Sunday, December 1, 2013

Celtic Solstice.......Part 1........and more...........

Hey everyone!

I would like to welcome all of my new blog followers and say THANKS for visiting my blog!

I hope that you all got your fill of blessings and turkey on Thanksgiving day!  May the blessings keep on coming your way!

I thoroughly enjoyed mine spent with my family.


My wonderful sister hosted, as usual, and the meal was super good!  I contributed chicken and dumplings and a layer salad.  We also had fried turkey, ham, sweet potatoes, dressing, cranberry relish, mashed potatoes, broccoli casserole, and rolls.  Not to mention pumpkin pie, and blackberry cobbler.  YUM YUM!  Yes, a great meal and time was had by all.  But, sadly, there were some people missing.  My brother in law's father passed away at the beginning of the year, as did my aunt.  Perhaps you remember me blogging about making some memory quilts out of some shirts for my brother in law's family?

Well, I have two finished and am ready to share them with you.  These will be Christmas gifts this year so the recipients haven't received them just yet.


"Hugs from Howard"
(Of course, the wind was blowing, thus, making this quilt look wonky! GRRRR!)
This quilt will be going to my b-i-l's mother.
My friend Dar of Dar's Patchwork Garden did the beautiful quilting on it.  Dar picked out the perfect panto for it, and my sister and b-i-l couldn't be happier with it.  I am sure it's recipient will really love it.
Once again, I used this tutorial to make the quilt top.

and........


"Dad Loved Cardinals Baseball"
This quilt will be going to my b-i-l's brother.
This quilt is made solely from flannel.  There were numerous flannel shirts to choose from, and I paired them with some of this red flannel I already had.  I am writing this pattern, and will be sharing it from my blog for those of you who are interested?  I couldn't be happier with the results of this quilt, and I truly think it displays the various shirt fabrics beautifully.  My friend Ann of Attic Threads generously let me use her long arm machine "BeBe" to quilt this.  I had a blast playing on BeBe and quilting wavy lines edge to edge!

So, Thanksgiving came and went, and on Thursday evening, I was like a little kid waiting for Christmas!  

Why?  

Really?  

You have to ask why????????


I simply COULDN'T wait to dive into the first clue head first!  I even woke up an hour before the first clue went live!  DON'T JUDGE ME! LOLOLOLOL  I was so excited to see which colors we would be playing with first, and what type of units we would be making.  True to form, Bonnie Hunter taught me a new technique using the Tri-Recs ruler set right off the bat.  And, let me tell you, I LOVE THEM!  After watching her very informative tutorial, I went to work!  I have already figured out another quilt I want to make using these tools!

It was so much fun going through all of the scraps I had sorted out for this mystery.  Finding the right size scraps that would work for this first clue was exhilarating!  I love the variety I was able to achieve!

I was all ready to sew when the machine I usually do all of my piecing at home on decided to act up!

:-/
Frustrated, party of 1!

Never fear!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Murna Marita to the rescue!
Bonnie Hunter would be proud that I am using her anyway, (not to mention my Meemaw) so, I have decided I am going to piece Celtic Solstice on her exclusively!

She buzzed through this first step like a champ!

And.....


TA-DAH!!!!!!!!!!!!
Part 1 is done!  Now, I have to wait until Friday again!
Linking up with Bonnie's Link Up here.
and

I would personally like to thank Bonnie for all she does for us scrap quilters out here in the quilting world.  I can't even begin to think about all of the time, heart, and soul she pours into each one of her works of art. Not to mention she is sharing all of the design and pattern to this quilt with us for FREE!  I would also be remiss if I didn't thank her for saluting all of the "guys that quilt" on her Quiltville Facebook Page.  What a wonderful honor it was to have one of my quilts shown with many other works of art created by the few of us men that quilt on her page.  Thus far, Celtic Solstice has already provided me with an amazing opportunity to meet many new friends via Facebook, and learn something new with the Tri-recs rulers.........and we have only had one clue thus far!  I can't wait to see what lies ahead during this mystery!

As always, I want to thank all of you for all of the encouragement!
Happy 1 year blogging anniversary to me! LOL
Kevin the Quilter





33 comments:

  1. Hi Kevin

    Your blocks look great. I cut all my pieces yesterday. I hope to get them sewn during the week. I subbed red for the orange as well. Congrats on your bogiversary

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  2. Happy Blogiversary! You are speedy getting that step done so fast! They look great!

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  3. I knew it wouldn't take you long to get step one done!! Your colors are looking great! Speaking of great looking -- you did a teriffic job on your flannel quilt. I'm still pulling fabric and cutting, so it may take me until Friday!

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  4. Looking good Kevin! I too, was looking forward to this mystery and as Bonnie gave us time to get organized, I prepared and waited for the day. Life got busy for a few weeks and I couldn't sew a stitch. My husband will attest to the happy grin on my face when I discovered that I could take time and sew and it was THE day! Yippee!

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  5. Okay, bro' quilter, you are fast and funny. Blocks look great. Like you I learned how to use the Tri Recs rulers and have gone on to use them in another project. We all owe a huge debt of gratitude to Bonnie. See you on Linky Monday!

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  6. Great job! I love your excitement ( i was spamming the refresh button for a while myself). I think your blocks turned very sharp, good job! What colors have you chosen for the other two colors?

