Quilt the World 2022

Posted in accuquilt, Charity, Finished Projects by lorimillerdesigns

Hello Quilting friends! I wanted to share with you my Charity Quilt for the Pay It Forward Campaign called Covering the World: One Quilt at a Time 2022. This is my charming Quilt of Valor Quilt.

I am an AccuQuilt Go!Getter and I have teamed up with other quilters and designers from AccuQuilt, Moda Fabrics, and Brother to create and donate our time and quilts to a charity of our choice. Every week in 2022, one person from our teams will be donating a quilt to our favorite charity. My chosen charity is the Quilt of Valor Foundation.

The Mission of the Quilt of Valor Foundation is to cover Service Members and Veterans touched by war with comforting and healing Quilts of Valor. I have many friends and family members who have served our country and I have a special place in my heart for the veterans and members of the military who have given so much of themselves.

I belong to my local group, Stitching Sisters Quilts of Valor in Clawson, Michigan. We get together monthly to sew quilts in fellowship and fun. Here is a picture of our group showing some of the blocks we were making for our quilts.

This picture showing the completed quilt made with our blocks being awarded to a deserving veteran.

This is a picture of our latest group of veterans to receive their Quilts of Valor.

We often get fabric donated to our group from the local community. All of the fabrics in the quilt I made were donated. I had a selection of chambrays and red and blue cotton fabrics with tiny stars printed on them.

I used the AccuQuilt GO! Blazing Star 12” Finished die (55051) by Eleanor Burns for my quilt blocks. The contrast of the prints and chambray really make the Blazing Star stand out. I used sashing and cornerstones to pull it all together. My friend, Sue Baker, did a beautiful job of completing the long arm quilting. She was one of the sisters who founded our Stitching Sisters QOV group.

Do you make quilts for Quilt of Valor? I have a FREE TUTORIAL to make this GO! Rising Star Quilt of Valor quilt on the Accuquilt Blog.

I hope you enjoyed seeing my Quilt of Valor charity quilt. Would you like to join us in making a quilt for charity? For more information on making and donating a charity quilt as part of the Quilt the World 2022 project, visit AccuQuilt.

26Jan2021

In Memory of Cookie Cat

Posted in Charity, Patterns for Sale by lorimillerdesigns

I had the best kitty in the world. His name was Cookie Cat and he was special. A lovely gray and white tabby, he was gentle and kind and he smelled like cotton candy. He was my quilting companion and he had my heart.

He would follow me downstairs to my sewing room and just stay with me while I sewed and quilted. Whenever I started quilting, he would appear and try to help. I would look away for a second and he would be…right..THERE. LOL

I had this little rolling cart and I finally put his cat bed in there and I would just roll him around the room with me.

In 2017, I designed a quilt in his honor with a big block and his sweet face on it and I called it, Cookie cat.

I thought it was adorable and versatile, four blocks for a baby quilt and one block for a pillow.

We have a little black kitty named Oreo too and to not be left out, I made some Halloween pillows in the pattern for him too.

But this sweet boy was my little shadow. At the beginning of 2020, he was diagnosed with cancer. I was glad to be home due to Covid to take care of him. He was spoiled rotten and got anything he wanted.

He started to just come and want to sleep in the bay window in front of my sewing machine. He could see the birds and squirrels. He would still follow me downstairs and just be with me while I quilted and sewed.

He passed away just after Thanksgiving and it hit me hard. I still miss him. I decided that I would do something to honor his devotion to me and celebrate that pure love he gave to me.

I have updated my Cookie Cat pattern with his picture and I have reduced the price in my shop. You can find it HERE!

This year, 2021, I am going to give the proceeds from this pattern to my local humane society. A tiny way to give back to the place where I rescued Cookie cat to begin with and a way to honor and grieve him in a positive way.

I appreciate your support of my charity this year and wish you too will experience the joy and unconditional love of a pet.

