Retreat Recap, part 1

Home again! What a great weekend! Not rested, but happy. 

My drive across the state to the retreat was uneventful, though I did get to have lunch with my sister, Karla, and our friend, Teena, as they were returning home from some meetings. Great meal and fun conversation. I had been worried about snow on my drive but I didn't have to drive in any until I turned down the drive to my daughter, Becky's, house. Had to climb into the back of the car to find my boots so I could even get out of the car. We had a fun visit talking a lot about their upcoming move back to our house so she can work on finishing their tiny house on wheels while her hubby is out on the road. 

Headed over to the retreat in the morning and got set up and started sewing. My first project was getting all the quilting threads on the HP quilt taken care of. As I was working on it I realized that the last 4 or 5 blocks I had quilted had poor tension so I ripped those out and will redo them today. Everyone loved the quilt and I was able to sell quite a few drawing tickets at the retreat. I also ended up selling one owl hat and getting an order for 5 more so I will be working on those in the coming weeks.

I saw a tutorial last week online for a folded bag and just had to try it so that was one of my early projects. (Lynn T, if you are reading this I am supposed to tell you that you are not allowed to try this yourself, Jill is making you one!) It is made from 2 squares of fabric, sewn together and turned right sides out, top-stitched and then folded and turned and fluffed and you get these. 

Mine is the second from the left on the bottom row. I really liked it as a thread catcher while sewing. Karla and I were going to make some scrap catchers like this but these folded bags are so much easier and practical that we went with these. Karla made 4 of the bags in the above picture and a couple of other quilters in our group each made one for themselves. These were all made from 17-18" squares.

Others came up and saw the bags and wanted to make some for themselves so I said I would do a little 'thing' downstairs and teach them too so they all started getting their squares cut in preparation for the next morning. I wanted to have some samples of a couple of the steps ready for the morning so I started a couple bags to give to my grandkids when they arrived the next day. I only had 10" squares of fabrics they would like so I went for it. I was so tempted to finish them to see how they would turn out but instead I cut another couple of fabrics up and made two little bags out of 8" and 9" squares. They are the cute little strawberry bags in the front of this next picture.

When I got up the next morning I dug out all the extra fabric I had in my piles and cut out whatever I could for bags and made the above baskets. We had much discussion about all their uses and determined that the 8" would make adorable little egg holders for Easter and the 9" could hold sugar packets at your table. The 18" ones are great for small potted plants and a 20-21" will hold a square box of tissues as you can see in the above picture. The biggest one there is a 20" and has a tissue box in it. One of the best  things about these bags is that they fold flat so are easy to store when not in use. I am hoping these will be a big seller at the quilt show and at Relay for Life. I have lots more fabrics I can use for them.

When I headed downstairs to the other quilting room there were at least 10 people who learned to make the bags. One person used corduroy which I think could be great for a larger bag made from maybe a 36-45" square to be used for dog toys or baby toys on the floor. Someone else used flannel which is so nice and soft and would be great in a baby's room for holding socks in a drawer or cotton balls or pacifiers or almost anything!

One of the ladies is an amazing quilter and embellisher and she had fun with her bag. You can see the front and back here:

I think that many of the bags will be made in the coming weeks by a lot of the quilters for selling at bazaars, using in their own homes, giving as gifts, etc. I know I am going to get more done in the coming days and weeks.


Well, I have much to do before Saturday's quilt show so I had better save the rest of the retreat recap for later!

Denim Quilts

******Important Update: As of December 31, 2015 this pattern will be available only in my Etsy Shop - LucysQuilts******

******If you have commented on this post in the past and haven't received the pattern it is probably because you did not give me an email address. You can either comment with your email address or click on View My Profile on the right and then click on Email Me on the left*******

In 2001, my sister and I each had a child graduating from high school and we decided to make a quilt for each of them as a gift. I was going through a bit of a slump in my sewing so I let my sister pick the pattern. She had this great pattern for denim quilts and thought that would be a good choice for her son and my daughter to take to college and since I had no better idea it was decided. We got together at her house and got the two tops made in a day or two and though both of the graduates were in and out of the house, neither had a clue.I loved the concept of this pattern and was inspired to make a few more, and then a few more and now I have no idea how many I have made based on the pattern but it is well over 100.

