, July 23rd. It was held at the retreat center of Prairie Quilts in the town of Hennessey, 1 hr 22 minutes and 72.5 miles north of my daughter's home in Oklahoma City.

The Prairie Quilts store is on the main street of Hennessey and behind it is a brick building called The Hive, devoted to holding quilting retreats. The classroom is spacious and a delicious lunch with dessert was served daily. Robin and I stayed overnight three nights at the Sleep Inn & Suites, 0.5 miles north of Prairie Quilts on Main Street.

 

Robin has a second sewing machine so she loaded it in the car for my use. We set up across from each other near a bright sunny window. 

Here are the orange toned colors in my autumn table runner kit. The dark chocolate background, shown in an image from the instructions, is a deep luscious contrast that ties in well with the other lighter toned batiks.

The paper piecing is very labor intensive and time consuming. The smaller interior circle shown had 32 pieces. An outer ring that wraps around it had over 100 pieces. I was too absorbed and busy stitching away to take any in-progress photos of that section. This paper piecing technique contrasts sharply with a method like chain piecing. Even the removal of all the paper takes a good amount of time and effort. I guess, as with any process, once I get better at it, it will go more quickly.

The class did not have a formal agenda; students each had their own project they chose to work on. Jacqueline continuously circled the classroom, stopping at each person and assisting them with where they were at in their specific creation, many quite large and intricate. I chose a moderately sized table runner in an autumn colorway, which finishes at 20" by 60", as a small kit to learn the techniques. Although I have been sewing for over 60 years and quilting for over 50 years, I found myself the slowest student in the class of maybe a dozen or so folks. 

Here is a closeup of a portion of the outer ring. The tiniest orange piece is directly under the one inch mark on the ruler. I looked at that teensy piece and said "Jacqueline. Really?" She replied, "Yes. Really. If you do not do that I will haunt you!"

At the end of the third day both my daughter and I took photos with Jacqueline showing our progress. I am holding the sum total of my efforts — one circle with a tail — and, that center yellow sun still needs to be stitched down via appliqué. I asked Jacqueline how long it would take her to sew this table runner. She estimated about four hours. The saying attributed to Theadore Roosevelt, "Comparison is the thief of joy," can be so true if you let it. I am impressed with her answer, but I am not going to let it discourage me. I will continue to work on this table runner a bit at at time between other projects.

In the following photo, on the left, Robin has two additional stars similar to the one she is holding to show for her accomplishments. By the third star, her points were absolutely perfect!

The final photo is my goal. In the three day class I completed only one full circle. I still have two more full circles to go and four quarter-circles at the corners. Then the set in process for all these components will prove to be challenging I am sure. Perhaps by next autumn I will be finished...?

OKC Quilt Show

On July 16th, Frank and I went to Oklahoma to visit my daughter Robin, our son-in-law, and their two kids. We timed our visit to coincide with the Central Oklahoma Quilters Guild show. The show had 329 quilt entries and 22 vendors.

QUILTS
My daughter is a member of this guild. She had entered five quilts in the show: four she's made over the years and one I'd made for her and her husband as a belated wedding present. First off I will show those five quilts. My daughter's most recent creation was named Every Heart Beats True, completed in 2021.

The second and third quilt entries were ones my daughter had made for the nursery, one each for her daughter and for her son. The Winnie the Pooh themed one titled Rumbly in my Tumbly was for her daughter, shown at nearly 13 in front of her infant quilt. Robin put the final stitches on the binding of Rumbly in my Tumbly while in labor. A dinosaur themed one titled Isaiah Saurus was for her son. He came to the show, too, on the second day, but, alas, we have no photo of him in front of his infant quilt.

Robin's fourth entry was titled Slices of Sunset. I loved her combination of pinks, oranges, and purples.

My daughter surprised me with a special ribbon in honor of me to be placed on a quilt of my choosing.

I chose to put it on a quilt with no other ribbons so the maker would be surprised. My choice was Posh Penelope by Joyce Curtis. I loved all the colors and it inspired me to try out my own curved rulers by Sew Kind of Wonderful, a challenge that has be on my "to do" list for a while.

My daughter's fifth entry was a quilt I made for her for her wedding. Masquerade was made from mask fabric cut and assembled with the stack and whack method and the construction is detailed in my blog post for 10/16/2020. Robin was married in in May of 2011. Taking 9 ½ years to complete a quilt is not so bad, is it? It did sit squirreled away untouched for part of that time. My husband Frank and I are posed in front of Masquerader and he reminded me how during its construction I often referred to it as "The Quilt from Hell".

With 329 quilts in the show I could not show pictures of them all. I chose to limit myself to 5% or 16 quilts and state a reason why I selected each. Here are the remaining 10, in no particular order.

1) Blue Heron by Allison Vaccarro used the same stack and whack technique I used on Masquerade, with the added design feature of incorporating the hexagons around a central scenic panel. The way she blended the hexes with the panel in appropriate places around made for great transitions. Next time I have a panel that inspires me, I would like to try the same technique.

2) Hextravaganza by Frieda Grischkowski  used Tula pink fabrics, which I positively love. I could also appreciate the planning involved in the particular fabric placement. The name is way cool, too.

