Happy Birthday Sally!

Our good friend Sally will turn 40 for the second time this Thursday. We celebrated in style last weekend and managed to surprise Sally, who was expecting cake, but not a party.

Sally got to wear the special birthday hat!

Joannie C. decorated the room and Sally's table in style.

Joan S. collected enough money to buy Sally two generous gift certificates for some local quilt shops. Sally is going to be able to stock up on some new fabric to feed her quilting addiction.

Here is Joan reading our birthday proclamation to Sally.

Kim P. made birthday cookies with yummy lemon frosting.

Kim has the whole alphabet in cookie cutters! She also brought a second plate of cookies for us to enjoy.

Here are Sally's birthday blocks.

Sally's blocks are in batik fabrics with a rich golden background color.

March is a popular birthday month in the Brown Baggers quilt group. There are four March birthday girls (five, if you count our friend Jean who has moved to Texas).

From left to right: Pat, Terri, Sally and me.

Pat also celebrated her birthday on Sunday and received birthday blocks. Terri is having her celebration next month and I'm not doing the block swap, so technically I won't have a party at quilting, although I intend to celebrate next weekend, all weekend long (my birthday is Saturday).

Here is Pat admiring her birthday blocks along with Marion, Terri and Joannie.

Pat's birthday blocks are bright and cheery in Kaffe Fassett fabric.

It's not a Brown Bagger birthday bash without a fantastic cake! And Marion also made home-made fudge, which I didn't take a photo of because I was too busy eating it! Several of us (no names) had fudge for breakfast.

This cake tasted even better than it looked, yes, you might think that's not possible...

Special thanks to Kim P. and Joannie for all the blog photos. I got a new phone (hooray!) and had left it at home with Mike to do the phone transfer.

A good time was had by all!

Thanks for visiting!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

A Quilter's Elegy for Joanne S.

We lost our friend Joanne S. last week, one of our beloved Brown Bag quilters. Joanne had been ill for a while, but she never complained, and we were grateful that she was able to rally her strength and attend a quilt weekend with us last November. She had been in hospice care for the last few months so most of us were able to spend time with her and say goodbye.

Joanne was an extremely talented quilter. She was a perfectionist who devoted herself to one project at a time, completing beautiful quilts with laser-like focus and precision. She had a great eye for color and she quilted all of her quilts on her Bernina and her Juki sewing machines. We will all miss her very much. She shared her love of quilting with her great niece Emma. We always had so much fun when Joanne would bring Emma to our meetings.

Here are some of Joanne's beautiful quilts that have graced my blog.

This is a quilt that we all made together for Emma.

This colorful Many Trips Around the World was one of my favorite quilts that Joanne made. There is a full size shot of it further below.

A shot from several years ago when Emma first started coming to quilting with Joanne.

This was a block of the month kit.

Lots of Christmas table runners all given as gifts.

Our road trip to The Missouri Star Quilt Company a couple of years ago.

This quilt has many, many tiny pieces!

Joanne made this in a workshop with Kaffe Fassett.

Many Trips Around the World.

One of Joanne's finished Birthday Block quilts.

Queen size Double Wedding Ring Quilt

This was the year that Emma volunteered Auntie Joanne to make 9 quilts for Emma to give as Christmas gifts to her cousins. Joanne finished them all and then taught Emma to sew!

In addition to being a quilter, Jo had a long and distinguished nursing career. She was a devoted sister, aunt, great aunt and friend. She had a great sense of humor. She loved to travel and visited many different foreign countries and exotic places with her dear friend Nancy D., another Brown Bag quilter and fellow nurse.

If you see some extra puffy clouds in the sky, it is Joanne doing trapunto and machine quilting in heaven. 

Thanks for visiting.

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

Happy Valentine's Day!

Happy Valentine's Day to my Dearest Blog Friends and Readers!

Today I will celebrate with one of my newest pug finds, pug-themed Valentine's Day socks! These little beauties kept popping up in my Facebook feed, so I finally caved in and bought them at The Paper Source.

I'm not sure what else I will wear to work tomorrow (writing this post in advance), but it will be planned to showcase my new socks.

Our wonderful cleaning people came and cleaned our house this week and made up our bed with my Valentine's Day Quilt... I laughed when I came home...

This is the BACK of the quilt. I guess the cleaning people liked this side better.

Here is the handsome LarryPug as seen on the FRONT of the quilt. It is a Yellow Brick Road design made up in Valentine's Day fabrics. I finished this quilt in 2017. It was quilted by my friend Val.

Here are some more photos of the backing fabrics. I had fun using the Alexander Henry pin-ups.

Valentine's Day Stud Muffins for me!

Perky Pin-Up Girls for Mike!

Here are my real life Valentine's:

Ziggy (aka the Doodlebug)

Caesar (photo bombed by Ziggy)

LarryPug!

And my favorite Valentine, my handsome husband Mike!

Thanks for visiting!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

Quiet Sunday with the Brown Bag Quilters

We had a small but dedicated group of six at our last Brown Bag Quilters' meeting on Sunday. Some of the girls were sick, some were working, and some were unaccounted for, but a good time was had by the few of us that made it.

Sue continued to work on her Christmas houses.

Marion worked on the latest Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt. She has nine of the 25 center blocks finished, so it will be another multi-year project for her to-do list.

We also celebrated Marion's birthday with a delicious chocolate cake!

Joannie chose fabric for a new quilt that she is making for her brother.

Terri worked on a pinwheel quilt.

Debby is hand piecing a table runner with teeny, tiny pieces!!

I brought a beading project to work on.

This is a pattern by designer May Brisebois and it is called Marquise's Jewel. I used the larger size stones intended for the necklace  to make a pair of earrings instead. They're not quite finished.

Thanks for visiting!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy

Brown Baggers MLK Quilt Weekend in Portsmouth, NH

Update to all my blogging friends: my Mom is recovering well from her bronchial asthma and my Dad is recovering from his pneumonia. My Mom is at home and my Dad is at a rehabilitation facility about a mile away. While I was helping my Mom in Florida, the Brown Baggers enjoyed our annual MLK quilt weekend.

This is a guest post with photos from my friend Joannie.

First finished project of the day went to Kathie!

Quilt weekends are a great way to inspire you to work on old projects. Here are some UFOs from the back of the closet that the Brown Baggers completed!

Marion's Stars...at least 20 years old!

Sally's Blue Batik Star... at least Sweet 16 years old...

Sally's Midnight Madness from 2002 at the Button Box is a finished top!

Need some bright colors for a dreary rainy day? Check out these quilts!

Kim P. with birthday blocks from 2016.

Jo Ann E. hiding behind her Kaffe quilt.

Pat's Rainbow Kaffe quilt. She made 2!

Pat's Gypsy Wife quilt.

Everyone got a lot done!

Cordula's Sparkling Gemstones

Debbie's Sampler

Karen's original design

It has Cathedral Windows in it!

Valerie's Snowball quilt

Sue working on her houses.

Margaret made Hen Houses. Click for a close-up.

Jo Ann E. made this miniature quilt and quilted it herself.

Jo Ann E. is an ardent applique-er and she does the most beautiful work.

More applique from Jo Ann E.

When she wasn't taking photos, Joannie worked on her rug. She took this class from our own Kim G.

Pat has twin granddaughters! This one's for Juliette!

And this one's for Kirstin.

Joan S made this quilt. I think it's a Jacob's Ladder.

and last but not least, Helene's modern beauty!

Hope you enjoyed this virtual quilt show!

Pugs and kisses,
Nancy