A Quilt for Joan

I met Joan when I joined my first guild, The Flower Valley Quilting Guild, about twenty years ago.  More than fifteen years ago we both joined a small daytime group started by a mutual friend we fondly dubbed "Day-Quilters".  So I've been to many meetings, lunches, field trips, and retreats with her, and she is a dear friend.  Here she is with a paper doll of herself; we were each asked to make one for a 50th Birthday Party/Quilt retreat we were graciously invited to a while back.

Sadly, Joan is losing her vision which means she has to give up quilting.  When I saw her a few months ago at Day Quilters she asked each of us to take what we wanted of her fabrics and UFOs.   I came home with this scrappy little 35" top.  

She thought I could make it into a doll quilt, but I decided to turn it into a "Joan Quilt".  Scrappy it began so scrappier it would become.  I just grabbed some scraps .....

..... and black & white prints, then kept making borders until I thought it was done.

Of course, it definitely needed Scottie dog fabric on the back because Joan really, really loves Scottie dogs.

It finished up about 53" square and pretty cute, I think.

Now it's washed and dried and has that comfy, crinkly look every quilt looks better with .....

..... which means it's ready to mail.  I hope it brings up a lot of sweet memories for Joan when she uses it.  I know it did that for me while I worked on it.

Linking up with Confessions of a Fabric Addict,

and Quilting is More Fun than Housework, 

and Tish's Adventures in Wonderland.

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!