Freda's Hive: May 2009

Kind of late in the day but it is still Friday so it is time to celebrate fabric.

These Japanese fabric fat quarters are going to make it into a hexagon project. Sooner or later. They are so pretty. For some reason I've been using a lot of pink lately.

I had this daisy fabric in a green color and since I'm always looking for sweet neutral prints so I was glad to find it in the light background.

I don't think I've announced yet that my daughter Whitney is expecting her first baby and our first grandchild in October (yes, the same month we have a wedding). If it is a girl I am definitely using these Michael Miller repro vintage kitty prints in a quilt or two. Whitney loves kitties so this would be perfect for her.

I know, I know, this doesn't look like me at all. But this sweet rose print has got to make it into a quilt at some point. My problem is I really don't have other fabrics that compliment it. So for now it just is pretty to look at.

Ok back to my normal fabrics. I love novelty prints with words. Especially kitchen prints. This is really a fun fabric to use. And it is in delicious red.

This is a vintage kitchen print. I don't have quite enough of it to use as a border for my new pattern/quilt. I love it though. Now this fabric is ME!

Happy Weekend. - nanette

Tuesday night was my night with the Alpine Group girls and it was fun like always. Flora had planned a night to sit at tables, work on projects and chat. Well more chatting than working went on. In fact we got pretty loud. But I think that just meant we all had so much fun catching up with each other. I brought my green and pink quilt to bind but I admit I only made a few stitches in between talking and taking pictures. And speaking of pictures - they turned out lousy. I've had problems in the past taking pictures in the Red Church cultural hall and I forgot about that and should have put my camera in a different mode. Oh well. I got a few but some great projects were not captured.

Debbie made a mini chicken quilt for her daughter's friend. Super cute.
Here is my great friend Tricia. Even though Tricia lives about a block from where I work we didn't know each other until the cottage block exchange. Tricia is so much fun. This is a quilt she started on a quilt cruise. I've always thought a quilt cruise would be great fun. Tricia has only been quilting a couple years but let me tell you she's good. She really has mad skills and a good eye. I love this quilt. This is Judy's quilt. Judy is an award winning quilter. This is a quilt to be sold for a charity Judy belongs to. The charity cares for handicapped children so parents and families can have a date night.
This is Judi's (another Judi) quilt. Judi is not only a good quilter but such a kind and classy lady. I'm really loving the colors here and it is making me want to put away my red and yellow for some deeper tones.
Oh dear I forget who owns this quit. Diana? Lori? Someone else? I guess this shows I talked too much. It is lovely though. Forgive me for not paying attention. If you Alpine girls prompt me on the quilt owners when I don't know, I'll edit the posts to get things right. I know this picture looks really out of focus but if you look at the people in the photo you can see it really isn't. The colors all blended together to make the quilt have such a stunning appearance. And unfortunately, yet again, I forget who belongs to this quilt.
This is Lori's quilt that her grandmother made. It is beautiful but hasn't ever been washed and it has some staining. Lori is trying to get the quilt cleaned and was asking for suggestions. It is just lovely. After seeing this one I was back to wanting my red and white.
I feel so bad my picture of the other side of this quilt didn't turn out. This is Laurel's quilt. I took a class from Laurel a couple years ago. She's got skills that I can only dream about. The back was curved piecing and fabulous. Can you believe she made a 2 sided pieced quilt! And it isn't one of those quilt as you go patterns either. Having just done some curved quilting I am always humbled by those that do it right and certainly Laurel and Jody do that. Maybe Kim has pictures on her blog?
This is a quilt started a couple years ago that was a month by month block from when Paula was the sheriff of our group. Paula loves teeny tiny pieces. I won't comment more on that! Whose quilt is this? (sorry) It is lovely.
My dear friend Flora encouraged those that wanted to participate in our group to make a quilt from my Cascading Blocks and stripes pattern. Flora is always in my corner and supporting my efforts. This month several quilts were shown using my pattern. And Flora gave me these sweet cream and sugar bowls just because she's so nice to me. Thank you Flora. What would I do without her? The quilt in the background is my pink and green version made from that same pattern (I'm still binding it) and I'll show it next week when I am done.
Here is Dianna and she's showing her version. She used children's handkerchiefs to border it. Sweet! It turned out really darling. I thought that handkerchief idea was great.This one is Lori's version of the quilt. Terrible picture but lovely lovely quilt. The colors are soft and sweet. Isn't it amazing how different fabric makes a quilt look totally different.
And speaking of something being unique. This is Flora's quilt with my same pattern. She used Kaffe fabrics. I can't believe how rich this quilt turned out using a completely different color palette. Again, these colors are making me want to make a darker quilt. Love it Flora! Janean came bearing a gift for me. This is a candle keeper beehive. Janean is always doing something nice for others. The hive opens up and you can put a candle inside and burn it inside the hive. Pretty special and picked out just for me. Thank you Janean. I'll get you back!

