Friday, April 30, 2010

Mom's Quilts




My Mom made all these , she is a pretty amazing woman ! There will be times when she can make several quilt tops in a short lenght of time .Most all of them are small lap quilts ,she has made several large quilts over the years .The bottom quilt is one of my favorites ,she made 4 or 5 just like this pattern  .Every time I go to visit her she has alot of new tops to show me .Her and a friend Both get together every week to quilt ,chat and have lunch .Mom sometimes helps her friend to make tops for a church that donates the quilts to children all over.

Thursday, April 29, 2010

Window Painting

This is one of Tina's windows I painted for her ,she gave this one back to me when they had to tear out the windows 2 yrs ago. I now have it hanging on my living room wall . One day soon I plan to re-do the frame with a crackle paint . I have not decided on the colors yet  .

Wednesday, April 28, 2010

My Farm Quilt


I made this about 4 yrs ago , I could not find the fabric for the right size barn ,tractor,water trough or truck , so I drew them out on muslim cotton and painted them with the Jaquard Textile Fabric Paints ,used the wonder under ,cut them out and placed them onto the already printed fabric . I still needed some brown for the dirt road ,so I painted that also, The Red barn was with the cow fabric, but I wanted a hay barn too.
Then I machine quilted it. The Quilt has been in 2 quilt Shows ,Suwannee Quilt Show in White Springs and the Davenport Quilts and Tea Show  .

Tuesday, April 27, 2010

Noah's Ark Quilts

I got a call from my daughter Tammy in Michigan requesting a Noah's Ark Quilt for a friend that worked with her .She was willing to pay up to $100.00 for it for a baby boy .
I first wanted to find a picture of Noah's Ark , I asked at church if there was a good picture of an Ark ,a friend found a child 's book about the Ark , so I had Royce Yates a friend from church copy it for me .Then I went around trying to find fabric of animals .I went to all the fabric stores around here , I used what I could find ,then ended up drawing and painting some of the animals ,I made sure there was 2 of each ,I was afraid the one's I painted would not be as good as the one's already in the other fabric . but they turned out good ,I don't know if you can get close enough to them on-line to tell which ones I painted. Its like a puzzle.
I made a normal size baby quilt with before the flood and then a wall hanging of it during the flood  .
 Both quilts  was a challege to make  .

Monday, April 26, 2010

Quilts at Quilts & Tea Show

Here are the few pictures I took at the Davenport Quilts & Tea Quilt Show in Nov. of 2009 , I already told about our adventure that day ,now I am showing the quilts .
The Outer space quilt and the Farm quilts are 2 of mine that I had entered ,the rest are favorites that we saw ,someday I may try to make  a quilt  like the one on top ,it looks like 1" squares in each block .I just love the colors in the quilt , unfortantly I did not get the name of the quilter .Note to self get the information !

Sunday, April 25, 2010

Spring Fling Pirate Boat


I am a member of the community center of K-Ville ,I have mentioned this before  . We had our annual Spring Fling yesterday  . The theme for this one was pirate theme ,we had decided to have a boat partly for display and partly for taking pictures of the childern with a pirate  .
The wood part of  the boat was donated  & cut by   Shane Bennet, I painted it and added the details with cardboard   & etc.
I had to paint the rails ,anchor, captians steering wheel and water out of card board and then cut them out with a steak knife ,it was like a mini saw for me , then I had to figure out how to put them on , I have a stapel gun and thought that would be the quickest way .... wrong the staples were only size3/8th and should have been 1/2 or 3/4th .so I ended up using hot melt glue and fencing nails . ,The mast is made from a 2"x 2 " ten foot aluminim pole and a 1 " x 2" wood for the yard pole . putting that together I left for my husband Royce  . then I wrapped rope around that in places to look like a pirate  ship mast and added the sail made from a sheet that Mom donated ,then I added the little black flags Daisy Bennet gave us  . I also constructed a crows nest for the top  .
 As you can see Sarah and the boys Waylon and his friend Thomas helped to set it up on friday to make sure it was going to stay . Sarah is always wanting to help her PaPa .
 The Spring Fling turned out good with lots of happy kids getting their pictures taken with the pirate ship & pirate  .

Friday, April 23, 2010

Raffel Quilt

For Our National Night Out in K-Ville of 2009 we had a block party at the Community Center ,part of out event was raffleing off Quilts and other small gifts .
I made this quilt at the beginning of 2009 ,I Fell in love with the pattern ,then I had to help plan the Event, so I decided to donate the quilt to the community center for this .Something new and different.
We had alot of people in our neighborhood show up . Close to  the end of the event we started drawing names , the winner of this quilt is Christine Dudley.
Will I donate another one ?  I have not decided yet ...Maybe  .

