Small Lone Star Wall Hanging

 

The first time I tried a Lone Star type quilt, I wasn’t happy with the results.  The points weren’t sharp, the center didn’t lay flat and the entire quilt was difficult to square up.  This was my post about the first quilt.

I wanted to try another Lone Star but not a huge quilt and heard about Kaye Wood’s Small Lone Star, one of many projects in her book, Quilt Like a Pro, using her Starmaker 8 ruler.  I’m happy to say that the ruler and her instructions made the difference between a quilt with problems and a wall hanging which I consider to be very nice and with just a few places that are not perfect – my fault since I have difficulty with  precision measuring, cutting and sewing.  

 

The “small” wall hanging is 23×23 inches with only binding, no border.  I machine quilted the piece with in-the-ditch stitching around the diamonds and decorative stitching in the squares and triangles.

For the backing, I took quite a few more hours to piece together a lot of scraps of various sizes, and I like the patchwork look of this.

Some day I might undertake another bed-sized Lone Star quilt, but for now I’m happy with the smaller version – and it even has some green in it, just in time for St. Patrick’s Day.

Valentine’s Day in the 1940s

In the 1930s-40s, I lived in downtown Cincinnati and attended old Raschig School on Central Parkway.  In those days, Valentine’s Day was a major holiday in school.  A week ahead of time, the teacher brought in a big cardboard box which we decorated with cutout hearts and bits of paper lace doilies.  A slot was cut in the top and we were encouraged to bring a Valentine for each person in class and put it in the box, waiting for the big day.  The Valentines were “penny Valentines” and probably cost less than a penny apiece in those depression-World War II days.

Then on February 14, it was time to get the Valentines out of the box and distributed to the class.  A boy was chosen to be mailman (never a girl!), outfitted with a paper hat and mailbag.

In 1993, I wanted to make a Valentine for family members and did a sketch of the scene, incorporating my memories of two boys in my class.  Rollo was the only black boy in the class, always well dressed in knickers and argyle socks.  Otto was from the poorest part of the school district and seemed always to be a little grungy with a sole-flapping shoe.  I was a proper little girl with waist length finger curls and a dress made by my mother.  In 1993, I didn’t have a color printer and printed the cards in black and white, then hand watercolored each one.

Imagine my surprise when about 10 years later, my oldest daughtergave me a Valentine gift of my sketch in redwork.  I had just started quilting at that time and put together a wall hanging with the redwork as the centerpiece.

The dress on the card was actually a black and white check which my mother later made into a doll dress.  I took a picture of the fabric and printed it in a nine-patch to use as two of the blocks…..

I also printed fabric blocks with vintage pictures of myself and old Raschig School to add to the history.  I wish I had pictures of Rollo and Otto, but they didn’t take class pictures at our school in those days.

When I see my grandchildren laboriously writing their names on their little Valentines to take to school and pre-school, I remember musty old Raschig and all the fun of Valentine’s Day.

Lodge Style Log Cabin Hanging

 

In the relatively quiet week between Christmas and New Year’s, I made a new wall hanging for my lodge-themed guest bedroom.  It was based on a pattern I picked up in September at Miller’s Dry Goods in Charm, Ohio (Holmes County Amish Country).  The pattern is called “Log Cabin”  (#99001) by Pine Meadows Designs.  The pattern size is 23-1/2″ long x 27″ wide and I added a wide border to come up with the size that I wanted to hang over a queen size bed.

The pattern and instructions are very complete for the center cabin and lake scene which is appliqued using fusible web and invisible thread.  There are 22 log cabin blocks around the centerpiece which can be paper pieced (patterns provided) or simply sewn together as I have done.  

I quilted with invisible thread, echoing the design in the center and using stich-in-the-ditch and some cross lines to accent the small log cabin blocks. 

It is a fairly simple pattern and not too time-consuming, resulting in a very colorful wall hanging which is perfect in my lodge style room.

Christmas Wall Hangings

 

I have 3 Christmas wall hangings that I’ve made since I started quilting 5 years ago.  Two of the earlier ones were made incorporating colorful primitive panels.

One of the wall hangings has a primitive Santa panel along with Bear Paw blocks from the Quilter’s Cache. 

This hanging is in the guest bedroom which has a lodge motif year-around.  Two Christmas stocking panels are combined with blocks made from flannel scraps and borders made from wonderful flannel with a village motif which was purchased at one of my favorite shops in southwest Ohio, Fabric Shack in Waynesville.

