Cuddly Thimbles

My latest thimble quilt made from bright pastel fabrics from recent baby quilts. 

All the colors are represented in the bright candy straws fabric used for the border! And look at the yummy back!  Its a bright pink minkee fabric.  I quilted soft roses and leaves throughout.

Open for business!

Opening day for the Feathered Star was Tuesday, Dec 7.  Since then I've had many shoppers and visitors to the store!  How exciting to see old friends come through the door and meet new ones.  Many are stopping by with good wishes and to see the amazing transformation of the building.  My mother and sister spent the first day at the store providing yummy breads and taking pictures.  Son, Aaron was there for opening day to make sure the computer cooperated nicely.  Many thanks to them!! 

The flower shop is long gone though I've been fortunate to use many things in the quilt shop including the Christmas tree and its' decorations.  The shelves from the flower shop have been repurposed to hold beautiful fabrics (many florals which is more familiar to them!).  Our friends next door have give us slat board to add to the back of two shelves where I display notions. From another friend I purchased old doors and school desks/chairs which are used throughout the store for display. 

Since the store has opened one new quilter has created her first quilt for a Christmas gift (string pieced squares using Civil War reproductions)... beautiful!  I hope she's just the first of many new quilters to gain inspiration and guidance from the store!

The Feathered Star web page is now online at http://www.featheredstarquilt.com/.  I hope to see you online or in the store!  Merry Christmas!

Logo... maybe?

I've been working on the logo for the quilt shop and this is where I am with that project at the end of the day.  What do you think?  Readable? 
We are making progress at the shop, hopefully the flooring soon!  I'm ready to move in the building with fabrics!

Giving Thanks

Several months ago I purchased a fairly large (10 1/2 feet!) curved church pew.  Unfortunately it took a tumble off the trailer and was in a terrible state!  My brother in law worked his carpentry/refinishing magic to put Humpty Dumpty back together again even better than ever.  So, to show my deep appreciation I made him a quilt.  I chose what we call the million squares pattern to represent the million pieces he brought back together to repair this beautiful antique!  Thank you, thank you, Craig!

The pew is destined for the quilt shop so come on down and enjoy it with me!

Snow White

The biggest latest development down at the quilt shop is on the roof!

We had insulation blown on the roof then this snow white rubberized coating.  Hopefully this will keep the electric bills reasonable and eliminate the leaks in the roof!  You should be able to spot us if you are flying over Clyde, wouldn't that be fun?!

Four Year Old Fun!

I teach four year olds in Sunday School.  We created this fun (and busy!) rail fence quilt one Sunday.  The kids chose from the cut rectangles and sewed three together to create their own blocks using the sewing machine.  Our class is all boys and one little girl.  As I have always found the boys are just as excited if not more so to use the sewing machine! 

The children will take turns taking it home for the week and writing about their experience (well, parents writing) in our journal.

Crazy Girl!

Today a young quilter friend came over and we made crazy quilts using a stack and whack method.  They were very different, mine in bright pastels, hers in black/white and bright colors!  Here's my effort from today.  Now to find just the right border fabric to bring it all together.    

I have long admired Mary Lou Weidman's bright pastel crazy quilt, I'm wondering if I could/will finish the quilt if I add appliques on the blocks like hers?? 

Roses and Feathers

This sweet pink rail fence quilt has a soft Minkee back.  I quilted it for Jane with soft roses and leaves.

Becky's pastel carpenter's star wall hanging is great fun with feathers in each diamond and stippled background!  Hurry and bind this and hang it!

Making Progress!

Our sidewalk in front of the future quilt store went from cracked and awful to beautiful stamped concrete!

Inside the new air conditioning is complete!

We uncovered the huge sliding glass doors that led to the building next door.  This huge hole in the wall will become something wonderful soon!

 And Mike has been working hard to finish the workroom and upstairs office and put in the electrical along both walls.  Hopefully soon we will be able to paint the tin ceiling and the walls and the staircase will be built! 

The quilt shop name will be the Feathered Star!  We will open Tuesday December 7.  Great fun ordering fabrics and notions and patterns!

Happy Fourth of July!

The quilt is a Lori Smith pattern except for the center block which was in my "I started this applique long ago" box.  Hurray for American Quilters... and future quilt lovers!

Feathered Diamonds

The "Too Good To Cut" Radiant Star quilt is now quilted.  I'm very pleased with the large feathers in each of the eight diamond shapes.  The background and border and just small stipple quilted as it was VERY difficult to see the quilting as I was working on it!  In the end it just adds an all over texture and lets the feathers take the attention.

Baby's Stars

Another new baby quilt!  Mommy to be requested 5 pointed stars that weren't all lined up.  I hope she likes it!  Here's a closer look at the border fabric and the free form quilting.

