Applique quilts from the early days

I got some great lessons in quilting while I was a college student in the upper Midwest.  The grandmother of one of my college roommates taught us both how to do hand quilting with the quilt on a large quilting frame.  That was so much fun. She taught us how to hide our knots and how to keep our stitches small and even. 

I didn't have a sewing machine of my own until I started to work after college, so mostly I did hand appliqué with turned edges.  I spent a lot of time doing appliqué at the laundromat!  Come to think of it, I stopped doing hand appliqué once I got a washing machine in my apartment! 

I drew my own patterns for the appliqués on both of the quilts below. 

Here's my godchild's well loved Winnie the Pooh theme baby quilt. It was a mix of cotton calico and cotton-poly broadcloth. The broadcloth has survived but the cotton calico has worn thin and shredded. 

I am thrilled it was used so much that it has gotten worn out!

This quilt was a wedding present a friend. The appliqués are all things that were important and special to the bride.  The bold prints are hand prints from Marblehead Handprints which was in a small fabric company in Marblehead Massachusetts in the 1970s.  I remember many happy hours of sewing in the laundromat working on this quilt, as well as the fascination of the other customers!

So that's it for my introduction. 

These days I mostly am making pieced or paper pieced quilts, but occasionally I will do a fusible appliqué. For the past 2-3 years I've been making about 2 quilts a month. 

I have lots of projects in the works and ideas for a lot more!  I enjoy making both traditional and Modern quilts.  I do use patterns but I love creating my own designs too.  It's color that I find really exciting.  Solids, '30s prints, modern prints, they all make me happy!  

So welcome! I hope you enjoy following along on my quilting and sewing adventures.  

How I began quilting

So why do I quilt?

College and quilting are totally linked together.  On a tour of colleges through Pennsylvania my Mom and I drove by a house in the country with had a little sign "Quilts for Sale" on the front lawn.  Very uncharacteristically, we stopped and knocked on the front door.  2 Mennonite sisters had a trunk full of quilts.  They were all the same appliqued flower pattern done in a variety of colors.  I fell in love with a red and green quilt.  Mom hemmed and hawed but finally said yes, we could buy it.  It cost $55.  As the years went by, Mom often said she wished she purchased more than one!
This quilt is still a beauty!

It stayed at home when I headed off to college in Minnesota.   

My classmates at college were from small towns and farms in Minnesota and North and South Dakota. They all had homemade quilts on their beds.  I was from the East Coast...no quilt. That required remediation and so began my quilting education!