Here it is finally done!* If you want to read the backstory and see the detail photos you can read all about in on the Non Unus Pluma page. I made this quilt specifically to hang here in our bedroom. The color inspiration was from this collection of Poole Pottery planet plates that I bought when I was working in London in 2002. We still had Pluto as a planet back then!
* Did you notice the asterisk? I have to be totally honest and say that this quilt might not be done. The center poofs a little and it's bugging me. I'm going to steam it this weekend before it hangs in the Montpelier Center for the Arts. After I get it back at the end of September I may add some more quilting. The big news of the day is that the quilt is done!!! I took the last stitch in the sleeve at 11:30 last night. I'll have photos tomorrow or Saturday. I did need a break so I took an hour to dye these beach towels. I had tied them and soda soaked them last week so they've been taunting me for a week. Photos of these to come soon too. Meanwhile, there's a bit of shop (and blog) news. I like to give myself a little "work" vacation a few times a year and it's time for another. That means free fabric for you but also an altered shipping schedule: Custom orders (including Shades Packs) ordered in August will be shipped September 7. All other orders placed after August 22 will be shipped September 1. A blog break for me means free fabric (and other goodies) for you! Be sure to be here every day next week for 6 great giveaways! Seriously, this is all I've got for today. The binding is halfway done. I hope to finish the binding and the sleeve by this evening.
I mentioned the piping tool that I used for this yesterday. In the comments Donaleen mentioned Ricky Tims' DVD Grand Finale. Bethanne Nemesh also has a really good book on doing fancy binding techniques called The Devil is in the Details. Yesterday I learned that it takes a lot longer to research, think about and agonize over doing a piped binding than it actually takes to do it. I used the Piping Hot Binding technique and tool and it was really quite easy.
My number 1 priority for this week is binding Non Unus Pluma so that's pretty much all I'll be posting about. I didn't make much progress this weekend because I was teaching Beginner Fabric Dying at Visual Arts and I was too tired in the evening to do much. As soon as I get this post done I'll finish up the piping today. During my TV time I have started on my applique borders. I really enjoy doing the blanket stitching applique so you are likely to see frequent updates on this project.
I don't mean that I'm ready for football season to start. I was ready for that in June. I mean that I'm ready to spend hours in front of the TV and, hopefully, not waste too much of that time. I have my 4 applique borders glue basted and ready for hand stitching! The rest of the blocks, spare parts, white and green fabric, templates and everything else is neatly packed away for.......whenever I get the borders done. Because I don't know how long that will be I even packed away the bias tape maker so that I won't get confused and use the wrong size when I move to the outer border. I have a smaller box with the quilt top center, 3 of the borders and lots of floss. The purple folder is where I'll keep the border that I'm working on.
Today I'm teaching fabric dyeing at Visual Arts and I already know that I have one trouble maker student so I might need a little hand stitching tonight to unwind. This doesn't have a darned thing to do with fabric or quilting or anything else creative so you are welcome to skip it. This post is primarily for my family. It starts decades ago with my paternal grandparents. In the late 60's they got divorced. It was a big deal because they were Catholic but it was the right thing to do for them. My understanding is that it took years for them to actually get divorced and there was long running animosity between them forever. We called them G-Ma and G-Dad so that's how I'll reference them here. Fast forward to when I was in college around 1980. They both lived in Roanoke, an easy 45 minute drive from Blacksburg. I visited them from time to time and could always count on a fabulous meal from G-Dad. He made killer scalloped potatoes. My G-Ma and I would talk quilting. She is the reason that I made the Cathedral Window quilt. I was visiting G-Ma one day and she gave me this charm. It was a charm that my G-Dad was given when he graduated from Virginia Tech in 1934. It was known as VPI back then. I think she gave it to me because I was attending VT at that time. I wondered why she had it and decided that I would take it to G-Dad the next time I visited him. I wore it and he noticed it IMMEDIATELY. He was very excited to see it and then gave it to me to keep. He said that what he really wanted was his "sheepskin". G-Ma wouldn't give it to him. I tried to get it but no luck. Skip a few more decades to the trip that Mom and I took to Bassett a few weeks ago. When G-Ma died my brother got one of her bedroom sets. He came into the kitchen one afternoon while we were