Cats and Dogs
05-30-2019, 11:04 AM
#1
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Location: Peoria, IL -- Midwest Transplant
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Cats and Dogs
This first quilt was also my first internet block swap. It came from Robert Calleham's Kitty Cat Charm pattern which was in McCalls Quilting October 2000 and we had the swap pretty soon after. I remember the Dread Pirate Rodgers and am pretty darn sure this was the swap! At least I recognize fabrics I used and others that were given to me in both quilts...
http://piraterodgers.com/quilting/20...p-block-quilt/
(sorry if link is not appropriate)
Rules were follow directions in magazine and make blocks out of cat fabrics with off-white background. Some people have a much darker idea of "off-white" than I think! I would have completed the top probably in the Spring of 2001. Obviously my border is one of my "let's take a simple idea and make it harder!" ideas. The paw prints were pieced in old school traditional ways, using little tiny triangles and all that, I would at least paper piece if I did it again. The string around the edge was hand couched before I quilted and is actually cord for window blinds, it was cheap and I liked the hand and look, had no problems quilting over it. There are some hidden things in the tangles, like my initials, a dragonfly, other stuff... This was one of my first long arm projects.
The back is also one of my first pieced backs. As I mention, I often buy fabric at the thrift store and for whatever reason isn't used on the top of the quilt but I love to incorporate it on the back. Actually the side borders were bought as new quilt store fabric but at least I got them on sale after the Holidays. There should have been more non-suitable cat blocks but when were cleaning up for my mother-in-law to visit I told my husband to not put the blocks into the storage unit... so where did they end up?? Yeah, finally found them about a year after the top was done.
http://piraterodgers.com/quilting/20...p-block-quilt/
(sorry if link is not appropriate)
Rules were follow directions in magazine and make blocks out of cat fabrics with off-white background. Some people have a much darker idea of "off-white" than I think! I would have completed the top probably in the Spring of 2001. Obviously my border is one of my "let's take a simple idea and make it harder!" ideas. The paw prints were pieced in old school traditional ways, using little tiny triangles and all that, I would at least paper piece if I did it again. The string around the edge was hand couched before I quilted and is actually cord for window blinds, it was cheap and I liked the hand and look, had no problems quilting over it. There are some hidden things in the tangles, like my initials, a dragonfly, other stuff... This was one of my first long arm projects.
The back is also one of my first pieced backs. As I mention, I often buy fabric at the thrift store and for whatever reason isn't used on the top of the quilt but I love to incorporate it on the back. Actually the side borders were bought as new quilt store fabric but at least I got them on sale after the Holidays. There should have been more non-suitable cat blocks but when were cleaning up for my mother-in-law to visit I told my husband to not put the blocks into the storage unit... so where did they end up?? Yeah, finally found them about a year after the top was done.
05-30-2019, 11:11 AM
#3
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So I mentioned my Mother-in-Law and her visiting, well she just loved that top and so I made her one as well. It's rare that I ever duplicate a project. However, these were all my fabrics and I used a consistent background. Also a much simpler border 
but the quilting is more involved. I used the same pantograph design in the "bed" of both quilts.
Edit: I don't know why these are on their sides. They looked correct before. And yes, those are my two little rescues helping me as we got ready for the MiL visit. I should mention that I am very lucky to love both my mother-in-law and my dear daughter-in-law. We wish we lived closer and/or she could visit us more often.
but the quilting is more involved. I used the same pantograph design in the "bed" of both quilts.Edit: I don't know why these are on their sides. They looked correct before. And yes, those are my two little rescues helping me as we got ready for the MiL visit. I should mention that I am very lucky to love both my mother-in-law and my dear daughter-in-law. We wish we lived closer and/or she could visit us more often.
05-30-2019, 11:33 AM
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And since we brought up the dogs, this is an original design of mine. While great minds think alike I've never seen anything like this before or after. I did a lot of fabric swapping around Y2K and one of the collections was dogs. It took a couple of decades before I realized that a dog house is basically just a square with a triangle on top of it. As I say, I have to take a simple concept and make it more complex by adding on the overhanging eaves, but I find when dealing with collections of fabrics it helps to have constants to tie the stuff together. Even before I joined the fabric moratorium, I've been trying to use up fabric so that's how/why I chose the "grass lawn" fabric. The border print came from when I first went to Grand Rapids to meet my to-be hubby's family (including my wonderful mother-in-law), we got it at a garage sale.
Originally I was going to quilt "woof" in the borders but I realized it would just get lost, so it's an overall edge-to-edge large scale bone stipple.
Originally I was going to quilt "woof" in the borders but I realized it would just get lost, so it's an overall edge-to-edge large scale bone stipple.
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