Challenge Blocks

Dear Readers,

Each year Possum Town Quilters issues a challenge to the members to make a block and those blocks are assembled into a quilt for the Columbus Arts Center.  They in turn either raffle or auction the quilt, to raise money for the arts center.  This years challenge was to make a block with a building on it.  It could be no taller than 8.5 inches tall and could be between 8.5 and 12.5 inches wide.   You had to use some of the sky fabric provided and some of the green for the grass provided.   I made two blocks this year....

I was pretty happy with this one... so I made another.  I was inspired by the art of    Diane Britton Dunham.  She had a painting called Christmas in Gullah, that had a quilt hanging outside a cook shack with some Gullah celebrating in the yard.  I tried to do the building, but I didn't do it justice.

I have tried to make it go right side up, but the internet defeated me tonight.  I deleted it.  Re-edited the photo.  Closed the program and then put it in again...still sideways.  UGH.

Stayed up too late last night watching Ole Miss take down Alabama....so I need to call it a night.  

Sew long,

Terry

Renovation - Large Guest Room

Dear Readers,

This summer I got both my guest rooms done!!  Today I am going to give you a virtual tour of the larger of the two rooms.  I had worked on and off for a while trying to get the glue off the walls and was just really struggling with it.  the glue was pilling up and the more you scrubbed the more it pilled and it was not going well.  In the late Spring we had massive rains, places in town that had never flooded, had water issues and flooding.  I had water come in my guest room.  A coworker who was the former owners former daughter in law (did you follow that?), told me there had never been water issues here before, and she had stayed friend with her ex-inlaws after her divorce and was in the picture when they were building the house.

These are the before and in the process photos.

With carpet removed and working on wallpaper glue.

So after the flood it looked like this....

With the paint, crown molding, drapes and furnishings.  Making drapes was one of the big projects this summer.  

So this one is ready for company!

Terry

Chloe's Quilt

Dear Readers,


This summer I got to go to SC to see my brother and his wife and my bestie, Sue Harmon and her sweetie Bill Harmon.

It was exciting to say the least.  I started out to buying a new, to me, car in Birmingham, AL as my car developed problems.  My brother said it would not make it back to Mississippi or to South Carolina.

After that was settled I headed to Tryon,  NC to see my brother and his wife and their farm.  Ed and Katrina have really worked hard to have a great farm.

He had a churn for making pickles and we used some of the cucumbers from his garden and put some pickles in.

My dogs were a little un-nerved by pigs, horses, goats, guineas and chickens but they looked happy enough.  We attempted to keep them locked on the porch but they did escape a few times.  Learned a lesson about electric fences and stayed a little closer to the house after that.

Ed is doing some chores here.  He really seems to enjoy it.  I guess it is a nice change from lawyering.

Sue and I had a plan to make a quilt for her granddaughter that would be born in September.  We only had a couple of days to get it done, but we were going to team sew this baby quilt up and get her done.  Sue and Jaclyn, her daughter (the expectant mom), had picked some fabric, in two color ways,  to use in the nursery, and they wanted that in the quilt.  So we looked at some of the Missouri star quilt videos and selected the floating squares as the one to use.  While Bill was cooking us dinner we made a quick run to the fabric store and picked some fabrics to coordinate with it and to use in the border.  There was no time to order fabric from Missouri Star.   We went and picked about 8 or 9 fat quarters and made our own precuts.  We picked the bright pink to make the blocks float.  Home we went to a wonderful dinner and to throw all the fabric in the washer so it would be ready to use in the morning.

I did most of the cutting and pressing while Sue was assembling blocks or sewing rows together.  We set her seam allowance to 1/4 inch and everything fit together nicely.  She did a great job.

Colby is inspecting.

Bogie is assisting with the inspection.

We finished it and found a long-arm quilter who could quilt it in ONE day.  So we dropped it off and Joyce did her magic.  Joyce even went a step farther and helped Sue put binding on her quilt as Sue had never done that and I had already left and gone back home.

 She has pictures of the finished quilt on her page here.  She did a great job and we were so lucky to meet her and have her quilt the top for Sue.  I would highly recommend her if you need the services of a long-armer.

We also whipped out a couple of sheets so it would match the quilt.

Sue sent me the last few photos.  So she gets credit for those.  Chloe is here now and wonderful.

Here is a picture Bill posted of her on her quilt with her big sister.

Sew fun!!

Terry

Sewing and other spaces

Dear Readers,

Many of you know I moved to Winona last year and bought a house that was wonderful, but dated!!  This summer things finally started coming together and furniture is in place, for the most part and I feel like I live in a home again.  I had been camping in the porch and the master and everything else was in a state of flux.   Tonight I am going to show you my sewing space.  I am so happy with it...

This is what I started with.  Taupe carpet, heavy drapes and wallpaper on every surface.  This room would normally be the formal living room and is going to be my studio.

I immediately pulled all the carpet and it took till after Christmas the first year to get the floors sanded and finished.

