March Madness

March really needs to simmer down! We've had more wintery weather this month than we've really had all winter and at this point in the year we are so looking forward to spring in Nova Scotia! But a good snow day makes for a good sew day regardless of what season the calendar proclaims we are in! So... while the weather outside was indeed frightful this week, inside the sewing room things were rather blissful!

The Robot was laying down some thread wizardry on a customers Labyrinth Quilt. I used a pantograph called Chinese Crescents by Keryn Emmerson for the first time on this one. It was elegant but not fussy, and it seemed to compliment the patchwork without overpowering the mazes. 

Keeping The Robot moving along requires me to be nearby to advance the quilt and since I had to hang out I figured I might as well get going on a quilt for a new kid on the block. My cousin and his girlfriend are expecting a baby girl this spring. They are going to name her Evangeline, and intend to call her Eva for short. I decided to make that sweet little Star Bright quilt from Swim Bike Quilt. I have made it several times and love it! It sews up so nicely and since I don't have a very big stack of pinks to pull from it would work well within the limits of my stash.

Eva! My grandmothers name. Evangeline will be a namesake of sorts for her great, great grandma so I felt compelled to put her name on the quilt! Not all 10 letters though, just 3 little free pieced letters showcased in the white space within the star.

Typically the star center is made up of four 6 inch squares. But in this case I made the letters, then put them together surrounded with plenty of the background fabric and then just cut the 11.5" square for the center square. The rest of the pattern was made as the directions suggest, though I did switch out some of the low volume prints in the background for pinks. Remember those groovy pigs? And those elephants from a long ago love affair I'd been having with the trunked beauties? 

Nan was a very talented seamstress. She was a wizard herself and I always figured she could have put a tail on a cat. She would have loved all the goings-on in my sewing room. Can you imagine her seeing The Robot work its magic? She did all her stitching on an old Jones treadle that she had converted to electric, it was a true work horse. Being lucky enough to grow up across the street from her meant that aside from learning to appreciate lilacs, molasses cookies and rocking chairs, I learned to sew on that machine with her hovering behind me.

I've got another customer quilt to complete this week before I get this one quilted up, but with a Baby Shower looming on the 8th of April, I had better get cracking!