A Happy Spring Giveaway

The Official Cookie Tester cut the lawn today for the first time this season and that glorious freshly mowed grass fragrance is everywhere. What a wonderful sign of spring and a terrific way to begin our May long weekend. It seemed to set the stage perfectly for a bit of a giveaway.

Some time ago Jane and I dropped in on Roberta with a few quilts for her to quilt and had a great visit. We got a peek behind the curtain to see how she works her quilting magic. We also got to see some of the projects she's working on and she sent both of us home with a little gift - the Rapid Fire Lemoyne Star ruler. Apparently she had to buy six at a time (!) but she was so keen to try it out that this didn't prove to be an obstacle so she shared the wealth. Long story short, I came home with two - one for me and one to use as a giveaway, so Cocoa and Quilts is our giveaway sponsor 😊.

There are instructions included with the ruler and I was really impressed with how well things went together.

Not one Y seam to be had!

The directions were very well written and, being a leftie, I was happy to see cutting instructions for both right and lefthanders. It took me about an hour from start to finish to make a block, including cutting, but now that I've done it once I know that it would get quicker the more you do.

You can make blocks from 3" to 12" in size. Roberta made about 12 of them at once for mug rugs and is down to about five or six as they make great little gifts. She's thinking that it is probably time to dig the ruler out again and make more, maybe with her Fig Tree stash. They would be gorgeous.

Mine is an 8" block (I didn't want to start out too small before I knew what I was doing) but I'm thinking that I might make a couple of 7" blocks for potholders for the Holly Bazaar.

I've seen this scrappy version on Pinterest which I just adore and would like to see if I could create something similar...

and this one that I saw on Craftsy. Drool.

So, if you are keen on the Lemoyne Star block and would like to make this ruler your own, just leave me a comment with what you'd like to make with it; the Official Cookie Tester will draw the winner on May 26. Good luck!....M

p.s. Just to give you a further idea of Roberta's very generous spirit, she recently quilted 20 - yes 20! - quilts for the folks in Humboldt struggling to deal with the aftermath of that fatal bus crash that killed so many of their hockey team. She is part of a small army of quilters worldwide who made and quilted quilts for this effort. They had  hoped to get 200 donated and I believe will have about 1,000 all told. How wonderful.

Puss in the Corner

I finished the Puss in the Corner quilt top today in time to get a few pics in the setting sun. It's sweet and will make a nice charity quilt.

We're still none the wiser as to where those orphan green blocks came from that started the whole thing - Jane says they didn't come from her. Regardless, they now have a home and are one step closer to being a quilt.

It's not huge - about 44 x 60" - but the width should make it easy to find a backing that doesn't need to be pieced. YAY!

Half way through assembling it I thought that maybe I should have reversed the use of the polka dot and yellow prints which would have made the yellows stronger but I realized that the example I was working from had the centres in the light print, so that's what I went with. Either way would work.

A few corners still need to be trimmed.

There's enough of the blue left to bind it and I'm thinking that the backing needs to be a little red number, so it's time to dig through the stash.....M

Sandy's Smitten, Too

It appears that Sandy has now also fallen under the spell of the hexie, more specifically, paper-pieced hexies. I believe her exact words were 'a little addicted'... She's been following along on my Minnie project and decided it was time to jump in with both feet.

Here's a group shot of her beautiful work to date. I'm loving all of the cream hexies that run through the middle of her diamonds from top to bottom - it's like strings of beads. She just picked up the tan fabric that's in the bottom right corner to pull more of that colour out of the florals. The final design is still a mystery but she's having a ball stitching those diamonds.

And, she recently went to a beautiful quilt show where she saw this vintage stunner during a seminar on antique quilts.

Made in 1878-79, it is stitched from 2,147 hexies and you can see that it was quilted in a very tiny diamond pattern. It's incredible how timeless this pattern is.....M

Mom and Dad's Quilt

Baylea is proud to reveal Betty's latest finish today - a gorgeous Bowtie quilt made from wool flannel shirts that belonged to mom and dad. She's calling it Mom and Dad's quilt.

It's a beautiful combination of strong plaids and soft pastel solids, and a lovely memento of the two of them.

It is all hand stitched and the quilting is done in a variety of soft coloured pearl cottons (a gift from Jane), picking up on the soft yellow and pink fabrics.

The tiny squares are made from a rich floral that softens things nicely - a fabric she bought at Marshall’s on Bank Street in Ottawa when she was still single (she's been married since 1984!). Apparently she was "saving it for good". 😉

Betty's earliest quilt memory is standing in the bathroom in my paternal grandmother's home where she had a linen closet - she must have stored her quilting therein. Grandma and Mom were looking at quilt blocks and one of them was the Bowtie. She was mesmerized at how the pieces came together to form the simple bow shape.

And, just for fun, there's a little 'klepto' quilting in it too - the woollen backing was kindly donated by Linda and will make it a nice and cozy throw to snuggle under.

Says Betty, "I love the randomness in my quilt, which uses the same geometry throughout. And, as for the colours, it truly is a winter quilt." I couldn't agree more....M