Big Quilts Week

This has been the week for big quilts at Ruthie's Quilting.

The first one was 114 x 104 and made by Carolyn. It's a Storm at Sea quilt for her daughter Andrea who is getting married next month.

We chose edge-to-edge feathers and I think it's beautiful! What a lovely wedding gift for a daughter.

Bountiful Feathers panto with a light tan thread.



The next one was 104 x 97 and made by Pam.

Beautiful fabrics were used to make this stunning quilt.

Pam chose Tea Rose panto and Sandlewood Omni thread.

Pam's Zippy Strippy Quilts

These two 1600 quilts were made by Pam also.

The first one has a thin flannel as batting. I believe it's going to Arizona, so she didn't want it real heavy. Also, she had started quilting a meander on her machine, in the center, of course, and it was about a quarter done. I loaded it and then started quilting at the top edge of her quilting and worked my way up to the top edge. Then advanced it to the bottom of her quilting and continued to the bottom.

 

I love the black squares she put between the strips!

This one has Hobbs 80/20 batting and I quilted it with Flower Child by Apricot Moon Designs. I think it's perfect for the fabrics.

Pam's 10-Minute Blocks

It's no April fools joke, I'm back! First post in 2 months, whew!

I post pics of quilts on Facebook as I'm working on them but have neglected by poor blog. I'm probably just talking to myself now, but oh well.

Here is a quilt that Pam made using the 10-minute block technique.

She just wanted simple quilting with the exception of the block centers. I almost caught the sunlight just right to show the quilting in those centers

You can see the center design pretty well on the back:

Pam's Neutrals

Pam saw this quilt at a quilt show and purchased the kit. She wanted it quilted exactly like the sample, which was stippled.

Yikes, it's 96 x 77 so that's 7,392 square inches of 1/4" quilting, which adds up to almost 6,000 yards of thread.

Here's the whole quilt, which doesn't really catch my eye:

It's when you start to see it up closer that you can see how stunning it really is.

Here I am starting the last row and I told Dan that it was time for a glass of wine. By the shine in my eyes, you might think I had finished off an entire bottle, but that's not the case.

Here's a really closeup.

Each row took a full bobbin and about 30 minutes.

Pam's Quilt

Every once in a while I surprise myself. I caught on to doing pantographs when I first got my machine and I still love doing them. But, there are some quilts, and quilters, that deserve custom quilting. This one is just one of those!



Pam's quilt is square as can be, her piecing is perfection and the fabrics are just yummy!



She wanted feathers, CCs, and stippling. She said she like lots of quilting, so here is what I came up with.



I used So Fine/Bottom Line and I'm ever so happy that I picked up a spool of thread at their booth in Cincinnati, because I ran out of the cone I was using. The spool is a shade darker than the cone, but worked just fine. I was so mad at myself for not checking before the bus trip, but it worked out.



And the back.....almost looks as good as the front!

Kylee's quilt is quilted

I finished the quilting, Popcorn, on Kylee's quilt this evening after a wonderful dinner with Julie, Andrew and Elizabeth. Tomorrow I'll tackle the binding.

I can't believe how quickly they are growing up. They are both very well behaved and I actually asked Julie tonight if they ever throw a fit. You know the kind, it usually happens in a store, and those big crocodile tears are pouring down some little child's face. I can only imagine they didn't get what they wanted and they'll be fine in a few minutes.

Anyway, Julie, I think you're a wonderful mom!

Pam's Crazy Nine-Patch
Very seldom do I have a customer that doesn't want their quilt's photos posted online. When Pam picked up her quilt last night, she decided to not sign the release for me to post them because she is planning to write her own version of the pattern. So, that one won't be shown here, and you'll just have to take my work for it that it turned out nice.

Crazy Nine Patch

Pam's Crazy Nine Patch has just about driven me crazy....not really, but it has been an experience. She sent Thermore Ultra Thin batting, one I've never used. There's not much to it and certainly not much room for those stitches to lock in place. Picking a quilting design took me a while. After lots of practice drawings, I decided on this stencil. There are lots of colors in this quilt top and I couldn't find anything to mark all the colors, so I taped the stencil to the back of a circle lord template, placed it on my table and used it like a pantograph. Clever, huh?



I think it's a great block design for these fabrics.



Next up is Waterworld on Jennifer's Chinese Coins.