there and said "looks what I found under the mattress of G-Ma's bed." (G-Ma had a habit of hiding things.) I filled him in on the backstory and he gave me the diploma to frame and put with the charm. There's also a pretty well known photo of the football team from 1932. They were the best team VPI fielded until that time. The photo is from a game they played against undefeated and #1 ranked, Kentucky. VPI won! I first saw the photo in the Hotel Roanoke bar at my cousin's wedding about 15 years ago. Tim saw it at G-Dad's house after he died and tried to get a copy from his wife. No luck there either. Here's the photo in a VT football book that I bought several years ago. G-Dad is 5th from the right on the front row. But how could I get a copy of that photograph? Two emails to the Virginia Tech Football offices and 24 hours later I had a high resolution jpg of the photo! I sent it off to MPix and got a 20" wide print made. The photo is actually very good quality but I took this through the glass and that's why it's blurry. He met my G-Ma while they were both in school. She was a student at nearby Radford. He was quite handsome and she was very pretty. They married and had 2 sons before the war and 2 after. Today I picked this up from the framer and I am thrilled with how it turned out. I originally wanted the charm framed with the photo and diploma but that was an additional $300 on a frame job that was already expensive enough. The framer and I talked about the diploma and we both thought it was parchment but, being the nice guy he is, he called Virginia Tech and found someone who knows about the history of these documents and found out that it really is sheepskin! The wrinkles are from the way that G-Ma had it stored and they couldn't come out without damaging it. While he was framing it I came up with the idea to hang the charm from the frame. That way I can keep the memorabilia together and still wear it occasionally. Here's how I did it with 2 eyelets on the back of the frame. It will be easy to slip the necklace off any time I want to wear it. For now it's hanging on the "college wall". There's Chris' gigantic UVA diploma, my small VT diploma, Chris' Naval Commission, G-Dad's diploma and a bunch of other college stuff. It may go hang in my brother's house at some point and will probably eventually find it's way to my nephew, his namesake.
G-Dad should be happy now. All of his college memorabilia is back together. Next summer my family is getting together for another beach week in Hatteras, NC. I like to take some sort of gift for everyone. The first year was right after I started making glass so I took all of my glass pieces for everyone to pick something. The last time we made TShirts to celebrate one of Mom's milestone birthdays. I decided on tie dye beach towels for next summer. It seemed to make sense to get started early! Here are the first 2 of 16. I think I'm going to do all of them in spiral patterns. One of my brothers HATES tie dyes so I might dye one solid blue just for him. These came from Dharma Trading and they dye beautifully.
Only 14 more to go! After finishing up the quilting on Non Unus Pluma I'm not quite ready to jump back into something involved. That means it's time for Vicki's Veterans Quilt Sweatshop. I had 8 that needed to be finished and got 6 done so far. I'm going to quilt one of my QOV quilts next. Here are the quilts I finished with a close up to show how I quilted it.
A little background. These quilts are all made by my quilt group, Country School Quilters, in Montpelier, VA. One of our members volunteers at the McGuire Veteran's Hospital in the spinal cord injury department and she shares the quilts with "her" patients there. Our volunteer, Terry, is also a longarm quilter and between us we almost keep up with the quilting for the quilts. I use the quilts as photographic samples for my beginner longarm quilting classes that I teach at The Longarm Network. So all of these will have simple quilting but I still think they turn out quite nice. On with the show..... The big news of the week are the new shibori fabrics added this week. It's been a few months since I've had time to dye shibori but a customer wanted one....so I dyed 8. Check then out in the shop. This has to be my favorite set ever. Every one of them is dyed twice, in 2 shades of blue or purple, to give more depth. The Harvest Moon gradient has been out of stock for months and now it's finally back! This fabric is the background for Deb Levy's Harvest Moon kit. Another of my favorites is also back in stock. This one is Summer Sunset and it coordinates with Eminence and Claret Stash Packs.
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I'm Vicki Welsh and I've been making things as long as I can remember. I used to be a garment maker but transitioned to quilts about 20 years ago. Currently I'm into fabric dyeing, quilting, Zentangle, fabric postcards, fused glass and mosaic. I document my adventures here. Categories
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April 2024
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