179 -Wall Hanging
Auntie Karwe made this special quillt to hang in Emmie's room.  Both are very cute.

178 - Cindy's Color Box Quilt

Cindy Wiens pieced this quilt top for the Mennonite Central Committee Quilt Auction that will be held in Fresno, CA this spring. Her husband, Mark, my cousin, came up with the border design. Good job, Mark.

I had the honor of quilting this beautiful quilt. The solids are Kona Cotton, which were one of my sister, Julia's favorite fabrics. I sure do miss you, Julia.

Most of these blocks have more than 50 pieces in them. The scrap pieces were paper pieced and had some great memory fabrics in them as well. Very nice job Cindy.

Posted by Ione

Quilt # 177 - T Shirt Quilt

We were commissioned to make a T Shirt Quilt from my cousin's Track & Field shirts from High School and College.

Pieces of favorite running shorts and also socks were added to the quilt top.

Even pieces of the favorite worn quilt that was taken on the bus were added to the back. Lots of fun and over 35 hours of work. Enjoy it, glad we could help take an item off your To Do List.

Thanksgiving 2011

No quilt this time just Happy Thanksgiving wishes to our family and friends. We are so thankful for our special day we had with our family. We made the candy turkeys yesterday and today Emily loved eating hers. She just ate the vanilla wafer and didn't eat the candies so not too bad.
A special thanks to the men and women who have volunteered to serve in the military. We will not forget those who paid the ultimate price for our freedom or their families, thank you. Erwin Harder - 1948 to 1969, William Bartram - 1959 to 1989, Andrew Shields - 1988 to 2008, and Anthony McDowell - 1967 to 2011.

BQ3

BQ3 by Maple Island Quilts

Now I just need to decide how I want to do the layout for these blocks. I'll show you a picture when the quilt is finished.

Quilt # 176 - Star with Dancing Block Border
58" X 58" 2011
This star block is an easy, fun quilt to make. By adding different borders it easily becomes a twin size quilt. I wanted an easy quilt so time could be spent on the dancing block border. This quilt is the sample for the quilt class I will be teaching at Diamond Lake, OR on July 10, 2011. Please let me know if you want to join the class.

#175 - Cabin Wall Hanging

I made this small wall hanging for some friends who have a cabin retreat. I hand embroidered the middle, adjusting a cabin stencil I had. We found a stick in the yard to use as a hanger. The perfect thank you gift!!

#174 - Jessica's Comfort Quilt

This "From Scraps to 12" Quilt was made for a bowling friend, Lori's Granddaughter, Jessica.

The bright cheery fabric has butterflies on it so quilted it with the Rebekah's Butterfly Garden Pantograph designed by a friend, Dave Hudson, from Pattern Man Designs.

Jessica, there are alot of people wishing you strength and courage.

I think about you often, Ione.

173 - Quilts for our Heroes

Happy Veterans Day. We are the land of the free because of the brave.

Thank you. Happy Birthday, Marine Corps.

Erwin Harder - 1948 to 1969

William Bartram - 1959 to 1989

Andrew Shields - 1988 to 2008

You and your families are not forgotten. Thank you

Quilt 171 - From Scraps to 12 with Oodles of Doodles for Emily

FROM SCRAPS TO 12 WITH OODLES OF DOODLES FOR EMILY

2010

36" X 48"

Miss Emily was kind enough to pose for pictures with her quilt from Grandma on a 100 degree day. The airconditioner and fans were blowing and she loves the colors of the fabric in this quilt. In May when I went to Quilt Market in Minneapolis I took a School House Class from my friend, Ricky Tims. He showed his new line of fabric from Red Rooster called "Oodles of Doodles". It will be in quilts shops this September/October. When the samples of this line were shown in pink, I knew this would be the fabric I used for my new granddaughter who was due in June. I used my pattern "From Scraps to 12" to make this quilt. I quilted the fabric designs and in the green block by Emily I quilted "Grandpa and Grandma Whitney love Emily". A pediatric nurse once said baby quilts should have rounded corners since infants can't move the corner if it pokes them in the eye. That idea makes sense to me, so Emily's quilt has rounded corners. I used Hobbs Wool Batting in this quilt and it drapes very nicely and can be washed. The quilt is really cute but it doesn't compare to the precious baby who has joined our family. We love you Emily. Posted by Grandma.

#170 American Hero Star

Happy 4th of July Everyone. Here is a star quilt that we just made at the American Hero Quilt Sew Day.

Love the simplicity of the pattern and hope to make alot of this quilt so we can get quilts on more of our heroes who make this, our Independence Day possible. Thanks to all our servicemembers and their families.

Erwin Harder, 1948-1969, William Bartram - 1989, and Andrew Shields 1988-2008, you are not forgotten.

Posted by Doug and Ione

Baby Emily

Well, it isn't a quilt, but Grandma Ione thinks it is just as good! Ione's first Grandchild was born this week. Her son, his wife and the baby are all doing well!

