November 2025

 We met at Deanna’s house on a warm autumn day.  Deanna’s husband was working hard on the two tons of gravel for the pavement and the garden. I took my jacket off because it was so warm.  The others were a little late because of the roadwork being done close to the house, so we watched him working hard until they arrived.  Unfortunately Sandy and Mindy were not able to make the meeting.  The next meeting will be at Mindy’s house on December 2 at 11:00.

Deanna

Deanna started us off with her two projects.  The first was her One Block Wonder that she is going to give to her sister in law.  She used 7 panels of an underwater scene of fish.  The instructions were not very well written, so she had to adjust it to complete the 56x72 inch quilt.  She quilted it with a water motif.

The second quilt was made with a Bernstein Bear panel.  She has been collecting dot fabrics for years and was finally able to use it.  She matched the dot fabrics with the clothing in the bear and it highlighted the whole scene.

Joan

Joan is waiting for her long arm quilter Melissa to make time for her hexagon quilt.  She made the back from the leftover hexagons.

Alice

Alice used her swallow fpp blocks to make a new quilt.  She talked about the zoom meeting with Maria Shell and how that inspired her to use her techniques to make the quilt.  She made 1 inch squares, a row of houses and other elements that Maria Shell, Gwen Marsten and Tara Faughnan taught.  She is looking for sources of solid color fabrics.  Maria uses this brand Dippy Dyes from Lisa Reber.

https://www.dippydyes.com/product-category/hand-dyed-fabrics/

Mary

Mary had three quilts to share.  The first is a donation quilt that she made from the quilt.  It came out so nice with all the green fabrics.

The second quilt is made with safari animals.  She said it was hard to find the animals, so she decided to make quilted animals in the plain squares.  To make the lion, elephant, hippo, etc, she used copyrighted free pictures from the internet. Traced the animals on tracing paper. Used a free motion foot to quilt with the tracing paper on the quilt. It came out so nice.

The third quilt is a vanity fair quilt block she used the leftover blocks to make the back.  The back looks just as good as the front.  It’s amazing how long forgotten blocks still look good.

Arleen

I had three projects to show.  The first is the block of the month from EBHQ. I got the directions from the website and used my scrap fabrics to make this colorful quilt

The second is a herringbone quilt using Virginia Finley Wolfs pattern.  Unfortunately, I turned in the book too early and forgot how to piece the strips together.  I had to rip out a lot, but in the end it came out nice.

The third project is an EPP project that I am making as a piecing project instead.  I paid the $14 to download the instructions from Tales of Cloth for the Cherish quilt.  Making this quilt is giving me more respect for the time it takes to choose the fabrics, cut all the small pieces and slowly piece it.  Imagine doing it by hand.

Marty

Marty had nothing to share about quilting, but shared her adventures in Norway.  She brought some cotton thread that she got from open quilting and wondered if it was okay to quilt with.  We believe that it is not polyester.  It is not that strong, but it should be okay to use.  It was good that we had a discussion on threads and needles. It’s good to hear what type of thread everyone is using.  Mostly Aurifil, Masterpiece, King Tut and Bottom Line.

Deanna made a Fresh Pear Cake which was made with fresh pears.  Perfect for the autumn day and so good with a dollop of ice cream.  Thank you to Deanna for hosting.