An Unexpected Present in the Mail

These are vintage 1940's quilt blocks made by a family member. They are my very own Touch Quilts to "Hold them, cherish them, savor the memories, frame them and hang them on the wall...whatever your heart desires."

 

Applique Birds sit on twigs of red, blue, green, brown or pink with 

contrasting bird fabrics and embroidery thread. 

 The thing that made the cathedral windows so interesting was the lone unfinished block with a needle in the block with thread still in it. There are 3 squares of blue pinned to it as if awaiting finding one more coordinating blue. The fabric in the middle of the second row is dotted swiss. You know how I love texture. The stitches are exquisite.

 There is a stack of these, all alike. I wondered if these 24" squares were meant for a quilt or for a table runner of some kind, maybe for Thanksgiving.

Man in a Boat, Fishing

This is one of my favorites. Of course they're  all my favorites but this one I really like.
This is a close up of the man in the boat fishing. His boat is actually a pocket.

The rest of the quilt has fish in a cross-section of the pond he's fishing and some other things that will lend themselves to the imagination when it's finally finished.

I start out with bits and pieces. They arrange themselves and then I stitch 'em down.

I like the way the stitching looks on the back of the fisherman. Quilt lining will cover the stitching but I like looking at it meantime. Eventually I'll get around to adding his fishing pole and line. I never notice stray threads until I look at pictures.

There are all kinds of textured fish to attach to this quilt. Fish make a good theme for a man's quilt.

Dominicker Hen and Sunflower

My first Chicken Quilt has a Dresden Sunflower, little rustic barn with Velcro door, A Dominicker chicken made of herringbone wool with a big red comb and wattle.

 

The chicken has two layers of felted herringbone wool with

padding underneath for added texture and lots of machine 

embroidery in a feather pattern.

Feet are felt, stitched before trimming closely

Comb is improvised of red broadcloth.

 

Sunflower leaf is a zippered pocket with a striped lining.

I put zippers on the outside so they are easier to

find; they are not a surprise.

 

Sunflower 'seeds' is a piece of brown crushed  velvet with 

vertical and horizontal tucks to  make tactile bumps. 

Rays are a Dresden plate with ends stitched down so

petal ends are free.

 

The chicken barn has a tabbed flap door with Velcro that pulls back to

reveal a fussy cut rooster. The roof which hardly shows here is

made from a linen table napkin with great texture.

 

You can't have sunflowers without a sun.

This one is gold velvet with organza ribbon rays. 

Padded for extra tactile pleasure.

The sky is pieced of random strips of blue fabrics.

Lady Quilt

The first of a short series of  'Lady Quilts' is finished. These are all in brightest fuchsia pink and lime green.

One of the upper corners is a large square of lavender satin with a padded touch square in the center and an appliqued crochet piece from a collection of medallions and motifs someone gave me. Tactile in the extreme!

 

One of my favorites for texture: a wool square with velveteen flowers, 

fleece leaves and satin ribbon stems.

 

 

A square of what I call 'lady print' flannel with grosgrain ribbons. 

There is a foam bead in the center square to discover.

Button feature.

  The button is on a length of cord that allows it to store in a deep slit pocket. Pulled out, it may be hooked with the loop or slipped into the little patch pocket.

Green fleece and pink felt high heels for fun.

Gold color machine embroidery, couched yarn, a row of curved stitching and two lines of couched embroidery floss. Great textures, interesting embellishing for a sold square.

This piece of quilt blocks fit into the space of two blocks of the quilt. 

Carolina Lily pattern, it has flocked pieces: 

the pink print and the yellow print have excellent texture. 

The center square had a small drawstring bag attached. 

Paracord ties are long enough to allow it to flatten, revealing the silk lining.

I almost omitted this feature but when I showed it to Suzanne she thought 

it would make a fun item for busy hands.

Perhaps my favorite, a velveteen square has a column of shallow pockets, some ribbon loops and a prairie point in the style that Nancy Zieman teaches on her web site.
 

This quilt has 12" squares. There are enough 12" squares to make a second one, but I may slash them into smaller pieces for a different look. The next quilt has 8" squares. The various tactile items and embellishments are mostly done, ready to sew together. 

This quilt is backed with pink flannel. Since there is no batting, these quilts do not require quilting to hold the batting in place. Minimal quilting makes for a softer quilt. There is enough straight line quilting to hold the lining in place and a little reinforcement where I think there might be stress, like under and around the drawstring bag. 

The vintage Carolina Lily blocks were hand pieced, so I topstitched where the seam allowance turned back to make sure they didn't come apart before I assembled the top. Once the quilt was put together I stitched along the ditch a few times to hold the backing in place.

