Friday, May 23, 2014

Half square triangles can create a beautiful quilt design

Mother's Day came a couple of weekends ago - I was lucky enough to enjoy  these stunning pink sweetheart roses and some lovely cards from our son and my beloved. I had quite a lovely day exploring a local rock and gem show on Mother's Day. There were lots of pretties and bling to tempt this bling girl. One of the things that I brought home was a lovely soft blue celestial geode.
 Currently  I have postponed working on our son's wedding quilt, as I had a quilt project that I wanted to complete for someone special. I plan to go back to working on the wedding quilts over the summer. After checking out a few patterns and talking with some quilting friends, I chose this pattern that is a tutorial from the Missouri Star Quilt Co. of the Half SquareTriangle Quilt using the Four Season Block
  The project is a quilt pattern from the Missouri Star Quilt Company pattern called Half Square Triangle quilt using the Four Season Block.  Unfortunately I do not have a design wall at home so I took the blocks to school and laid them out on the tables so that I could see how to  better arrange them.
I then brought the quilt blocks back and got it all sewn together in a top.Last weekend (which was our Victoria May long weekend) I went back to school and  and spray basted it all together. 
 I knew I had limited quilting time just now so I was very happy to have some time over our long weekend in May.  This photograph below was taken of  the quilt now that it is quilted. I took my time choosing the outside border and I am pleased with the results. I still have to bind it but I am well on my way to finishing it.
Jenny Doan from the Missouri Star Quilt Co, does a great job of explaining how to put the quilts together step by step. I had not tried the technique that she used to make the half square triangles but I liked the technique very much. I found that the triangles less daunting than usual and would use this technique again.  I would have liked to have a written version of the quilt so that I can check it out what I am doing but the tutorial was pretty clear. I understand that the Missouri Star quilt Co, has begun to write a magazine called Block. I believe that they have two issues of the magazine- one that has come out recently. I don't know if they have written out the instructions for this particular  quilt.
 This quilt used 6 charm packs- three dark collections  and three packages of little fabrics that were combined with a little bit of yardage for the wide borders. The back of the quilt is Stonehenge fabric by Northcott - it quilted up beautifully.  The quilt is a large twin sized quilt. I hope the intended recipient will really enjoy having an afternoon nap under the quilt.

On another front entirely, we have a new cat named Atari. She is a senior cat who needed a new residence as  her owner was moving to New Zealand.  We are beginning to adjust to  each other though she still is a bit shy. We wonder if she will be quilt kitty like Mars was?
 Or perhaps we will have a dog quilt helper- - you can see that Dusty the dog thinks that she could help too..  The jury is out whether the two of them will be compatible or whether they will just put up with one another.. Stay tuned for news about the pet front..

The next few weeks will be filled with school projects that need to be finished at year's end. Then I can look forward to summer which will be busy with some old and new quilt projects. More  next time..
Warmest regards,
Anna

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