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  7. Happy anniversary Kevin, your blocks look sooooo neat - mine I fear are a bit wonky. Yes thanks to Bonnie as always for her inspiration and kindness to us all in gifting this quilt to us.

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  8. Your blocks looks striking and amazing. Your quilts are beautiful. I love the star one in particular.

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  9. I enjoyed everything about your post, sharing your Thanksgiving with you, the beautiful and meaningful quilts you are making in remembrance of one who is missed, and the great job you did on Celtic Solstice part 1. Like Debi above, I think yours look neater than my slightly wonky ones. I've only completed 20 though, maybe I'll improve as I go. Looking forward to your pattern, I can see a lot of scraps being used up with it, and it looks like it would make a lovely quilt for many occasions. Wish I had more plaids, but I think it would also look good with prints or solids. Sorry for your machine problems, it's always nice to have a spare, and lastly, Happy Blogiversary.

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  10. Happy blogiversary Kevin! You blog posts over the last year have inspired and humored me. Thank you!

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  11. You have a beautiful family!
    I love love love the memory quilts you made! GREAT JOB!
    Isn't it nice to know that we have our trusty old machines to fall back on when our new-fangled, computerized ones go on the blink? Hope it is nothing too serious with your machine. Love your mystery quilt pieces! I'll be following your progress! :)

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  12. Great job on step one! We seem to be using similar colorways! I'm switching out black for the green and gold for the yellow. :)

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  13. Love the quilts especially the star one. I agree whole heartedly with your comments about Bonnie.

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  14. Great quilts, you really are an awesome quilter. Nice rich blues you've selected.

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  15. Nice family photo! The quilts are fabulous. I love your old machine. They truly are the best!

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  16. Love your red, white and blue! What other colors are you using. If I go red, etc, I would have enough stash! I was going shopping today and may not need to! Thanks for showing your work.

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  17. Happy Blog-o-versary! Love your RWB! I am in the process of making a memory quilt also. I am using the BQ pattern from Maple Island quilts. Love how it is progressing..and its gonna progress FASTER as I promised it to her on FRIDAY! lol I am going to save your memory quilt patterns as ideas, You did a great job! (I predict tears... I'm just sayin'!)

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  18. What an awesome post - Those two memory quilts are amazing. Love the contrast of them. Most excellently done, Kevin!!! And You Go with the mystery work! You know I'm jealous of everyone getting to play along. :D

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  19. Wowzer you are a speed demon in the best way. Love your RWB combo...I'm not so speedy,I'm only half done with my Clue 1. Thanks for sharing your family.
    May,Michigan

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  20. This quilt is going to be an amazing QOV! Can't wait to see how it comes out in all the colorways! We are sew very lucky to have found our Bonnie!

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  21. Love your colors. It's going to be beautiful.

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  22. Happy Blogiversary! Love that we are sharing colors, can't wait to see how they turn out! I also had a learning curve on the Tri-Recs but love them and am thinking about doing the one that is posted on the FB page.

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  23. Beautiful use of old shirts! Really makes me sad that I didn't save any of my Dad's, but I wasn't into quilting in the 80s when he passed away. Good job on the Tri-Recs units, too.

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  24. Great post! Love the memory quilts. They will be well loved. You are way ahead of me on Celtic Solstice.I just started cutting today. Hoping to do it all from stash (oh wait, I did buy some green to add to the variety already ;)). Wondering if you are doing the Large or Small version of the quilt. I am increasing the small units by about 25% because the 75"x75" size is including borders and I tend to be a borderless quilter.

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  25. I like the red whit and blue colors you are using. Can't wait to see how your finished quilt will look with those colors.

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  26. I love the quilts you have made! Your family is super lucky to have such a quilter in their midst. I love using the Tri-Recs also, I used it to make a baby quilt with lots of stars and it was really fun.

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  27. Go Kev!!! I LOVE that flannel quilt - that looks so cozy and comfy. Glad you had a great Thanksgiving,,,,

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  28. Look at you go! Murna Marita is no doubt thrilled to contribute to your Celtic Soltice project (which looks like it might be a QOV???). What great memory quilts too. Sounds like you had a really nice Thanksgiving. Happy blog anniversary! Time flies when you're having fun, huh?

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  29. Wow, one year already! It doesn't seem like it's been that long since you started posting your amazing and beautiful quilts. The memory quilts have a lot of "dazzel" to them, especially the plaid and red flannel.

    I have the fabric mostly washed for Bonnie's mystery, but haven't found time to make that first cut. Looking forward to seeing yours come together.

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  30. My Spartan is my favorite machine. I turned mine into a hand crank. They are sweet machines. Have fun!

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  31. Happy Blogiversary Kevin!!! So glad you decided to join the world of blogging so we could all learn just how amazing you are! :*) I got tears looking at those used shirt memory quilts - WOW! You took those old shirts and made two absolutely beautiful quilts!!!! Now THAT'S what I'm talkin' 'bout!!!!! And it's good to hear some appreciation for Bonnie - she has done more for quilting today than anyone else I know - she inspired me when I began to quilt also, and I still LOVE HER QUILTS!!!!

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  32. BTW - I did see your quilt on Bonnie's facebook page - I recognized it right away :*) Congrats!!!!!

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