Showing posts with label thank you quilt. Show all posts
Showing posts with label thank you quilt. Show all posts

Saturday, June 1, 2019

Quilt 130 :: Omigolly Miss Jennifer


Back in 2013, I was talking to a few moms at my MOPS group about preschool options. One mom told me about a hidden gem that I hadn't heard of before. It's a community choice school, which means it's a public school (no tuition!). It followed the state guidelines, but had some flexibility in how they achieved those goals. It had a STEM focus, and used project-based learning. I was intrigued. 

So one day, about six years ago, I picked up D from the preschool he attended four hours a week at our church and we drove over to the new school. I was only four years into motherhood and new to the world of pick up lines. As it turned out, I had arrived just as the school day was getting out. D and I walked into the school and were greeted by a bewildered staff member who wondered why we were there. 

I'm sure I said something like, "I heard there was a school here and wanted to check it out." The woman, who later learned was Miss Jennifer, patiently asked me to hang out while parents picked up their kids and we'd talk when things settled down. At that building, there was an indoor pond by the front door with books on display. D, age 4, picked up a book and quietly read until Miss Jennifer was free to give us a tour. 

The school was as wonderful as I had hoped and D had a blast reading all the signs in the rooms and along the hallway. I asked when he could enroll and was disappointed to learn that there was a waitlist. I filled out the paperwork and began our wait. 

A few months later, we got the call that there was an opening and D could start in October. Fast forward six years, and my little boy is now a decade old and a few short days from the end of his elementary career. And still, when we arrive, or when we check him out, Miss Jennifer is the friendly face that greets us.

When I first started working through the list of teachers and staff for whom I would make quilts, I knew I wanted to make a quilt for Jennifer that would convey how she is the thread that stitches all the pieces of our school together. She may not be known as well as our teachers or principal, but her quiet work behind the scenes is what makes our community run smoothly. I spent awhile thinking of a pattern that would show her connection to everyone else at school. 

I remembered a stunning quilt I saw at a quilt show a few years back. It's called Omigosh by the late Sue Garman. I wish I had a chance to have met her when she was alive. I'm sure we unknowingly crossed paths at the Quilt Festival in 2014. Both Sue and her husband, Jack were legends at NASA. I would have loved to have heard her stories about NASA and quilting. 


I remember being stopped in my tracks when I saw the quilt because the pieces were SO tiny. I started a version of Omigosh a few years ago. The squares of the nine-patches finish at 1/2"!


I saw a "supersized" version another quilter made and thought it would be fun to make one of both. 


My Omigosh is going to take years, I suspect. Especially because anything I try to make for myself tends to get sent to the end of my to do queue. As I made the first two supersized blocks--which are still pretty small with nine patches made of 1" squares--I thought of who would be worthy of a quilt this time consuming. Miss Jennifer, of course!

Jennifer's favorite color is blue, so I made all of the churn blocks in shades of blue. 


I laid them out so that the light blue blocks would make a heart. The reality turned out a little more subtle than I had planned. I wanted each block to be different, and my goal this year was to only use my stash. I am drowning in blue prints, so I'm happy and somewhat shocked that I had this many blue prints!

For the nine patches, I used blues from each of the churn blocks from squares for each of the 12 school quilts I have made over the last six years. 


I had the idea to use scraps from the other teacher quilts a few quilts ago so some of the strips were already set aside, but it probably took two weeks of sorting through my bins to find at least 2 strips from each quilt!

For the other scraps, I thought of the quilt as a sort of I Spy quilt with some fun fussy cut blocks. 

A few Dutch squares to remind her of the de Jong family.





This little Viking was featured on the school quilt I made, and is a nod to my Minnesota roots.


Of course, we are in Ohio, so I included local sports teams, too.



l didn't want her to forget my aspiring rocket scientist, so there are a few blocks for him.




And finally, I have a little nod to the first quilt I ever made. 



D happily did his part to impart love into the quilt by being the first to sleep under it. 


When he was awake, he used the quilt as a background for a fun impromptu photo shoot. 


So hard to believe his days at SCOPE are ending. So many transitions in the days and weeks ahead.


Thank you Miss Jennifer, and all the teachers and staff members who pour their hearts into their kids. 


To find pictures of my progress on this quilt, check out #OmigollyMissJennifer  on Instagram. To see what I'm currently working on, including my 2019 Brain Injury quilt, follow me at deJongDreamHouse.

