Yes, I’m familiar with the “don’t ask me to hem your pants” mantra, but my church asked those who could to host activities as a fundraiser, so I offered a mending clinic. My blogging friend Mariss, in South Africa, teaches mending, so I thought I could, too. If you click on this link, you’ll see that her mending class is much more structured than mine!

I just told people to bring what they wanted to mend and we’d figure it out. Most of us had fun! Here are a few of the successes:

This older commercial quilt had been attacked by a dog; the patch was cut from a piece of fabric I quilted years ago.

There was a little hole in this favorite T shirt, so the owner covered it with a pretty coordinating fabric that ended up looking like a badge or pin.

This fleece blanket had somehow been split down the middle; the owner fixed it by sewing wide binding to both sides.

Another woman patched her jeans in multiple places, but I failed to get a picture of her her work.

And despite all the mending fun, I got the binding on this little art quilt.

Circle from Ankara fabric, 45″ x 45″

Have you done any mending lately? And BTW, we didn’t hem any pants!

As in very little, 8″ x 10″. I joined a group of friends to learn to make a collage from one of Laura Heine’s kits. We were warned to choose one of her small “Whatevers” so we could finish in one afternoon.

“Amazing Truck”, 8″ x 10″

This truck full of flowers was attractive but a bit too SS&G, as my Mother would have said (Sweet, Simple, & Girlish). So I added an alien who had been dumped out of his spaceship but landed gently on the flowers. He’ll be up and walking again by the time the truck stops.

This was a fun exercise and I probably will make one of Laura Heine’s larger collages using my own fabric. It’s a nice thing to do with friends.

And now for the experiment. You may recall that one of my groups made these blocks:

I decided to make mine into a little wall hanging–in this instance about 24″ square, so bigger than the one with the truck!

I first tried an experiment with some scraps

It worked, so I made a “dimple” in the circle I cut from the strip blocks.

Nip, 24″ x 24″

I quilted this but haven’t bound or faced it because it was just an experiment. I may never “finish” it, or I may use it to try a new edge-finish technique.

Have you tried quilt collage? Laura Heine or other? Did you enjoy it?

I just finished this quilt top and this is the last you will see of it, because a friend quilts all our group’s quilts for Flying Horse Farms. She even binds them, so after I give her the top, backing, batting, and binding, I’m done! Such a deal, right?

Although I like this quilt, I can’t really recommend the pattern because of the way it’s printed. The layout is clever, but the publisher obviously wanted to save paper and ink so the illustrations aren’t placed with the text–you have to keep going to the next page to see what they’re talking about! Thus a pattern that should have been easy was kind of a pain.

Quilt Stats

Name: Tranquility

Finished size: 60″ x 70″ (which was a 6-yard quilt, not 3-yard)

Pattern by: Fabric Cafe, from the book Make It Modern With 3-Yard Quilts

Pieced by: me

To be quilted and bound by my friend Jerri!

One of the groups I belong to recently decided to experiment with adding narrow strips to make a design more interesting. We used orphan blocks for practice. Unfortunately, I didn’t take “before” pictures, but here are the modified blocks. You can click on any block for a closer look.

Our next project is to take the blocks below (made in a previous challenge)

and make them into a finished project, either as they are or modified in any way we want.

Stay tuned!

I had in mind to make 3 quilts for the Quilts of Valor program this year. The last one is ready, so here they are. These are given to military veterans to thank them for their service, but I make them in honor of my parents, who both served in World War II. You can see their pictures in an earlier post, here.

Here are the finished quilts. I’ll now take them to my local QOV representative who will see that they get to deserving veterans.

QOV 2025-1, 60″ x 80″

QOV 2025-2, 61″ x 72″

QOV 2025-3, 61″ x 74″

All these were quilted by Linda Nichols, who is an official QOV longarmer

Now it’s on to the next quilt–you know that story! What are you up making these days?

OK, the first finish isn’t mine, but it’s all the more notable because of that. A friend who had previously made only two quilts decided she wanted to make a sea glass quilt and asked for my help. And by help, I mean I only showed her how to do things; she did every bit of the cutting, fusing, quilting, and binding herself! She just decided she could do it, and she DID.

Sea Glass wall hanging by Michele

The only part that gave her any trouble was the binding, and I think we can all agree that’s a challenge for many quilters.

The second finish is a quilt I made for the Mancuso Celebrating Women challenge.

Full Circle

To make this, I cut up a partial quilt top left by my Grandmother, Mary Lee Ownbey Kimsey. I’ve written before about the dilemma of what to do with the unfinished pieces I inherited, and this seemed an appropriate solution.

Grandmother’s wedding picture, 1908

Granny pieced by hand and her seam allowances were only about 1/8″! However, there was NO chance those seams were coming apart. She took tiny stitches and backstitched frequently to lock the seams. I originally tried taking some of it apart to re-use, but that was almost impossible!

