Holiday Season Madness

I hope everyone enjoyed the holiday season and got to take some time for yourselves to get some extra quilting time in.  I know I did!  There's so much to talk about this month!

First, and most exciting for me, I got the best Christmas present EVER!  My new Gammill with a Statler Stitcher was delivered.  Yippee!  There's actually a bit of a story that goes with the delivery.  Daren (from Linda's Electric Quilters) and Cody (from Gammill) arrived early in the morning and started work, getting everything brought upstairs and put together.  By early afternoon, she was ready for the initial testing.  That's when things started getting strange.  The machine started stitching by itself!  Daren would stop the stitcher, touch the table, and it would start on its own again.  Or, he'd stop it, and step back and it would start again!  I joked that Mom was there with us, testing it herself, because she was so excited about having a Gammill back in the house again.  It turned out that the issue was more likely a short in the machine, and it had to be sent back.  I went ahead and christened her with the name Carol Ann, after the little girl in the movie Poltergeist.  Hehehehe.  Just a few days later, a new head was delivered and installed, and is working absolutely beautifully!  I picked up a couple of community service quilts from my guild, and quilted them for practice.  I love it!

Carol Ann all set up and ready to stitch!

Community Service quilt #1

Close up of the flowers I quilted onto the blocks.

Close up of the work that I did on the sashing and cornerstones.

Community Service quilt #2.

Close up of the quilting from the backside.  A pretty, swirly Edge-to-Edge pattern.

Anyone remember the miniature Sleeping Beauty that I was working on a few months ago?  I just finished it!  My original plan was to hand quilt it, but when I really started thinking about the amount of quilting that I thought it needed (so much stitching in the ditch!), I changed my mind and learned how to use a walking foot on my Bernina.  I finished all of that stitching in the ditch, then loaded it up on the Gammill to add some pretty feathery patterns in the center and in the quarter circles.  I think it turned out beautifully!  I gave her the name Southern Jewel... the bright colors remind me of pretty gems sparkling in the sun.

Finished Southern Jewel.

Closeup of the quilting in the center.

Closeup of the quilting in the quarter circles.

Shot of the quilting from the backside of the quilt.

Next topic... Mom may have mentioned it previously, but she and I had been collecting charm squares to make our own charm quilts.  Charm quilts have an interesting story behind them, where women would collect pieces of fabric and make quilts that had 1,000 different fabrics in them.  Well, I finally finished the top of the first of my charm quilts.  Yes, the first... of three!  After I started making the quilt, I thought there was still a good bit of fabric left on each of the charm squares, and realized that I could make at least one more quilt.  Or, I could make two more quilts all of different sizes.  So, my Goldilocks quilts are named Papa Bear, Mama Bear, and Baby Bear.  Papa's top is done, and getting ready to be loaded up and quilted, probably with a swirly, feathery edge-2-edge.  Then, I'll get busy finishing up Mama and Baby.

Papa Bear

The beginnings of Mama Bear and Baby Bear.

I also finished a miniature double wedding ring quilt.  This was a pattern that I bought at Festival this year, all paper pieced.  I've always had a kind of obsession with double wedding rings, and I figured this would be a good way to scratch that itch without having to make a full size quilt.  So cute!  I haven't quite decided how I want to quilt it yet, but I'll start working that soon enough.

Paper pieced double wedding ring miniature quilt.

And last, but certainly not least, I want to share photos of a couple of quilts that friends are almost done with.  First, Becky finished her Omigosh! top, minus the borders in this photo.  This is such a popular pattern, and you can definitely see why.  It's beautiful!



Becky's Omigosh!

Second, Jerrianne finished The Grape Quilt!  There are just a couple of grapes on the quilt... I think over 1600 of them!  It's absolutely gorgeous!  And, this was a pattern that Mom had put together, and I found the file for it, complete except for a cover photo.  So, as soon as Jerrianne's quilt gets back from being quilted, and gets photographed, we'll be releasing the pattern for sale on our website.

Jerrianne's Grape Quilt.

That's all for this month.  Happy New Year to everyone!  My resolution is to quilt more, and to post monthly blogs this year.  Yippee!

Keep quilting,
Jenny