Circle circle, dot dot. I got my chemo shot.

Although at my age I don't recognize birthdays, this year I did celebrate the fact that I am a 10 year cancer survivor.  This quilt helps me remember that.  The quilt is a combination of block projects, all in bright colors.

 

My Worker Bees designed an exchange that required participants to make 12.5" blocks (any pattern) using dot or circle fabric. The block in the upper-right corner looks like just a solid white but it is actually a white and pale pink 9-patch.  No matter how much I fooled around with the exposure, I could not darken it enough to get a good image.

 

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I happened to have enough fabric from over 3 decades before from the Delta Xi Chapter of Kappa Kappa Gamma's Greek Sing costumes.  I know we did songs from 42nd Street and I think we wore black leotards with cummerbunds made from pink and white polka dot fabric.  42nd Street became my favorite musical and my kids were subjected to the entire score throughout their childhood.

 

These two designs are a sample of the exchange blocks. You can see one was two simplistic swirls and another was a candy popper design.

 

When I got sick, I started getting super-cute 6.5" cupcake blocks around my next birthday.  They were sent to me anonymously through the mail and I loved each and every one.

A couple of months after the first post-diagnosis birthday, the American Cancer Society had come up with their One More Birthday campaign which made these blocks even more meaningful.

I actually had to use 2 green fabrics in this quilt as I did not have enough of either.  One was random swirls and circles on a bright green background, the other was a Kelly green calico from the 1970s that my aunt had given me when she was cleaning out a closet.

 

Although it was machine-pieced, I did hand-quilt the entire quilt which ended up being about 77 x 77 inches.

Make you bounce, rock, roll and skate Don't underrate how I operate

This was one of the most challenging projects I have ever designed.  The recipient was a competitive skater in her day. She provided 4 costumes, all of which were sequined, sparkly and very slippery. Although the fabrics weren't stretchy, I fused interfacing to the backs and fray-checked every cut edge to make them behave.

I knew that the patriotic vest and white lacy bodysuit would work well together.  I overlaid the vest on top of the blouse.  A strip of the rainbow outfit was used as a cummerbund. I wanted to include all the fabrics on each side of the pillow, so I created a gold medal out of the neon yellow costume.

The other side was a bit of a challenge.  I created pillows for this person in the past using crazy quilt designs which would have worked nicely.  However I discovered a quilt block called Marcie's Maze and given that the recipient was named Marcy, albeit spelled slightly differently, I knew this would make a great side.

Not only did I reposition sequins for this side, I also appliqued the name tags that had been sewn into the costumes.  I created the piping from the striped fabric as well. I originally wanted the yellow and the white to be reversed but it looked too much like sunny-side up eggs.

The bass is booming from down below And Norton is chillin' with Mario

This queensized quilt is made for an Oakton alumna/current Duke Blue Devil. She will be getting married to another Duke grad shortly after graduation so this will definitely fit in their decor.

She wanted a more random layout than most so the blocks were cut in multiple sizes.   Neither sashing nor borders were desired so it was simply edged with binding.

This shirt was completely covered with quotes written in puffy paint.  This was a spirit shirt made with her cross-country team.  The quotes ran onto the sleeves so the block ended up being a fat apital T as opposed to the typical quadrilateral.  The recipient was also a swimmer so we incorporated her team bathing suit.

The recipient is very devout so in addition to the  shirts from religious camps and teen organizations, the backing was pieced as a basic cross in Duke colors.

You act like a diamond waiting to be set In a gold ring, as if I bet

This quilt is for a a husband and his new wife  who is the proud owner of a lovely diamond. :)

This is the Ampersand Quilt mashed up with a word search game.  The bride and groom are both Ivy League graduates in the humanities studies.  The words run horizontally, vertically, diagonally in all directions.

I love bright colors and was thrilled that the couple did as well.  I was told she loved yellow and disliked pink, just the opposite of my taste. The letter tile fabric has been out of print for about 10 years, but thanks to Fabric Place Basement in Alexandria, they happened to have some in stock...not any more I bought it all!

This quilt contains 900 squares as it's 30 x 30.You can see humanities themes in the squares:  houses, alphabbets, written words, books, crosswords, games and lots and lots of yellow.  I pieced it using a gridded fusible interfacing and simply quilted in the ditch.

Ponce De Leon constantly on The fountain of youth, not Robotron

 

This quilt was made for a baby boy named Leon.  He was born on March 15 of this year.  His mom had bright vibrant colors for the nursery. 

As any student of history or Shakespeare knows, March 15 is the ides of March, the day that Julius Caesar was assassinated in the Roman Senate. 

The design was inspired by the 2002 USPS stamp designed by Michael Osborne.  With 3 of the letters overlapping in the words love and leon, it was an easy switch.  The N is the logo that media network NBC used in the mid 70s.

"Beware the ides of March." (Shakespeare, 1998, 1.2:103).

Grab the phone, call my dad. Shared some love, felt so glad.

These two quilts were made for adult siblings whose father had died.  The mother had saved boxes of ties and had found specific ideas of how she wanted them to be constructed.

The black background quilt was for the daughter.  She loves Asian decoration and this design reminded her mother of a kimono. 37 ties (or pieces thereof) were used in this 3' by 5' quilt. The black background was a meandering freehand and the ties were quilted in the ditch.

As you can see in the pictures below, some ties were pieced to each other diagonally, others horizontally.  I appliqued many of the tie labels onto the quilt as well.  The father always loved West Highland Terriers hence the significance of the dog tie and dad tie in the right picture.

For the brother's quilt, the mother wanted a loose, woven pattern of ties on a hunter green background.  There are 24 ties used all together, 12 running horizontally and 12 running vertically. The quilt was 4 ft by 4 ft which required using almost all of the tie with just a little bit left over. This was a bit tricky as there were many more directional ties than allotted spots.  I ended up basting it very closely before quilting as the needle had to go through many more layers than a normal quilt and the silk ties slipped.

The applique and the quilting were completed at the same time. The layout was a bit tricky as there were many more directional ties than allotted spots. Because the interlining remained in the ties for them to keep their shape, it ultimately was a very heavy quilt.

Now, all night long Charlie rides through the station crying, "What will become of me? How can I afford to see my sister in Boston or my parents in Cincinnati?"

This Tarragon twinsize quilt was created last year for a future Northwestern Wildcat.  I had made pillows for his siblings and aunts and a quilt and pillow for his dad so now it was his turn!

 Many of the shirts were from his early childhood, not just high school.  I loved the fact that several of the shirts had transferred photographs like the beautiful Basset Hound you see below.  One of the blue mini-designs is from a neckerchief he wore at camp.

Amongst other activities Charlie played baseball.  I have no idea if this was a high school spiritwear shirt or from a Babe Ruth or JCC team but I DO know he was number 26.

The entire family are huge fans of the various Cincinnati professional teams.  The Reds shirt is from Spring Training in Florida.  I quilted heavily around the alligator so that the head would really pop.

I hope that this quilt has kept him warm during those frigid Chicago winters!