Chandelier Quilt

 Inspired by one of the tutorials on Missouri Star quilt blog, I made this quilt with a beautiful charm pack and about a yard and a half of a white on white floral. This was a really easy quilt to make, and would be very well suited as a teaching quilt for new quilters! For each three charms you can complete two blocks and as you see I cut a couple of the blocks in half to complete the setting.

Make a "Chandelier" Quilt with Jenny Doan of Missouri Star

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wy-sFNUwLNM

Gifted to Celia in memory of her daughter Sandra

This quilt was gifted to my sister-in-law Celia, a memorial quilt remembering her daughter Sandra. 

Flannel Memorial Quilt for Pete

The inspiration for this quilt was a flannel shirt that Pete brought home after visiting his mother after his father died. He told me he wasn't likely to wear the shirt it wasn't the right size it wasn't really the right color but his mother had really wanted him to take it home.

So being a plaid I decided to combine it with other flannel plaids and make a nice cozy flannel quilt blanket. Went through my Jo-Ann fabrics flannel stash and combined it with plaids and solids and a few pieces left over from quilts I had made Ezekiel through the years.

I decided to put a thin batting in the middle and then I did a meander quilting to hold it all together. The idea of this quilt is it can lay at the foot of the bed and be thrown over Pete on cold nights.

And keeping it special some of the blocks that were from his father's shirt still have the buttons and details on them.

The flannel back is multi colorful hands, peace signs, rainbow hearts and random leftover blocks from the front. 

Memorial Quilt Alden William

We were expecting our second grandson in December, 2018, when we learned that he was affected by grave genetic annomalies and would not be able to survive.  I had been working on his baby quilt, with embroidered hobos accented with fabric tinting.  Set with flying geese in shades of blue.  Very similar to the quilt I made my first grandson.

We lost him 6 weeks before his due date, he died loved, inside the only home he ever knew.

Alden William Cortez.  November 6, 2018.

Migrating Geese Baby Quilt

After making my first Migrating Geese Quilt, I decided it would be fun to make one where the geese wandered a bit.  I chose some neutral colors and made it baby quilt sized.

Memorial Quilt for Alden William.

Remembering Dean, a Baby Memorial Quilt

It's always so devastating when a friend or family member loses a much anticipated baby during the pregnancy. I like to make a quilt so the mother has some tangible memento that her baby's life existed and to acknowledge the reality of the loss.

Half Square Triangles in a sweet, pale Winnie The Pooh fabric.

Celestial Stars Quilt

I had a pack of charm squares that inspired this quilt.  The dark blues have stars and planets and swirls on them, and they contrasted so well with the mustardy yellow suns and swirls.  Then I saw the pattern on a Missouri Star tutorial... and the quilt idea was born!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oahqzxvUuDs

Now, my setting.  Not as originally planned.  I made 4 blocks at one sitting, and came back later and finished 2 blocks.  When I went to arrange the blocks on the table, I realized I had made mirror images of the sets.  They did not flow into each other they way they were supposed to!

So I decided to offset the blocks so their edges would not show that I had messed up the design.  I had only a 1 1/2" strip of the background fabric left over when I was done, so that was lucky I had just enough to set them!  The plan had been to make a 36" square for hanging on the quilt rack in the dining room, but the setting made it bigger, so I added a border and finished it as a lap quilt instead.  

It was gifted to a friend at church as a memorial quilt. 

Around The World Baby Memorial

For a family mourning the loss of a baby yet unborn. A small quilt to
honor a love lost.

Memoril Quilt

My former Mother-In-Law accepted me wholeheartedly when, at age 18, I married her son and began growing up.  She became my mentor, my other mother, my friend and someone who loved me, despite a divorce some 8 years later, now nearly 35 years ago.  I remained in good touch with her, and she still called me and treated me as "daughter."

For her eldest daughter on her passing.

Butterfly Memorial Quilts for Ruth

Ruth and Dad got married in their 80's, and enjoyed 7 loving years before, at age 96, Ruth passed. I made little memorial butterfly quilts for her 4 daughters, and 1 for my Dad, for the memorial service.

 

Memorial Baby Quilt

Forever Quilt

Butterflies Quilt

My cousin Tary was a unique man, sweet, loving, kind. We lost him way too young.

The butterflies are batiks, the sky is a gently painted light blue on muslin. The quilt will reside with my cousin Patty.

Fly back home,  on newly formed wings.  I miss you.

Grandmother's Vintage Blocks

A friend of mine recently sent me these photos of a quilt I made for her way back in 2002.  She brought me some Grandmother's Flower Garden blocks her grandmother had made. I decided rather than trying to attach them and finish the quilt that way I would applique several on a muslin background.  Some repros fabric in the border, and a large stitch hand quilting finished this little memory quilt!