I have the best group of ladies to enjoy. They make me a better quilter and enrich my life. Just like so many of my online quilter friends. I veryblessed.

-nanette

Last night was "quilt night" with my local girls - That Alpine Group. More on that when I can digest the pictures. But it was fun. Over the weekend I wanted to get caught up on making my blocks for the 20 year celebration quilt since the beginning of our group. So here are my latest blocks.

This was a fun one. I hope the fabrics will all come together in the end. I need to stick with the red, turquoise, yellow theme with accents of green.

This is supposed to be a pineapple block but I'm not sure what mine looks like or even when I went wrong. I don't know if I should put in a couple extra circles in that 2nd row. I'm unsettled about this one.

This is Jody's block and I'm not good with curves. But I should be. For some reason mine measures more of a very scant 9" instead of 9 1/2". And this was my 2nd attempt! If I really fudge the seams, tell me it will quilt out!

This is an appliqued sewing machine block. It has lots of little pieces still to put on after I finish appliqueing the body of the machine, so the verdict is still out on how this block will turn out.

A new quilt back from the quilter. I scalloped the top and bottom edges. Binding is sewn on so I just have to hand stitch the binding the rest of the way. More about this later, too.

I had stuff to do when I got home from quilts last night and didn't get to bed until way late. I had an early morning meeting so I'm a little bleary eyed today. Need diet mt. dew. Just one of my vices.

-nanette

It was so nice to have an extra day and get some little projects finished. I worked on my new pattern (a little) and my blocks for "That Alpine Group" 20 year sampler. I'm sorta caught up with several items on my list and I'm ready to move forward.

A couple months ago I made new "fabric" with strips of fabric from my stash.

I have been wanting to make this shop hopper bag from the magazine my friend Laura gave me. I've been looking at the pattern and the fabric for 2 months now and decided this weekend was as good a time as ever to be bagging.

Here is the front of my new little bag. I quilted it by stitching in the ditch. Also, I added interfacing (the pattern did not call for that). To finish it off I put my little "Freda's Hive" tag on the front.

Here is the back. I had to cover the ends of the cotton webbing so it wouldn't fray. The pattern calls for casing the webbing totally in fabric but I liked it just the way it was. It was easy to make and I enjoyed binding the bag like a quilt. I machine stitched the binding down by stitching in the ditch. I'm getting better at that. I think the key is pressing the the binding around the edges before stitching in the ditch.

Here is the lining. I used some thick cotton twill fabric with sewing icons on it. And then I covered a button with a sewing machine on it for the front. But it actually uses Velcro for the closure and the button is just decoration.

I also made a hexagon tote bag. It was super easy and very fun to pick out the fabric and put it together.

The front and back are exactly the same. The flower is made with a Japanese cotton/linen blend with dainty little flowers all over it.

I put my "Freda's Hive" tag on this bag too. I really like the strawberry fabric in the center.

I stitched my bigger ribbon that says "One of a kind from Freda's Hive" to the inside pocket. I have two pockets on the inside. One big and one small.

Both bags were good projects that were enjoyable and relaxing to make.

-nanette

I thought I would show some of my scraps of vintage kitchen novelty fabric. It really is my #1 favorite fabric type. Most of these I will show today are small bits. Although I do wish I had yards and yards of all of them I'm glad for even a tiny piece.

