Sharon made this “Farmer’s Wife” Sampler Quilt. If you are not familiar with the story behind the pattern, I have quilted one of them before and written a little about the background in that post. Click here, if you would like to read it. It is a very traditional quilt, and since the design “Swirling Feathers” worked well the last time, there was no need to change it, and I used it again for Sharon’s version.

This is the other quilt Shelly dropped off for quilting, her modern take on a traditional pattern. The same could be said for the quilting design she chose. “Continuous Baptist Fan” looks a lot like the traditional design but was adapted for longarm quilting and can be stitched without starting and stopping in between.

This is the first of two quilts that Shelly asked me to quilt for her. Isn’t this a great scrap pattern? Shelly’s version is definitely an autumn quilt, and she chose “Acorns & Oak Leaves” as the quilting design, but it could easily be adapted to any other season, depending on the feature fabric.

I am afraid this situation will go on a lot longer than we think right now, and I am trying to get back to normal as much as possible. I am still posting quilts that I quilted last year, yes, I am way behind. Somebody pointed out the other day that I needed to change my watermark. I won’t because I processed these pictures last year, and it takes too much time to do it all over again. But before we go back to looking at quilts, I would like to thank everyone here in Chilliwack who has been diligently following the rules of physical distance. There are exceptions everywhere, of course, but the vast majority have been really good about it, very patient and polite. And it will look like nothing is happening for a while, the case numbers will continue to go up which can be very frustrating. Hang in there, people, and be patient. We are doing the right thing, and staying home saves lives. And now let’s get back to quilting.

Lisa made this baby quilt featuring exotic animals as a gift, and she let me choose the quilting design. I auditioned a few, and then I came across a pattern that came with my machine called “Elephant Walk”. The elephant was cartoonish enough to work with the quilt, and since there probably won’t be another chance to use this design anytime soon, I decided to go with it. The original pattern had some grass between the elephants that I didn’t like. It was smaller than the elephants and left too much space unquilted. I took it out and then flipped every other row to make the elephants walk in the opposite direction. Can you tell how much fun I had with this quilt?

This interesting quilt in soft colours that gives the impression of woven strips was also made by Linda. The quilting design that I used for this one is called “Lapis”.

This pretty floral quilt in blue and yellow was made by Linda. She asked for low density quilting, and we picked “Ginger Flower” for her quilt, a floral swirly pattern that picks up the five-petal flowers of the outer border fabric.

Nancy made this pretty butterfly quilt using floral fabrics in soft colours. She stitched around the shapes using a machine blanket stitch and switched from matching thread to contrasting threads after a while to make the quilt more interesting. The quilting design is called “Wild Wind”.

Darcie made this cozy flannel quilt in blue as a gift for her son. The quilting pattern “Diagonal Plaid Bias Cut” is my new favourite design for quilts with squares, and it looks fabulous on Darcie’s quilt.

More than a year ago my friend Doris gave me a box of berry fabrics, saying she had made several quilts using these fabrics and was tired of them now. She thought maybe I would have a use for them. Well, it was a box of free fabric… what was I supposed to do, right? I took it home, and when I opened it I saw that there were even a few blocks inside. I don’t remember how many, maybe six or seven. I decided to make more blocks and turn this into a donation quilt for our guild. I didn’t have a plan, and that is not the way I usually work. I need a plan and a backup plan and possibly even a backup backup plan. Just making blocks not knowing where I was going was hard work for me, and that’s why it took so long to finish this quilt. That and a lack of time, of course.

I finished the top before Christmas and managed to quilt it over the holidays. Although I usually like to custom quilt all my own projects, I decided to use a pantograph this time and picked “Strawberry Fields”. I figured I might as well add more berries to the mix. And the quilt is so busy that any custom quilting would have been lost anyway. Then other things took priority, and I finally managed to put on the binding this week, yay. Now I just have to sew on the label, and it will be ready to be donated at the March meeting.

Jean made this quilt in autumn colours from a batik jelly roll. We thought that a pattern with leaves would be a good quilting design for her project, and going with the fall theme, she chose “Acorns and Oak Leaves”.

Shirley made this Split Nine Patch quilt using Christmas fabrics as a group project with her friends. The quilting design she chose is called “Lapis”.

I had to drop everything else and make time for this cute project, a quilt I need as a baby shower gift. Baby showers are like Christmas, they sneak up on you, and suddenly they are looming just around the corner, and you haven’t finished your project yet. I miscalculated because of a cultural difference. Baby showers are not a thing in Germany, and no one would ever think of giving a gift before the baby was actually born. I always had late March in my head as the due date, and when I received the invitation to the baby shower for next week, a whole month was suddenly taken out of my mental timeline, and that is an eternity in quilting. Anyway, I got my act together, I had the design and fabrics ready, and I spent the holiday weekend making the quilt top and quilting it. Here is a little preview, this little guy makes me laugh every time I see him. The quilt is done and just needs the binding, but I still have one more weekend before the shower, so it should be finished right on time. There will be a pattern for this but I haven’t even started writing it yet. I also have to make a sample quilt that won’t be given away. I had planned on making the blocks all at the same time but of course that plan went out the window as well.