Quilt #20 :: Rafael's Heart

I'm not sure why I didn't write posts for so many of my quilts in 2014, but better late than never! Today I'm sharing about my 20th quilt, Rafael's heart. 

Rafael's daddy is from Colombia and his mommy is from the US. I wanted to make him a quilt that celebrated both of his nationalities.

I'm pretty sure I found inspiration for this quilt from Blue Elephant Stitches' quilt Pixelated. 

I laid out my template in PowerPoint. I realize that I made some changes when I actually cut the fabric, particularly with the yellow print. 

We know a lot of international families and writing this post reminds me of the other versions I have intended to make!

I debated a bit whether to put the Columbian flag or the American flag as the heart, but the US won out. 

I used one of my favorite verses on the label--Ephesians 2:10--though I noticed in the picture that it has a typo. Hopefully, I fixed it before I gifted it!

As always, D took his job as product tester seriously.

I have to admit that the picture of Rafael on his quilt is pretty adorable too. 

Linked to:
BOMs Away @ What a Hoot Quilts
Color Party @ The Clever Chameleon
DREAMi! @ MMM Quilts
Design Wall Monday @ Small Quilts & Doll Quilts
Finished or Not Friday @ Busy Hands Quilts
Linky Tuesday @ Free Motion By the River
Main Crush Monday @ Cooking Up Quilts
Midweek Makers @ My Quilt Infatuation
Monday Making @ Love Laugh Quilt
Moving It Forward @ Em's Scrapbag
Needle & Thread Thursday @ My Quilt Infatuation
Off the Wall Friday @ Nina Marie
Oh Scrap! @ Quilting is More Fun than Housework
Sew Fresh Quilts @ Let's Bee Social
Show Off Saturday @ Sew Can She
To Do Tuesday @ Stitch All the Things
UFO Busting @ The Madd Quilter
Wednesday Wait Loss @ The Inquiring Quilter
What I Made Monday @ Pretty Piney
WIP Linky Party @ Silly Mama Quilts
WIPs on Wednesday @ Esther's Blog
Whoop Whoop Friday @ Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Quilt #19 :: Patriotic Plus

Time for another throwback quilt that I haven't shared before. I made this quilt in August of 2014. My local quilt group, Piecemakers, was collecting quilts for veterans so I came up with this design. 

The most memorable part of making this quilt is that it was the first time (yes, that's right, first) time I sliced off part of my finger with my rotary cutter. I got to walk around with a Mickey Mouse finger for a few days.

It's pretty fun to see how my craft room has changed in the last four years. From this picture, I can tell that my thread holder has changed to a bigger one in a new location, the top of my craft table is now a (bigger) piece of bowling alley, I have a larger cutting mat,  I have a shelf and printer in that corner, and I have a new sewing table and machine.

We live in a growing neighborhood. You can see our immediate neighbor's house was still being built, and now there is a whole street of houses behind the blue house in the background!

I hadn't yet developed my system of hanging quilts on a rod on the back porch, so I just had one silly helper. "Show me the back side."

Linked to:
BOMs Away @ What a Hoot Quilts
Color Inspiration & Linky Party @ Clever Chameleon
Design Wall Monday @ Small Quilts and Doll Quilts
Finished or Not Friday @ Busy Hands Quilts
Let's Bee Social @ Sew Fresh Quilts
Linky Tuesday @ Free Motion by the River
Main Crush Monday @ Cooking Up Quilts
Midweek Makers @ Quilt Fabrication
Monday Making @ Love Laugh Quilt
Needle & Thread Thursday @ My Quilt Infatuation 
Off the Wall Friday @ Nina Marie
Oh Scrap! @ Quilting is More Fun than Housework
Scrap Happy Saturday @ Super Scrappy
Show Off Saturday @ Sew Can She
UFO Busting @ Madd Quilter
Wednesday Wait Loss @ The Inquiring Quilter
What I Made Monday @ Pretty Piney
Whoop Whoop Friday @ Confessions of a Fabric Addict
WIP Linky Party @ Silly Mama Quilts
WIPs on Wednesday @ Esther's Blog

Quilt #111 :: Dutch Canuck Quilt

Many moons ago, I made my 21st quilt, a maple leaf baby quilt for a Canadian friend. 

