on the path

I have been learning a little bit about photo effects that can be used to enhance or alter the look of an everyday digital picture.  This picture was popped into Instagram and one of the filters really made the highlights of the blocks and stitching pop into view.

This was a quilt made by a customer, using the traditional "Drunkard's Path" block.  Each block is made of 2 pieces, one is a quarter of a circle and the other is the arc that matches up to that circle edge and completes the square.  This quilter used all blue and white, making a very distinctive design.  She told me she likes a more traditional style, so I thought feathers in the blocks were called for.  I tried to find a little more history about this quilt block to share with you, and didn't turn up many facts.  But I did learn this:  Legend has it that some quilters believed that it was bad luck to piece a Drunkard's Path quilt-the person who slept under it might develop a thirst for drink and wander far from home.

Let's hope that wasn't true for this quilt maker!  Probably the biggest challenge with this quilt (besides staying sober!) was determining how to do the design with the fewest stops and starts.  Those pesky stops and starts always mean securing the stitches and thread ends so they won't come apart, and can be hard to do and make as neat as possible so as to not detract from the design.  Once I figured that out, it was smooth sailing!

I finished up another very important project--

ready for stuffing!  I have written before that I made a set of 4 of these quite awhile back, where there were just 4 in our little family.  Then along came a super son-in-law, so I dusted off the old pattern and made one more.  Now, we have a need for stocking #6 plus one more on the way!  So I actually put together 3 new stockings, repeating some of the same fabrics or similar ones.  Now we have Ian's name on one, and another is reserved for his baby-brother-to-be, plus I am ahead a stocking "just in case"!

This is the trusty old pattern--

probably now only to be purchased at an antique store!  The leaves and the berry on the cuff detail are sewn on using fusible web and the blanket stitch on my machine.  I used to use this technique a lot, back in my early days of quilting, but now not so much.  It was a good jog for my memory to do it again.

I have also been dabbling with some wool pieces lately, working on some possibilities for classes at the store.  We sell quite a bit of wool and often have customers looking for instruction or just a group to join that shares the love of wool applique.

These hexagons are just the beginning of a set of pieces that would make an entire quilt.  They come from Under the Garden Moon.  There are many cute designs and include not only the applique process, but embellishment with stitching, too. 

Also in the works is a set of 12 little quiltlets that include a traditional quilt block with a wool applique design to coordinate.  These come from Buttermilk Basin, and I am working up some kits for them.

Here's my little Ian, showing off his "fish face" much to the delight of his grownups!  Just when I think he can't be any more lovable, he finds one more way to tug at my heartstrings!