Warm Wishes,

Lori

24Mar2017

Free Tutorial – Liberty Quilt of Valor

Posted in Charity, EQ Mini, Finished Projects, Home Accessories by lorimillerdesigns

This Liberty Quilt of Valor is the project of the month with a free tutorial designed with EQ Mini Software by The Electric Quilt Company . It uses Broken dishes blocks set on point using light and dark blue prints from my stash. The scattered triangles of red pull it together and add that pop of color along with the candy strip bias binding. This quilt looks complicated but was easy to design and is easy to stitch together.

I belong to the Stitching Sisters Quilt of Valor group. The mission of the Quilts of Valor Foundation is to cover service members and veterans touched by war with comforting and healing Quilts of Valor. This quilt is made using the traditional patriotic colors of red, white and blue.

EQ Mini is the new scaled down, simpler version of EQ7 quilt design software. This program was created for quilters who are just getting started using software for quilt design. EQ Mini will help you create, edit, share, and print patterns and yardage for your quilt designs.

Liberty Quilt of Valor

Finished size is 60″ x 75″.

Materials

1 5/8 yd white background
1 3/8 yd Light blue
2 7/8 yd dark blue
3/4 yd solid red for triangles and thin border
1/2 yard red and blue stripe for binding
4 yards fabric for backing
70″ x 84″ batting

WOF = Width of Fabric

Directions

Cut Fabric:

Light blue

8 — 13″ squares

Dark Blue

10 — 13″ squares
7 — 5 1/2″ x WOF strips for outside border

Red

2 — 13″ squares
6 — 2″ x WOF strips for border

White background

7 — 12 ” squares

Striped fabric

Cut 7 — 2 1/2″ x Width of Fabric strips

Make Blocks

Hint: Because you need to match seams, be sure to keep an accurate 1/4″ seam allowance and make sure blocks are square as you sew them to keep things in alignment.

Take one light blue 13″ square and one dark blue 13″ square and place them right sides together.
Mark a line diagonally from corner to corner, both ways.
Stitch 1/4″ away from the lines on both sides.
Next mark two lines down the center of the block.
Cut along the solid lines to create 8 half square triangle units.
Press the half square triangle units open pressing to the dark fabric side.
Make 7 more sets of dark and light blue half square triangle units.
Make 2 more sets of half square triangle units using the dark blue and red fabrics.
Mark a diagonal line on each of the white background squares. Be careful not to stretch the bias edge.
Arrange your pieces using this design as a guide. There will be a few extra half square triangles.
Sew together the individual broken dishes blocks, then sew the center together in diagonal rows, aligning edges.
Piece together the red border with 45 degree seams.
Cut 2 side red border strips 2″ x 62 3/4″ long. Stitch to the sides of the quilt being careful not to stretch the bias edges of the white background.
Hint: You may want to stitch 1/8″ from the bias edge of the white background pieces to keep them from stretching.
Cut 2 red border strips 2″ x 50 1/8″ long. Sew to the top and bottom of the quilt.
Piece together the dark blue border.
Cut 2 side dark blue border strips 5 1/2″ x 65 3/4″. Sew to the sides of the quilt.
Cut 2 dark blue border strips 5 1/2″ x 60 1/2″. Sew to the top and bottom of the quilt.
Piece together the backing.
Make a quilt sandwich with the backing face down, then the batting, then your quilt top face up.
Pin baste the quilt layers together.
Quilt as desired. I echoed the seam lines for the half square triangles. I added feathers for the white background space and quilted a large chain in the dark blue border.
Sew the 2 1/2″ binding strips together and add to the quilt.
Finish the binding and you are done!

Make it scrappy! I used up light and dark blue fabrics from my stash to give this quilt a scrappy look. You can too. Or you can use 8 light blue fat quarters, 10 dark blue fat quarters and 2 red fat quarters for the center blocks.

This quilt meets the guidelines for a quilt of valor, but it would make a great patriotic quilt for your home too. Change up the colors to match a bedroom or even in your favorite team’s colors. I would love to see your Liberty quilt, tag me on instagram @lorimillerdesigns.