At the time, I was nervous about making the stem of the maple leaf. As it turned out, they were pretty simple. So I wouldn't forget how to make one, I made another maple leaf, in Dutch colors for a quilt I wanted to make for some other Canadian friends, the Vriends. 

For this quilt, I wanted to use both Canadian and Dutch flag colors. The Vriends are long time friends of Niels, who became my friends after Niels and I started dating. Joel was the best man at our wedding.

The Vriends share our Dutch ancestry and have the super appropriate Dutch last name that translates to friends. 

This block, along with left over fabric from Niels' citizenship quilt sat in a bin until this spring when their family of five made plans to visit us in July. Nothing like an impending visit to push a quilt to the top of my to do queue!

I didn't have a final design in mind when I made the initial block, and, as often happens, I made things up as I went along. I realized that if I swapped the blue and red, I could mimic the Canadian flag with the outside blocks.

For the back, I modified the Dutch flag using prints with Dutch tulips, rowhouses, and bikes. Of course, D had to sleep with the quilt to make sure it was filled with our love.

When the Vriends arrived, their quilt was waiting for them on their bed.

The quilt made a great excuse to get a family picture. 

Linked to:
BOMs Away @ What a Hoot
Design Wall Monday @ Small Quilts & Doll Quilts
Finished or Not Friday @ Buy Hands Quilts
Linky Tuesday @ Free Motion by the River
Let's Bee Social @ Sew Fresh Quilts
Midweek Makers @ Quilt Fabrication
Monday Making @ Love Laugh Quilt
Moving It Forward @ Em's Scrap Bag
Needle & Thread Thursday @ My Quilt Infatuation
Off the Wall Friday @ Nina Marie
Oh Scrap! @ Quilting is More Fun than Housework
Show Off Saturday @ Sew Can She
To Do Tuesday @ Stitch All the Things 
Tuesday Linky Party @ Clever Chameleon
UFO Busting @ Tish's Wonderland
Wednesday Wait Loss @ The Inquiring Quilter
What I Made Monday @ Pretty Piney
Whoop Whoop Friday @ Confessions of a Fabric Addict
WIP Linky Party @ Silly Mama Quilts

Quilt #38: Patriotric Explosion

Here in the United States, we are celebrating Independence Day! I thought it was the perfect time to write about my favorite patriotic quilt. This Patriotic Plus quilt was finished in December of 2014. I made it as part of my church's quilt ministry and I hope it is warming up a deserving veteran. 

Inspiration for this pattern came from Marit at Quilt It's Fractured Field Study #2. Marit was inspired by Kathy Doughty of Material Obsession, but I'm not sure which quilt started this parade.

This quilt was made entirely from scraps in my overflowing scrap bins. Apparently I didn't take many photos of the process of making this one. Then again, it was 2 years ago, so it's also possible that I filed the photos in a special place I will find sometime after I share this post. 

But from this picture you can see that the blocks are made of 2.5" x 4.5" rectangles sewn into squares. It was really easy and fun to assemble. 

I planned the layout using the portable design wall I bought at the International Quilt Festival in Houston that October. I really love it, but alas, it doesn't work too well in our narrow laundry room or narrower hallway. (This is my reminder to offer it for sale on one of my Facebook quilter sale pages!).

This is also when I was creating my quilt display in my craft room. 

Happy Independence Day everyone! Stay safe and watch your fingers!

Linked to:
Can I Get a Whoop Whoop @ Confessions of a Fabric Addict
Design Wall Monday @ Patchwork Times
Fabric, Thread, and Yarn @ France Nadeau
Fiber Tuesday @ Quilting Room with Mel
Let's Bee Social @ Sew Fresh Quilts
Linky Tuesday @ Free Motion by the River
Made By You Monday @ Skip to my Lou
Main Crush Monday @ Cooking Up Quilts
Monday Funday @ That's What Che Said
Monday Making @ Love Laugh Quilt
Moving it Forward Monday @ Em's Scrapbook
Needle & Thread Thursday @ My Quilt Infatuation
Oh Scrap @ Quilting is More Fun that Housework
Off the Wall Friday @ Nina Marie
Pin Me Party @ Diana Rambles
Show Off Saturday @ Sew Can She
Too Cute Tuesday @ Funky Polka Dot Giraffe
Wow Me Wednesday @ Ginger Snap Crafts

Quilt #14: Niels' Citizenship Quilt

So, I've been grounded from my crafting for a little bit. Turns out my rotary cutter is really, really sharp.

