Recap of November

I'm not sure where the month of November went! Well, I am, really, so here are a few pictures to share!

 First of all, the quilt show in North Augusta, SC, where I entered my Words to Live By quilt. It was a great show and I feel honored to have won this ribbon - there were many great appliqué quilts.

 I was thrilled with the ribbon!

 Here is my Black and White BOM I finished earlier this year . . . .

And last, my Botanical Garden. A really fun quilt to make,  inspired by Sarah Fielke's book. 

This show was on a Friday and Saturday and I left Sunday for Nicaragua for another mission trip. There were three of us ladies, carrying packages to 74 sponsored children at a Christian School there. 

 Here we are with all our bags, ready to leave.

Sylvia shares more of Jesus' love to the children as we are getting ready to distribute the care packages while the children eagerly wait! 

 I was able to see these children that my husband and I had sponsored in person! 

 What a joy. . .

 and this precious girl we have corresponded with for five years and now she is graduating from high school, wanting to become a nurse. They were all three graduating.

 We took the 15 graduating seniors on a day trip to Lake Nicaragua, lunch at a restaurant and to this gorgeous overlook at Catarina below.

One little village we visited has no running water. This is the way all the people get their water - they go down this path past where the road goes, wash their clothes in the 'river', which is really a stream, bag their clothes up and fill their five gallon bucket and walk back up the hill to their home. Truly amazing!! A well has been dug nearby and now there is an effort to raise funds to pipe the water a couple of miles down the road so the people will have water at their homes. The path was difficult to walk down for us, yet they do it frequently.

Here is the 'river' where they have carved out areas to sit on the rocks as they wash their clothes.

This little ten year old girl filled her bucket with water and waited to lead us up the path.

She would not go until we followed and she knew we would be okay, the whole time holding the bucket of water on her head. Amazing! 

Another exciting thing is that a sewing ministry was started five years ago and many are graduating from this school and are able to have home businesses to make money to help support their families. It's great to see that sewing, which I love so much, reaches around the world to help others!!!

Bible Quilt UFO

My current UFO project is a Bible Quilt, pattern by Jan Patek, I began - oops - in the nineties, finally completed the appliqué in the 2000s and set it aside. It has embroidery work for the lettering and I was not real comfortable with that so, I put it away all neatly in my portfolio case. Since I have done so much work with wool in the last 3 years, I am no longer afraid of the lettering and hand stitching.

 Here is block one and

 the picture of Jan's quilt on the cover. This was one of the first BOMs I had ever seen and it seemed SO expensive - it was $6.50 a month, and all I could think was that you could buy a book for $20 back then. Anyway, I liked it so much I bought it.

 I used a lot of Roberta Horton plaids and stripes which were so easy to appliqué with the fineness of those fabrics.

 Here is my portfolio case. Only problem is, it holds the blocks so neatly you just let them age too well!

 I put a pocket for the patterns on one side and

 the other side holds the blocks in place nice and flat. My first case was made by a friend and given to me and since then I've made a couple more to accommodate the size blocks I was making.

Words to Live By - SBOW 2013

I have another quilt finish to share! This could be called my 'quilt of the year'!

 I finished the top in the spring but waited until recently to quilt it. It took a while but was worth the time! This was the SBOW from Primitive Gatherings for 2013. 

Lisa Bongean (the designer and shop owner) even had a lettering guide so we could 'write' our name. I really enjoyed stitching all this beautiful wool! Here are a few close-ups. 

 This wording was not in the pattern but I feel it to have the most important words of all so I changed one of my blocks.

 Still on the longarm!

 Between 6 and 700 half square triangles. The biggest challenge of all!

There is a quilt show in North Augusta, SC, on November 6 - 7, where I will put it to show. I'm still a member of this guild after living away for 16 years - a great group!!

Botanical Garden

 This quilt is from the book below by Sarah Fielke. It was quite fun choosing all the fabrics, even though it took many days to pull it all together.

 Below is her version in the book.

I laid out tons of fabrics on the table and begin sorting . . . again and again . . .

 I finally cut some and put the blocks together.

 And then changed those again and again. . .lots of decisions!

 Below it is coming together!

 Above and below are auditions for that triangle. Honestly, either would work but which is the best?

 Here it is on the design wall . . .

and still hanging on the longarm. 

Flower Garden Blocks

 I began this quilt in January 2012, but as you know, I get sidetracked easily and have many projects going at once. I did lots of tracing, months later I chose many fabrics, and even stitched a couple of blocks and then set it aside.

 However, I picked it back up and now have six blocks completed. I had even debated on whether to try the starch appliqué method that works so well for others but I already had my freezer paper cut for needle turn so decided to stick with that.

 I suppose the only drawback to my method is that occasionally the freezer paper comes off a little. I try to get it ironed on well the first time and then leave the paper on and use the edge as a guide.

 As usual with most of my appliqué, I am trying to use the fabrics just as are pictured on the pattern. That is often what draws me to it.

 Happy fabrics is what these are and they make me smile!

That's all for now. I do have many more quilts to show if I'll just get back to blogging!

Modern and Simple

 I showed some fat quarters recently and this is the quilt that came of them. So simple to make but I like the statement it makes because of the fabrics.

The pattern is in this book and on the cover above by Kaffe Fassett - Quilts in the Sun. What a difference fabrics make! I like both quilts but they are very different. It began with 20 fat quarters.

 Here are a couple of close-ups and I used a pantograph called Geometric Path to complete the modern look.

Thanks for viewing my blog and stitch when you get a moment!!