Lena's Quilt

Several years ago my friend Sharon brought me a stack of HST's that she found when cleaning out her mother's things.  Sharon vaguely remembered her mother working on the blocks when she was a girl, the 1940's or 50's. She asked me could I put the random blocks together into some kind of memory quilt. This is what I came up with:

Lena had pretty much already constructed the 25-patch blocks, all fabrics and arrangements are original. I find is so charming!

Making Memories

A friend brought me 2 old quilt tops, sewn many years ago by her mother.  This friend wished to divide the 2 tops among 5 family members, so each could have something made by her mother.  I told her they would be small, wall quilts, or table runners.  She agreed that would be the perfect size.  She said she preferred the blue quilt, but thought the rest might prefer the other quilt.

I was very excited to do this challenge!  Since it wasn't MY mother's work, cutting into it felt exciting, and I looked forward to seeing what I might render from these 2 quilt tops.  

I started by cutting out the center of the postage stamp quilt.  It was perfect, glorious, and I LOVED the color use.  I was very tempted to keep this one for myself, I loved it that much!
#4 was made from blocks cut from the 4 corners of the quilt.  #5, from blocks along the sides.  #3 also blocks from the sides, and I found a purple from my stash to make a centered design. #2 was the lone quilt made from the blue and white.  I carefully selected the blocks from the quilt that had a lot of variety, and a little brown stain to keep it real.  I machine quilted them all fairly dense, backed them with unbleached muslin, and gave them a gentle wash then into the dryer to wrinkle them up a bit.

This was a very fun project!

Coffin Quilt

Back in 2004, I read an article in a book on old quilts about the custom of memorial, or "Coffin Quilts" in the late 1800's.  So I decided, along with a collection of reproduction prints of "mourning cloths" of that era, to make my own Coffin Quilt.  I chose a block named (of course) Coffin Star, which is a 16 patch square in a square.  I used 2 different grays from my stash to set the somber black fabrics, along with a tan from someplace.

The border is a great Anaheim Warehouse find, a black/pink/grey stripe I picked up for $1.98 a yard on one of my fabric binges.

 Perhaps my favorite part of the Coffin Quilt is the Epitaph, written by my BFF and quilting partner Sprout.  I wrote it on the back, and have asked Pete to display and read it at my funeral (some day MANY hundreds of quilts from now!)

In death
I leave this world I've known,
To reach
A place with streets of gold.

But still,
Remain, thorough quilts I've sewn,
And left,
Upon God's earth to hold.

 

Baby Memorial Quilt

Sometimes I buy some fabric and even stitch it together.  These fabrics were in a collection of fat 8ths I got during a quilt run a few years back.  They are sweet, innocent, old fashioned classical baby fabrics.  I put them together, found a great stripe from my stash for the mitered border, then it went in a closet.  Until just the right baby came along, who's brief life mattered so much to his parents.  I knew just which quilt top I had, and pulled it out and finished it.

  Baby Dale, 2009.

Suzanne's Coffin Quilt

Several years ago, some friends and I ran a "challenge."  Each of the four of us choose a theme, or a color.  Then we made a 12" block for each other.  My theme was "blue" and Suzanne choose "coffin quilt" as her theme.  Sprouty choose "fish" and Faye "flowers." 

When we got our blocks, each of us added one of our own and finished our quilts.  Suzanne never got around to finishing hers, so a few years later I took up her blocks and made her the Coffin Quilt she wanted.

Here is a quote on the practice of "Coffin Quilts:" 

 The graveyard quilt is one type of mourning quilt. Mourning quilts were popular in the mid to late 1800s. Aside from the graveyard quilt, other mourning quilts don’t have a particular theme or design associated with the term. After the death of a loved one, quilters (at this point in time, predominantly women) would work on a quilt to help them grieve.

A quilter might choose to make a quilt using a deceased person’s favorite color or favorite pattern. Or, the woman might simply quilt any old quilt block pattern just to keep her mind occupied and to help her work through the grief process. Most of the quilting back then relied on groups of women, so that fellowship also offered help in the healing process.

Suzanne's quilt has:  An upper block with a cross.  The right arm of the layout is a block called grave stone.  The left arm has owl fabrics, another symbol very dear to Suzanne.  Steps to The Altar in the center, Crown of Thorns on the cross body and Coffin Star on the bottom.  The backgroud is filled with little tumbler blocks, symbolizing the shapes of headstones in the graveyard.  The pink lines are tiny skulls, and the border is Day Of The Dead dancers. 

Suzanne's birthday is Halloween, and she brings her quilt out every year in October.

My Mother's Scarf

I hand quilted this scarf of my Mom's after she died.  I have simply pinned on many of her costume jewelry and pins and crosses.  I like it on the wall.

My Mother's Scarves

After my mother passed, I collected her many silky scarves that she used to wear with such fashion sense.  Eventually I decided to make a few into quilts and these two postcard sized quilts were made for my niece (so my Mom's Grandaughter) and my Sister-In-Law. 

I also placed a button from my Mom's sewing room on the one little quilt.