Throwback Thursday - Tropical Jazz & Tropical Sunrise

In 1999 I took a Stack and Whack class taught by a member of The Flower Valley Quilt Guild.  We used Bethany Reynolds' book "Magic Stack-N-Whack Quilts".  The fabric I used was a beautiful (and bright) floral, tropical print. I was intrigued with the technique and absolutely loved the blocks resulting from my fabric choice. 

I didn't take a lot of photos of my work then, but I think you can see the variety in my hexagons in this closeup. 

I let it live in my sewing room for a while as a UFO.   A long while.  I didn't want to make any more blocks so I added borders to make it bigger (68" by 98"), hand quilted it (heavily!), finished it in 2004, and called it "Tropical Jazz".  I really love this quilt.  So does my sister.  She called it "Barb's quilt" from the minute she saw it..   

   






















"Tropical Jazz" was juried into The Pennsylvania National Quilt Extravaganza in 2006, and since my BFF lives near Phillie she got to see it on display and even sent me photos!

In 2007 I entered it in the Circle in the Square Quilt Guild's exhibit "Quintessential Quilt", and it won 2nd place in their Large Quilts-Innovative category.

Because it was going onto the guest bed it needed a companion quilt to hang over it on the wall.  I made a center block for a Round Robin .....

..... sent it off, and the rest was added by quilty friends so that it finished at 55" by 55".  I hand quilted it, named it "Tropical Sunset", and put it on the wall.  You may have seen it in this blog entry about Round Robins.   (Barb decided this was her quilt, too!)  

By 2011 I was just a little tired of Barb calling these her quilts every time she was at my house.  I decided she was right and gave them to her.  Not really.  I decided because I love her I wanted her to have them.   To say she was surprised is an understatement.

Well, I guess I had more photos than I thought I did!  I hope I didn't overwhelm you, or worse, bore you with them all.  If I did don't tell me.  I had fun reliving it!

    

"Remembered Promises"

So long ago that I'm embarrassed to admit it, I told a young friend of ours that I would make her a quilt.  After all, I had made a couple of quilts for her older sister Anna so it was her turn.  I had just taken a class for Bethany Reynolds' Stack and Whack quilts.  Esther wanted a pinwheel star quilt so we went shopping together and she picked out some fabric.

I put it away for a while and got busy with other things.  Actually that's an understatement.  You know how it is.

When we moved from St. Louis to Huntsville, Alabama almost 5 years ago and I unpacked my stash, I came across the fabric and realized I hadn't made Esther's quilt yet, so it went on the "To Do" list.  Each year after that it got carried over to the next year's list and last year it made it to the top.  I was so excited to be making this quilt, and I knew that, at this point, it would be a real surprise.  I got it all cut out.

I even got some blocks made.

Then the funniest thing happened.  I broke my arm.  But "by little and by little" last year I worked on it. 

When I got to the point where it needed to be basted, I decided that a special quilt needed a special batt.  When bamboo battings first came out I bought one just to be supportive of my local quilt shop, but because it was so pricey and kind of different, I kept putting it back to use for something special.  I decided the time had come.  What could be more special than this!?!

Basting was next.

For some reason when it came time to quilt it, I got all the purple background quilted first, using a royal blue thread so it would be easier to work with, and left the stars for last.  Big mistake.

I started quilting the stars four or five different times and didn't like what I was doing, so I kept ending up ripping it out.  I finally decided to try something I had never done before but had seen in magazines and really liked -- big stitch quilting with Pearl cotton.

The closer I came to being finished the more excited I got.  I was really regretting having waited so long to make this quilt.

The label for this quilt needed to be personal, so I hand-embroidered it using a snowman because that's one of Esther's favorite things, and I thought long and hard about what to name it.

I mailed the quilt to my dear friend Gloria (you met Gloria in this post) and asked her to deliver it for me.  She enjoyed being in on the surprise and sent me this picture.

Even though I regret waiting as long as I did to finish this project, Esther assures me the timing was perfect, and she is very happy with it.  I just hope she knows how much love went into it.