The third hanging is from a pattern called “A Scottish Christmas”, Mad Dog Marketing, PO Box 5608, Evanston IL 60204-5608.  The pattern was sized for a 37-1/2×54″ piece, much bigger than I wanted, and I sized it down to 17×22 and made a few changes/additions.  Since scotties are among my favorite designs, I love this wall hanging and it also won a blue ribbon at the Warren County (Ohio) fair.

The little crow picture above the scotties was made by my oldest daughter.

Little Boy Blue Quilt

 

I had the idea for this quilt two years ago and made it to enter in the Warren County Fair (Ohio) where it won 3rd prize. 

The pattern was taken from a wonderful book, Embroidered Childhood Memories by Brenna Hopkins & Nori Koenig, American Quilter’s Society, Paducah, KY.  The book includes more than 100 vintage patterns from the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s – “Nostalgic needlework patterns capture the enchantment of fairy tales, lullabies and sweet dreams.”  I used the patterns for crayon coloring on white fabric.  I drew the pattern on the fabric with a permanent fine-point pen, using a light box, then colored the pattern with crayon and heat set by placing a piece of white paper over the coloring and pressing it. 

I chose the snowball block to show off the pattern and used a variety of blue, green, yellow and white fabric in the piecing to complement the crayon colors. 

I put the quilt away, thinking it would go to the first great-grandson in the family, and he came along on November 15, 2007.  I made up a label for the quilt and waited for my chance to present it to little Curtis.

 

I saw him for the first time last night.  Curtis didn’t have an opinion, but his mother and big sister liked the quilt.

Primitive Santa Quilted Wall Hanging

In the early 1980s, we had just moved to a home in the country, on the Ohio/Indiana border.  It was a complete lifestyle change for me and as I was preparing for Christmas, I decided I’d like to have china that had a holiday theme.  I told my husband that’s what I wanted for an early Christmas gift and asked him to pick it out for me since I wasn’t familiar with the stores in the area yet. 

He stopped at one of his favorite stores, a small version of a discount store called Van Leunen’s.  He came home with a box containing four place settings of International China (Japan) in the Country Christmas pattern.  It was love at first sight for me.  The next day, I stopped by the store and picked up 8 more place settings to be sure I had enough for my growing family and to insure against breakage.  I never saw the pattern again anywhere until I chanced to look it up on eBay where I found it was selling for more per plate than we had paid for four place settings.  It was just perfect for our home in the country and has been used for every meal from St. Nicholas through New Year’s Day for over 25 years. 

 

Last year, I had the idea to make a kitchen wall hanging incorporating some of the design elements in the china and made this piece with a cow leading Santa’s sleigh. 

My oldest daughter liked it and asked me to make one for her.  Since she likes sheep so much, in this version a wooly sheep is pulling the sleigh.

To get the pattern, I took digital photos of the china, re-sized them and printed them out in black and white.  Then, I traced over the various pieces onto fusible material, ironed that onto the back of the individual fabrics and cut out the pieces.  An applique mat is really helpful in putting together the small pieces before fusing them to the background.  In each case, I used a vintage buckle as a hanger.  I enjoyed using a lot of scraps from fabric that had been purchased on our trip to Holmes County Amish country earlier this year.

Country Turkey Wall Hanging

 

I bought this pattern while I was in Holmes County (Ohio) Amish Country earlier this year.  I thought it would make a nice wall hanging in my cheerful yellow kitchen.  The pattern is by Becky & Me and the basic pattern measures 16×16, a nice size for a pillow or a wall hanging. 

I used the fusible method of applique and decorative stitching to complete the project.  It has a nice country look for the Thanksgiving season.

Halloween Quilted Wall Hangings

When I started quilting about 5 years ago, this wall hanging was one of my early efforts.  My daughter did the hand quilting on it, since I do no hand quilting myself and wasn’t too good at machine quilting at that time. 

The second wall hanging was made about a year later and I did the machine quilting on this one.  This hanging won a blue ribbon at our county fair.

The third hanging also won a blue ribbon at our county fair and was made 2 years ago.  I used the same cat and moon motif to make a vest for myself, which also won at the fair.

All three pieces were appliqued using the fusing method (I’m also not good at needle turned applique).  They didn’t take long to make and are cheerful additions to my Halloween decor.