Half Hexagons from Jelly Rolls

Donna Crow's Half-Hexagon Quilt

Denniele and Donna have been making half-hexagons out of Moda Jelly Roll strips.

Donna used Arnold's Attic, my late 19th-century reproduction line from last year. The strips are 2-1/2" wide.

Using a 60 degree ruler you cut half hexagons and sew them into strips. There are no Y Seams if you use this method.

Denniele developed the technique for a class.

 "We used a 60 degree triangle ruler and painter's tape.  That way you can make your hexagons any size.  I am working on one for [my granddaughter] made from a honey bun.  It may be for her doll! "

Half Hexagons by Denniele Bohannon

Denniele used a Jelly Roll from Civil War Homefront, a mid-19th-century line from a few years ago.

"After the hexagons...I wanted a small border to stop it visually and also to make the edge straight for the border...so I played until it worked."

And speaking of half-hexagons I've been collecting pictures. Here's a quilt from about 1875 from Laura Fisher's online store.

Notice the half hexagons as background to the farmstead.

And the upside down cow

See more pictures of the Monumental House Quilt by Sally Goforth of Weymouth, NJ at Laura's store here

http://www.laurafisherquilts.com/shop/Quilts/19th-CENTURY-QUILTS/p/MONUMENTAL-HOUSE-ANTIQUE-QUILT-Sally-Goforth-Weymouth-NJ.htm

And see some Norwegian cupcakes from half-hexagons by AnnAKa on Nicola Foreman's blog here

http://www.nicolaforemanquilts.com/1/post/2011/02/a-box-of-chocolates.html

The Perfect Thirties Quilt

Denniele Bohannon sends photos of the old top being quilted by the Harrisonville (MO) United Methodist Quilters. It's a postage stamp quilt with all the squares about an inch in those sweet pastels so popular in the early 1930s. According to my Encyclopedia of Pieced Patterns, variations have been published under several names, among them Rainbow Round the World and Aunt Jen's Stamp Quilt.

I've seen kits for this quilt design with each piece pre-cut and sorted into a box like a Whitman's candy sampler box, but I imagine most of these postage stamp quilts were pieced from the neighborhood scrapbag.

Clockwise from the top: Rita Benson in the blue shirt, Lee Cunningham, Alice Law, Mildred Randall, (founding member of the quilters who is 94). Not pictured Ellen Wray and Denniele who took the photo.

Denniele writes:

We meet every Monday and quilt. Usually we break for lunch and return to quilting. The money raised is given to many causes. Most recently, we were a Silver sponsor of our local Relay for Life, donated to our two local food pantries, a backpack program for school aged children in need and the Women's Life Choice Center in Harrisonville. We make an annual donation to the Festival of Sharing as well. There is usually a waiting list and it takes about a year to reach the top!

Quilts we have quilted for others have won a blue ribbon at the Missouri State Fair and at the Osceola Quilt show.

Morris Workshop Colors

In The Morris Workshop reproduction collection I did for Moda we have six colorways. (Colorways is textile jargon for color palettes.) I gave each a name derived from Morris workshop history. While Fennel Green and Indigo (above) recall colors, the other names come from Morris places and people.

The tan is Hammersmith Tea, a reference to a London neighborhood on the north bank of the Thames that is now home to the William Morris Society and a name which the firm used for carpets. Merton Brown (above) is named for Merton Abbey in a village in Surrey, home to much of the design and textile production.

Red House Brick remembers the Red House in Upton, Bexleyheath, which Morris designed and lived in with his family.

Wardle's Sky Blue recalls Thomas Wardle who was a designer and dyer.

Britain's Textile Society is hosting a conference dedicated to the work of Thomas Wardle September 25-27 timed to coincide with the exhibition: Dye, Print, Stitch: Textiles by Thomas and Elizabeth Wardle at Macclesfield Silk Museum in Cheshire. Click here to read more about the conference:
http://www.textilesociety.org.uk/events/event-details.php?textile-event=102

The Morris prints are so great (No thanks to me---thank the Morris Workshop artists) that simple patchwork is quite effective. Here's one by Linda Frost just using the strips.

And Denniele Bohannon sent photos of a quilt made of triangles from the last Morris collection, A Morris Garden. She donated it to her church for a raffle. She writes:

"The Harrisonville (Missouri) United Methodist quilters did the quilting. I am one of them....learning from the best."