HeartStrings Quilt Project

For our June/July project we’ll pull out those Homespun fabrics and make some quilts suitable for donating to organizations for men.

The guidelines are as follows for blocks that will be sent in for group quilts.

Start with an 11 inch muslin foundation

Center string is BLACK cotton fabric, cut 2 inches and it can be a print but it should be tone on tone and read fairly solid.

The remaining strings should be from homespun fabrics.

Blocks are trimmed to 10.5 inches after piecing.

We will set them 6×8 blocks for a quilt that will finish at 60×80.

As always, these guidelines are just for blocks that are sent in for group quilts. If completing your own top or quilt you can modify them but for tops that you will be sending in for quilting, please keep them about 60×80 in size.

Donna organized and held a sew-in yesterday in Winfield IL to work on Quilts of Valor. More photos can be seen in her online album but I wanted to share some of the HeartStrings quilts they worked on here.

Robin shared these photos with us of her guild’s work day making HeartStrings quilts. She writes that many of their quilts will go to Quilts of Valor and Women’s Advocacy programs. Click on the thumbnails to see a larger photo.

After seeing my post on Julie and her HeartStrings helpers, Diannia had to make her own string star. She wrote that she quilted the top on her domestic sewing machine using muslin that had a preprinted quilting design and donated her quilt to the church for a fundraiser.

A group of 10 met Saturday in Shoreview MN to work on a variety of HeartStrings projects. In addition to assembling a couple blue centered tops, we worked on yellow blocks and tops for our current project, Quilt as you Go blocks, other HeartStrings blocks, and tying and binding quilts. It was a very productive day!

Other photos from the sew-in

Sunday a small group of us gathered in Hayward MN at the Calico Hutch quilt shop to work on HeartStrings projects. This was the first sew-in that I’d attended held in a quilt shop and what a pleasure it was. Carolyn (the owner) had everything set up so nicely all we had to do was plug in our machines and start sewing.

More photos can be seen in our online album.

Helen has been playing with setting some of her yellow centered blocks and here are a couple of my favorites. Visit Helen’s blog to see more settings.

Julie and some of her blog readers are making string quilts for HeartStrings. Read more on Julie’s blog.

Not only productive but fun, a group of us gathered at Ann’s near Harrisburg PA this past week to work on HeartStrings projects.

Other photos from the sew in

For April and May we’ll be working with YELLOW, how’s that for welcoming Spring?

If you decide to participate, you have two choices:

1. Use a bright yellow center strip (cut 2 inches) and then add bright colored strings and strips to create blocks for children’s quilts. Other than the yellow center, these are made just like our guidelines. This is the set I’ve got started.



2. The second option is to use blue and yellow strips and strings and again, they’re pieced like our guidelines except these DO NOT need to have a consistent color center string, use blue or yellow and they don’t even need to be cut 2 inches – it doesn’t matter.
   • I suggest that you NOT alternate the blue and yellow but place them randomly to avoid creating a striped effect.
   • We won’t be sashing the blocks, but this quilt by Petra will give you an idea of the look we’re going for.

As always, we continue to accept blocks made according to the guidelines for those that choose not to participate in the special projects.

To send blocks in for group quilts, email me for the mailing address.