Sunflowers for Kay

My dear friend Kay Card moved away.  She went to Kamas, Utah of all places and now lives just down the street from her son's family which includes five wonderful grandchildren, so I guess I understand.  It was mostly her husband Brian's idea so she went kicking and screaming (her words) because why would you ever choose to leave beautiful Oregon, but things are falling into place and she feels good about their decision.

I'm glad that Kay told me about their plans to leave Oregon before it was public knowledge, but when the word got out it was only about 2 months until their planned departure.  Our quilt group decided to make a quilt for her but we had to hurry.  I chose a pattern that I had seen before and had remembered Kay commenting on.  It was called "Indian Summer" designed by Karen M. Walker of Laugh Yourself Into Stitches.  The sunflower is Kay's favorite flower and because the pattern uses a single block repeated through the quilt, it was easy to divide up and have multiple people work on.  It was on April 26th that Jessica, Ardyth and I went to "A Speckled Hen" quilt shop just south of Tualatin to look for some fabric.  We found everything we needed at that one shop.  Most of the browns came from my stash and scraps because we needed little bits of lots of different brown fabrics.

The next day, Ardyth and I got together and cut it all up into 24 kits.  We cut brown strips for the log cabin centers and let everyone choose their own combination of fabrics but made no requirement about how the log cabin part of the block should be sewn except that the dark brown square had to be in the center.  The inner border uses the same dark brown fabric.  We handed out most of the kits at our quilt group that next Wednesday and had to be sneaky because Kay was coming.  There were 10 sewers, so everyone took at least 2 to make.

This block is a little more complicated and fussy than it may appear at first, but everyone did a fantastic job.  The little pinwheels are only 2" square and are made from the bits that are cut off after making the triangle corners.  Everyone made four of these.

The blocks were finished in record time and I had the top assembled and delivered to Pam Gamble for quilting on May 30th.  She had it completed by Thursday, June 6th.  Pam was so impressed with our work.  With so many piecers, the possibility of disaster is real but can I just say, we are awesome quilters!  The quilting design is called Lush Leaves and the crows on the backing fabric add some fun and whimsy to the project.  It has no reference to the old crows who made the quilt.

Long before the quilt was even planned I had offered to host a going away open house for Kay and Brian on June 23rd.  The quilting group decided that that night would be the perfect opportunity to give Kay her quilt.  She was totally surprised and loved it of course.

From left to right - Monique Beikman, Wendy Garner, Melissa Hunter, Jan Bracha, Sharla Averett, Donna Spackman, Jessica Lancaster, Kay Card (missing are Ardyth Graham, Dawn Staley and Anjuli Martin).

I attached this label to the lower left corner of the quilt on the back.  All the sewers printed their name and I used up the left over pinwheels to frame it.  It was a fun secret to keep and a beautiful quilt to give to a beautiful friend.  Happy Birthday today, too.  We miss you!