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Window Paintings

About the same time I painted my Mom's Mural in her kitchen my sister Tina asked me to paint some windows in her sun room.
So I painted 2 sets of windows ,that has 4 window panes in them ,that means 8 different pictures  .I do not have all 8 pic's on here ,the ones shown are the favorites , Tina painted each window in white ,then I did the rest and loved painting these  .The windows were in front of Gary's Mom's room and a couple yrs ago they had to take them out and redo the wall with shelves for her.So now she has only 2 of these hanging up in her room .She gave one to me and the other is in storage  .
  The one of Flowers I painted for the fun of it and did a crackle finish on the frame .I had it in a yard sale , the pastors wife saw it , she was going to buy it from me, and asked me to hold it for her, but her birthday was the next week ,so I surprised her & gave it to her and she now has it hanging up in her Dinning room .She has done so much for me !
I have alot more windows  to paint ,I plan to get to a couple this year .
I will be showing the other window painting in another post .

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

The Boundless Sky Quilt

I started this quilt about 5 yrs ago , I was just playing around with some really bright interesting colors, I cut 2" squares , put them on my small wall board 5'x6', filled it up with those colors , I did not have the proper colors to make it blend in the way I wanted it to ,I went shopping for more fabric ,came across some dark that looked like night time sky and decided I would do it as an outer space quilt ,I then needed to find more fabric , it took me about 6 months to get all the right colors and then I could not find some that I was wishing I had , I never thought about making the colors I wanted , of course at that time I did not have the Fabric Dye I have now  .
Anyway I added the planets ,stars ,coments & gassy looking stars then machine quilted and glued rhinestones all over it for some sparkle . This quilt has been in 3 quilt shows and can fit a full size bed  .I have had it hanging on my wall ,I took it down last Nov . for the Quilts & Tea Quilt Show in Davenport .
I talked about that show in an earlier post .

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

My husband loves to read western books and watch westerns on TV,so I decided to make him a quilt in a western design I used the print fabric as a guide for the size block and went from there ,I did not need a pattern, then I machine quilted it  , He was thrilled to finally get one after all quilts he saw me make for the grandchildren .

Monday, April 19, 2010

Under Water fishing game

I am a member and Historian of K-Ville Coumminty Association and for 2 years I ended up planning the events with our President , we needed new games for the children , the old fishing game was of cloth , dull & boring ,so I asked a group of men if they were interested in helping us make some new ones , our friends Jim & Lee furnished the wood ,Royce & Jim put them together, I painted the bi - fold  boards to look like underwater scenery ,  and here you see Chloe & Sarah helping , but of course they are just using water ,but they loved every minute of it . Both Girls love to draw and paint on paper though and are very good at it  .They seem to be taking after their Grandma !!

Sunday, April 18, 2010

Davenport Quilt Show With Sarah

In this post I will talk about When Sarah , her Mom and I went to the Davenport Quilt's & Tea Quilt Show in Nov. of 2009.
 It started out as a pretty cool day ,When we got there the first thing we saw was the horse & buggy ride .
But first we went to  the community center to see all the beautiful quilts and vendors .then we went to the city hall and firehouse this is Sarah on the old firetruck ,she kept talking about the horse & buggy ride she could not wait to get on it, but we had to wait for them to take a group of seniors to the church where there were more quilts and a place to serve food .
So in the meantime we went to look at the vintage cars ! Lots of those ! I did not get enough pictures ,  we walked around some  ,Sarah was facsinated with the fountian in the middle of the lake .
Finally we get to ride the horse & buggy ,they even provided us with a lacy umberalla ! Sarah loved every min. of it but it ended too soon as we were already at another building with more quilts ,we was going to get back on it but had to wait and we were wanting something to eat, so I noticed we were right next to where I parked so we got in the van, drove to the other side of town to eat and visit the antique stores ! Wow were there alot of old things ,I could have stayed there all day, but unfortantly we had to get back home before the other kids got home from school, it was a great and tiring day for 4 yr old Sarah, I asked her if she would do it agian and she said yes!
 So Plans are in the making to go agian this year  .
I have more pictures of the quilts , some of mine I have already shown in earlier posts , I will show more in another post.

