MN Love

Before leaving Ann Arbor, I promised Jenna I would try to blog more. Since I'm not always crafty in the sewing sense, but I'm usually expending some creative effort, I'm going to try out blogging about more things to keep me in the habit of record keeping. 

A few days ago we safely arrived in MN and had a bunch of fun along the drive from Ann Arbor to Minneapolis. Here some of the highlights:

Teddy Bear Factory in Chelsea, MI

Epic pirate-themed mini-golf in the Wisconsin Dells

I'm so happy to be home and I'm even more excited to get settled and put down roots.

Triple Finish

About a week before the move, I finished up a project I'd been plugging away at for the last few months: three little quilts for a set of triplets.

The quilts weren't hard, but I was slow in getting them done since I was distracted by the impending move and nervous about such a high risk pregnancy. The mom did great though! She managed to go over 36 weeks and each of three were born last week at over 5 pounds!! So without further ado here are three little quilts for Mason, Noah and Paige.

My favorite fun fact about these little ones is that their uncle (one of my husband's best friends growing up) wanted to name them Corey, Sean and Tapanga (Boy Meets World, anyone?)

Movin' along

I've been sewing, even though I haven't really been blogging...

I'm working on three little quilts for three little babies on the way (a friend is having triplets!) and I'm finally feeling urgency to get the project done since she's only a month from her due date (and is amazingly still pregnant, woohoo!) and as you can see from the boxes and my cutting table being on the floor, we're about a week and a half from moving again.

The move is really exciting. I got a job in Minneapolis, where I'm from, and I can't wait to live long-term near my family. I still don't like these kinds of transitions and major relocations, but there's some solace in knowing this will be the last one.

In celebration

After making the quilt for my PhD advisor, I still had half of the Parson Gray fabric leftover. Since I loved that quilt so much (and Jon did too), I decided to make another almost identical quilt to keep for my self to commemorate finishing my degree. Mine is just a little bit bigger than the original at about 50"x70".

I pieced, basted and quilted almost the entire thing at a weekend retreat I went to with the Ann Arbor Modern Quilt Guild at the beginning of January. It was an awesome way to get this project down, I just hunkered down with a great group of women and no distractions (except for hilarious conversation and girly movies).

I learned all kinds of great tips too, from how to make my own spray starch, to ironing a quilt sandwich before basting so the top and back "stick" to the batting (you can use fewer pins!), to making sure that I have tables on all sides of my sewing table so the quilt glides as I quilt it. Quilting this quilt was the first time I wasn't sore from moving the quilt around!

the back

So all around, I'm loving this quilt and the label will read:

"In celebration of earning my PhD and starting the next chapter!"

antique quilt from my (other) grandma

At the first Ann Arbor Modern Quilt Guild meeting I went to back in August, Ginia gave a great presentation about the history of quilt dyes and patterns. She also does quilt apprasials, so I had her take a look at this quilt. It was a lot of fun to talk to her about it and I thought I'd share it here to remember the details!



This quilt is a bit of a mystery to my family. My parents found it in my grandparents' house after my father's mother pasted away. It was kept in the back of a closet without a note or label and my dad had never seen it before. You can still see markings from the original construction, so it probably has never been washed.

Ginia estimated the date of the quilt at circa 1940, which was an interesting time in my grandma's life. My grandparents were raised on farms in western Wisconsin and went to school to become teachers so they could live in town. In 1940, my grandpa was teaching at a school in Minnesota and my grandma was still in Wisconsin teaching one-room school. In 1941, they were married and my grandma moved to Minnesota as well. This quilt could have been something she did to pass the time before they got married; it could have been a going-away gift from a parent; she could have bought it; or any number of other things.

The craftsmanship on this quilt is pretty remarkable. Each Sunbonnet Sue is hand appliqued (perfectly) and embellished with embroidery. Each Sue has a solid bonnet with a cute matching print dress. The colors match beautifully and are wonderfully arranged. The hand quilted stitches are amazing. Ginia also noted that the binding is "jack-knife" binding which I've never seen before, but also adds to this particular quilt's value, as it's a more difficult and less common technique.

I can't help but think about the woman who made it and wonder who she was and why she made this quilt. There are two mystery marks in the border on the back of the quilt, one looks like a S and the other looks like a G or C next to a faint E marking. They look intentional, but it's not clear to me what they mean. I guess we'll never really know...

Since I'm the one in the family who's most interested in quilting, my parents gave it to me a few years ago. I think the sunbonnet Sue's are kind of cute and the colors are great. It's also a twin size so if I ever wanted to put it on a bed or hang it on the wall, it's a good size.

I need to be more careful about refolding it in more ways so that the fold lines aren't so prominent, but overall, I'm pretty happy that the quilt didn't get more damaged while my family's had it since none of us knew what we were doing with it.

Ann Arbor has a Modern Quilt Guild!

One of the major benefits of living in Ann Arbor this year is that I get to be a part of a Modern Quilt Guild!! I've been to two meetings so far (they happen monthly) and the women are awesome and really welcoming. They also have a monthly "sew-in" where you can bring your sewing machine and a project to work on and quilt/sew together (this is where I got the art kits done).

I've never had a community like this before or a place to sew with other people before, so this is pretty great. Plus, it means I will definitely sew at least one day per month. :)

I'm taking part in a round robin style bee with some of the women of the guild. The starter blocks were really eclectic, but I think that's going to make it fun! My starter block was actually one from another bee I was in that didn't quite fit with the other ones I received, so I figured this would be a fun way to give it a new life.

Last month, I received this block from Cherie.



It was so beautiful and the piecing was perfect. I wanted to show it off and allow some space for others to add something more detailed later, so I just squared off the block and framed it up. I'm excited to see what becomes of it!

More art kits!

My best friend is getting married this Saturday and I made the little kids attending her wedding (including the flower girls) traveling art kits like I did for my wedding. There are 4 girls and 1 boy all between the ages of about 3 and 7, so these will hopefully make them feel special and give them something quiet to do during cocktails and dinner.



Each kit has an 8-pack of crayons, 5 markers, a Dover Little Activity/Sticker book, a 4x6 pad of paper and a couple loose sheets of stickers, so the total cost for each kit was about $8 (I bought a number of items in "bulk" on Amazon). Like last time, I used the Traveling Art Show free pattern from Bread and Buttons (found here) and made the following modifications:

I used velcro instead of ties so that little kiddos could open and close them by themselves.

• To make the velcro strap, I cut a strip of fabric 2 1/4" x about 5-6", folded it in half lengthwise (like a hotdog, not a hamburger), sewed right sides together, leaving one short end open to flip it right- sides-out. Then I sewed on the velcro to the strip. 
• When I attached the strap to the main part of the kit, I made sure to attach it in the middle, but lower than the top edge of the inside pocket (this allows the exterior velcro stitching to be hidden by the pocket).
• To get the velcro on the pocket part of the kit in the right place, I put the supplies into the kit before I sewed the pocket divisions and placed the second piece of velcro so that the kit would close securely.

I also altered the size of the pockets so that they fit the supplies that I wanted to include.

• If you want to make the pockets as shown here, the measurements from left to right:
  4.5" - 4.75" - 1" - 1" - 1" - 1" - 1" - whatever was left.

I feel like those instructions are kind of confusing without pictures, so if you'd like to see me put together a tutorial on these modifications, let me know and I'll take some pictures and post one soon.