Tag Archives: finished quilt

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My daughter turned four in May. She finished her first quilt last week and boy is she proud! She pulled the rainbow of fabrics from my stash (because she didn't have a stash at that point, a problem we've since rectified). The girl has an eye.

Now this may seem like a simple case of second child syndrome, since my son had a seven part series on his first quilt. In reality, she finished hers much more quickly than he did. Perhaps because I wasn't also chasing around a 2 year old while I was helping her sew. Additionally, we opted for a larger quilt with fewer pieces for her, so there was less piecing. (I totally owe you a "The Making of Rainbow Swift 2" post.)

The quilt is about 40" by 50", made up of 10" squares. Like my son, my daughter did all the piecing of her first project sitting on my lap at my machine. I pressed all the seams for her. And by the time we were on the quilting step she was itching and ready to sit at the "kids" machine (same model, on a kid sized table) to do the quilting by herself.

She still needed help with her walking foot quilting, particularly because she opted for curves when we brainstormed her options. I mostly managed the bulk of the quilt and reminded her when to stop and start to reposition her hands. She's great at stopping to take out the pins. Once she was done, I quilted her life-sized handprint onto the quilt. I love this fun little detail.

She hand wrote her quilt label. I love that she named the quilt Rainbow Swift 2. Rainbow Swift is the doll quilt my son made for her. The label is GIANT.

It was great fun to see her enthusiasm and pride in her work. I'm so happy that I can share my passion with my kids. We got it finished (I made and attached the binding) just in time for her to bring it along to my guild meeting last Monday for her first quilt show and tell. She's been sleeping under it every night since. And many morning she even makes her bed!

It's also great for hiding under and surprising people. ;-)

My son handed down a few months ago when he declared, "I'm not in training anymore."

An Interview with the New Quilter

Tell me the process of making a quilt.

Sew them together. Sew the squares together and then you sew the sandwich together. But first you put pins and pinmoors in. 

How did you decide on the name “Rainbow Swift 2”?

I already had Rainbow Swift and I liked the name.

How was it to be taught by your mom?

I liked it. Because [my brother] got to sew and I didn’t. (I think this amounts to “it was about time she taught me.”)

What did you like best about making a quilt?

I like that it is big and it can almost fit my bed.

What about the process of making it?

Sewing it like a rainbow. It looks real like a rainbow because the stitches go curving. [Admires her work.] And it’s rainbow thread. And there’s rainbow raindrops on the back and kind of rainbow curly fabric.

What is your favorite part of quilting?

My favorite part of quilting is sewing the stuff together.

What was the hardest part?

The hardest part was curving it [while quilting] because I had to press harder with this hand to make it curve that way.

What’s the most important thing to know to make a quilt?

To know not to go too fast and take out pins when you need to.

What would you tell a new quilter?

To do that same thing.

Will you submit your quilt to the next SCVQA quilt show?

Yes.

What are your plans for “Rainbow Swift 2“ now that it is done?

To cuddle with it and sleep with it.

What are you planning for your next quilt project?

To make a kitty quilt. And there’s stripes on the front. (sneak peak in my last post)

Is there anything else you’d like to add?

Yes. I like sewing and I wish I could sew every day like Mom.

 

Thanks for visiting!

I'm linking up to Needle and Thread Thursday, TGIFF and Finish it Friday, as well as the Q3 Finish Along finishes party. See all my Q3 WIPs in my goal post.

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Yesterday, about seven hours before my brother arrived for his birthday dinner, I finished his quilt. I finished his quilt that I started for him in 2004. Let's just take a second to put that in perspective. That was before I lived in this house. In fact, it was two homes ago. It was before I had kids. It was before I was married. It was before I had even met my husband. Yeah, basically, I was a completely different person back then. The single, middle school math teacher, who really didn't have much time for her newish quilting hobby.

baseball quilt

Oh, and by the way, I actually gave my brother this quilt as a Christmas present in 2004 (photo above). I think that was his Junior year of high school. I wrapped up about eight finished blocks for his gift and then "was going to finish it up for him." See, he even tried them on. And fake slept. ;-) Well, here we are, twelve years later. I know there are people with WIPs older than mine, but come on. They are snowball blocks. I've completed over 40 quilts (granted, many of them mini quilts) since I started his. Sheesh!