Saturday, April 17, 2010

Chicken Coop Painting

One day Mom & I were out walking around her property ,at the time she had an old feed shed out back ,I found the chicken coop door and feeder in that shed ,I had an idea as soon as I saw them . So I took them up to the back porch and told her I wanted to paint a picture but did not have anything to paint on  ,she asked what I needed ......I said  anything that will be weather proof that I can put behind the door. Mom found a plastic tablecloth that she did not want ,  I cut the correct size and painted the rooster on it, mounted the painting on the back .Then painted a hen with chicks on the feeder .They are now hanging up on Mom's back porch.
A few months later when a rooster died she saved the tail feathers for me , I put those in the painting ,then found this drift wood she had and put that on top of the frame .
Mom used to have alot of chickens & roosters but gave them up as the cost of feed was getting to be too much for her to handle  .

Friday, April 16, 2010

Secret Sister Quilt

Stacey Franklin was my secret sister 2 yrs ago , when I found out she wanted to become a nurse ,she started collage for nursing the same year , I found this nurse fabric at Fabric Warehouse on North Florida Ave . She was really surprised to get a lap quilt from me .
 When my sister Rexa saw the fabric she wanted me to see if I could get some more for her because her sister-in law is a nurse , I have not been able to find any more of it no where !

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Metal Butterflies


These metal Butterflies belong to my neighbor Tracey,she came to me and asked if I could repaint 3 of them . I said sure , They were plain and faded ,just 2 colors, no detail , so I got out my Birds & Bloom magazine and found the moarch butterfly ,so this is how they turned out .
 I liked them so well I went to Lowes to see if they had any metal ones , they did ,but my gosh the cost was way more than I could afford . Maybe I'll find some at a yard sale one day.
Tracey has them hanging on her wooden fence and look good from the road .

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Great Grandson's Lost Quilts

Both of these quilts were supposenly sent to my Great grandson in Indianna back in Nov. of 2009 . His mother said they never reciecved them ,come to find out they had moved and never sent us the new address ,I did not know they moved ,no one ever told me . The quilt of the Noah Ark is a whole cloth that I machine quilted , the other one is also whole cloth that  Mom quilted by hand .Both took awhile to make .
My grand daughter checked to see if they could be recovered , she had gone to the house they used to live in and noticed quilts hanging up in the windows !
She could not be sure they were the same ones as she has not seen what they look like ,so I found these photo's .If they are the same ones in the windows ....Hummmmmm .....how can anyone open a package that is not addressed to them ??

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Practice quilt top


I had always wanted to do a whole cloth quilt , so I decided to make a sample first , I had some leftover muslim just the right size for a table top . I took 2 of Mom's stencils and kind of played with the design ,I started with the center ,then added the straight lines to make the squares , then the feather design all around that , I used the multi color thread . I did not like it and was going to put it away . Mom said NO!!  It is so pretty ! I said to myself well if she likes it then I will finish it for her and give it to her for chirstmas .I wanted to add a boarder but she thought it was pretty without one, so I just put a binding around it ,
.I forgot to take a picture of the finished product.
I did this on my new machine with the new bobbin case and loved the results of the tension , so hopefully I can do another one but bigger and different  .

Mini Quilts for Chloe

The Mini Quilts for Chloe's Doll house the smallest is 3 1/2" x 2 1/4".....the largest is 10" x 7".I made these by sewing small strips together and then cutting and turning so colors are opposite ,making the binding was a challenge !


Monday, April 12, 2010

New Basket Weave

This was put this together last fall while at Mom's, I have always wanted to make another one just like the first one I made and it sold at the quilt show  . I have the top on batting and backing ready to quilt ,but it is at Mom's . I may do the quilting the same as the first one or I may make a different design, I have not decided if I want to machine quilt it or hand quilt it .I did the first one by hand so it took awhile to get it done ,but my hands sure were hurting afterwards .
So this is one quilt waiting for me at Mom's ,hopefully by the time I go back I will have decided how to finish it  .

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Idea For New Quilt

I found this fabric at Fabric Warehouse on north Fl Ave. in Lakeland ,I thought it would make another farm quilt .I had been reading Red River Of  The North by Lauraine Snelling ,the farm scenery fabric reminded me of the books about a family from Norway who imigrated to North Dakota flatlands and struggled to keep the land and then after several years they were able to farm with a tractor .This also reminds me of my Grandpa Goodwin and his farm in Wellsboro ,Pa .Hopefully I can make this soon with some other fabric's from my stash .

Mural on Mom's wall