I was sleeping in one of the other rooms and working on getting wallpaper off the master bedroom, patching walls and priming and painting.

Once I got moved into the master bedroom, I had went to work on the other bedrooms.  Most of my furniture at this point was being used to stage my house in Columbus, so I was mostly living out of boxes.

Ended up having some water issues and had to put in a french drain and pull some walls down because one room smelled musty.  There wasn't any mold, but the insulation had a bad smell and that took care of it.

Got both guest bedrooms done first as I was worried my house in Columbus would sell and I would not have any place to put my furniture.  Eventually I had them done and could attack the sewing room.


I have metal shelving from K-mart for storage.  I made flannel backed with left over drapery fabric to protect the fabric from light and give me a design wall.  I had made an ironing table last winter.  Read about that here.

   Looking from the opening to the dining room toward the cutting table.

My sewing space second iron and table for small ironing project.

The stash with the covers off.

The covers reversed.

I will show pictures of the bedroom on another night.  My dad gave me folding screens to put between the dining and sewing room if it is messy and I am having company.  I did not get pictures of that because right now I have a cafeteria table set up and a chair I am getting ready to re-upholster.


Sew long,

Terry

Quilted Postcard for Celeste

Dear Readers,

In August my daughter took a trip of a lifetime.  She did all the arrangements and planning booking each step of the way.  She went on a trip to Africa!  She hiked Kilimanjaro, went on a safari, and went to the island of Zanzibar on the Indian Ocean to recover from the hiking.  I wanted to send her a postcard to commemorate her trip so I made this and mailed it so it would arrive about the same time she returned home.

That is her logo climbing Kilimanjaro!!  She is starting an new blog that she will be posting guides to recreating her trip.  And I am sure there will be lots of pictures to come.  Click here to read about it.

Sew on,

Terry

JJ Knox Quilt

Dear Readers,

In April I was asked to make a quilt for the JJ Knox Connection to use as a fund raiser.  JJ Knox was the name of the Black High School in Winona, MS before segregation ended.  Once schools were integrated,  my understanding is that, JJ Knox School was not in use as a school and burned at some point.  The graduates and the Winona community as a whole are working to beautify the grounds and commemorate the graduates, many who have gone on to make major contributions to the area and nation. 

I knew the big fund raiser would take place on Labor day weekend, which does not give too much time, given that most long-armers have a two month waiting list.   I was given the idea to use the JJ Knox school colors of royal blue and white.  I knew the design would have to be fairly simple or it would be too difficult to get it in on time.  About that time Missouri Star had a deal of the day on a Blue and White jelly roll.  I put my order in and then the next weekend took it to Main Street Fabrics in Ackerman to find a backing, solid royal blue and solid white fabric.  They had just what I needed and gave me a discount since I am a MQA member.  I dropped the top off the first week of June and crossed my fingers.

I used the left over strips to make a piano keys border.  Some of the lettering is paper pieced and some is pieced using half square triangles and strips.  The quilt is approximately 60 x 70 or 72...I can't remember the length and I did not write it down.  

I got the quilt back from the long armer the first week in August!!  Whew...just enough time to get the binding on and a hanging sleeve!!

The big fund raiser, where they will sell raffle tickets, will be Saturday, September 5, here in Winona, MS.  If you happen to be in the area and would like one, come on by and join in the celebration.  

UPDATE:

I got this update from a reader on FaceBook-

Thanks for the update...I do not remember who told me about J.J. Knox as it was 2015.  Was talking with another friend at church about JJ Knox and she said the fire was started by a bad electrical connection as the floors were the old kind with an oil finish, causing it spread very quickly.  She said no one was in the building when the fire started, as it burned at night.  Anyway I am not going to do anymore research on this topic.  

Terry

Antique Quilts

Dear Readers,

Sorry all the summer got ahead of me and we have been back at it in school for three weeks.  So it is time to get into a routine and start back with routine posts and getting life in general on track.

Last fall I took three antique quilt tops to Betty Lewis to quilt.  They were tops made by my sister-in-law's (Anne Sanders Turnage) great grandmother Buelah Duke.  I assembled backs before taking them and bound and labeled them upon picking them up.  I delivered the last one to them on Jeff's (my brother) birthday.  I must say I am so pleased with the way they came out.  The tops were in great condition.  They had been stored in a cedar chest for about 50 or more years.  They all laid very flat and were in good shape.  Betty did a nice job with the quilting and I picked them up about a week or two before  the time school got out and started binding them.  It would have been nice to hand quilt them myself or pay for hand quilting, but the price was prohibitive and I felt it would be better to be a quilt and go for a long arm overall design.  And it would be too long in the delivery if it was up to me to hand quilt them.  As Bonnie Hunter says it is better to have a quilt than a flimsy, even if it is not historically correct.

This pattern was called Garden Patch so I renamed it Pink Garden Patch.  I asked Betty to put a Daisy flower pattern on it.  

Dresden Fans  Clam shell quilt design.

Sting quilt got a loopy design.