I'm finding these mostly too precious to actually use. But they do inspire me and keep me always on the look out for kitchen novelties.

I have more of this piece so I suppose at some time I may fussy cut it for just the perfect setting.

These I will cut and use in windows of one of my house blocks.

The kitchen in the home I grew up in had 12" ceilings with a 1940 era stove, white cabinets and novelty kitchen wallpaper/curtains. There was a built in china hutch in the corner and the kitchen table sat between the windows. It was not a modern kitchen at all as the home was built in 1896 but I have happy memories of that kitchen and it made a great influence on my love for vintage kitchen linens.

Have you seen these Japanese masking tapes around blogs? Why don't USA makers think of these clever ideas? Natalie gave this assortment of tapes to me for Mother's Day. I'm going to use them in packaging. There are lots of fun ideas for them on blogs like this one. Clever.

Well I am glad to have a long weekend. It is always fun to just stay home on a long weekend when I can get extra family/sewing time.

I'm going to watch "Rebecca" while I sew tonite. I'm looking forward to it. I really enjoy Hitchcock films and this movie is on my top 10 list. I love to "hate" Mrs. Van Hopper. My favorite line of the selfish, vain Mrs. Van Hopper character is when given her medicine she says: "Wretched stuff! Give me a chocolate, quick!"

I hope you all have a lovely weekend.

-nanette

My rainbow swap blocks arrived! Thank you so much Jane for hosting this great swap. If you look at my side bar you can see the button for Jane's swap. I love my blocks.

Now the fun begins trying to decide how to sash and place them in a new quilt.

The thing I first noticed was the great precision and technique used in all the blocks. They were really made well. Thanks to all the gals in Swap Group 1. Love the blocks.

I do think something like black would be a good neutral to sash them with but not black with white dots like my latest quilt. I think I'm going to snoop first on all the plans the other swappers are making on how to set the blocks. It will be fun to see first how everyone is making their quilts. This will make a great memory quilt.

-nanette

I showed you my vintage fabric Friday and I was able to sew 1 thing so far this week - the scarf. It is a border type print and I did have to french seam it where it will hit the back of my neck.

The rick rack is a velvet rick rack, hard to see in the picture but it is really sweet. I dusted off my rolled hem foot to finish off the edges. It was fun and fast. Now I have to figure out what to wear it with. I guess I don't have much in orange.

Just FYI - Mr. Hive's first day was good but overwhelming. He said he felt like he was drinking out of a fire hose. I know he is up to the challenge. Thanks everyone.

-nanette

With Dresden plates and fans turning up all over blogs I thought I would re-show some of my past projects. Since I don't really have much new to show today.

This is my very scrappy Dresden plate quilt. You know how I love scrap quilts. There is something very satisfying about using scraps from other quilts.

It was made several years ago in response to an "Alpine Group" challenge. I tried to make up something "new" for the border.

I need to get my scrap bin under control right now so maybe this would be a good repeat quilt. It just seems that no matter how many scrap quilts I make, I still have more bits of fabric!

This is another quilt I made several years ago. It is sort of a youth bed size. For this one I made more unified fan colors.

I fussy cut the corners with little novelty and toy images. They were so fun to pick out. I love to fussy cut.

To make the fans stand out more I put a plain white block in between my fans. Somehow I felt it was more vintage looking that way.

Here is another fan quilt and this one was made with all vintage fabric fabrics. I purchased a bag of small scraps several years ago and my machine quilter Wren gave me a bag of vintage scraps too. Plus I cut up pieces of some of my smaller cuts of vintage fabric. It ended up being quite busy but I think the green helps balance it out.

Many of the fabrics are feed sack. It looks kind of crazy in this picture but it really is a pretty quilt and I love looking at all the vintage fabrics.

Today is Mr. Hive's first day at his new job after a 4 1/2 month lay-off. Yayyy! I'm just so grateful. I hope he likes it. I thank my friends and family for all the moral support and prayers on our behalf. I know there are so many out there still looking for jobs and I hope we all keep them in our thoughts and prayers.

-nanette

About me

My Etsy Shop

Blog Archive

Instagram