Now that I'm coming off my pain meds, I have some time to write about another quilt I finished: Niels' citizenship quilt! That's right, ladies and gentlemen, my Dutch husband is now an American! (And still a Dutchie, he is a new dual citizen).

Not the most photogenic family photo of Niels' big day, but the best of the bunch! The ceremony was in September, shortly after I tore my meniscus, so I was in rough shape, but I wouldn't miss this event for the world! Now you have an idea of how behind I am in my posting...and my quilting! It took almost as long as the citizenship process! Okay, not quite that long!

I first started gathering fabric for this quilt last May when we were in Florida. I saw the blue star fabric and the red and white fabric during a Walmart stop and thought they could make a cute American block. (Of course, after I was done making all the flag blocks, I realized I could have saved a lot of time by cutting rectangles instead of squares for the bottom half. Live and learn).

When we went to the Netherlands last summer, I looked all over for just the right Dutch fabric. I found a lot of great fabric, but not exactly what I was looking to use in Niels' quilt. 

I did use the Delft fabric on the top of the stack, but to make blocks to mimic the Dutch flag, I bought three different fabrics from Spoonflower. Bikes, tulips, and canal houses. Doesn't get more Dutch than that!

My original plan was to make an American side using the flag blocks, and a Dutch side rail fence, like this. 

However, Niels loved the soft cuddly minky I've been putting on some of the other quilts I've made--and really, who wouldn't?!--so he asked for minky on the back of his quilt. I thought I was back to the drawing board when Niels and his design apprentice came up with this idea.

After opting for dark blue sashing, I was able to whip out a template. 

I needed 21" 6.5" flag blocks. Each block included 1 blue 3.5" square and 3 striped 3.5" squares, for a total of 21 blue squares and 63 red squares. As I mentioned above, if I wanted to save myself some time, I would have cut 21 striped squares and 21 3.5" x 6.5" rectangles. 

For the Dutch flags, I cut several 2.5" strips each of the red bike fabric, the white tulips, and the blue canal house fabrics. I sewed one red, one white, and one blue strip together (order was important, of course). Then I cut the long strips into 20 6.5" squares.

The Delft fabric and state fabric were easy: simple 6.5" squares, twenty of each. For the sashing, I cut 72 2.5" x 6.5" rectangles. (I cut many, many width of fabric strips later to connect the rows).

The columns came together very quickly.

Once the columns were done, I added the long width of fabric strips in between the columns. It was a good thing I stopped to take a photo, so I could notice that I put these columns together in the wrong order. Hello there, seam ripper!

I should mention that this quilt keep getting bigger and bigger. Originally, I had planned on 25 total squares (plus sashing). That looked too small, so I added four more vertical rows.

But the dimensions were off, so I added four more rows on the bottom.

By this point, it was December 23, and I conceded that I wouldn't have Niels' quilt done by Christmas...

...But it didn't stop me from trying. I spent quality time on Christmas Eve with D (and baby Jesus) making a quilt sandwich. 

Pinned and ready to quilt! 

Niels tried to help.

I was able to get the quilting done before we opened gifts Christmas Eve after church. He didn't mind that his Christmas gift didn't have a binding.

Pretty nice Christmas Eve. Cuddled up with a new quilt and reading after D was put to bed.

December 26, finally got the quilt back from the boys--they both love it!--to finish the binding.

Neither boy would let the quilt get too far out of his site. 

I was able to put my Christmas gift to good use. I LOVE these Clover Wonder Clips.

Label made and DONE!!

I think he likes it!

I'm excited to have a finished quilt around me at home. When I'm not cuddled up with it, it serves as inspiration on my new quilt rack. 

Linked to:

Craft-O-Maniac * DIY Dreamer * Fluster Buster * The Idea Room * I Put a Bird on It * Just Us Four * Practically Functional * Romance on a Dime  * Sew Can Do * Tatertots & Jello * This Silly Girl's Life * Will Cook for Smiles