Patty's Memories

Patty lost her husband about a year ago, and she had me make 6 quilts from his clothing.  One for herself and her 2 adult children, and 3 for her grandkids.  The adults got a throw size, and the grandkids got crib sized.

I used 3 different patterns for each of the large quilts, and the same 3 patterns, but with smaller pieces, in the crib quilts.  All the pieces are 2" wide, but in the bigger quilts they are 6" long, and 4" long in the smaller quilts.  There was enough denim left that I was able to put a border on Patty's, and on 2 sides of her kids.

Patty's

Jen's

Jason's

The 3 crib size:

Ella's

Piper's

Julian's

She had the clothes sorted for each quilt.  They all have t-shirt logos from the Chicago major professional teams - Blackhawks, Bulls, Bears, and White Sox.  (sorry Cubs fans...) There are also t-shirts with the logo of the company he worked for.  There were also pockets from his jeans.  The adult quilts got the pockets with the red tag and logo, and the 3 crib quilts are plain pockets:

Patty's has the pocket and embroidered logo from his company that were on a denim shirt:

He enjoyed golf, fishing, and gambling, so she had me use those fabrics in the backing.

All 3 fabrics were used in each quilt. The large quilts have an extra strip of the clothing pieces to provide the necessary width

I quilted a simple meander in the smaller quilts, and a meander with loops in the larger ones.  I used a medium grey thread in all 6.

Karen's Flower Patch

Karen pieced this fabulous top using Judi Madsen's pattern "Flower Patch".  I had made it several years ago, (see mine here) and Karen liked the pattern so much that she made one for herself.

She used fabulous Kaffe Fassett fabrics for the flowers.  They are always bright and have big flowers.  She used black and white as the outer border of the flower blocks to really make them pop.  

There are no 2 alike.

I quilted hooks in the body of the flowers, and connecting curves in the black/white borders.  Then a dense fill in the background to really make the flowers pop.

I quilted another connecting curve pattern in the frames around the two flowers that are on stems.

In the borders, I did hooks in the smaller pieces, and double hooks in the larger pieces

The first border is a black and white printed fabric that looks like it's pieced.  I simply followed the lines between designs to make it look there are seams.  

You can see this border in the full picture - I didn't get one of just the border.

Karen added another border at the bottom of the quilt for some extra length.  She used all these fabulous fabrics to make a piano key border. 

 I quilted a hook with a spike on top in each of the piano keys

The back is even fun

Darlene's scraps

Darlene used up a lot of her scraps to piece this smaller quilt - great for wrapping up while watching TV.  It's 58 x 58.

Each block has the same dark brown, and the rest is all scrappy:

She wanted simple quilting, so I just did an all-over with hooks and swirls:

The backing is from her collection of Civil War reproduction fabrics:

Brian's Memories

Brian's family is big on T-shirt quilts.  I've done 4 for his kids, and now one from his shirts.  This one is the biggest - 90 x 108.  There are 75 printed pieces, plus 17 plain filler spots.  

It's pretty heavy due to the size.  

I quilted one of my favorite pantographs - "Shades of Anasazi".  It's a great all over pattern for t-shirt quilts.

Purple is his wife's favorite color, so that's what I got for the backing and binding.

Barb's Giant Dahlia

Barb finally pieced a top for herself.   I've quilted quite a few tops for her, and most of them were gifts for others.  This Giant Dahlia will go on her bed.  It's 85 x 102.  The flower is not centered as she was smart and put extra space at the top to tuck under a pillow.   The binding has been attached to the front, and is the solid red used in the borders.

She showed me some pictures of one already quilted that has tons of feathers, and that's what she wanted.  There are feathers in every single section of that dahlia.  Many of the shapes were fussy-cut so as not to cut up the printed flowers:

There is a center circle with one flower that I outlined, and then feathers all around:

The outer edges of the circle have feathers also:

I quilted a long swirly pattern in the background.  It gives it lots of texture and movement:

There are lots of borders, and I treated each one differently:

The backing is a fabric from the same collection:

Sarah's Hexies

Sarah got this top from her aunt, but isn't sure if the aunt made it or bought at a garage sale.  Either way, she wanted it finished. It's 68 x 77.

I used a white thread and quilted simple connecting curves to highlight the hexies, and also to give it some strength since it was all hand-stitched.

yellow diamond

Each diamond has a white center, then a round of prints, then a solid, with white for the pathways between each diamond

gold diamond

I found a pretty yellow 30's print for the backing and binding.  I had to make a bias binding as the two sides are scalloped.  Some of the hexies at the outer edges are distorted as those outer hexies are smaller than the ones in the diamonds, and the edges had pulled up badly.  I had to stretch it some to get it to lay flat.

backing