The Tiffany blue brocade and lace are from my aunt's wedding suit back in the 60s. The dark blue (it looks black in the picture) is from my uncle's dress blues that he wore for the wedding. He was in the Navy and is a Vietnam Veteran. I feel very, very blessed to have these fabrics but I'm not sure if it's because Aunt Tricia cut up their wedding outfits for me or because I have his uniform, a true piece of our history. It's very humbling. My aunt inspired me to start quilting. She is very, very creative with a needle and thread and has unwittingly challenged me to change, adapt, and improve in my own little fabric world. This is not to say that we are the same at all, but we do appreciate each other's work. Aunt Tricia's quilts, and decorative clothing, is generally super bright and very modern, except for her work with buttons, neckties, and yo-yos. (She is being featured in an upcoming issue of Belle Armoire.) I tend to be much more traditional and while I enjoy pops of brights, I lean toward spring and fall colors.
The brown floral, black cat, and turquoise paisley are from my cousin Tommie Sue, whose favorite colors are orange and turquoise. Can you tell? One of TS' jackets was in the Valentines issue of the same magazine this year. I'm thrilled for them both to have been published, as well as extremely jealous!
I have never worked with wool before. It sews nicely, but does it ever attract every snippet of thread and anything else! How in the world do soldiers keep themselves looking as handsome and neat as they do? It boggles the mind. Anyway, the eagle pattern is from the Q is for Quilter blog that I found a few days ago. I just had to play around with the size and transfer it to my water soluble stabilizer. The USA is free hand.
My strawberries are satin stitched. Didn't I say a long time ago that I was NOT going to satin stitch again? Ah, well. They turned out nicely. The pink flowers to the left are silk ribbon and done in a lazy daisy stitch, as are the leaves.
Tommie Sue's Halloween cat was cute but needed something. I picked out his whiskers, eyebrows, mouth, and ear hair with a single strand of gray. There is satin stitching on the solid orange of the striped fabric he is wrapped in and black backstitching.
My lucky horseshoe full of flowers is tatted. Some of the flowers I had laying around and can't remember where the patterns came from (sorry to anyone I have offended). The horseshoe came from Be-stitched. This is a very cool site with lots of different motifs well beyond the general doilies and edgings. This arrangement didn't come out the way I envisioned, but I'm not sure what to do with it so it's staying as-is.
I finished the block last night and stitched it to some of the surrounding blocks early this morning. Hopefully next week I will be able to share pictures of all the blocks sewn together, before the border is added. I found the perfect fabric for that last weekend while shopping for school clothes. I know, the fabric store is not the first place most people think of these days for school clothes. But after spending that much time shopping with my little teen angels, I deserved a mommy break.
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