Give Me Books and Quilts: Mary Marks' New Mystery

Love books? Here's a quiltlet that I made a couple of years ago. It's 7" long and illustrates a famous John Keats quotation: "Give me books, fruit, French wine, fine weather, and a little music out of doors played by somebody I do not know." 

It's a wall hanging, a coaster, a bookmark, or even a cuff bracelet. I call these concoctions quiltlets. (Find more in the word cloud on the lower right.)

And speaking of books and the people one knows - I don't read a lot of quilting fiction, but I make an exception for my friend Mary Marks' quilty mystery series. First, they are fast-paced page turners, Second, they are hilarious. And third, her heroine is a quilty, clever, reckless, zaftig, 55-year-old heroine, Martha Rose.

There is one drawback; this third book, Gone But Not Forgotten, features luscious descriptions of a broad range of Los Angeles cuisine, from In-and-Out's secret menu to a Salvadoran restaurant; plus chocolate babka, pastrami, Italian roast coffee, and raisin challah, applesauce cake - you get the idea. I was torn between not wanting to stop reading, and needing to leap up and drive to the nearest bakery or ethnic restaurant.

You also gotta love that her heroine, Martha, is a hot mama who is the object of various character's romantic desires. She's a not-always-nice Jewish girl, living the dream, with plot twists aplenty, and quilting tips at the end.

If you haven't read one of Mary's books yet, I suggest starting with the first, Forget Me Knot, and second, Knot in My Backyard, since the characters develop in interesting ways. Read them outdoors with a glass of fine wine - you will enjoy them, I guarantee!

(No financial affiliation with Amazon or Mary. I did receive a review copy of her book from the publisher.)

Shouldn't Your Bouquet Match Your Quilts?

Karla Alexander is a well- known quilt teacher and book author, who developed the 'Stack the Deck' book series. Her method/game nicely combines planning with serendipity. The basic idea is to cut a stack of square blocks; subcut blocks  into different pieces; shuffle each pile of pieces differently; and stitch the pieces back into blocks.

You do have to read through the directions a couple of times, but once you grok it, it’s a lot of fun – perfect for when you don’t want to design too much, and just want to get to the sewing.  From her book 'New Cuts for New Quilts, More Ways to Stack the Deck,' I made this quilt, which she calls 'Razzle Dazzle.' Her model quilt was made from multicolored batiks, with sashing in black-and-white checked fabric. I used print fabrics, and a black-and-white square sashing.

A little loud, no? I don’t know why I like purple and yellow so much. I keep coming back to it. Or maybe I cured myself with this project.... 

In any case, once I was done, I liked the quilt, but I liked the pile of scraps generated from trimming up the blocks to size, even better. I mean, this was one heckuva great-looking scrap pile, consisting of slivers from ½” to about 2” wide, each sliver made up of several fabrics.

They were a little too narrow for a scrap quilt…So I decided to turn them into flowers. I cut out backing circles from felt, using my pinking shears. 

The felt circle is a couple of inches shorter than the slivers. Flipped to the front, I piled  a bunch of slivers on each backing, setting each strip at a different angle, like an asterisk. Added a couple of strips cut from the black-and- white sashing to fill things out. 

Stitched them together in the center, added a coordinating button. Then I drenched each flower  in “Stiffy”, and laid it to dry on waxed paper. Stiffy keeps the slivers more or less pointing outward. The final step is to hand-stitch on the extra-long pipe cleaners (aka chenille stems). I wound a couple of the stems together to make them stronger. 

And voila! A raggedy bouquet that matches my quilt! (Just what my house needs: MORE crazy yellow and purple explosions everywhere!)

Karla’s latest book, 'Dynamic Quilts with Easy Curves,' uses her shuffle approach to cut curved shapes. One of the great things about her books is that you don’t have to buy the first one to understand the system – she re-explains it in every book.