#169 - American Hero Quilt

#169 - American Hero Quilt
It is Memorial Day Weekend 2010 and we are sharing this American Hero Quilt that was made at one of our Sew Days at Pacific Beach. We are part of the American Hero Quilt Project that is supplying quilts to Madigan Hospital for injured servicemembers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. We are also supplying quilts to the receiving hospital in Afghanistan where wounded warriors are first treated and prepared for transport to Germany. We are glad to be part of an ever growing group and so happy that more and more quilters are stepping up to help in this endeavor.

This Memorial Day we want to thank our Fallen Heros and their families for the sacrifice they paid for our freedom. We know that freedom isn't free.
Erwin Harder and Andrew Shields you are not forgotton.

Quilt 140 - AHQ Jewel Box Star

April, 2010
50 x 60

I started this quilt a few months ago for the American Hero Quilts (AHQ) project. Mom was hosting another (AHQ) sew weekend at Pacific Beach, so I made sure we had this along to finish up.

Normally you would put the jewel box squares and the star squares right next to each other so you get a secondary pattern, but the blues and reds didn't seem to have enough contrast and the pattern was just getting lost. So, improvise was the word of the day. I decided to set off each block with dark sashing, and used extra partial blocks to make it a little longer.

It still needs a small border, probably dark blue. Looking forward to another sewing weekend!

Quilt 139 - Mennonite Auction Quilt

Cindy Wiens pieced this Pam Bono pattern and it was machine quilted by Ione Ewert Whitney.

Cindy and Ione were happy with the winning bid. This was one of those quilts that many quilting ideas were auditioned on the plexi glass before the quilting started.

Quilt 138 - Canyon Rim Quilt 2010

CANYON RIM QUILT 98" x 108"

9 Patch / Hour Glass

Quilt top was pieced by Adele and Betty.

Quilted by Ione

Many lovely pansy fabrics were used in this quilt top. Each year we as sisters make a quilt for the fund raising event for Canyon Rim Manor.

Who will be the winner of this quilt?

Mom and Betty are checking out the quilting. Big quilt that needs the binding yet but then will be ready to display.

Mom, Adele and Betty ready for the Valentines Dinner at Canyon Rim. What pretty ladies and flowers.

Quilt 137 - Teal Coffee Quilt

During our stay at Pacific Beach in January, we made a trip to the quilt shop in Ocean Shores. I found a pack of squares from a line of coffee inspired fabrics that were too cute to leave on the shelf. I bought a yard of the teal and brown companion fabric for the border.

A few different patterns went through my mind, but I decided to just leave the squares as they were and make a simple quilt that showed off the colors and design of the fabric. I plan on quilting it with cross-hatching and binding in the same fabric as the border. It will hang on the wall across from my kitchen.

Quilt 136 - Green and Pink Wall Hanging

40 x 40"

We are out at Pacific Beach doing some quilting and a little sightseeing. I made this the first night here knowing we'd be doing some driving and hiking the next day. The fabrics were a gift from my boss, a package of green and pink fat quarters. I hadn't know what I'd do with them, but one of the books we brought proved to be the right inspiration. The flowers still need to be appliqued, but we still have a couple of days.

Storms tonight again, but we are prepared. The pictures below were taken on our trip up the coast today.

Quilt 135 - Avo-Cat-O wool ornament

2009

4x6"

As a follow up to The Avocato wall hanging I made for my friend last Christmas (Quilt 119 on this blog), I ressurected this small wool version for her gift this year. This had been my first attempt at this pattern, which is Block One of Helene Knott's Garden Patch Cats called The Avocato. I had thought that making it smaller and doing a wool applique would be easier and faster, but I ended up not liking it at all and made the full size version in cotton instead.

This little wool version almost ended up the garbage can, but after all the time I spent on it, I went with my Mom's theory of "Save it! You never know..." And she was right! I pulled it out again after a year had passed and it wasn't quite the tragedy I had remembered. I put a little embroidery embellishment on it, whip stitched a back on it, took black wire from some other ill-fated craft project to make a little hanger for it and voila!

She loved it and only wished she could have a dozen more to cover her tree with! Maybe next year...

Quilt 134 - Office Wall Hangings

2009

13" x 16"

The law firm I work for moved to a different building this year, and my new office had a large blank wall that was just crying out for a wall hanging. When packing up her office, my boss found several rods from old card catalog drawers that she just couldn't bear to throw away. The moment I saw them I said "quilt hangers"!! They are only about 16" long, so I had my dimensions pretty much figured out before I started the quilts.

On a trip to Chelan, I had purchased some fat quarters that I knew would come in handy someday, but didn't really have a project in mind. They turned out to be the perfect mix of the neutral used on the walls of our new office and some bright cheery reds and pinks to liven up my office space. I used the Convergence technique and added an accent border on the bottom to make them a little longer than they are wide.

I also tried a new technique for binding, using strips on the sides and triangles in the corners, to avoid having any binding showing on the front. Fun!! I already have some other small quilts in mind so I can change them out every couple of months.

My high tech solution for mounting the rods: gold colored thumbed tacks. It would have been little cup hooks, but the drug store didn't have any, so gold thumb tacks it is!