Christmas Quilts

 

Many years ago I made this Christmas "Jelly Roll" quilt for my dining room table.

The next Christmas quilt I made was this Happy Holidays wall hanging. (You can see my Nutcracker on the left.)

I made this quilt with Christmas presents during the pandemic. I swap out the pillows on the couch so they coordinate with whatever quilt I've thrown over the back of the couch.

Last year I made the small JOY pillow for the red chair.

Earlier this year I made the Noel Banner that you see when you first enter my house. I designed it to fit the space perfectly. It does that, and it looks beautiful. I'm really happy.

I'm pretty sure I'm done making Christmas quilts, but hey, you never know. I don't have a special one for my bed yet...

I haven't got the rest of the Christmas decorations up yet, but that will come. I like to do it a little bit at a time.

Christmas in the Bathroom

 Thank you all for your kind words and thoughts about Millie. They are all very much appreciated. It's all I can do to keep from crying. I have to remember that Millie has brought me such incredible joy, and connected me with many friends, and that was unexpected for both of us. Nothing lasts forever, but Millie has been with me a good long while, and I shall continue to enjoy her every day she is still with me.

Now, on to the Christmas decorating.

I'm hosting the dinner this year, and I got the decorations up, but I felt something was missing. (and you know me...)

You all know how much I hate, loathe and despise "cute" (except for kittens, puppies and small children related to me). I have always thought the shower curtain I chose for the second bathroom was pretty cool. (I wanted to rewallpaper the room, but chose something white before I realized the tub, sink and toilet were... beige). ANYWAY, aside from the cat vase with the holly I showed you yesterday I thought the room needed a little something. I wondered if they made any holiday themed shower curtains that weren't "cute."

Indeed they did. So now this lovely graces my bathroom. You can also see the small pointsettia I put in there too. 

Here's the view from the other end of the room. I have red hand towels to use too.

This the shower stall in my main bathroom. It's so tiny I don't use it. Instead I store extra toilet paper (hello pandemic), some cleaning supplies, and I actually hang the holiday wreath in there during the year.

But the view from the toilet is decidedly utilitarian. What to do....??

WRAPPING PAPER!!!! I cut the pieces then taped the paper to the inside of the shower door. I probably would never have thought of this if it hadn't been because I've been making the lined drawstring bags to use to wrap gifts this year. I like looking at this a whole lot better.

This is the tub in the main bathroom. It is a spa tub, and I have always thought it was so ugly and dumb I never used it and just put junk in it. Or on the edges, as in the littler boxes Millie decided she didn't like a couple of years ago... I knew I'd had to at the very least make it presentable for Christmas dinner when my guests might see it...

I thought maybe I could fill it up with poinsettia plants. So I cleared out all the junk that was in there (you already know where the bucket ended up). I thought it looked better already. I stuck a poinsettia plant in there to see how it looked and to figure out how many I'd need to fill it up. After I took this picture I took the plant out and scrubbed the tub.

It looked really good. Then I got another idea. But the execution of that idea is still in process, so you are just going to have to wait to see what happens next.

OH, and by the way, yes, I know that poinsettias are poisonous to cats, but Millie just ignores them, so I am safe. Because otherwise I could not have done this:

Yeah. I got a little carried away. You know what my son says: "You know what I love about you, Mom?

"When you go over the top, you keep going."

Happy Holidays!

 

I've finally got the house decorated for Christmas. The tree is up and it looks good. I gifted myself a wool pressing mat and a pair of LL Bean's Wicked Good Slippers. My gifts have been mailed. There are a few I have to wrap but I have plenty of time. I am starting to sew my holiday boxes together, but since the fabric is white, there is nothing new to see. 

I've decided to take some time off for the holidays. I'm going to read, bake and eat cookies, hang out on the couch with Millie and watch movies, sew the box quilt together and generally take it easy.

