Childhood

Knock knock

Who's there?

Olive

Olive who?

Thank you!

I love you too!

For the non-English speakers (or you know, those who may not remember), "olive who?" sounds like "I love you." So you have just baited the other person into confessing their love! I remember my little sister telling this joke with glee when she was about five years old.

So, this is my solution for Month 2 of the Gwennie-Inspired Medallion quilt along. The theme is "Childhood," and I think a silly riddle checks that box. I was able to continue my "olive" theme from the first month. Improv letters like this are not uncommon in Gwen Marston's quilts either. And, I'm migrating to mostly solid fabrics, which is another thing many of Gwen's quilts do.

The theme for Month 3 is "Log Cabin," and you can see that foreshadowed in the way I'm attaching the borders:

And, since childhood was a long time ago, I did go ahead and use hourglasses in the corners as well.

So, I'm very happy with it now!

Remember these bear claws that I made and rejected for round 2?

This was a story about going camping and seeing a mother and baby bear running through the campground one night. Childhood memory + baby bear = twice as good, or so I first thought. But I've realized the problem was simply that the colours were too dark, too soon.

Now I know that they aren't bear claws at all. They are stars.

Months 3 & 4, log cabins and stars, coming soon! In the meantime, check out the other improv quilters at the Ad Hoc Improv Quilters' monthly link up, right here.

It's a Warm Finish!

It's Warm Inside is finally a finished quilt!

This poor quilt has really had its ups and downs. I designed it to be Quilt as You Go (QAYG), with the narrow white cotton sashings. But, between the fluffy flannel log cabin blocks and all the loose batting, it was way too dusty for my allergies. So, I pieced it all together and took it to a longarm rental place to quilt it myself.

Wait for the chorus...

That turned out to be a really miserable experience that started with a friend of the owner setting up a quilt on the machine I had reserved, and which went way downhill from there. I should have walked out right then, but alas, I was not as smart as the song. The clincher was when the owner told me that my quilting idea was wrong and looked bad, when I was about half done. Fortunately, there are other fish in the sea!

But, despite all the hardship, in the end I think it's a likeable quilt. The snowmen are jolly, and the simple quilting works fairly well on the flannel logs. I circled around all the snowglobes in the border, which made them quite puffy:

The fat red binding stands out well too. I had a couple of yards of aqua, white and red Christmas fabric that I think I meant for a border at one time. But it matched perfectly, so I used it on the back here, and filled in the remainder with the leftover snowmen fabrics from the front.

I have Mimi Dietrich's book Happy Endings, which includes this idea for piecing the label right into the back:

Since I had to piece the back anyway, it made sense to me.

So, I'm glad to have it done, only two years later than planned! I'm catching up. :D To see all the posts on this quilt, please click here.

The gnome? He kept his thoughts to himself.

And Some Dots

It's been two weeks, and I just have a little hand sewing to share today for Slow Sunday Stitching. The day after my last post, I was smoothing out my Gwennie Medallion basket block on the bed for this photo...

...and my back cracked and folded. Two days in bed, two days mostly in bed, but the good news is that I heal well, and the x-rays are clear.

I have not been back on the sewing machine since, but it has given me time to re-think that wavy border. I unpicked it a few days ago. Today, with luck, I will straighten out the sides, re-attach it, and move on to the first border. With luck, I will be appliqueing more olives by the end of the day!

While I was recovering, I did manage a little EPP for Leigh Latimore's Brinton Hall. When you really can't think at all, EPP is the perfect activity! I need 20 rosettes for the first border, and I ran out of plaids. Rather than repeating fabrics, I thought some dots would work:

So that will brighten things up!

I have one more suitable dotty fabric, this blue. Then I think I will have to repeat one of the plaids, probably the bright yellow from the last post.

I am still not 100% decided on the background and floater fabrics, or even on the design. The original Anna Brereton quilt, which inspired Latimore's design, has octagons, and I happen to have suitable octagons in my EPP stash. I've sewn up a few, but the way is still not clear.

But, I have to shelve that for now, because if I have any chance at all of meeting the October 1 deadline for the Gwennie medallion, I have to get back on that horse!