She DOES play that sport, sisters and lacrosse, Real talk, the dogs done finished her off.

Such a fun story: Over a decade ago, I created 3 quilts for 3 sisters who all played lacrosse at their local high school and respective universities.   At my initial consultation with the mom at her house, I vaguely recalled a little girl very interested in the process of designing the layouts.  The mother saved my contact information and 13 years later got in touch with me as the fourth sister had grown up and it was time for her quilt.  Thank goodness I hadn't changed my email address!

Like her older siblings, the recipient was an avid swimmer in her youth and played lacrosse and field hockey at Woodson High School.

She attended American University and is now a lacrosse coach at Lehigh University.

I think it is wonderful that her entire family were all excellent participants in the same athletic endeavor,

Well, I am Ms. Peri, I'm very On, rock the microphone, and then I'm gone

This was a blast from the past recipient!  Many years ago, I created quilts for two brothers,  My son and the recipient's sons had been in the same Boy Scout troop but of course all the boys are now well into adulthood pursuing careers and raising families.  

The recipient had an aunt who handpieced and hand appliqued this cheerful springy quilt top many years ago.     The quilt top had never been put together as a quilt. It was in fairly good shape despite the passing decades.  Unfortunately it was cost-prohibitive to quilt this beauty by hand so the recipient opted for machine quilting.

We appliqued a simple label to the back reading as follows

: 

Hand-pieced and hand-appliqued by Pauline "Aunt Polly " Miller in 1960.

I love football! I love football! I love football!That’s my reason That’s why I chat about the whole damn season

This is a quilt made for an avid footie fan/former player.  Playing for travel teams in childhood, Langley Saxons in high school,  culminating as a Christopher Newport University Captain, he amassed a tremendous amount of tournament patches as well as shirts.

I was thrilled to obtain the soccer field fabric designed by Robert Kaufmann as I knew it would be a great way to highlight some of the patches.  Many years ago, Robert Kaufmann came out with basketball court, hockey rink, American football gridiron, and soccer pitch designs.  Like most fabric manufacturers,  RK had a limited print run on designs.  Once ithey're gone. they're gone, :( However, one of my favorite fabric stores that tends to carry older fabric was my saving grace yet again and they had this design in stock.

    

The left side of the field has light blue and grey patches representing the CNU Captains and the right side are the green and gold of Langley High School.  The remaining patches were sewn on the various t shirt blocks.

The recipient picked up the quilt with his daughter and son.  He asked them where it should be put in the house obviously thinking the family room but the children simultanrously laid claim to the quilt shouting "my room!"

And she's been working on her game Because life is taxing Gotta get it together and see what's happening

This quilt was made for the sister and cousin of three previous recipients,  She is an excellent lacrosse player, so good in fact that she earned a full scholarship to play at the University of Colorado, Boulder.

Instead of using a solid piece or pieces of fabric for the backing,  we used a green for the middle fabric and appliqued both her high school cardinal mascot and college buffalo mascot as opposing teams.

I then used more of the buffalo fabric that was used for the sashing and borders above the field and red cardinals below.

When the recipient was a little girl, she and her dad were members of the Indian Princess YMCA program,  My sister and dad were also in the Indian Princess program way back in the 1970s.  I don't remember my sister's Princess name but my dad was Bumbling Bear.

In any case I rearranged all the patches from the vest to fit them in the 14.5 " square block.  Luckily all the patches had only been glued onto the vest.   It was a tight squeeze but it was doable.

I was able to keep the zipper intact for this block.  I love retaining the architectural elements of garments such as hoodies, pockets, buttons. and zippers.

The recipient's paternal grandmother's father was a US Congressman from Iowa who served in the House in the 1950s and 60s, making this t shirt very vintage.

Um, how much sound from the brass to the air Will it take, to put your cheers in the air? (Pardon me there)

The recipient was not only a trumpeter for the marching bands both at Thomas Jeffersosn High School of Science and Technology and at the University of Virginia, he majored in music. TJHSST, referred interchangeably as either TJ or Jefferson, is a public magnet school that is currently ranked 14th in the nation.  In his spare time during his US Presidential terms, Thomas Jefferson founded the University of Virginia.

When the recipient graduated from UVA back in 2016, he had cut up his shirts in different sized squares and  hemmed them with gigantic stitches. He then glued them on a fleece blanket that had the Cavalier Marching Band logo machine-embroidered in the lower-right corner.  

He was never pleased with the results so his mom contacted me to see if we could "fix it" for his birthday. She wanted to incorporate the blanket in its entirety.  Neither mom or son had any idea what kind of glue had been used back then.  I was really nervous that him being a TJ grad AND a guy that he had used Gorilla Glue or something even stronger. I did a test and discovered that it was a water-soluble adhesive.  I soaked the blanket in a bathtub and found all the squares had become free and were floating independently.  I then washed all the squares and the now plain blanket to get rid of any remaining stickiness.

He wanted a masculine sashing so he opted for a blue and white plaid with rust accents.  Upon initial layout of the squares against the plaid, I could tell the design really needed a solid to both separate the busy plaid from some of the busier designs and to unify the square sizes.  This Kona grey set off squares nicely.

The original blanket had curved corners so I machine-appliqued the entire blanket on top of the flannel.  Usually you would add sashing by sewing the strips to the outer edge of the fleece.  This is a great quilt for the winter as it has 4 layers, top, batting, fleece, and flannel.

 Happy Birthday!

Is your name Michael Norton? No mine's Clarence.

The recipient of this queen-sized quilt is the sibling of two previous clients.  He is both an Oakton High School and James Madison University alumnus. He was a typical student having summer jobs, running track in high school and joining Sigma Nu at JMU.  His bio-brother is also his fraternity brother which made him a legacy.

The mother wanted to incorporate more than just t shirts.  The two following pictures depict blocks made from his preschool tote bag.  Obviously the recipient was a big Thomas the Tank Engine fan back in the day.

The borders of these blocks were made from a dress shirt that both boys wore when they were little.  The brother's quilt also uses this gingham.

Nick Norton, Sigma Nu, and Mr U-V

This quilt's recipient is an undergrad alumnus of the University of Virginia  and earned his Master's of Architecture at California Polytechnic State University—San Luis Obispo.  The older sibling's graduation from Duke had been commemorated here.   

 

The recipient and his brother are members of Sigma Nu, albeit at different universities. 

When choosing the backing, I used UVa fabric and a fabric depicting commercial buildings.  Although this was a home decorating weight material, I really thought it was appropriate for an architect's quilt.