See you on the flip side, and while I might have something interesting to write about before the end of 2020, if I don't, Happy Hanukkah, Happy Solstice, Merry Christmas, Happy Kwanzaa, Boxing Day and Happy New Year's. Let's all hope 2021 is as good as we hope it will be.

Ciao for now.

The Second Bird

 

I made a Red Christmas bird. If you look closely you will see part of an amaryllis flower, which was made into a box and is shown in yesterday's post. Also check out the legs, they are mini Christmas packages. The beak is as big as it is because I wanted that swoop.

Before I figure out how I want to arrange the blocks, I have to decide where the birds go. Once I know whey they (or one of them) will go, I will rearrange the boxes. So for the next few pictures, ignore the boxes and the prints and just look at the birds. This one, above, is way too symmetrical for me.

I like this better, where the birds aren't in the same row.

Trying to get the birds closer to each other, I stuck in a really tall narrow box. I had originally made this box for my HAPPY HOLIDAYS quilt, but here it just looks like a wall separating the two birds.

Getting rid of that box doesn't make this better. There is too much space surrounding the birds.

When I arrange the birds like this, they look like they are getting ready to duel. Not exactly Holiday-friendly.

I will figure out where I want to place the birds, and then I will rearrange the boxes. Stay tuned. I might just turn this thing on it's head!!!

I heard from my friend SewGirl.  This is her quilt, above. Hers is big enough for a king sized bed - 7 rows of 10 blocks each! And she quilted it herself on her Bernina 830. Yowsa!

If you want to make your own birds, like mine, you can get my tutorial here, at my Etsy shop. 

If you want to make free pieced letters like in my Happy Holidays quilt, I have a tutorial for making letters without paper piecing. You can get that here.

Happy Holidays!

Millie and I would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas, Happy Hannukah, Kwaanza, and Happy Holidays.

Holiday Time

I've got all my holiday decorations up, including the Happy Holidays quilt I finished last year. Here are the two birds that grace the quilt. I made them from Christmas fabrics, and I wanted them to mirror each other.

The finished quilt also has free-pieced letters and some trees and holiday packages. 

There is no pattern for the quilt, but if you want to make birds like mine you can get my tutorial here, at my Etsy shop. My tutorial for the free-pieced letters can be found here. Both are instant downloads so you can get started right away.

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all my readers, all around the world!



This is my Happy Holidays quilt, made with my free pieced birds. It's all original and designed by me, Lynne Tyler. It is totally free-pieced, made without patterns, templates or paper piecing.








If you want to make these birds, you can get my tutorial here at my Etsy shop.

H-a-p-p-y H-o-l-i-d-a-y-s

My Holiday quilt is all finished.  Dorothy wanted to know if there was a pattern. No, and there won't be. However... I will be working on tutorials for my free pieced letters later this year.  You can get the tutorial for the birds here, at my Etsy shop. It's an instant download, so you can get started right away. The trees are simply elongated triangles, and the packages are just boxes with small HST (half square triangles) for bows.

This quilt is 47-1/2" tall by 41-1/2" wide.

Holiday in the Heat

I picked up a few quilts from Janet Lee over the weekend. Janet Lee added snowflakes in various parts of the Holiday Quilt. I had told her "I hate cute," and to avoid anything cutesy like Santas and reindeer. She did it just right.

Since I had made the binding for this quilt ahead of time, I was able to get started right away.

 Now all I have to do is hand sew the binding down.

I took it outside to take a picture of it (in the HOT sun on the HOT pavement) even though it has about six million pins still in it.

Jet lag is a tough thing to get over the older you get, and I'm still recovering, but I have five quilts to bind so it will be nice to sit on the couch and "watch" tennis on TV while I do them. The weather is supposed to be really hot for the next several days, so it will also be a comfortable place to be.

Holiday Quilt Backing

This is the fabric I have chosen for the backing of the Holiday Quilt. I wanted to stick with the red white and green theme. I haven't figured out what I'll use for the binding, but I have learned not to decide until the quilt is quilted. It is due Monday.

