Shop Handmade - Lilly Bee

My on-line shop is named after my grandchildren. You can see my lovely products here!

In this photo, taken in my studio, I am making a Valentine tablerunner. I love to sew on my antique Singer machine, though I also have a wonderful Bernina!

Shop Handmade - Lilly Bee

Peaceful pastel

A quilt top, twin size, on the rail of our deck. It was inspired by the "Fengshui" pattern from

http://www.blueundergroundstudios.com .

Hancock's will have a batting sale Sept. 17th. So I will stock up and be ready. I am sewing a backing now...fun!

Simply Delicious

From several years back....an applique pattern was much loved!
This is a quilt called "Simply Delicious" by "Piece 'O Cake" quilt designers.

I was going through a closet in the studio yesterday and found this bag.

Inside are two completed blocks from the quilt, the pears and the apples. I plan to make 2 more, the plums and the peaches. Luckily, the patterns are still available and can be downloaded (for $3.00) each from here !

Red Sky at Night

This is a scrappy quilt which I am teaching the beginning quilters this month.

The pattern, "Red Sky at Night" is a "BIRDS IN THE AIR" variation and is in the July 2007 issue of Fons and Porter's "Love of Quilting" magazine. It is a wonderful design to use some of my stash of 1980's Ginny Beyer fabrics and VIP Cranston Print works!

Great Nieces and Nephews Need Quilts Too!

These are quilts for children. 2 "boy" quilts and 2 "girl" quilts.
The boys are brothers who live in Colorado.




The girls are sisters who live in New Zealand.

I used Kaffe Fassett and other florals for the little girls and fabrics with a Western feel for the brothers.

Luke's quilt

I received this card from my friend, Barbara. It shows her grandson, Luke, examining his quilt,... after exclaiming "Wow!"
It is a bright little boy's quilt with fabrics featuring cartoon characters and Oriental calligraphy! Here is Luke, a very happy little toddler!

Floral Parade Crib quilt

This would be a good crib quilt for a contemporary sophisticated nursery.

The blocks are 8" finished. The quilt top is 40 X 56. I may add a small border....

Perhaps this one will be for sale on ETSY soon?!!!

Shop Models

Yesterday I got busy at the sewing machine and made this 80x65 " quilt top.






It is to be a shop model for a local quilt shop which stocks a lot of Kaffe Fassett fabric. I love the clear pastels and gorgeous prints...all accented with the stripe! This is a very summery and soft quilt, I can hardly wait to get it back and quilt it!

Fa-la-la-la-la

I am madly sewing hanging sleeves onto quilts....and I even hope to get this new quilt pulled together and ready for the show....Ho, Ho, Ho!
This one is called "Reggae Rhythm" because it has African fabrics as well as wild contemporary fabrics (which are scraps from "burp cloths" which I sewed for the baby while at my daughter's, LOL!).



Meanwhile, Mr. Pear has hopes of his own, and has pulled all of our Christmas decorations out of the attic. He is on the right track, it is definitely time to get some of that up and celebrate the season. I can see it will be a busy, fun weekend!!!!

Getting ready to hang

It is 2 days away from a quilt/art show which I am having with a friend at our local Episcopal church parish hall....


My sewing machine is warming up so I can sew bindings and hanging sleeves on these quilts!
I'll post some photos early next week of the show after we have hung it!

The Bible Quilt

Here are the nativity and the resurrection blocks.
Jonah (love the sun!)

This folk art bible quilt is one of the most interesting I have made.

Patterns were from Jan Patek. Many of the Old Testament Stories are illustrated, as well as the nativity, the wedding in Cana and the Resurrection!

I love Kaffe's fabrics

I enjoy using the beautiful large prints designed by artist Kaffe Fassett.

The quilt with scrappy nine-patches is one I made and sold a few years ago.

The one on the right, I call "Summer Window" is going to hang in my art show this November.

Published long ago....

More of my past unearthed at my Mom's....this is an article from Quilt magazine in September 1981.
I was truly in love with quilt-making!