Looking for the EQ Mini Design Instructions? You can find them HERE

For more projects and tips and techniques on using EQ Mini, visit my Electric Quilt blog series EQ Mini Friday Fun.

For more information on EQ Mini software, go to EQ Mini.

31Aug2016

Quilting Roundup – Summer 2016

Posted in Charity, Finished Projects, Home Accessories by lorimillerdesigns

It has been a while since I posted the projects I have been working on, so it was time to do a little round up to at least catch us up to the beginning of the summer. My only son graduated from high school and the day after his graduation party, I decided to get appendicitis and it had to come out. Mix in some recovery time, summer vacation, weekends at our cottage up north, and well, you get the idea. The picture above is of my new grey couch(what a great setting for any color quilt, I can mix it up whenever I like.) I finished my pow wow quilt (Pattern by Cluck Cluck Sew) and two pillows from all of the scraps.

I did some wiggly quilting in the sashing and just wavy, organic lines over the arrow shapes. It was a quick way to quilt and it washed up great.

Next up, I had some lovely organic cotton prints with kitties on them. I used the Ballerina quilt pattern by Jaybird Quilts. It is a great way to use a special fat quarter bundle where you want to see the prints. My good friend, Laura, had celebrated a big birthday, so this throw quilt was her gift. I even did kitty themed allover quilting with curly que lines and yarn balls.

Here is a good view of the quilt and my yarn ball quilting.

I think the grey, aqua and yellow look so great together and she loved it.

I had picked up another cute bundle of fat quarters from Pink Castle fabrics in Ann Arbor, Mi. I thought they would make a great baby quilt. I thought this was a very cute pattern but I forgot about the one way prints, so that made piecing a little more challenging. I just straight line quilted around the larger squares. Then I hand drew a starburst design in the blocks.

I stitched the star burst with free motion quilting on my little bernina and on the outside big white corners, I did a some close lines for extra texture.

Here it is all finished. I had just enough yellow for the border to make it pop. Thanks to my son who is holding it up for me.

This little mini quilt was a kit that I bought in Grand Rapids at the AQS show. The pattern is Puddle Jumping Mini by Thimble Blossoms.

All those tiny pieces. I think it takes as long as a big quilt to piece these babies.

Even though it was only about 12 inches across, I still pinbasted it like crazy before quilting.

Here is my finished quilt. I just stitched some diagonal straight line quilting. It was some work, but it is so cute all finished up.

Finally, this red, white and blue beautry. I belong to the Stitching Sisters Quilt of Valor group and I finished up this large block quilt.

I was given the opportunity to award my quilt to Jerry. You can see Katy to the right, she did the longarm quilting on it. She simply does beautiful work and donates her time for many QOV quilts.

And of course, every service member gets a quilty hug to welcome them home. After serving 10 years in the National Guard myself, I have a special soft spot for all of the men and women who have served our country. It is a joy to honor them in this way.

I hope these projects inspire you to quilt up something special for yourself, a friend or even a service person. Happy Stitching!

24Apr2016

Quilting Roundup

Posted in Charity, Finished Projects, Modern Quilt Guild, Work in Progress by lorimillerdesigns

Dear friends, I have been neglecting you. This year my only son, Colin, graduates from high school. We went on a much needed vacation to warmer climes in February and then all the busyness caught up to me. Let’s catch up with a quilting roundup from January – yes January. That just means I will have a few more roundups to share to get us caught up to April. January, it was cold outside so a good time to stitch away. I worked on some old UFO’s, some newer things and some I even got finished. I thought you might like a peek into the studio to see what I have been working on .

I saw this pattern for birch trees and red birds and I thought it would be perfect for a January wall hanging in my dining room. The birch trees are pieced in black and white prints and then I quilted them with wavy natural lines.

The little cardinals are just machine appliqued onto a few of the trees.

Here it is finished. Don’t the cardinals make it such a cheery winter scene?

