Rowing Again, and Summer Sensations almost here!

Hi!

My friend and I went to get our Saturday Sampler blocks this past Saturday (7/9) and decided to stop in at some other shops in the area to get their Row patterns. Do you have a local shop that does Saturday Sampler? I know the idea goes back 10 years or so and I started going to Knight's Quilt Shop in 2012 after my shop closed in 2011. You purchase your first block in January, bring back the sewn block the next month and get the kit free. If you don't get it sewn, or can't go on the correct Saturday, you don't get it free, it's $5. Little Lamb Quilt Shop always did the first Saturday. Knight's is on the second Saturday. I've got 4 years worth of blocks done and still haven't assembled a top. I'll get to it!

After getting our blocks and row pattern at Knight's, we headed north along the New Hampshire/Maine border. We stopped at four other shops:

Saltwater Fabrics, South Berwick, ME. This one is titled "The Perfect Sewing Room." You can see the ocean out the windows - so clever!

The Village Quilt Shop, Berwick, ME.

Sanford Sewing Machines in Sanford, ME.

Footprints Quilt Shoppe in Rochester, NH.

That brings me to 10 row patterns collected so far. People are turning in completed quilts and winning 25 fat quarters already. I am saving the rows for future sewing. I've been scanning them as I get them so I will be able to find them when ready to sew.

The other news today is the schedule for the Summer Sensations Blog Hop that I'm participating in has been sent out to participants. My turn is on Sunday, July 24. I have a quick and easy project I'll be sharing. Please visit the wonderful Marian at Seams to be Sew for more information.

I'll be back with the next block for 101 Patchwork Quilts later this week.

Thanks for visiting,
Mary

101 Patchwork Patterns - Block 5

Good afternoon,

I meant to post this block yesterday but went out shop hopping for the Row by Row Experience. We just went to 1 shop in Massachusetts and then swung back up and stopped at 4 New Hampshire shops. So, a good day for collecting row patterns. We went to:

Portsmouth Fabric Company, Portsmouth NH

Red Barn Sewing & Yarn, Merrimac MA

D & D Sewing and Quilting, Plaistow NH

Pintuck & Purl, Exeter NH

Stitched in Stone, Kingston NH

I've downloaded the photo reference pages from https://www.rowbyrowexperience.com/ and we've noticed a number of rows are patriotic. Wouldn't it be fun to do a quilt with just the various patriotic themed rows? 

We also found a group of 6 shops in Western Massachusetts who's rows go together. This was designed by Valerie Morton. Take a look at this:

It will make for a long day trip but I hope we can do it. What a great idea! The shops are:

• Bayberry Quilt & Gift Shoppe, Chicopee MA
• Quilts & Treasures, East Longmeadow MA
• Pumpkin Patch, Lee MA
• Karen's Quilting Corner, Williamstown MA
• Brookside Quiltworks, South Egremont MA
• A Notion to Quilt, Shelburne Falls MA

101 Patchwork Patterns Block 5 Spool

This week's block is a simple spool of thread. You can make yours any color you want. I colored the block in Electric Quilt with blue but made it with red. The choice is yours! You may download the pattern here.

1. Make two half square triangle blocks with the 3-7/8" background and spool squares. I drew a line corner to corner on the beige side but it doesn't show in the photo because I used beige thread. So this side shows the two lines of stitching, a quarter inch either side of the drawn line.

Add the half square triangle units to the 3-1/2" spool squares. Clip the points once the rows of the block are sewn. 

Sew the two background and one thread 3-1/2" squares together. Press towards the background.

 Add the top and bottom spool rows to the center row. Press towards the center row.

And here you have your spool block completed.

My photos are taken on a Steady Betty block pressing board that I keep right next to the sewing machine. It's starting to look a little worn, but I've had it for five years and it gets a lot of use. I guess it's held up pretty well.

Here's what the quilt looks like now. I've worked ahead and have the rest of this size blocks chosen and drawn. Now to sew them and write the patterns! I've chosen two different basket patterns as the last block of this round. One is pieced and the other has an appliqued handle. So it will be up to you which to use. We will be able to assemble the top as we go. The spacer rows are added to make the measurements work out for the next round of blocks. Visually it will break up the blocks a bit as well.

Hope you are enjoying making these beginning blocks. Please contact me if you have any questions.

Thanks,

Mary

101 Patchwork Patterns - Block 4

Hello!

Have you done any hopping on the Row by Row Experience yet? It started last week. I went into a local shop on Sunday... and forgot to ask for their row pattern! At least it was a local shop (Portsmouth Fabric Company) and it will be easy to stop in there again. I went in specifically for some light batiks during their sale and forgot the row pattern, and bobbins for my home machine. Forgot the darn bobbins too! I never seem to have enough bobbins. If you are a lover of Kaffe Fassett fabric they have their 2015 row "Kaffe Sets Sail" available on their website and in the shop.