Many fellow quilters have asked for information about the way they are put together over the years including one request on my last post. I was hoping I had already done a tutorial here but looking back quickly did not reveal one so here goes...

The pattern was adapted from the pattern for the cover quilt on Kaffe Fassett's book Glorious Patchwork. I am not sure who adapted the pattern for denim but it was inspired. I have changed the pattern a little to make it easier for this method, but it can be done as printed in the book.I make my quilts out of old jeans because I love the variations in the fabric as it fades and the pockets are great. You can also use new denim of various shades or colors. If you are using jeans, you either rip them at the seams or cut them apart. Then you cut squares that are 2", 4", 6", 8", 10" and 12". You also need the fabric for the strips in between the blocks. The pattern called for black cotton and I have used several bolts of 60" black Kona for these quilts! The black is cut into 1" strips. Some of the strips are cut into 2", 4", 6", 8", 10" and 12" lengths as needed. Some are used for the strips between the rows.

The basic method here is to put a strip of black between each block of denim. The beauty of this is that you are never sewing denim to denim so the seams don't get too bulky. You need to practice with your machine to get the right seam allowance. I have found that if I use my 1/4" foot for this quilt the pieces don't match up as they should so I use the regular foot on my Pfaffs and sew more of a true 1/4" seam as opposed to a scant 1/4".

My first thought after I got the pattern was to use the sleeves that I cut off the twill coverall's that my husband wears for work. I have always saved them (I know, a little crazy) and he has had grey, forest green, cadet blue and navy blue coveralls over the years but that looked pretty boring so I went to thrift stores and fabric stores and found some twill prints that tied them all together. This is the one I made for my husband using up the last of my twill pieces (at that time) and as you can see I only had 2", 4" and 6" pieces left.In the first few years I went to thrift stores and picked up jeans for the quilts. I found that 12" squares aren't easy to get from most jeans so I bought some denim dresses or jumpers and occasionally very large jeans. I've also found a few pieces of denim yardage at the thrift stores or bought some on sale for the larger pieces. I have gotten some great colored/print denims at the thrift store in the children's section and a few in the women's section. I found one that was a white denim with huge blue roses that should never have been made into a pair of size 20 capris! It did work well in my king size quilt when added to yellow, green and blue denim!Now, since people know I make quilts out of old jeans, they frequently ask me if I am still making the denim quilts and hand me grocery bags of jeans. This is why I have several boxes of jeans in my attic waiting to be cut up!

The best thing about this pattern that makes a 52" X 56" quilt is that it can be easily adapted to make a larger quilt or to use different pieces if you don't have the correct number of pieces of the various sizes from the jeans you want to use. It is all based on a 2" grid. The pattern starts in the middle with a 12" square and then rows are added similar to a log cabin block.

Here is one I made for a friend using jewel tone quilting fabric. Love this one!!!This is one I made this summer experimenting with a pink print fabric for the strips instead of black.After getting this round robin quilt put together I decided to use some cream/tan denims with a maroon Kona for the strips and got this great quilt. As I said earlier, I have made more than 100 quilts based on this pattern. I made 7 or 8 using Christmas prints, a couple for wedding quilts using the wedding colors in various prints and one using Laurel Burch's Ocean Song swirl fabrics in various colors. Most have been denim and many of those were donated to the foster care program in our area for foster kids graduating from high school. I have found that teenagers love these quilts. They are also great for baby quilts or young children as they are very sturdy.

The original graduation quilts and my king-sized quilt were professional machine quilted by a friend. Then for the next few years I tied the quilts until I got brave enough to machine quilt them on my trusty Pfaff 1222's.

If you have any questions, or would like me to email the pattern to you, just email me.

*****UPDATE*****  - I am no longer sending out the pattern via email. Due to the high demand it is only available from my Etsy shop: LucysQuilts. Also, comments are moderated so it may take up to a couple of days for it to be posted if I am out of town but I will get to it and respond so you don't have to comment again if you don't see your comment right away.

*****I have posted a Denim Update here.*****