I belong to the Stitching Sisters Quilts of Valor Group in Clawson, Michigan. We have an Accuquilt GO cutter machine and it was my month to try it out. I made this awesome eagle medallion and the scrappy log cabins using the cutting die.

Here is the center medallion being pieced in the center of the scrappy log cabins. I added white fabric to make the medallion really stand out. I did not think I would ever do a log cabin but the fabric die cutting machine made it so easy and really easy to cut up those left over fabric scraps.

Here it is all finished. I used up a lot of scraps and Katy S longarm quilted it with feathers. It is beautiful.

These are the blocks from my Sit and Stitch group. We have a group of seven gals who get together each month. We each have a box with our quilt project inside and we pass the boxes around to each other each month. This month I had Tina’s box of paper doll blocks. She wanted each row a different color and I chose green for my row of dolls.

My Detroit Area Modern Quilt Guild does charity bee blocks each month. Then someone volunteers to make a quilt from all of the ones that each member made for the month. Rebekah, our president, sends out a block design and a color pallette and we stitch away. They always turn out great.

Here is the latest block that we did for January.

And here are the blocks on the table at my Detroit Area Modern Quilt Guild Meeting.

I also worked on some messenger bags and totes, but I will save that for another post. Happy Stitching!

5May2015

More Charity Quilts and Facebook

Posted in Charity, Finished Projects by lorimillerdesigns

I am catching up on a few projects and sharing some updates for Lori Miller Designs.

First, I have a new business page for Lori Miller Designs on facebook. I would love for you to visit and like my page. You can get updates on when I post new quilty blog articles or when a new block is ready for my Grandma Town Block of the Month. If you have a moment, Won’t you stop by and LIKE my page?

More Charity Quilting

My quilt guild, the Detroit Area Modern Guild, makes quilts for charity. This year our quilts are going to a childrens critical care unit at Beaumont Hospital. I finished up three quilts to donate.

This first quilt is a stunner. Can you believe I made it with scraps from another project? These are the squares I cut off from my Kimberly Einmo’s Chainsaw Quilt. You can see and read about that quilt on my blog HERE. One of our guild members, Barb DeVilbiss, quilted this one on her longarm machine. Doesn’t her design really make the half square triangles look interesting?

This small baby size quilt is just strips of flannel with the raw edges out to fray and fluff up. Super simple to make and so soft.

This quilt I made a little larger in hopes of having something to give to an older boy who might be in need. This is the Ballerina pattern from JayBird Quilts. This setting happened because I did not have enough of one basketball fabric to do the whole thing. It really makes the quilt look special to have a basketball border at the top and bottom. Barb DeVilbiss quilted this one as well.

Here is a picture of the tag we put on our quilts. I really think it is a nice touch to add when we donate the quilts.

What kinds of quilts are you making for charity?

14Apr2015

Charity Sewing – Quilts of Valor

Posted in Charity, Finished Projects by lorimillerdesigns

Today I thought I would share a few of the quilts I have made for one of my Charity Groups. I belong to the Stitching Sisters Quilts of Valor group. This group was started by three sisters, Maureen, Sue and Terry and it meets once a month in Clawson, Michigan. We get together to sew, eat, and quilt. Our group is part of the National Quilts of Valor Foundation organization. The mission of the Quilts of Valor Foundation is to cover service members and veterans touched by war with comforting and healing Quilts of Valor. Many of our Stitching Sisters members have or had a loved one who was serving our nation during war time and making quilts was one way to do something useful and helpful for those deserving men and women.

Our members make the quilt tops and then volunteers longarm machine quilt the quilts. I started out making quilts for my own family members who were in the service. I finished three tops for three of my cousins who have served.

Our group has focused on completing and awarding quilts to as many WWII veterans as we can. We have supported the local VFW and veterans organizations in our area. Our group has a waiting list that we try to fill as quickly as possible.

Here is a picture of our last large award ceremony held at the Clawson Community Center. It is just a special moment to share this small token with the men and women who have sacrificed so much for our country. There are usually a few good tears all around when they are awarded.