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Quilts To Go

What could be more green than making quilts by hand, no electricity needed? Quilt to go! Ok, seriously, I’m not advocating that we give up our sewing machines. I love my Bernina way too much to do that. But I also really like hand work. I like to have a quilting project to take along with me when I’m traveling or sitting at my kids’ lessons. For me, handwork is also relaxing and soothing. I have several ongoing projects that I work on by hand and I thought it would be fun to share them with you.

The Star Quilt

photo of star quilt made with quilt patis

I’m making this star quilt completely by hand using “Quilt Patis”. Traditionally, this pattern would be done using English paper piecing. However, I’m using a great tool called Quilt Patis, which are little diamond shaped plastic templates that be used over and over. Quilt Patis come in several sizes and shapes. I got the idea for this quilt from another quilter who posted photos of her quilt like this on line. Unfortunately, I can’t remember her name or her web site, so I can’t give her proper credit.These are a few stars that I have assembled, but not added to the quilt yet.

stars not yet assembled into the quilt

Here is the back of a star and you can see the Quilt Pati templates that I use.

For more information about Quilt Patis, visit the website of Pati Shambaugh, who invented these wonderful little tools. Sylvia Steiger has a great photo tutorial about how to use Quilt Patis.

Midget Blocks

Another ongoing project of mine is my "Midget Blocks" quilt. I’m making a quilt using the patterns posted at Sentimental Stitches. Gayle at Sentimental Stitches own a unique Depression Era sampler quilt constructed of 187 little 4" squares and she is drafting and sharing patterns for each of the blocks. So far about 90 have been posted. I’ve only made 45 or so, but I’ll get them all done eventually. Some of the blocks are machine pieced, some are paper pieced, some are hand pieced, and some are appliquéd. The little appliqué blocks and the hand pieced ones are easy to carry along as a portable quilting project. Here are some of the blocks I’ve made by hand. Keep in mind that each of these blocks are only 4 ½ inches finished!

Cathedral Windows

The classic cathedral windows quilting pattern is another good hand quilting project. Here is a pillow that I made.

These blocks can be made entirely by hand or you can do some of the prep work on the machine and then do the hand sewing when you are out and about. I originally learned this technique from my favorite online quilting group called CyberQuilters on Yahoo Groups. One of the group members taught a great weekend virtual class on cathedral windows.

If you want to learn to make cathedral windows, there are several very good tutorials available for free online. Here are the two best ones I have found. They teach two different ways of making this block.

http://april-makingendsmeet.blogspot.com/2008/07/cathedral-window-tutorial.html
This is the technique that I learned. I made all of the background squares on my machine and did the window sewing by hand.

http://hyena-in-petticoats.blogspot.com/2007/08/cathedral-window-quilt-tutorial.html
This is an outstanding tutorial that teaches a different method for making cathedral windows.

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