Posted by Jen @ de Jong Dream House at 3:46 PM 11 comments
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Friday, April 19, 2019

Quilt 131 :: Coded Thank You



As I type this, I am sitting on the floor in the great room of the de Jong Dream House. A few days ago, movers came and took all the furniture away, so I have this week to pack up the last few things. It seems fitting to write this post about the last quilt I made in my craft room here at the dream house.


This quilt is being gifted to my son's tech teacher. I had hoped to finish all the school thank you quilts before school got out last week, but I didn't quite make it. It was a pretty ambitious goal, so I feel pretty happy that it's finished now!

The idea for this quilt came as D and I were talking about the relationship between art and science. It doesn't take long with D to see his passion for science. STEM pursuits were never my cup of tea in school. But God gave me an aspiring rocket scientist. So we talked about how much math I need to use when quilting and we talked about the beauty of the nebulae. We got talking about how QR codes reminded me of pixelated quilts and I started thinking about making a QR quilt. D suggested that his tech teacher would like a QR quilt because she teaches about codes (along with doing a lot of other important things for our school).

I made a QR code to link to this page, and used it as the pattern for the quilt. 


Like most pixelated quilt, the construction wasn't difficult. The challenge for me was twofold, 1) because mistakes in the blocks are not easily noticeable, and mistakes meant that the code wouldn't work, it was extra important to constantly check my work and note the same top left hand corner of each block, and 2) I was packing the dream house and making decisions about renovating the lake house the entire time I was working on this quilt, so I could only work in 10-15 minutes increments a day, often only cutting out or putting together a (partial) block per session. 


I was so relieved when the completed QR part of the quilt worked on my phone! (And led to this page in its placeholder form).


Mrs. Dodson's favorite color is hot pink so I knew I would use it for the border. D suggested that I include binary code, so the gray part of the border spells out THANKYOU. 


Finally, for the binding, I spent way too much time cutting the strips out in order to spell out thank you in Morse code. 


The message repeats 3.5 times, but if I didn't mention it here, I don't anyone would have noticed!



As is usually the case when I find myself with a (self-imposed) deadline, I never give myself enough time. Most sane people would say, "There's not enough time. I'll focus on moving, then I'll finish the quilt." I am clearly not sane when it comes to quilting or moving. (Can you see the quilt in that mess?)


On the other hand, one of the most brilliant decisions we made with the moving process is to hire some guys to move the big stuff. It turned to a long twelve-hour day of us packing things up before they were wrapped and hefted out to the truck. In the morning, we said we'd have them pack as much as they could. They were very efficient, but wow, we have more stuff than we thought!


On the morning of the move, I got up four hours before the guys arrived to quilt the top. I sewed for 20 minutes, then packed for 20 minutes. After they arrived, I sewed for 5 minutes, then packed for 20 minutes.  


I finished the binding the night before because I was trying to be done with my quilting table so it could be moved while I finished up the quilt. By early evening I was racing against the movers. 


There wasn't much left in my craft room when I finished, but it was fun for our tattooed young guys to see my progress and cheer me on. They even helped display it from the truck when it was done.


The thing I will remember when I think of this quilt is how symbolic it is of our life at this moment. It looks really chaotic, but when you step back, you can see that there is an order and a process. And the overall message is gratitude. And gratitude is why I made this quilt, and why D wrote this message for Mrs. Dodson.


Mrs. Dodson was never D's primary teacher in his six years at SCOPE Academy, but her work impacted all of the learners at our little school. In addition to teaching, at first her own class of fourth graders, and then tech to all the students, Mrs. Dodson spends countless hours writing grants and is our curriculum and assessment specialist. Our school is so much richer for her passion and dedication, so I wanted to include her in my list of thank you quilts. 


It's hard for me to believe that this sweet dream house season of life is over. It started when D was 3 and just starting preschool. It is ending as D is 10 and finished with elementary school. His love for all things space has stayed consistent the whole time. We could not have found a more perfect school at which to begin his academic career and will forever be grateful for the love and energy our small but mighty school poured into our boy. In fact, D made a second note:


As always, D slept with the quilt to add his love to it. This was extra special because it was our last night as a family in the Dream House.


I feel that anything I try to say failed to convey the depths of my gratitude, so I can only hope that what I say with my stitches will suffice. 

To see more pictures of this quilt in progress, check out #codedthankyou on Instagram. To see what I'm currently working on, please follow me @deJongDreamHouse.