One Hundred!

This is quilt one hundred for me to quilt on my HQ 16!  We bought the machine in August so it is 10 months old...averaging ten quilts per month.  It is quilted with all over feathers in the center, tiny all over feathers in each of the four outer border corners, and long feathers in the 2" green border.  I love it! 

Now on to binding!

Uncovering the Past

We have been taking down the paneling at the flower shop and uncovering the past.  On the south wall you can now see where the steps used to lead up to the doctor's office.  Long ago the building housed Walker Drug Store.  Elevated in the back was Dr Webster's office.  You can see in this picture the level of the raised floor (about 4 1/2 feet) on the left and where the stairs were at the right of the photo.  Wouldn't it be wonderful to have an old photo of how the building looked then?  Now all I have is a photo of the pharmacist, Tandy Walker!

The building is looking really LONG now that there are fewer obstacles in the way!  We have two more walls to take the paneling off then we can paint and expose some of the brick.

Finishing Babies!

Funny thing how inspirations go... you make something that inspires someone else, then in turn you are inspired by THEIR quilt and have to make another... and so it goes!  So here's my bright thimbles quilt!  The incredibly bright pink was a bit much around the border but somehow the lime green binding makes it all right.  Quilt magic I guess.

Here's another example of quilt envy... only it was a the baby thimble quilt I made for Presleigh.  After it was delivered to baby I missed it and certainly had enough fabric to make another.  So, combined with the doll fabric from another baby quilt, I made my very own!

In order to have the dolls all standing upright and not have to piece the border I decided to include some flying geese blocks, they give a little "direction" to the quilt as well!

The last baby quilt finished this week is for baby Cade.  We enjoy many laughing hours together when Mom is working.  He and Eli surely know how to appreciate a new quilt... when I lay it out and say "what do you think boys?"  they both immediately crawl over and hug the quilt and Cade says "Ohhh!" 

Don't forget me, baby Cade!

Too Good to Cut Part 2

I created this sweet star quilt using the Debbie Maddy pattern Radiant Stars and the same box of fabrics I used for the Too Good to Cut challenge.  As with all the Debbie Maddy patterns the star is a no "Y" seam construction. I did alter the pattern to use 9 1/2" triangles instead of piecing all the little squares which used much less fabric and looks tidier to me.

My original Sweet Thimbles quilt (for the challenge) focused more on the pinks while this quilt uses the pink as an accent color with green as the major color.  

Of course, as always there were smaller scraps of fabrics that needed sewing into a pineapple quilt.  This is very pastel for me and difficult to even fathom that I would sew it but it is very sweet and dainty!  I probably would not have chosen the border fabric for this particular quilt except that #1 I already had it and #2 I used it in the middle of the quilt but it does seem to liven up the pastels a bit!

Step by Step

Finally all the suspended ceiling tiles are down along with the framework and support wires!  Then we took down the old AC duct work.  That make the biggest difference as they were right down the center of the building and wrapped in white insulation!  You could see from one end to the other except for all the shelves which are just too big to move around much!

The next step is exposing all the plaster by removing the 70's paneling.  We will chip away some of this plaster to show some of the brick.  In the process of removing the first 1/4 of the paneling we discovered that there was originally a display window at the front of the store which you can see below at the right of the photo.

There are several large and wonderful white shelves and a great counter that will go against the two walls on the left and right where we won't need to remove any plaster.

Coming soon... the new AC/heater!

Happy Graduation Kasarah!

A friend's daughter is graduating from high school in just a few days!  Mom and Dad secretly chose nine t shirts that represented her many activities at CHS including cheerleading, powerlifting and student council.  The quilt is much like Kasarah... bright, organized, happy and fun!  It was presented to Kasarah at a tea party hosted by her parents last week.

Happy Graduation!

Flower Shop update

After three liquidation sales a donation truck came by and picked up the remainder of the flower shop inventory.  Everything left in the building is intended to be used in the quilt shop!  We are extremely fortunate to have inherited many sturdy shelves with the building that can be repurposed for fabric bolts. 

We have successfully taken down the walls to the kitchen and office in the back of the building.  We have also taken a peek at what's under the floor so we'll know how to proceed there.  Now come the big decisions about what we will rebuild.  Our original idea needed to be revamped but I like Plan B very much!

Baby Dolls

This sweet baby doll fabric really didn't need much piecing to show off the cute dolls and clothing.  Since fabrics had two different background colors I used the gathered pink in a more bold color to set the two apart.

The outer border is simple stipple quilting but the center is dainty all over feathers.

Originally I had chosen the tiny doll fabric for the binding but it just didn't add anything to the overall design, so I switched to this fun pink and brown alphabet fabric!  I love it!