3) The unique color combination in Taste of Morocco by Donna Lemmons caught my eye and I could appreciate all the non-45° angles. (As a random note, this quilt and its maker seem to be fond of double consonants.) Taste of Morocco was a first time entry.

4) Crimson Christmas by Marsha Kirby, quilted by Jeremy Dickerson, had such crisp poinsettias I just had to capture it. The quilt is very striking, even more so by the strong color choices and 60° designs of Krista Moser.

5) This cosmic kitty by Frieda Gischkowski, aka Multiverse Cat 1,  made me smile. He seemed out of this world and the colorway and fabric choices supported the illusion.

6) The shapes and color choices selected by Karen Mott for Alhambra Rosette make for a strikingly stunning quilt. I am beginning to recognize in myself how I am drawn to quilts in solid colors yet I tend to sew predominantly in prints for myself. Self knowledge can grow from quilt shows.

7) Aha. In striking contrast to the previous quilt is solids, Dandelion Fine by Mary Miller is a celebration of prints. She was besotted with the Dandelion fabric as was I. I bought some of it in March of 2019 at the Sacramento Quilt, Craft, and Sewing Festival because it reminded me of a phrase in one of my son's  childhood books, I am a Bunny by Richard Scarry. "I blow the dandelion seeds into the air."

8) Zigzagging in October by Amy Stanley inspired me to another way to use the square in a square blocks I am fond of producing. It will showcase another use for my jelly roll creations when paired with a common background fabric. I have a jelly roll of polka dots and another of stripes. Both would work the way Amy Stanley designed her quilt. Zigzagging is fun to look at whether in a quilt or a slalom!

These two quilts are in my blog posts for 4/23/25 and 1/20/25 respectively.

These final two selections are quilts I would never attempt for myself. They are so labor intensive, especially when I refer to appliqué as "the A word".  Both quilts truly merit mentions.

9) Holiday House by Kathy Patty has no associated story. The quilter just loves holiday themes.

10)  Donna Lemmons used many different techniques to complete her quilt titled Christmas in Oklahoma. I am in awe of the joyful cacophony of everything Christmas.

I did not show all 329 quilts but I thought this 26 second video I took at the end when the quilts were being taken down might be fun to watch and show a few other quilts.

PURCHASES
In addition to the 329 quilts, the COQG show Symphony of Color also had 22 vendors. My daughter was in charge of securing vendors, signing contracts with them, and attending to the logistics of their set up and breakdown. It was a big job and I am so proud of her. Of course I had to buy stuff from these vendors.

Recently I had purchased a Lella Boutique pattern for a Frankenstein pillow. The vendor, Good with Sugar, had kits put together with fabric only in just the right combination of colors, especially those spot-on greens, so I picked up one kit. 

On the left of the next photo I bought the Quilted Projects for All Seasons book from Prairie Quilts. The funny story about that book is that I looked at it and put it back without buying it. I shopped at other vendors and came back to Prairie Quilts idly browsing some more. When I did not spot that book I got a clutchy feeling of, "Oh, no! I really wanted that book." The books had been merely rearranged and once I found it again, I bought it right then and there. Remember the song Big Yellow Taxi by Counting Crows? An excerpt from the lyrics is

Don't it always seem to go
That you don't know what you got 'til it's gone?
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot

On the right in the same photo is a Coriander Quilts Wooly Stars sheep pattern I have been eyeing for some time since when I first saw it at the The Quilts by the Bay show in Pacific Grove this past May 2025. It came from the Good with Sugar booth.

 

My good intention for this show was to not buy much fabric. My stash is overflowing and my suitcase from travel could not tolerate a lot of extra weight. Ever noticed how heavy fabric is?  But being on a fabric diet is like being on a real diet. You eat around everything except what you really want. That is how I accumulated theses notions and tidbits.

Coasters came from Grana’s Front Porch Fabrics and ​Christmas zipper pulls from Good with Sugar. Parrot scissors came from Sherry Worley and silicone tools from Prairie Quilts.

Well, just like a food diet, you can eat around a bunch of stuff before caving and indulging in what you really want. Here are the fabrics I bought. From 2 Busy Beez in Edgewood, NM I bought three one yard pieces that coordinated. I could not pass up that lovely peacock focal print. And I really do not have a lot of floral prints. This was the largest of my fabric lapses.

From Grana’s Front Porch Fabrics I bought this 1¾ yd remnant for the remarkable price of $5. How could I pass that up? Remember, I really do not have a lot of floral prints plus this is a Robert Kaufman. 

From Among Friends (Topeka, Kansas), this fireworks fabric was too outstanding to pass up. I only have a yard but is it too pretty to cut apart so it will most likely become a backing for something patriotic ... or perhaps a tote bag ... or maybe pillows...

I have a horse lovin' granddaughter so this panel will be something for her.

Although I'd gone to the show Friday, I also went in the afternoon on Saturday, the second day of the show. My grandson went in the morning on Saturday. He and his other grandma had fun digging through three long troughs of fat quarters on a hunt of horse themed ones for his cousin. They found six.

The whole family enjoyed the show a great deal and it was special, all the more so, due to my daughter's heavy engagement in its success.