Our block this week is called Shoo Fly. I found information saying the block is from the first half of the 1800s but quilts made from it were usually 1875 or later on www.quiltindex.com. It is also called Hole in the Barn Door and frequently associated with the Amish.

Download the pdf pattern for Shoo Fly here.

Make half square triangle units:
This is the same process we started with last week. I am going to add some basic reference pages in the near future. The first time we use a unit in a block we'll cover it in detail. Subsequent appearances will be shorter and refer to the general instructions pages.

1. Draw a line on the wrong side of the lighter fabric, corner to corner.

2. Sew 1/4" from the drawn line on both sides of the line.

3. Cut on the drawn line and press open, towards the darker fabric.

Press towards green.

Make your rows:

4. Lay out the squares and half squares as shown in the block picture. Sew the rows together.

Clip the points as you sew the seams between pieces (shown by the arrow).

5. Sew the rows together into the block.

We have now completed 4 blocks of our quilt. I have gone through all 101 patterns and chosen blocks for the rest of the quilt. It will not include all 101 blocks. It will include optional applique blocks that can be used in place of a pieced block. Some quilters prefer not to do applique so I haven't made it mandatory. I am going to supply the border instructions soon so that you can start working on it if you wish to. I don't often do pieced borders and there are a lot of blocks in this one!

Here is where we are at with the completion of today's block:

Thanks for visiting. Do contact me if you have any questions about the blocks.

Mary

Row by Row Experience starts today!

This year's Row by Row Experience runs from today, June 21st through September 6. I'm looking forward to going out shop hopping this summer and collecting row patterns. Of course, I have a project box that contain kits and patterns from last summer that I haven't finished. I plan to only collect patterns this year. I'm sure I won't be able to resist a few kits but I'm really going to try not to give in. I wrote the patterns for Seacoast Sewing and Quilting in Portsmouth, NH and Biddeford, ME.

Since my husband passed away in April I've been trying to sort through things and start to downsize. I don't need this big house all to myself, and I won't be able to afford it indefinitely. The biggest problem is we're the third generation to live in the house and no one ever threw anything out. I mean it. Newspapers from 1916 are in the drawer of the secretary. There is a built in cupboard in the dining room with glass doors, and on top of Mark's grandparent's wedding china are obituaries clipped from the newspaper going back 100 years. His grandparents were married on June 28, 1916 and lived here for the rest of their days. Mark's mother never lived anywhere else. And we were married on June 28, 2000, so that tells you how important family history was to Mark. Does that give you an idea of what I am sorting through?

I have fabric and kits left over from Little Lamb Quilt Shop in Barrington, NH, that I owned from 2004 - 2011. I'm going to be listing things on eBay and I'll share links when I do. We ran a Thimbleberries Club from 2005-2011 so I have a lot of Thimbleberries fabric. In the last few years I've begun to collect batiks and the modern prints and colors available now. I remember fabric reps showing modern fabric lines to me the last couple years before we closed and I didn't like them at the time. Now I love them! Oh well, tastes change, and mine has. And some people are going to get good deals.

I'll be back tomorrow with the next block in our 101 Patchwork Patterns quilt. I still haven't found my thirties fat quarter collection so I'm continuing to make the blocks with batiks.

Mary

Row by Row Experience

Did you participate in last year’s Row by Row Experience shop hop during the summer? If I counted right, a friend and I went to about 30 shops over several day trips. We stopped in shops from Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts and Connecticut. I even did a couple extra on the way to and from doctor’s appointments in Massachusetts. And I started out great, making rows as soon as I got the patterns. Now, as is my habit, it all sits in a project box waiting to be finished.

The 2016 Row by Row Experience theme is Home Sweet Home. I’m sure this is going to produce some wonder row patterns. You can look at their website and blog for more information. There is a fabric line from TimelessTreasures, designed by Debra Gabel, coming out now. Hancock’s of Paducah has it on sale! There is also a coloring book available.It looks like the shops will be listed by state on Facebook. If you don’t know, you do not have to belong to Facebook in order to view public pages.

I found a blog post from The Little Green Bean on how to make a fabric map, complete with .studio files for each state. I don’t have a Cameo cutting machine to use the files but I am planning on getting a Brother Scan n Cut in the near future. You can convert the cutting files to your format but I’ll save how for another post, once I’ve actually done it. If you have a summer road trip planned you could combine that with Row by Row quilt shop stops and make a map of your trip. I’m envisioning a black map outline with scrappy states appliqued for where you were. My family took a trip to California from Connecticut when I was 7. I have the atlas that mom marked, and lots of photos. Wouldn’t that make a fun memory wall quilt?

Thanks for visiting, and don’t forget to share this blog with your friends.

Mary