I'm thrilled to have finally finished this gift for him. I'm also relieved to not have the weight of a twelve-year-old WIP on me. I haven't yet determined what my next oldest WIP is, the quilt that will now fill that taunting role in my life. It's just better not to know. ;-)

While I was working to quilt it in the last few days, my son came in and asked me what I was doing. Now, he's a quilter. He knew I was quilting the quilt. I was confused. It turns out, what he wanted to know was what patterns I was quilting. He said he thought I would be quilting baseball players and baseballs and stuff. (The kid clearly thinks my free motion skills are beyond where they are.) So together we joked that maybe we could find some parts that looked like players in my meandering quilting. Here's what he, my sister and I came up with:

Player fielding a ground ball:

Pitcher:

Catcher:

Runner:

 

The back is simple. I used up the last of my baseball mitt fabric. (The last of the red baseball fabric went on the back of my daughter's first quilt.) and I snuck in some of the red fabric that I used when I made my kids' baseball clothes.

 

Here's the 58" x 83" quilt all washed and crinkly, just in time to give to Chris.

 

 

My son excitedly helped deliver the gift.

I named this quilt Finally. I'm glad that got a chuckle from Chris when he received it. He also appreciated that my label has washing instructions on it. :-)

Happy 28th Birthday, Chris!

I'm linking up to the Q3 Finish Along finishes party. See all my Q3 WIPs in my goal post.

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I participated in quilt bees for the first time in 2015. For Stash Bee last July I chose the Simply Woven pattern from the Moda Bake Shop website, written by Jessica Kelly. I asked that blocks be made in a rainbow of color, using red, orange, yellow, green, blue and purple each once, in any placement within the block.

I ended up with 13 blocks (12 shown above), and knew I'd need to make a bunch more (23!) to get to a 60" x 60" finish, my preferred minimum size for a lap quilt. So this project got set aside.

Fast forward to last month. When the initial call from the Orlando Modern Quilt Guild came to help make quilts for the victims and families of victims of the shooting at Pulse (all details about the quilts here), I thought of the Woven Rainbow project. As details about the quilt plans unfolded, they asked for heart blocks. My local guild is combining efforts to finish a couple quilts to send, so I opted to make some blocks for our group to use.

And my Woven Rainbow blocks stayed in their container.

Just a day or two after that came the devastating news of the death of 2-year-old Lane Graves in the alligator attack at Walt Disney World. I thought a lot about the family and when I read that Lane had a 4-year-old sister, my heart broke for her especially. I have a 4-year-old daughter and I can't imagine her world being rocked by the loss of her sibling. I knew immediately that I wanted to make a quilt for Ella.

As you know, quilts take time, so I thought about what I had in progress that I could finish up especially for her. My Woven Rainbow project seemed like just the choice. I could use 12 blocks to make a 36" x 48" quilt, a great size for a 4-year old. And the rainbow palette seemed just right as well.

I chose a blue floral backing fabric and did some simple straight line quilting to echo the right and bottom edges of the colored strips. I bound the quilt using leftover binding from other projects. I love how much color there is. It's such a happy quilt!

The label reads:

Woven Rainbow
for Ella
made by Sarah Goer
with blocks made by
2015 Stash Bee Hive 1 members
June 2016
San Jose, California
wash cold. tumble dry low.

The quilt is on it's way to Nebraska. I hope Ella likes her Woven Rainbow and it helps her family wrap her in love during this difficult time.

Thank you for visiting. I'm linking up to Needle and Thread Thursday, Finish it Up Friday, TGIFF and the Q2 FAL Finishes Linkup. See all my Q2 goals here.