Quilt Stats

Name: Full Circle

Finished size: 24″ x 24″

Designed, pieced, quilted by me, using some pieces joined by my Grandmother some time in the 1950s.

I submitted this in accordance with my resolution to submit more/be rejected more this year. And by the way my entry to the International Quilt Festival was not accepted, but the point is that I tried.

“Irregularly irregular” is the verbal description of atrial fibrillation, a common but abnormal cardiac rhythm. The words stuck in my head (I’m a word person) so that’s what I named this little quilt. The quilt itself is irregularly irregular, but I figure that’s good for art.

The 4 quadrants are all different sizes, the seams are intentionally unmatched, and the quilting is irregularly spaced.

The edges are wonky, too, but THAT was an accident. I found the 2A foot among the accessories for my new Bernina 570 and wondered what it was for. With the help of Ms. Google I quickly found a video of someone using it to finish a quilt edge with a satin stitch, so I tried it.

It distorted the edges, and especially the corners, of the quilt. Of course, this was my first attempt, so I may get better with practice. Or not. Stay tuned.

Quilt Stats

Name: Irregularly Irregular

Finished size: 15″ x 15″

Designed and quilted by me.

And when the next person asks, “What’s this one for?” the answer is “Because I wanted to”!

I admire the graphic nature of many of the designs by Eudaimonia Studio and have made several quilts from her patterns. This latest one is from a pattern named Sincerely.

The background fabric is a metallic silver I bought some time ago. Maybe you can see it better in this next photo. Look at the cool quilting as well–it’s a panto from Urban Elementz called Retro Lines One.

Quilt Stats

Name: Sincerely

Pattern: Sincerely by Eudaimonia Studio

Finished size: 59″ x 59″

Pieced by: me

Quilted by: Linda Nichols

If you like unusual patterns, check out Eudaimonia Studio. She has a number of free patterns in addition to those for sale in her shop.

For those of you not familiar with it, the phrase “half a bubble off plumb” is used to describe someone or some action that isn’t quite right (in the opinion of the speaker, of course). The “bubble” referred to is that on a traditional level (tool used in building), which will be half a bubble off if the board you’ve laid it on isn’t level. And so…

Since this quilt is a little crazy, I named it Half A Bubble Off Plumb. 

This quilt is made from “studies” done in Tara Faughnan’s block studies course for 2024-25, which of course you’ve read about here. I added a few strips and other pieces and re-arranged the pieces for days before deciding on the layout.

After deliberation, I decided on this black fabric with tiny dots of various colors for the binding.

Quilt Stats

Name: Half A Bubble Off Plumb

Finished size: 57″ x 59″

Designed by: me, using blocks from Tara Faughnan’s block studies course

Quilted by: Linda Nichols

I guess this counts as another orphan quilt, with more to come because I have lots of blocks left from Tara’s class.

As mentioned previously, I have well over 100 “orphan blocks”. Many are just leftovers from quilts where I made extra blocks. A friend recently asked WHAT I could do with them!

I know some of you like to put those on the back of the quilt, and I agree it looks good, BUT: I hate piecing backs, and long-arm quilters hate pieced backs. That’s two reasons, and the second one is the more important; I DO NOT want to aggravate anybody who is willing to quilt for me.

I do piece backs sometimes anyway. For example, this quilt had so very many extra blocks that I just made it reversable:

This and other patterns by Sassafras Lane are surprisingly easy and are good for using fabric collections

But what else can be done with them?

If you have 9 that are similar enough in color/value/style/whatever, a Circle of Nine quilt works well. There are multiple Circle of Nine quilt books by Janet Houts and Jean Ann Wright; just look on the used book websites.

A couple of Circle of Nine Quilt,s to use up orphan blocks

I’ve also taken a bunch of leftover blocks, cut them up, and put them on the design wall with variable sashing to make an improv quilt.

I made this quilt from orphan blocks

Orphan blocks can be used in place of focus fabric in quilts designed for big prints, like the BQ patterns.

Orphan blocks can be used as the “focus fabric” in patterns designed for big prints

And some of us are so stuck on the same color families that blocks from many different quilts can be combined into one. This next quilt is made entirely from orphan blocks. Some had to have sashing added, some had to be cut up, but they all worked.

Blue Sky and Sunshine, 60″ x 72″

Of course a limited number of similar blocks can be combined into a table runner, even if it’s necessary to add sashing to make the sizes equal..

This little block was hand quilted and given a facing to finish the edges for a wall hanging.

I had forgotten about this little leaf-pounding piece that I quilted by hand.

And individual blocks can be made into placemats, mug rugs, potholders, etc.

What do you do with orphan blocks?