Linked to:

Tuesday:
Colour & Inspiration Party @ The Clever Chameleon
To Do Tuesday @ Stitch All the Things
Favorite Finish @ Meadow Mist Designs

Wednesday:
Let's Bee Social @ Sew Fresh Quilts
Midweek Makers @ Quilt Fabrication
Wednesday Wait Loss @ The Inquiring Quilter
WIP Wednesday @ Esther's Blog

Friday:
Beauties Pageant @ From Bolt to Beauty
Finished or Not Friday @ Busy Hands Quilts
Finished Friday @ Quilty Girl
Off the Wall Friday @ Nina Marie
Whoop Whoop Friday @ Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Saturday:
Scrap Happy Saturday @ So Scrappy
UFO Busting @ The Madd Quilter

Sunday:
BOMs Away @ What a Hoot
Oh Scrap @ Quilting is More Fun than Housework

Monday:
Main Crush Monday @ Cooking Up Quilts
Monday Making @ Love Laugh Quilt
Moving It Forward @ Em's Scrap Bag
What I Made Monday @ Pretty Piney

Posted by Jen @ de Jong Dream House at 12:30 AM 12 comments
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Thursday, March 21, 2019

Quilt #125 :: Mrs. Miller's Steinway



It's March, which means that spring break is here. After that, the end of the school year--D's last at his amazing school--is edging closer, and I am edging closer to the end of my list of thank you quilts for the staff. My latest finish is a quilt for D's music teacher, Mrs. Miller. (Settle in, this is a long, photo-intensive post!)

 One of my absolute favorite pictures from the last six years is this one, taken after his first day of kindergarten and he didn't want to go home. Mrs. Graves, our principal, is the foreground, coaxing him out. (Mrs. Graves received her quilt last year). Mrs. Miller is laughing in the background. I love how it captures her joy. She is a wonderful gift to our school 


Making this quilt was my February One Monthly Goal. Some of you already know about the inspiration, but I will summarize here.

I first started thinking of Mrs. Miller's quilt last spring when I made an inventory of what I had left to do. Of course it would be music-related and I wanted to incorporate the school song. For several months, this paper was all I had in the project box for this quilt.


When we came in to say hello at the open house in August, I took a picture of the sheet music to our school song.


There are a lot of great music quilt out there. I was leaning toward a log cabin piano quilt I saw, but was hoping for something a little less time intensive because the next and last quilt will take a quilt. When I saw these two quilts, especially with Deborah's appliqued sheet music, I knew what I wanted to do. (I asked both quilters about the source of the quilt. Deborah said she saw it somewhere, then sketched it out. Lynn said that it was in a magazine years ago. If anyone knows the answer, please let me know!)


After having no luck finding the pattern or designer with a reverse image search, talking to those who had posted their version, and scouring Pinterest, I opted to reverse engineer the squares and HSTs of the original design.

I started with the Trip Around the World background because it was the easiest. I was still figuring out how to do the keyboard and bottom of the piano. It was was a little wasteful to do the background this way because I wouldn't be using many of the pieces, but it was very helpful for finding the center. 


That reminds me that one of the few quilts I still have to share is the baby quilt I made for my cousin's son. It was my first (and only) Trip Around the World. Maybe I'll share that one next. 


It ended up being a good way to plan the colors because my goal was to use only scraps and I found that I was a little short on some of my original choices.


Once the background was sorted, I started adding the piano pieces. 


I used four different shades to convey depth. 


I made lots of edits along the way. For example, I changed the pedals from gold to silver. 


And it took me a few tries to figure out which back leg I needed (or didn't).


And the lift really gave me fits! How to make a diagonal piece. Where does the lift start? Where does it end? Should the edge of the piano be angled or straight? 


If I had more time, I would have paper pieced the blocks with the lift, but instead, I made bias tape and appliqued it down.


While I was working on this quilt, I was constantly looking at photos of grand pianos on the internet. One day, I was at a house with a real live grand piano!  I took a million pictures and got down to eye level with the keys to see how they should look.


If I were to make it again, I would like to try to add a lamp or metronome. 

The bench was pretty easy to figure out. Using HSTs on the top corners really helped with the perspective. The pedals are half the size of the bench legs. 


And then it was time to make the keys. I found a small piano keyboard print and the large piano print
in the inspiration picture, but neither was the right size so I realize I had to make them individually. It was a little trick getting the spacing right. I opted for 1/4" between the black keys within an octave and 1/2" between the octaves. The black keys are 1/2" wide.


I thought briefly of stitching lines to indicate individual keys, but I decided that was too much crazy math!

So much tiny!


The center of the quilt looked a little plain, so I decided to add the Steinway name and logo. I wish every music teacher could be gifted a Steinway piano for all the tireless work and love they pour into our kids, but alas, I can only make one. 

