(click photo to see a larger version)
Cheri Sullivan is a member of Illini Country Stitchers Guild in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois and co-chair of the Project Linus Committee.
She emailed “I found your website from a heartstrings logo on someone’s blog, and thought the string quilt would make a great project. I cut the muslin squares and attached the center string (with one adjacent string, since they are stitched together) because I thought that was the only critical strip to have placed correctly. As it turned out, some of the people who came to Make A Blanket Day (a Project Linus event) could not really sew (one woman was the grateful mom of a blanket recipient), so I was glad I had started each block. Still, they did a GREAT job on the blocks!”
Cheri posted directions for making string blocks on their group blog and shared the HeartStrings quilt in progress with her members.
She recently emailed the above picture of the finished quilt and these photos of the Illini Country Stitchers work night at Sew Sassy where they were making another string quilt for Project Linus.
Many of you may have already read about this quilt on Bonnie’s blog but I wanted to share it with those of you that don’t belong to our Yahoo HeartStrings group and follow our progress here on this blog.
Bonnie talked about the dilemma of having a sick friend and wanting to make a quilt to comfort her but being torn between trying to find the time to make the quilt or spending the time she had with her friend.
The HeartStrings blocks in this quilt had been made by our quilters, sent in to Sue who grouped them together and sent them to Becky. Becky assembled the top and when Bonnie needed a comfort quilt, sent it to her to quilt and give to her friend Marie. I won’t rewrite what Bonnie has expressed so well – you can read the story by clicking on the 3 links below.
Stuck between quilts and a hard place
April is National Volunteer Month and what better way to celebrate it than making more HeartString blocks?
Don’t forget to mark your calendars for the last weekend in April. On Saturday April 28th, those of us in Minneapolis and surrounding areas are getting together in person and will be meeting at Sue Frank’s house in Stillwater MN. Please email Sue for the address/directions if you plan to attend.
Meet at Sue’s house starting around 9:00 AM (She’ll have coffee and pastries)
Sew till 12:00
Lunch break and shopping 12 – 1:30 /2:00
More sewing !
Sue says she can make maps of the local shops and people can decide to come back and sew after lunch or take off on a shop hop.
For those of you not in the area, plan to sew along with us on Saturday making HeartStrings blocks or working on your current HeartStrings projects. We’ll all continue on Sunday and participate in our virtual retreat.
A recent post on the HeartStrings Yahoo group reminded me that one of the best features of our project is the ability to participate at whatever level you choose.
You can visit Carol’s blog by clicking here.
Since then, I’ve started (and now almost finished) another quilt top where all the blocks have red centre strips and at least one yellow strip in them. I’m expecting to have it finished in the next few days, and will post a photo.
Since we’re going to collect some Chinese Coin sections for the months of April and May I thought I’d share how I make my sections for those quilters who haven’t made these before. They’re very quick and easy.
First, just to review the guidelines.
First I pulled out some of my short strings – these happen to be about 6-7 inches but as long as they are an inch longer than I need to trim my section I’ll use them.
second, I sewed the strings into pairs
then I sewed two of these pairs together and had 4 strips, then sewed 2 of those and had 8 strips – last I added an additional pair. (As I’m sewing my pairs together, I’m careful to keep my left edge fairly even so that when I go to trim the section I won’t end up with a shorter strip not being long enough to square up.)
When the section was as long as I wanted it, I ironed all the seams in one direction
and trimmed the section to 5.5 inches wide – trimming some off of each side to get straight edges on both sides of the section.
I keep my sections shorter than my ruler so I can trim them without having to scoot my ruler along the edge but other than that I don’t worry about how long the sections are.
Any questions? Email me at mmcjohnson@gmail.com
These sections will be mailed to Megan in AUS and to me in the US. If you are sending some in, email me for the mailing addresses.
June and Al’s first HeartStrings Quilt for Quilts of Valor
Close-up showing June’s quilting.
June emailed me photographs of her and Al and told me “I visited with Al and Helen (his wife) yesterday and showed them the finished quilt. They loved the quilt, the backing, the label and the whole idea. Each of them thanked me for getting him started making string blocks. Together they made a small lap quilt and tied it. They are going to make them for their sons, grandchildren and great-grandchildren.”
Kathy, one project member, decided to use the HeartStrings Quilt Project as inspiration for her daughter’s quilt club.
She told us that “the string blocks are going to be great for teaching 1/4″ seams, pressing, etc. and we’re going to be doing red, white and blue blocks.”
“In five weeks my daughter and her friends have worked on their heartstring blocks. They are all doing a great job…and having fun to boot! They have completed 42 blocks with blue centers…I’ve done one!!! So, I will make the additional 5 blocks this week and hopefully get it all put together. They are as proud of themselves and each other as I am of them!”
As you can see from the finished top below, Kathy managed to make the last few blocks and assemble their first quilt top. Didn’t they do a wonderful job?
Kathy tells us that the 3 of the girls in the club are 10 and the youngest is 8 years old. Now that they’ve completed their first HeartStrings blocks and quilt, next up will be a project of their own.
HeartStrings Quilt Project 