Quilts and 2020 Retrospective

Happy New Year!  We're plugging right along with block drive finishes. These six Spring Pinwheel quilts bring us to 18 from the March/April block drive.

All six of these were assembled and quilted by me with my trademark easy stipple.

I have to give huge props to Gail, Nicki, and Holly who sent in prepped bindings which really helped mew with finishing these quilts.

I love these little Boston Terrier faces!

I really liked this particular backing fabric.

There are still about 7 more of these pinwheel quilts to come.  I love how happy the colors are , definitely one of my favorite blocks we've done in a while!

 On new years it's appropriate to take a moment to look back.  My best estimate (given that the last few block drives haven't been sewn up yet) is that we will produce around 90 quilts from the block drives during 2020.

 Added to that of course were other donated tops, and finished quilts outside of the drives. Louise finished off 25 orphan quilts herself.  162 quilts were delivered to the hospital and we surpassed 700 quilts donated!  150 quilters participated in CiL during 2020, 46 of them for the first time.

Any way you count it, 2020 was a big year for Covered in Love and I'm looking forward to next year!

Apparently Jack and the cats were having a wild party last night while I was asleep.

Covered in Love is a 501(c)(3) charity that donates quilts to patients dying in the hospital, over 700 so far! The Nov/Dec drive is going on now.  Check out the main post HERE if you want to get involved. 

 

Linking to  Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Finished or Not Friday

Merry Christmas, Have Some Quilts!

Merry Christmas quilters! This is my faaaaavorite holdiday; I love the whole Christmas season.  I am now working on a Covid unit and volunteered to work the holiday so my family celebrated on Wednesday.

These first two quilts were assembled and quilted by Linda D. from blocks sent in by Mina during the July/August block drive.

There's another star quilt that Mina sent in in this post, so that's a total of three from her for the summer stars drive! 

As many of you know, these patriotic star quilts are some of the most popular ones that Covered in Love makes. There are many veterans and their families in the hospital and quilts like these mean a great deal to them.

These next two were assembled and quilted by Linda as well, from assorted block drive blocks.

I grouped this batch together as "modern" stars and I LOVE how Linda arranged them.

If you see your blocks in any of these quilts please jump in the comments and claim them!

Finally, this quilt was just returned to me by Louise.  Jacomina donated these churndash blocks as a UFO and Louise completed them into a quilt.

I hope you all enjoy your holiday and stay safe and well.  As the number of Covid cases increase the hospital converted my old unit into a isolation unit so I decided to go back to work with my friends.  It's very different than normal nursing.  I did get my vaccination last week, hooray!

Covered in Love is a 501(c)(3) charity that donates quilts to patients dying in the hospital, over 700 so far! The Nov/Dec drive is going on now.  Check out the main post HERE if you want to get involved. 

 

Linking to  Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Finished or Not Friday

Strings 2020 Wrap Up

Yes, just short of a year from it's kick off the 2020 string block drive is wrapping up. Thanks to the many of you who participated in this drive, like Beth T. who made the top above and Kathy C. who quilted it!

I love the gingerbread man backing this quilt! The rest of these were assembled by a combination of Pam M. and me and quilted by me.

The seven quilts here plus those previously posted bring us to a total of 23 out of an expected 24 from this drive. There is still one out in the world with a volunteer quilter, but all the ones I was responsible for are done and I'm feeling accomplished!  When #24 comes in I will post it so we can all enjoy it :)

As you know if you have been here a while, I have been experimenting with our traditional string block design over the past few years.  This design grew on me but it's not one of my favorites compared to the ones we've done before.

I do like the variety of layouts that can be made.  Strings are a never ending source of ideas!

For January I'm thinking about going back to basics with a slight twist, you'll just have to wait and see!

Here are most of the quilts in their "family portrait." They have since been delivered to the hospital, helping to push CiL past 700 quilts.

And here is the block drive By The Numbers for those of you who I know enjoy that. Merry Christmas everyone!

Covered in Love is a 501(c)(3) charity that donates quilts to patients dying in the hospital, over 700 so far! The Nov/Dec drive is going on now.  Check out the main post HERE if you want to get involved. 

 

Linking to  Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Finished or Not Friday

A Homemade Quilt

Welcome to the weekend, quilters, and happy holiday season! Just one quilt to show today. Officially, this is the first finish from this summer's red, white and blue block drive.  It's a "bonus quilt" I decided to finish with the patriotic batch since it matched so well. (Thank you to Alycia who commented to let me know this pattern came from a mystery quilt "A8" she ran in 2018!)

Christy sent in the top a while back. There are a mix of shirtings and quilting fabrics in it and it measures a generous 66"x78" or there abouts. If you want to see more of Christy's beautiful shirtings tops for CiL click here and scroll down.

I got the rare honor of being able to pick this one out and gift it. I recently caught up with a friend and learned that, sadly, her father passed this summer. It sounds like due to Covid they fell through the cracks in our normal distribution system at that time. 

I picked this quilt because I thought she would appreciate the shirtings in the top, and I backed it with this striped fabric which was formerly curtains in Linda's grandson's room.  Binding from Gail, I think. I love how personal it all feels. Since I was mailing it personally I was able to write a card and tell the new owner all about the provenance of her quilt and the people who helped make it. 

She wishes to send her greatest thanks to you all and let you know how much it means to know that people care about her loss and how difficult this time has been. Especially going into the holidays.  She is so incredibly grateful for your efforts.

Much love, from all of us.

Covered in Love is a 501(c)(3) charity that donates quilts to patients dying in the hospital, over 700 so far! The Nov/Dec drive is going on now.  Check out the main post HERE if you want to get involved. 

 

Linking to  Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Finished or Not Friday

Hooray for Louise

Louise has been putting her time at home to good use finishing quilts for Covered in Love at quite the rate! For anyone who is unfamiliar, Louise and I have had an arrangement for a while where I ship her UFOs and orphan blocks donated to CiL and she recombines them to make beautiful finished quilts!

You can read more from Louise about how she put together the first 3 quilts on this post on her blog here.

She has a real knack for matching different projects and fabrics and I love her FMQ!

These Christmas Geese and coordinating Christmas fabrics came from Priscilla.  Holiday themed quilts can be hard to place with the right family, but Christmas quilts have landed in just the right place before. 

So many beloved family matriarchs make Christmas such a special time of the year that Christmas memories are tightly connected to that loved one in family members' minds.

This jelly roll race top also came from Priscilla and the blocks down the middle came from Jan.  Amazingly, the colors are a perfect match!

For the final three quilts in this post you can read what Louise has to say about them here.

I LOVE this ocean-y blue quilt. The hunters star blocks in the middle are leftover from a CiL block drive a few years ago. The FMQ around the boats is too cool!

This red, white, and blue quilt combined a lot of different people's blocks to make a homey sampler.

Scrappy centers in the middle of these stars.

Lastly, this string quilt with the nine patches in the corners favors red, white, and blue tones and the sashing has fireworks on it.

You probably already know that I love string quilts because of all the different little scraps of fabrics there are to spy!

As always, Louise is one of my quilting heroes!  I hope you all had a very happy holiday. I found time for some fabric dyeing experimentation, my first time using sun reactive dyes.

Covered in Love is a 501(c)(3) charity that donates quilts to patients dying in the hospital, over 700 so far! The Nov/Dec drive is going on now.  Check out the main post HERE if you want to get involved. 

 

Linking to  Confessions of a Fabric Addict and Finished or Not Friday