The new skill I am most excited about is thread painting. I have seen some incredible thread painted quilts at shows and it's been on my bucket list to try. I've learned how to set my Janome 9400 up for free motion but I'm still in the train wheel stage. But I knew enough to have an idea.

First, I printed the logo on freezer paper, and ironed it in place. Then with my needle speed as slow as it would go in the free motion setting, I stitched through the freezer paper


I started with a practice piece of fabric. Good thing I did. There was a learning curve!


By the time I finishe the logo, I was feeling pretty confident.


Now I was ready to do the real thing, with metallic silver thread.


The hardest part was actually picking off the tiny pieces of paper. I was able to put my new cordless mini vac to good use. Best gift ever. 


This shows the scale. 


The last thing was to add to sheet music. When I furtively asked about the music for the school song, Mrs. Miller was kind enough to send the sheet music home with D. I took a picture of it, then adjusted it online. I cut a letter-size piece of music fabric and printed the sheet music on the wrong side.

I thought I was done with the top...


but then I realized I print page 3 of the sheet music instead of page 1. Gah! And this is the part where I learned that Steam a Seam 2 is magic! I used to use Heat N Bond Lite, and it really bonds! I like Steam a Steam 2 because it's two-sided. I can move a piece around if I realize the placement isn't perfect. When I made the sheet music, I had already topstitched around it to secure it to the quilt top.

Once I ripped out the stitches, all I had to do was iron the fabric again and came right off! Magic! I was so afraid it would pull or rip the fabric underneath but it was perfect.


When I made the sheet music the second time, I remembered to take pictures. I like to cut 1/4" strips of the Steam a Seam 2, take off one side of the protective page, and line the edges of my applique, with the sticky side down. This is the process I use for my labels as well. The paper side is just rigid enough to hold the 1/4" seam when I fold and press the seam over. Then I lift the seam up, remove the paper, and finger press it back down.


I cut the corners to avoid bulk.


Next, I cut a piece of Steam a Seam 2 the same size as my fabric piece and, after removing one side of the protective paper, place it over the entire thing.


The adhesive is activated when pressed and the seams are secure.


Finally, using the same method, I created the label with PowerPoint. I cut a piece of white music print 8.5" x 11", pressed a same-size piece of freezer paper to it, and print my label.


The only thing left was to let D work his magic of imbuing the quilt with his love by sleeping with it.


After taking my traditional photos from the back porch, I thought I was done. But then as we were driving around an area I wasn't familiar with, I saw this piano-shaped sign.


Because D is more interested in Mars than music, pianos have been off my radar. It wasn't until we pulled off the highway to find it that I realize it was a Steinway gallery!


I learned the value of the Steinway name as a girl taking piano lessons in Minnesota. There was no question that it was the name I would give to Mrs. Miller's quilt. What I didn't know was the history of Steinway's presence in Ohio, particularly with Oberlin College and Conservatory, which became the first all-Steinway school.

We made plans to return in a few days with my quilt. When we arrived, we stopped inside to ask permission to take a photo outside. 

The manager of the Cleveland Gallery, Bryan, was so generous! He invited inside to take photos with the Steinways. Here are a few of my favorites. 




The gallery itself is a wonderful place with gorgeous, gleaming instruments and walls covered with photos of Steinway artists and technicians.


The area where we took photos was set up as a concert area where artists are invited to come showcase their talents. I'm so glad we saw that sign!

This week I also learned that the former Steinway gallery location was recently purchased and will be restored to its former glory.

By this time, I had a grown quite attached to the quilt. Alas, it was time to take it home. On the last day of school before spring break, I caught Mrs. Miller by surprise on her way to the parking lot. 


There are few things better than delivering a quilt in person to someone who is both surprised and appreciative.


Her expressions were priceless. I'm so grateful that a friend was there to take pictures!


Because it was pick up on the last day of spring break, it was a little busy as parents were driving up, but I loved seeing the faces as they watched the scene unfold. My favorite photo is when D's regular teacher, who received her quilt last spring, came over. 


D has learned a lot more about music that he acknowledges and everytime he belts out tunes from John Williams to Mozart to Queen, I know it is her influence. 


As the proud daughter of teachers, I know how hard Mrs. Miller and other teachers work. I hope this shows just a small bit of appreciation I have for the love the pour into my son.


This has been such a fun project, I hate to see it go. But these pictures remind me that it is now exactly where it was meant to be. 


You'll be able to find pictures of this quilt on Instagram at #MillerMusicQuilt. To see what I'm currently working on, including my 2019 Brain Injury quilt, follow me at deJongDreamHouse.


Posted by Jen @ de Jong Dream House at 11:55 PM 15 comments
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