Susan appears to love fall colors, judging from this quilt! The fabrics look like they’re from a designer named Sandy Gervais who designs gorgeous collections for Moda. She almost always includes teal in her collections. The piecing in this top is very simple, and the quilting needed to be simple, too. Susan opted for an […]
Derby is over and summer is coming soon. Here are a few renter projects from the past few months to whet your appetite for summer quilting… Angelique made this very colorful bargello top and quilted it here recently. She wanted to quilt it from the front of the machine and did a simple meander in the […]
Beverly took a class on applique a number of years ago and this beautiful top was the result. I was delighted to help her finish it! This design was taught as a block of the month, so there are a number of different blocks. Some are pieced and some are applique. Beverly didn’t want me […]
You may remember Jackie’s super-cute seahorse baby quilt for a boy from my blog post in January. A few weeks later, she brought in this equally cute baby quilt top for a girl and asked me to quilt it the same way. Like the seahorse quilt, Jackie wanted this top quilted using the Wisteria edge-to-edge […]
Two and a half years ago, the Thomas Jefferson Unitarian Church decided to work on a project that would be inclusive in its participation yet diverse in its individual contributions. More than sixty members of the congregation participated, learning everything from fabric dyeing to surface embellishment. This is their very special quilt. Pat Sturtzel and […]
If your winter and spring have been like ours here in Louisville, you’ve seen the weather jump rapidly from below freezing to warm and sunny to snow flurries, sometimes all in twenty-four hours. Michelle may have had weather on her mind when she picked the fabrics for this top that she brought in for me […]
Have you ever had a friend suggest that you use Minky to back a quilt, only to have another friend say, “It’s SO hard to sew with Minky!” Should you try it or not? Is it O.K. to use fabrics other than quilting cotton in your quilt? The answer is YES! Some fabrics need to […]
As I’m writing this, it’s a cold, rainy April day here in Louisville. There’s nothing better to do on a rainy day than stay inside and quilt – except perhaps to catch up with the renters! Dorothy quilted this top a few weeks ago. The pattern is so bold and eye-catching that it took some thought […]
This very traditional top was brought to me for quilting by Anita. It is a sixteen-patch pattern, meaning that each block has four columns and four rows, so sixteen squares per block. Most of the fabrics in this quilt were designed by Jo Morton, a much-loved Civil War reproduction fabric designer. The colors are warm […]
Wow! Pamela brought in this gorgeous purple quilt for me to quilt a few weeks ago. Pamela is a dyer, but these are all commercial fabrics – almost all of them batiks. Does she have an amazing stash or did she have an epic purple shopping trip? Either way, the variety of purples, from a light lavender to a […]
One thing we love here at Quilted Joy is the huge variety of quilts our renters and customers bring in. We love the colors, the styles, and the stories behind the quilts – and every quilt is different. Margie quilted this quilt a few weeks ago. At first, it looks random, but if you look at […]
The holidays are always a busy season at Quilted Joy. So many quilters are busily working on presents for their family and friends or finishing up UFOs to meet annual goals. We think it’s safe to post pictures now, so let’s see what they were working on! Colleen has become the master of efficiency. She brought in five table […]
Jan was visiting Pinterest recently and saw a quilt that inspired her to play with value. By “value”, I mean light vs medium vs dark shades of colors. Placing light fabrics so that they contrast with dark fabrics can create an entirely new secondary pattern within a quilt. This has been used traditionally with log […]
Pam brought in this lovely wallhanging a few weeks ago to quilt. The design is by Jinny Beyer and is called Stained Glass Star. Aren’t those blues, greens and golds gorgeous together? Pam even used Jinny’s famous border prints in this project to tie it all together. It took a couple of rental sessions, but […]
Here is a contemporary quilt that I recently quilted for Susan. This is an interesting design because each block is a tessellation. A tessellation is a shape which interlocks with itself when turned different ways. According to the rules, it cannot be a square, and in this case, the shapes are kind of like […]
Let’s catch up with the renters a bit, shall we? This time, we’ll focus on quilts that were quilted using the design boards. These grooved boards make it very easy to follow a pattern with your quilting, whether you’re a complete beginner or more experienced. We have single-block boards and full-width sets in a variety of […]
Jackie brought me this top to quilt for her. Don’t you love the seahorse fabric? To give you an idea of the scale of the printed design, this is a baby quilt! It will be a gift for a very lucky little boy. Jackie said she’s relatively new to quilting. Even as a beginner, she has […]
Cardinals are frequently seen as a motif around Christmas – on stained glass ornaments, on greeting cards, and in our own back yards. Here, we see cardinals making an appearance as a gift. You may recall Karee’s sampler quilt, about which I recently posted. She chose a unique setting for her blocks, which is something […]
We have some wonderful renter quilting to share with you! Jean brought this colorful top in to quilt for a friend. Each of those triangles is a bandana worn by a dog that her friend has owned. Jean embroidered the dogs’ names on the solid black fabric around the edges. Because she wanted to make […]
Charity asked us earlier this year if we could accommodate a somewhat larger certification class than usual. (We try to limit the class to two students so each gets plenty of personal attention from the teacher.) With a little scheduling work, we were able to say yes, so… Say hello to Charity, her mother, her […]
Here’s a special Christmas gift from a very proud granny! All of those blocks in Linda’s quilt are reproductions of her grandson’s art projects from school. Isn’t that so fun? Linda said her grandson’s art teacher takes pictures of all the kids’ projects and uploads them to a website. Parents and grandparents can then go […]
Virginia recently brought this top in for me to quilt. Look at all these gorgeous floral fabrics! With so much going on visually, developing a quilting plan can be challenging. Here’s how we made choices for this quilt. First, Virginia knew that she wanted the quilting to have an overall nature theme with all those […]
It’s so easy to find something you’re good at and stick with it. Whether it’s a certain piecing technique, quilting with a design board, or using your computerized quilting system. It’s called our comfort zone for a reason! I wanted to remind you how important it is to break away from the normal routine and […]
Lynn recently brought in this contemporary double wedding ring top to be quilted. This is a family gift to a couple who recently married. The quilt top appears to be Metro Rings, a design from Sew Kind of Wonderful. This pattern uses strip sets constructed of jelly roll strips. The strip sets are then cut into the curved […]
