Back to Farmer's Wife Blocks!

It's been a while since I published a blog on the progress of the Farmer's Wife blocks that I completed back in January!  I found some significant yardage back here in New York so I managed to finish bordering them all last week!  I am going to make the king sized quilt in two pieces each 5 blocks wide by 9 blocks long.  These are the 30's FW blocks that I did.  For some reason, I missed quite a few in the book but have now given away the book.  I had one block left over which is one I wasn't all that crazy about anyway.  This is the second half.  The blocks finish at 8 1/2 inches square.  The strips around the regular blocks were cut 1 3/4 in wide and the half square triangles were cut from a 5 1/2 in square.  It used a lot of fabric but I must have had a full bolt of this off white fabric.

This was the first half of the quilt.  I am very pleased with it.  I found some leftover striped blue fabric that I am going to cut up and use as an outside border.  First will be a border of the off white and then a narrow border of green.

After I finished all the blocks from the 30's book, I decided I might as well do the 20's blocks, of which I have about 10 more so this quilt will be 9 x 11 blocks I think.  The blocks are very bright and I had a really difficult time deciding on how I would border them and how i would set them.  You can see this set is columns of straight set and then on point set and then straight set.

I thought I would like the green for setting the blocks as the yellow is so bright but didn't like it at all.  The background green is a better match than it looks in this picture however.

I found some significant yardage of a very pale yellow and decided that I would try that.  It is not perfect but is okay.  There is so much bright yellow in the blocks in this bunch of blocks.

This was my first day's work and you can clearly see the yellow background.  In some ways, it almost mutes the brighter yellow.  So I forged ahead!

And here is what is done after two days.  I actually found one of those slotted rulers that had 1/4 markings which made the cutting of the strips much more accurate.  These blocks also finish at 8 1/2 inches.  I am going to use purple and dark green in the borders to try to tone it down a bit.  I won't be doing any of the machine quilting until I get back to NC where my faithful Juki is as well as my pool noodles which make basting much easier!  I don't put on borders anymore until I finish machine quilting the whole quilt and get the two sections sewn together.  They lay so much flatter that way and i never have to measure the outside!

Genesee Valley Quilt Club May Meeting -- Part III - Part II of Beverley's Trunk Show

You can begin to see Bev's transition from more traditional structures which she had touched on briefly before.

This was a self portrait done in a class!

Beverly does lots and lots of machine quilting in her pieces which you can see if you look closely here.  

She uses all of her hand dyed pieces which obviously have numerous techniques applied to them.  She is emerging from a straight rectangular set as well!

This was one of my favorites and is really part of another series.

This actually is a piece that is split in 2.

This is her last piece and isn't done yet!

It was a great show and the group really enjoyed it!  

Beverly commented that she has to have her hands busy and that is me as well.  I can't watch tv without doing something!

 

Genesee Valley Quilt Club May Meeting - Part II -- Beverly Kondolf Trunk Show

It was really a delight to see Beverly's journey from very traditional quilting into art quilting.  She and I joined the quilt club just about the same time and soon were leading up a committee that spent several years documenting the quilts at the Rochester Museum and Science Center.  She credits me with getting her into the art quilt goup which had recently formed (around the year 2000!).  Most of her older quilts were hand quilted and she has done a lot of hand piecing as well and taught it to club members on Saturday.  She mostly does art quilts now using her own hand dyed fabrics.

This is the beginning! 

This was done with blocks from a Suzie Payne workshop -- a lot of us learned piecing from this local lady.  Suzie was the one that encouraged her to join the guild.   

Here she is starting to move toward art quilting with this lovely composition.  I don't remember seeing a lot of these quilts!

 

Really seeing the beginning of transitioning to art quilts here.  The trees were made of some sort of twisted fabric that she hand sewed down.  

This is the back of the following quilt.  I noticed Beverly constructed many of her backs.  She is beginning to use more and more of her hand dyed fabrics and said she mostly uses purchased fabrics for the backs.

Here you can see her movement to more improvisational quilting.  

Using only her hand dyed fabrics here in a piece called Vesseks (I believe).

 

This is actually 3 pieces which are supposed to be hung vertically.  Again, she used her hand dyes.

This was a quilt which was made as a result of our Mola Challenge in our art quilt group.  Many many of us had purchased molas from Priscilla Kibbee and the challenge was to use one as inspiration.  I believe they all hung somewhere but can't remember where.  I also participated in that challenge.

This was also inspired by a mola but was less literal than the last piece.  There is a chicken on the mola and that inspired the chicken tracks across the quilt.

This is the first in a series of quilts Beverly did.  It was also an art quilt group challenge.  We were to create a quilt inspired by the Almighty Dollar.  This was Bev's interpretation of the E on the bill.  I also participated in this challenge and the quilts were hung in the Rochester Public Library.  My quilt and a couple of others were also featured in a coin magazine thanks to my sister!

This is inspired by the previous quilt.  It was supposed to be dark blue and red but her dyeing resulted in a more purple hue.

Leftovers from the preevious quilt!

The next three are also interpretations of the block in different colors and orientations.

 

Quilts from the Genesee Valley Quilt Club May Meeting - Part 1

This first bunch are just a very few of the Comfort Quilts that were donated this month.  They had a total of 49 but the ladies were moving awful fast across the stage so a lot of my pics were very blurry.  Quite a few of the quilts were variations of the quilt.

I really liked this one -- simple but effective and scrappy!

Another one I really liked!  I may do one of these myself.  Again, simple but effective.

This is the raffle quitl for this month's meeting.

I apologize in advance for not having the maker's names for most of these Show and Tell quilts.  We have an outstandingly talented quilt club here!

This one was spectacular!

This was designed and made by a very talented artist in the club -- Vicki Coykendall.  She should really sell this pattern.  The quilt is for her first grandchild.

The next post (or posts) will include the quilts done by our speaker and long time friend -- Beverly Kondolf - who did a lovely trunk show.  I luckily had taken a seat right up front which is unusual for me but I am glad I did.