Busy Mat

Usually touch quilts made here are about 36 x 36" so they can be used for both activity and light cover.

The activity director at our local nursing home wanted to know about using buttons and zippers for restorative therapy. I made a trial mat using a fabric place mat that could be placed on a table or a geriatric chair tray.

 

A length of Velcro to open and close a tab

 

A button feature with large buttons

 

Zipper feature reveals a pocket.

Ribbons make it easier to grip.

The one I used this week has rattail cord.

After vowing not to buy anything else, I could not pass up 

this beautiful ribbon with butterflies solely for decoration. 

Under the Sea

Finally, fishes in their habitat is done. What I see in my imagination never turns out exactly as I envisioned but this is close enough.

The sky with a crocheted sun, the water with lace waves lapping the shore, and seashells at the seashore.  The seashells are embroidered felt and the sand dollars are stamped acrylic paint.  There are some stamped fishes, too. This was my first venture into stamping. I loved the technique. I hope the heat-set paint holds up.

 Susanne asked if I could add zippers. Pricey trinkets at today's prices for a donated item, but I found one in my notions stash to try out. I made a little pocket and there's a surprise inside: felt goldfish on a satin ribbon stream.

  Flipflops on a ribbon were around some washcloths I bought recently. I gave the zipper a ribbon pull tab and a green grosgrain ribbon anchor tab to hold onto when zipping.

 

There's a pocket, every quilt gets at least one pocket. If you count the zipper, this one has 2.

The center part has 6 reverse applique fish, each a different texture. Linen, plain cotton print are shown here.

One of the 'fish' is just a silk circle with 2 little folded points that could be fishes entering the area. The other three are felt, linen and a piece of lining fabric, silky to touch. I couched several different yarns and used crochet thread in the bobbin to stitch a decorative pattern from the back side.

Green organza ribbon is couched to form seaweed, too.

I kept wondering why quilt clubs showed their donation quilts as just random pieces of fabric with touch items like zippers just stitched on and odd bits of fringe and stuff with little attention to colors and patterns and maybe a theme. 

The answer to my question was heart-breaking. They said, "Don't make them pretty. The touch is the thing for the residents. If you make pretty and bright and attractive, they will likely be stolen."

I decided to make mine as interesting as possible given what I have to work with, and add a feature that makes theft less tempting: a label. I roughly added the initials of the facility: MCNH on a bright tag that can't be missed. I embroidered it over and over so picking it out would be too painstaking to a thief and stitched it several times to the front. Then I stitched through all that into the whole quilt when the backing was on.

Just in case that is not enough, I made a regular label, printed with a fabric marker that is supposedly permanent and stitched it on the back side with enough lines of tiny machine stitches to make removing it difficult.


I'd like to think that theft is not a problem around here in small towns. Not so. A small blooming plant in a dollar cache pot that I sent to Miss Trudy when she was in another facility near here was taken from her room. Her sister visited daily and knew the day after it was taken. It was blooming and fine the day before when she visited, so it was not discarded because it died.
I also branded the quilt with my initials stamped in white acrylic paint, a fanciful JC in cursive so the J makes a butterfly's wings. The rest of my quilts will all wear a butterfly brand.

Stamping at the Savoy

Yesterday it rained all day. I made stamps using fun foam carved and glued to corrugated cardboard with a little tab handle of white Duck tape. Maybe it was the bright colors of fun foam that urged me on past a reasonable number of stamps.

I made a flamingo, some butterflies, a fox, poppy pods, flower forms, leaves just for fun and abstract lines. A tulip, a star, a seahorse, a bony fish --I could hardly stop.

Today when the sun shone bright, it was time to try out my work. I unrolled the undersea quilt and a lady quilt with fuchsia velvet and poplin.

I got cold feet. I had to remind myself that it was just cloth and thread and a little paint would not hurt.

I stamped a sand dollar beside some felt seashells.

I let some bony fish swim up out of dark water to tie the two 'water' fabrics together. While we're here, the two color item on the right is a little embellished zipper pocket. Suzanne encouraged me to add some zippers. I found one in my treasures to put on this quilt.

I added a stylized butterfly that forms my initials. While it rained, I read about Whistler --the one who painted the famous Portrait of his Mother-- signing his work with a similar mark. Of course, Whistler's was hardly recognizable as a butterfly, no more than mine is but his is much fancier. This first stamp, a negative shows up well but I decided a regular stamp was better suited.

  







I gathered courage to stamp my butterfly initials on  blocks belonging to the Lady Quilt.

