The Week In Review!

Unusual for me, but I have not blogged for about ten days, I am afraid that the problem with my back returned in the worst way leaving me quite unable to sew, quilt or really do anything.
Today is the first day I have been mostly up and around and I took advantage of the opportunity to meet up with my quilting friends at 35th.Ave. Sew 'N Vac for their "Black Bag Saturday".

 A few years ago I had the privilege of quilting this vintage Missouri Daisy for a client and fell in love with the design, isn't it adorable and very typical of the period. Knowing I would not be able to tackle all the handwork myself, I have searched for a top to buy but never found one in good enough condition- they are handwork labor intensive and rather rare it seems. Each of the little petals are gathered and appliqued on top of the stars, then the center applied last.

I was more or less bewailing the fact that I would never have one of my own to quilt when one of my blogger/quilt friends Cheryl, over at MO.Broker, My Creative Side offered to trade her piecing skills for my quilting -wow I was tickled, and jumped right on that offer!

 I have decided to keep the stars all the same color and the petals will be a variety of other prints, the background white Kona muslin.

 These are some of the FQ '30's reproductions I purchased for my own Missouri Daisy, a bargain at $1.25 each. They will be for the petals, in addition to those prints below which came from stash.

This red may be used for the stars, I thought it would show the petals more unless I find a better alternative! The yellow will be for the centers of each block.
Cheryl and I plan to blog about this project as we go along, Cheryl may even invite a sew-along if anyone else is ambitious enough to complete this quilt. It is not a complicated quilt and there are several settings available, the little gathered petals on the stars are the most laborious part. It does appear that this block design like many of the older ones is known by a few other names, Amish Dahlia, KC Star and probably others. The unique design that sets it apart are the gathered petals, otherwise the star design itself is not, I think, unusual.

This green I also purchased today, it came from a selection of '30's repros solids and will work very well to bind the recently quilted vintage applique quilt. See previous post!
Our group then went to brunch after our exhausting shopping and before moving on to other activities!

I stopped in at Joann's to pick up velvet panne fabric to make those posh looking pumpkins you may have seen around in specialty stores for $25-$50. There are many ways to make them some posher  looking than others but two of the best tuts I found are at House of Hawthorne and Stone Gable Blog .
 It looks really easy and I think they are adorable, but instead of using very expensive velvet I am using  inexpensive crushed panne that is on sale at Joann's. I purchased one yard total for $3.
The "blue" is in reality a royal purple, just hard to control the colors in the transfer from cloth to the page!
I will blog about my project, the most difficult part will be to find those lovely pumpkin stalks, so if anyone has access to pumpkin/squash stalks, please let me know! I can use sticks but it won't be the same!