Quilting friends

Today is Thursday, my favorite day of the week. No teaching except for an evening lesson and even today that was cancelled so I have the evening free! And, I went to Utsunomiya to Mrs. Furui's house to meet up with the gals and work on the bazaar quilt. That is coming along nicely though no pictures to show since things are still in the basting (applique) stage. But!!! I did get permission to show some of the wonderful things my friends have been making!

Here's another beauty from Furui-san's hand! You may think she is really prolific since I just posted a picture two weeks ago of another gorgeous bedsize quilt. Well, this is bedsize too and beautifully quilted... but no, she didn't do all this work in two weeks. She's been working on this quilt for over 10 years!!! Actually we started it together (I mean I made a similar one) and though mine has been finished for a good 8 years (at least!) she has pushed hers to the back of the closet on numerous occasions to make time for other things. It has been 3/4 finished quilting for at least 5 years but she just didn't put it on the priority list. I guess I teased her enough that she finally set her mind to finishing it. (Actually she still is putting on the binding but I won't let her stop now!


The next quilt is Mrs. Harada's and she is busily doing the quilting on it. Actually Harada-san doesn't particularly like quilting (so why is she doing such detailed work?) and she loves piecing so when we plan a bazaar quilt with a lot of piecing we delegate an awful lot into her basket. I think she is making this quilt for her husband.

And lastly, a quilt from Ochiai-san's daughter Mai-chan. She had to do a patchwork project for high school and she chose Sun Bonnet Sue (well, applique and a little piecing). She did a fantastic job and the applique is tiny and perfect! It was her first time quilting too and she put in some nice hearts and stitched-in-the-ditch. She had a time limit on this project so we are all amazed at the beautiful and detailed work that she did. Yeah Mai-chan!

As for me... I'm still plodding away on my Autumn Blossom Quilt. Rats! The trouble with hand quilting is that I have nothing to show for months on end. (Or in some cases years!)