I brought my dad Christmas shopping at the Mall last night, so I didn't get any sewing done.

I haven't even decorated my Christmas tree yet!

Holiday Quilt Progress

I have been working on the Holiday quilt, adding WOWs to the parts and sewing them together.

I am really, really glad I decided to limit the amount of stuff. Of course, it wasn't as easy as it looks. I sewed some of the trees in the wrong order, and added the outer white "border" to the wrong side of one of the vertical tree rows and had to take that all apart.  Sigh.

 Here is the finished Holiday Quilt flimsy.

Oh, I have a correction. My Mom tells me I was three years and five months old when I asked my grandfather what H-A-P-P-Y-H-O-L-I-D-A-Y-S spelt, not four years old.

Decision Day!

I made two decorative trees for the Holiday quilt. No reason I can't use them both.

I made a gold asterisk, and stuck that up there, then tried to connect it visually with the gold present at the bottom. I did not like it. Nope, nada, not at all.  As soon as I set the birds down the other night I knew the asterisks wouldn't work with them. But you know me, I have to TRY it to be sure because hey, sometimes weird stuff DOES work.

And no matter HOW I rearranged all the trees I couldn't find an arrangement I liked. Finally I thought. F*** it. I designed the damn thing with one column of trees on either side and only three boxes.

So I got rid of all the extra stuff and took a step back.  Yup. This is it. The extra trees were cluttering up the design, and the gold asterisk and gold box were unnecessary. Limiting the number of trees also allows you to see the decorative trees better. The design is simple and clear, and communicates everything I wanted.  This is it. Now I shall fill it all in with my usual variety of White On White fabrics.

Presents! Trees!

I made a couple more presents for the Holiday quilt. I'm pulling stuff out of my stash and trying to use it creatively. I do NOT want to go shopping for Christmas fabric. Anyway, I really like these three boxes.

I thought a couple of other boxes in different sizes would work, but nope.

Next I trimmed the tree triangles and added tree trunks. As you can see, I moved the pieces to the floor of the studio because I can't see very well on the wall in the hallway because it is too dark, and also too far away from my sewing machine.  I've started laying things out, as you can see. Ignore the asterisks up there for a minute.

I had some leftover asterisks from another project and stuck them there to see what they would look like.

Blech.

When I went into the studio the next morning to look at the layout in daylight, I discovered Millie, "helping me" by making sure the blocks don't fly around on their own.

I didn't decide about the asterisks, but looking at this I realized I needed at least one of the trees to be a lot more decorative.  Oh well, those decisions are for another day.

Two Turtledoves... Maybe?

You had to know I would do it...

You just HAD to know I was going to include some free pieced birds in the Holiday quilt!

Maybe these two are the two turtledoves in the Christmas Carol. Or maybe not. It doesn't really matter.

I am having so much fun with this!



If you want to make your own turtledoves, or your own unique birds, get my tutorial  here, on my Etsy shop. It's an instant download, so you can get started right away.

A Tree or Two or More

I wanted some trees for my Holiday wall hanging. These greens were the most Christmas-y dark greens I could find that would work. I liked this WOW because some of the circles had sparkly silver in them. Gotta have some sparkle on a Holiday quilt.

Rectangles, triangles, trees. Easy Peasy, Lemon Squeezy.

And a box with some half square triangles to suggest a bow. Certainly not rocket science.

The lighting is SO CRAPPY there, this really looks ugly. It certainly needs more stuff. (And the trees need trunks, but they haven't even been trimmed yet!)

This is the plan in my sketchbook.  It'll get there. I can already hear my friend Julie saying, "I'm not worried. I know you'll be able to pull it off."

Looking at the sketch now, I like the asymmetry, particularly the boxes at the bottom. I'm going to have to make sure to keep that.