Quilt Tops for Harvey

As I've said before, the response to my request for blocks to make quilts for the residents of the senior's home that burned down in April was incredibly generous. It was beyond anything I ever thought possible 😊

It was so incredible, in fact, that even after accounting for the residents of the home, the employees and all of our town's first responders, I still had way more quilt tops than I needed. 21 more! So, rather than holding on to them, taking months to finish them all and then trying to figure out who around here might possibly need a quilt, I decided to send them where I know they will be put to good use.

All ready for their photo shoot 😊 A huge thank you to Aiden and Zachary for holding up all 21 quilts so I could take the pictures!

Mel, (mel_is_a_swapaholic on IG), is organizing an effort to make quilts for those affected by hurricane Harvey. It's such a joy to send these 21 quilt tops on to her and I know they'll bring a bit of cheer to their recipients. 

Please know that these blocks were not chosen to be sent on because they're in any way less than the blocks that I've chosen to keep. In fact, some of these are so gorgeous I wish I had a piece of the fabric they were made from 😊 It's simply a matter of numbers and wanting to make the best use possible of all of these beautiful blocks.

Now, let's admire some pretty quilt tops, shall we?

This top was donated already pieced, though it's a little smaller than we've been making from the donated blocks. It was so pretty, though, that I didn't want to mess it up by adding unrelated blocks. It will be perfect for someone just as it is!

The lady who sewed these blocks together wanted to do something a little different with them, so she raided her stash for some coordinating reds and created a whole different layout.  

So, did you see any of your blocks in these quilt tops?

All of Us

Devotion for the Week...

I'm sure you've noticed that it takes a lot of work to keep a household running. First, there's the necessity of having a paying job to provide an income. Then there's the meal preparation, house cleaning, yard work, laundry, bill paying and grocery shopping. In our house we have the added task of stacking our firewood each year when it is delivered, then the job of bringing it inside throughout the winter to be used in the furnace.

The idea of any one person doing all of that work is crazy. It simply wouldn't be possible. Even in times where men did nothing in the house, they generally were the ones to provide the income, so there was a sharing of the work.

All of us who are a part of the household should be helping with the work of running the household. Obviously, not everyone will do the same work (Nathan, who is 9, doesn't have a job to help pay the bills, for example), but everyone should be doing something.

One of the jobs our boys help with is the stacking and bringing in of the firewood. When people comment about how good it is that the boys help with the wood, I laugh and say that they like to be warm just as much as we do, so it's only right they help.

There's a lot of work involved in building up God's church too, and it's only right that all of us who are a part of it should be doing our portion of that work. In fact, Paul wrote that everyone doing their share is actually crucial to the maturity of the church.

Note here that I am not writing about the particular church that we attend on Sundays, either the building or the congregation that meets there. I'm referring to the whole family of God, all of those around the world who believe in Jesus as Savior.

Ephesians 4:11-13 says: "So Christ himself gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip his people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ."

There is so much in these three verses! First of all, notice that the leaders of the church (the apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors and teachers) are given to the church to equip everyone else for works of service. The clergy are not the only ones who are to be serving the church and the community. We're all supposed to be doing it.

If we are all doing our part, whatever that may be, then just look at all that will come from our combined efforts: the body of Christ, the church, will be built up until we all reach unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God and we will become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ.

Building up the church can be taken here to mean both increasing the number of those who are members of the church and the spiritual growth of all believers. Isn't it interesting that this building up of the church will continue until we all reach unity in the faith?

We will also have unity in the knowledge of the Son of God, which I think goes hand in hand with unity in the faith, since it means that we will all agree on everything pertaining to the Son of God.

On top of that, or maybe because of it, we will be mature in the faith, no longer weak or immature.

Now attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ is a little hard to understand, but basically it means that we will become Christ-like. We will exhibit the character of Jesus in our everyday lives because of our spiritual growth and maturity.

Don't you want all of that? I know I do. Which means we must be seeking ways to serve others according to the gifts God has given us. What I do and what you do may be different, but that doesn't change the fact that we should be using the gifts God has given us to reach people for Him and to encourage spiritual growth.

It's up to all of us to pitch in and use our spiritual gifts to build up the church.

FMQ Doesn't Have to Be Perfect

A couple of days ago, I shared a picture of my current (secret for now) quilting project with a friend. She took one look at all of those straight lines and said, "I'd never be able to do that, unless I used a ruler."

We tend to think our quilting has to be perfect in order to look good, but it doesn't! There are a bazillion lines in this quilt and when you stand back they all look perfect, but I can guarantee you that they're not 😊

I am aiming for the lines to be horizontal or vertical, but there are plenty of slightly diagonal lines that have crept in. And even though I know there are a lot of them, I really had to search to find some for this picture.

Generally, quilting lines should be a consistent distance apart, but these ones definitely aren't! Every now and then as I'm quilting, I remind myself that I'm trying to quilt farther apart, so I make a conscious effort to space them out more. It doesn't take long, though, for my 'tiny quilting' habit to take over and the lines grow closer and closer together.

The great thing is, no one will ever know! There's enough consistency in the variations that it all looks like I meant for it to happen. And as a bonus, it is creating absolutely wonderful texture 😊

When we're quilting, we have our noses so close to the work that we see every little imperfection as if it were lit with neon lights. No one else will ever look that closely! Even other quilters who might know what to look for are never that critical of anyone else's work.

Don't let the fear of the imperfect hold you back from trying a new design, or from trying free motion quilting altogether. Even Angela Walters, one of the free motion quilting queens, says that "Finished is better than perfect" and "Close enough is good enough"!

Do you embrace the imperfect in your quilting?