I always love getting email from charity quilters. It just warms my heart to know that good things are happening. Today’s quilts are from Karin.
She writes:
“Good morning Jo! Hope your Christmas was merry and bright and everybody was healthy. We don’t generally have a big celebration, as the family is all spread throughout the country, as are our friends, so I spent quite a bit of time at the long arm. That’s okay though because that’s my happy place.
I was able to finish up the quilts that came from Patty K, down in West Palm Beach and I used quite a bit of the backing material that Linda W from Williamstown New York sent me back last winter.
First up we have a beautiful and well-coordinated patchwork of charms that were provided originally by you, Jo. I know that neither of you could possibly know this but purple hydrangeas are my absolute favorite flower. And purple and green is one of my favorite color combinations.
I quilted this one with the light lilac backing that Patty included and purple thread in the bobbin and on top. The quilting motif was loops and leaves, one of my favorite ones to do.
I practiced my circles in the thin solid purple borders, but it appears I still need more practice, as some of them turned out more like eggs than circles.
This beautiful quilt finished up at 32 by 42. I really loved this quilt and loved working on it, and if I didn’t have a better place to put it, I probably would have kept it, lol.
The next quilt in today’s parade was …
noted to have been made with dog fabric that originally came from Gail C, whereabouts unknown.
This was a really fun quilt, and I loved looking at what all the dogs were doing, there are soccer balls, dishes, and either baseballs or tennis balls, I’m not sure which, and some balloons in each of the dog squares. The cat squares are actually triangles, as the quilt block pattern appears to be a square in a square. There are all different smiley cat faces in each of the blue sections.
I quilted this with simple arcs and doubled them up for added interest.
I used an ivory-colored thread on top and my go-to lime green in the bobbin.
I backed it with the remainder of that super soft flannel that came with the panel of stacked animals from last week. It is still super soft and quilts nicely. This quilt finished up at 36 inches square, which I found perfectly suitable for a square and a square block.
This large quilt was pieced by Patty K, using fabric from N Kratz, way back in July. Patty calls it Spoolin’ Around, as the block construction appears to make up spools of thread.
There are all different tone-on-tone fabrics, as well as solids and florals.
I didn’t want to do an edge-to-edge as that would take away from the piecing, and I wanted to highlight the spools. Keeping in the theme of the thread, I just did a straight line, matchstick quilting across each spool. The end result is that instead of highlighting the spools, it made them recede and actually highlighted the pinwheel effect of the background fabrics.
Not quite what I had imagined, but still pretty. That quilting left the sashings open and I was afraid that would pucker up so I put wishbones in the sashings and built-in faux cornerstones at each junction. The backing fabric is the remainder of a floral sheet sent by Linda W, of Williamstown, NY, and a large piece that was donated by my local quilt shop owner. I debated about quilting it with blue or pink thread but I settled on pink because every block had pink in it and only some of the blocks had blue. I used a variegated blue in the bobbin.
This quilt finished up at 52 by 56 inches. As you can see, I have it shown on a queen-size bed, so it is almost big enough to fully cover a twin-size bed.
This final quilt was a cutie. I am a sucker for ladybugs, and always have been. I think this is one of your free patterns Jo, maybe the bricks pattern? Whatever the name is, it turned out cute as can be. The ladybug fabric is flannel, while the accent white, purple, and orange bricks are cotton, so I knew I had to keep the quilting rather dense so as not to allow much shrinkage. I decided to just quilt swirls and loops in a random fashion, trying to get several stitches in every brick. I used alternating swirls in the outside border. My top thread was white and my bobbin thread was purple, to coordinate with a large piece of peace sign fabric that was again donated by Linda W of Williamstown New York.
This was another large one, finishing at 56×60 inches.
A great big thank you goes out to every lady involved in all these quilts, from donation of fabric to piecing, to donations of money for shipping and batting. None of this would have been possible without your village Jo. With our recent freeze, we have had a few house fires in our county, where people are using old space heaters and stoves, just trying to stay warm. I know that we don’t have it so bad, just having 4 nights of freezing temps, and no snow or rain, but that is a tremendous challenge for a lot of our older and homeless folks, and those who have left been left homeless due to fires.
These quilts, and all the others, are sincerely appreciated by me and the people of Citrus County, Florida. They have all been run through the washer and dryer and are on their way to the firehouse as soon as I finish typing. Thank you again, from the bottom of my heart.”
I am so happy that these are all out and on their way to helping others. I can’t imagine having a house fire. AH…I would be so sad. I love that Karin has teamed with the local fire department so that these quilts can get out and be helpful at a moment’s notice. Many thanks to Karin and to the many who helped with providing fabric, tops, and needed items.
So many bright, colorful quilts and what a small world that Karin is from Citrus County Florida. So am I. There are many generous quilters around the country that give so much to help the residents of their area and beyond. The need for comfort and care is growing every day, and it is good to know that quilters are there with help.
Where are you located? Perhaps we can get together some day?
Dear Karin,
I live in Az, I am a new quilter, and would love to be involved in quilting for Charity. Please can you help me know how to do this? Everyone’s quilts were beautiful,
Thank you, Gwenda
Very nice quilts and colorful and very nicely quilted! Such a wonderful donation to the fire department for them to use as needed.
Thanks Karin for completing these quilts, along with much help from others, for your local firehouse. I know quilts for kids are always appreciated.
Wonderful quilts. Your quilting is very nice!
Beautiful quilting.
Karin,
I am in Inverness. Meeting up would be nice. My email is dweeks4602@gmail.com. Let’s see if we can arrange something.
Donna
Karin, You do such a wonderful job and always add your personal touches with the choice of stitches and the colors of thread! You would make any quilt shine! Patty K.