Wall hanging by Judi Madsen

I had a lot of fun with this class on www.iquilt.com by Judi Madsen. She's an awesome instructor and very thorough. Online classes are the best for me. I can pause when I need to or take a day off. I go at my own pace. I suggest you look her class up and see for yourself! You won't be sorry!

Blue and Brown Irish Chain

This quilt was a gift to my father for Christmas last year.  Little did I know it would be the last Christmas I'd get to spend with him.  He had been battling kidney cancer since 2014.  Unfortunately he passed in April of this year.  I'm happy I was able to make him smile.  I know he used this quilt a lot.  He was covered up with it when I visited him.  

Razor's Edge meets the world!!!

I can't even tell you how excited I am to be sharing this with all of you!  This is my very first pattern created completely by myself!  I worked hard getting it just right and I couldn't be happier!  

I never intended on creating my own pattern until I posted a picture of this quilt online and someone mentioned wanting my pattern.  Well, since I didn't use a pattern and came up with this on my own I decided that maybe I needed to write one up.  So I did!!!  

The blue and white quilt was pieced and quilted by myself.  I chose to do pebbles and swirls inside the blue areas and lines inside the white.  The border was my absolute favorite part of this whole quilt.  I chose to do a custom border with zig zags and pebbles and swirls.  My biggest challenge quilting it was the corners.  I was clueless how to do them since my edges didn't line up right in the corners.  I think what I ended up with works great and I couldn't be happier!  And just look at that back!  Adorable little birds!

I just want to say thank you to everyone that has given me the confidence to do this!  I would never have done it if it hadn't been for you!  Also thank you to my 3 toppers that 'tested' the pattern out for me!  Pat Smith, Meagan Morgan Campion, and Laurie Myers Cormier.  You all did a great job and thank you for helping me 'tweek' the little things to make the pattern better.  I truly appreciate it!  Ok, now the good stuff.  Pictures!!!

First up.....Razor's Edge by Serenity Puffinberger

This was also my first 'real' quilt that I quilted on my new APQS Lucey longarm machine.There was quite a few mistakes, but the end result turned out pretty good.  This one I gifted to my talented grandmother Alice Rippetoe.  She is an amazing crocheter and always makes blankets for everyone.  I thought she would appreciate getting something this time instead of giving.  Love you grandma!

Next up, Pat Smith

Don't you just love those corners?!  I quilted this one as well.  I chose to do an all over feather on the inside and another zig zag border.  This time I used my brain a little more and figured out how to get those corners 'just right'!  lol  Oh and check out that gorgeous backing fabric!  I love it!

Next is, Laurie Myers Cormier

I love that she sent me photos as she was putting the quilt together.  And isn't this picture with my pattern in the back awesome!?  lol

These are the only pictures I have of this quilt at the time because I did not quilt this one.  I just love the color combo don't you?  I can't wait to see the finished quilt after it's been quilted Laurie!  I'll be sure to update this post when I get them!

Last but not least, Meagan Morgan Campion

She also sent me this picture above before she finished the quilt.  Isn't this just lovely?  She sent this one to me to be quilted and I'm thrilled!  I had a hard time coming up with a design for it.  I finally chose connecting curves in the white space and beautiful flowers in the colored spaces.  I did a small curl in the skinny border and piano keys in the larger border.  I can't take all of the credit though.  I did get some of my inspiration from Judi Madsen.  I have her book Wide Open Spaces and that is where I got the design for the flower.  She is an amazing quilter!  

Check out that gorgeous purple backing!

Thank you again to all of you who helped make this possible!  

Pattern Testers

Pat Smith

Laurie Myers Cormier

Meagan Morgan Campion

Inspiration

Judi Madsen

Thanks to my husband for putting up with all that noise in the other room!  lol 

My kids for putting up with it too.  Hee hee.

My grandmother Alice Rippetoe for giving me the creative bones that I've inherited from her and of course to all of the lovely people in my facebook group who encouraged me.  Thanks to all of the other wonderful people in the other FB groups as well.  (yeah, I belong to a lot of them lol)

I really want to make sure everyone knows just how grateful I am for everything!  I can't wait to see where my hobby takes me in the future!

You can find my pattern in my Etsy store here...Quilting Is My Serenity

Happy Quilting!!!!

Quilts of Valor Foundation

I've had the wonderful opportunity to quilt for the QOV foundation.  You can read more about it here QOVF.  It's a wonderful thing to be a part of.  Here's a few pictures of some of the work I've done so far.  Everyone is very nice that I've had to work with.  I couldn't have picked a better group to work with.

If you'd like to see more I post everything to my facebook page QuiltsBySerenity.  Thanks!

Serenity

Whole Cloth Quilting

My husband has bugged me for a few years now to make him a quilt for on our bed.  He told me he wanted a white one that we could put under our other quilts (blankets) to add that extra warmth.  Well, of course I couldn't just throw one together simply.  lol  so I took on a whole cloth quilt challenge.  My first large WCQ on my longarm machine.  I do have a whole cloth quilt project in progress on my Facebook Group 'Free Motion Quilt Along With Ren'.  I am quilting it on my sit down domestic sewing machine and will be using the Quilt As You Go method to put it all together.  You can check that out here: Free Motion Quilt Along With Ren to learn more.

Now back to this beauty here:  I felt overwhelmed trying to figure out how I wanted to go about this quilt.  After endless hours on Pinterest and Google Images I finally decided to break the quilt up into sections.  Hence the horizontal strips.  This was great because I just did my own thing in each strip and it was so much easier to quilt.  (at least for me it was)  ;-).  There are a ton of pictures here and of course they don't do the quilt justice at all.  It is really a beauty.  Oh and of course I couldn't hide it under my other blankets.  It's right on top!!!! 

Swirls and pebbles above.