The title says, "An Innovative Quilter-" the large bed quilt features a center grouping of fan blocks and lots of room for pretty handquilting! It was purchased from me by a dear friend and fellow quilter who was so encouraging to me in those early years, Mary Jo Dalrymple.

The 3 wall-hangings were Castlewall (2 versions in larger photos) and Clamshell (small photo). They published directions for my "clamshell" quilt.....which you can hardly see here!

In the 1980's we were always on the look-out for any all cotton fabric which would work well in our quilts...we could call each other and spread the word when we found some!

Today we have many gorgeous fabrics to work with...here are some of the fabrics I will be making into quilts this fall....and winter, I'm sure! These are mostly by Kaffe Fassett, wonderful colors, design and visual texture!

New Zealand Baby

This is a baby's nursery in New Zealand.

Here is the mom, Krista with Eva Gabrielle. They (and her handsome dad),were

at the wedding this weekend.

They sent the photo of the quilt I made for their daughter. It is nice to see that they

love it enough to decorate around it!

Wedding quilt almost finished

These blocks have now become a bed-size quilt! (see 2nd photo)

The blocks are scrappy and feature fabrics which remind me of summer in a mountain meadow....Andrew and Mary met in the Tetons two summers ago.

I got it back Sunday from my friend Darlene, who has "Sew Graceful Quilting", a long arm quilting service. She does beautiful work! I asked her to quilt it loosely and she did....fluidly and loosely, looping feathery shapes in a meandering pattern.

I still have to sew the bright blue binding on it and send it to the kids....their wedding is coming up! August 11th!
Bright blue for the binding, will pick up the center of each block which is a 4-patch of various blues and white.

Golden Curry

I am making a "brick" pattern wallhanging using my Kaffe Fassett fabrics, with others. This will be a hanging for the art show I am doing with my friend Tracie at St. Paul's Epsicopal church this coming November...I want lovely rich pieces to hang there!

Family connections

Having a quilt shop for 11 years gave me a
lot of time to make things for and with
those I love!!!!!!!


Here, in May 2000, my daughter stops in
with my 10 month old granddaughter. My
mother has come up from Little Rock for
the Mother's Day weekend. Four genera-
tions in the shop that day!



The next photo shows my mother sitting by a window in a farmhouse in Wisconsin.
We went to visit my niece and her family that summer.
Mom worked on quilting a pink and brown basket quilt
which I had pieced. It is now owned by my daughter.



This last photo is also in Wisconsin...my great-nephew, Lane. He is reacting to a quilt which I made and brought up there for him.....He loved orange to I used lots of orange around fabrics featuring objects he would recognize....cows (they have a dairy farm), tractors, Big bird, Bob the Builder, etc.

He just said, "WOW" !

Morning Glory quilt

The fall of 2000, a school near my quilt shop had a fence covered with beauty!
Morning Glories!

My friend Tracie , who was spending some time at my quilt shop/retreat center, offered to help me make the hand-appliqued blocks for the morning glory quilt. She even went by the school and took a photo of the flowers for us to enjoy!


Here are some of the blocks we made....the round close-up
of the morning glory alternates with the more geometrical
trellis block! The finished quilt was 3 times this size....




This quilt was sold to someone who fell in love with it....another to a good home!

A garden gate quilt

A charming pattern, was it from "Country Threads?" I forget....

But since I had a garden gate like this and a black cat who could strike the same pose, I was compelled to make this one!

However, it was a very HOT summer that year...

2000....I chose cool and frosty colors for my Garden Gate quilt. The orange traditional pumpkin turned into a "ghost" pumpkin...a pale white/green orb. I used lots of blues and lavenders...and turned my red and white flag stripe fabric to the "wrong" side for a paler frosty effect. I liked the morning glory block so much, that I ended up making and selling a morning glory quilt* later that summer.

*to be posted in a minute

Sunflower Baskets

A quilt photo found in a scrapbook from 2001.



This is a quilt top I made from a pattern in a Fons and Porter magazine.

I sold the top to Lonetta Blevins, who then had it hand quilted.
The baskets, in reds, blacks and golds, are machine pieced and the sunflower border is fused and blanket stitched on the machine.

A wonderful look for sunflower lovers!