I am emboldened to try some new decorative details since I joined free classes at Textile Evolution.

It sounded like such a fun place, I could not resist, even though it was a year past the time when others were taking part in the original studies. They assured me that it was all right to visit, comment, have a great time.
 
"Check out the free book studies of Fabric Embellishing: the Basics and Beyond with my friend Ruth Chandler and I under the Online Classes tab. You do need the book to participate in the book study but there isn't any fee to jump in and play. You will find tutorials, videos and fun projects." --Liz Kettle.

I had to make a little laundry list of the embellishments appropriate to my projects with Touch Quilts, else I'd be hauling out boxes of beads and ordering off for things not suited for tugging and tasting and going though a hot washer and dryer.  

Some of the class elements are things I already use: Couching, reverse applique, and decorative stitching using heavy thread in the bobbin sewn from the wrong side.  

I had already stitched many of the different stitches my sewing machine can make, but mine are just on pieces of scrap cloth, not neat and suitable for binding into an awesome book of embellishments. I did think to label most of the better ones.

Twenty-five years ago, I would have been flying off to the PNW or Colorado to take part in live classes for an unequaled learning experience. This is the next best thing.

 

Auditions Today

I am auditioning quilt blocks, ribbons, scraps and pieces of brocade material for touch quilts today.

 

One of the late Rachel Johnson's hand appliqued butterflies.

 Earlier this morning it was shocking to read that Fidget Quilts should not be pretty --I'd noticed that they often are not-- because it makes them tempting to theft from facilities where they're donated.

To make my quilts less attractive for larceny, I started machine embroidering the initials of the facility in 2" letters along the front edge through all layers. One would have to be really adept with a seam ripper to take out 3 layers of close zigzag without destroying the quilt. So sad it's necessary.

 

I think of my Touch Quilts as art. Maybe it isn't fine art, but I want them to look pleasing to the eye, so I have try-outs for fabric combos, complimentary colors, and ribbon trims.

 

Cabbage roses from this strip of upholstery

fabric can be turned in trapunto-style roses

with great touchable texture.

 

The orange color in the upper wing of this 

butterfly compliments some other pieces I may use.

 

A closer look. Note the fine hand stitching.  

I may zigzag over the stitching with monofilament 

thread to insure the vintage stitches stay in place.

While I'm auditioning colors and textures, I am also reviewing which trinkets and trims were successful in previous quilts. From left: 1) couched heavy knitting yarn, 2) crochet thread wound on a bobbin and machine stitched using a fancy stitch from the reverse side, and 3)lighter weight yarn, couched.  At the top are reverse applique 'fish' in different textures with ribbon trims.

The machine bobbin work is pleasing to the eye, but the touch factor is not nearly as good as the softness of couched yarn. 

Tactile Items for a Lady's Quilt

This is the first touch quilt I've started that is specifically for a female resident. Most of the time, I try to make them suitable for anybody who needs a little warmth and something to keep hands busy.

 Prairie Points were already my fav before I found Nancy Sieman's blog and the directions for what she calls Column Quilts. This is just a section of a column. I will sew wide rectangles to each side to enclose the fidget items: a double triangle pocket at the bottom and folded squares and rectangles forming more touch items.

A better view of how the pieces can be fondled.

 This satin butterfly is still in progress. Machine embroidery lines are stitched from the wrong side with variegated Knit-Cro-Sheen wound on the bobbin.

 High heeled pumps can be left plain or decorated. I think plain will work here. These are craft felt appliqued on lime fleece; they have texture!

 This is one of a number of vintage Carolina Lily quilt blocks that I am using in touch quilts. They are hand stitched so for these quilts I am stitching in the ditch with decorative machine stitches once the backing is on.

 I thought this might be a terrific idea before I made the drawstring purse. It is poplin with a silk lining. Paracord is the drawstring. It's a stiff affair. Suzanne thinks it might work for some of the residents and suggested we try it out despite my misgivings.

Drawstring purse when the drawstrings are fully opened. It's on a flimsy piece so I am going to quilt the square onto another square of fabric before sewing the block to its companions.

This quilt was laid out before I stopped making plain 36" lap quilts with square blocks. This one is
nine 12" blocks. I have two more 'Ladies' in progress with more and smaller blocks.

Note: I 'm sure you noticed the wrinkles. I haven't a display board for my work. Each quilt in progress is laid out on a folded bed sheet. When I finish for the moment, I roll the sheet and store them. Blocks do get wrinkled after the initial sew and press. I press again when I'm ready to sew the quilt together.