"I Heard It On the Radio" PNQFAM Artist Reception

 I Heard It On the Radio

Seattle Modern Quilt Guild

June 11 - August 3, 2025

Back in December, I shared about the Seattle MQG "I Heard It On the Radio" challenge exhibit being displayed at the KEXP Gathering Space in Seattle. Well, it was our good fortune to have the exhibit shown again at the local (about an hour from my home)  Pacific Northwest Quilt & Fiber Arts Museum in La Connor, WA. The Artist Reception was last Saturday, and happily my husband and I were able to attend.

The quilt shown above is Golden Blunders, inspired by Golden Blunders by The Posies, created by Christa Poel. I wasn't able to get photos of the entire exhibit, but have several of the quilts shared below. If you want to see more, be sure and look back at my post from December.

And finally, here is my entry on the left, Surrounds, inspired by Seattle by Perry Como. 

I guess I got a little distracted, and didn't get close-ups of the two quilts hanging next to mine, but here are the cards hanging next to them, Major Tom in the center, and The Neon Lights Are Bright on the right. Hopefully you can zoom in a bit and see them better. Totally missed getting a photo of my card, darn.

Anyway, that was very fun! Surrounds will be coming home in August, but it was really a joy to participate in this challenge with nearly 40 of my guild mates. Thankfully Beth @goolaffgirl got good shots of the entire exhibit, so check out her post if you'd like to see more.

Stash Jazz

Unfortunately, I haven't been able to attend any Seattle MQG giving quilt sew-ins, and finally I decided to just go ahead and make a quilt for them to donate. Some time before her passing last year, Carole Lyles Shaw gave permission for the guild to use her Stash Jazz pattern for giving quilts. I opted to make the 55" x 62" Small Lap Quilt version, though mine actually came out 55" x 58" due to the amount of border fabrics I had. 

The pieced blocks were made totally of scraps; then the solid blocks and borders were from stash.

Honestly, piecing the scrappy slabs was time consuming! I had grabbed my blue and yellow/orange scrap baskets, thinking the quilt top would be primarily blues and oranges. Come to find out, I had more yellow than orange, so that's what ended up happening.

Still, when it was time to cut the solid slabs for each block, I still went with blue and orange - Kona Riviera and Orangeade. Except I didn't have quite what I needed, so the blue corners are actually Kona Ocean, and the orange corner is obviously a print. I think it works, especially since the quilt top is definitely focused on the scraps.

For the back, I started by piecing the leftovers, and added stash prints and solids to bring it up to size.

Early on I knew I wanted to do a grid for quilting, and when I remembered I had a cone of Aurifil 50wt 2225 [Salmon] - thank you Aurifil! - it felt like kismet. And gotta say, quilting went so nicely with my new machine. It gave me a lot of joy to have the quilting go so smoothly.

I had originally planned for a scrappy binding, but once I was trimming the quilt, scrappy didn't feel right. Or at least not with the scraps I had left. Happily, I happened across random pieces of original Cotton + Steel Mesa by Alexa Marcelle Abegg from back in 2014(!!). And I think it's a fun addition.

So thanks to perfect timing, our guild meeting is tonight, and I'll be able to deliver both the Pixie Stix quilt I bound and this Stash Jazz to the Giving Committee for donation. Pretty sure it will go to either Kenmore Senior Women’s Shelter or YWCA Pathways for Women. Perfect.

Linking up with Quilting Jetgirl's Favorite Finish {June 2025}.

Linking up with Quilting & Learning, What a Combo's Free Motion Mavericks.

Giving Quilt

I've held off sharing this quilt hoping I'd find out more about the maker and design, but several weeks have gone by and I've learned nothing, so since it was something I used stashed fabric on, and counted in May's Fabric Usage, I figured I might as well go ahead and share it. 

The quilt top was rescued off the Seattle MQG retreat free table by Amber @greenamberdawn, then longarm quilted by Jana @janalroyal. Besides to these two guild members, credit also goes to guild Giving Quilt chair Linda Teri, who passed the quilt off to me for binding, suggesting "contrast would be good."

Perfect! I was free to choose binding fabric from my own stash, and used a fun pink on pink dot to finish the quilt, which measured 60" x 72". I'll return the quilt to Linda at our June meeting for labeling and donating. This year, the guild is donating to Kenmore Senior Women’s Shelter, YWCA Pathways for Women, and Westside Baby, so the quilt will go to one of those organizations. Glad I could help make it happen.

ETA: THANK YOU to Wanda @exuberantcolor for identifying the quilt pattern for me! It's Pixie Stix from Strip Your Stash by Gudrun Erla @gedesignsgudrun. Whew. One piece of the puzzle solved.

"I Heard It on the Radio" Exhibit Celebration

On December 2 at the KEXP Gathering Space in Seattle, the artwork of nearly 40 members of Seattle MQG opened to the public for viewing. The exhibit was the culmination of the "I Heard It on the Radio" challenge that we had been given months ago. Works were inspired by a song chosen by the maker, each between 60" and 100" in diameter, with tenets of modern quilting kept in mind. 

Many thanks to the Challenge Committee – Bridget, Chandra, Jackie, Karen, Kae, Kelty, Lorinda and Martha - for making the vision a reality.

During the challenge, a playlist had been made of all the inspiration songs. You can have a listen too, by scanning the QR code above.



I had the pleasure of visiting the exhibit on December 4, the evening of the opening reception, and it was good to gather with members to celebrate and enjoy the exhibit, most of us seeing the quilts for the first time.

You may remember my "Surrounds," made for the challenge earlier this year. I shared the quilt, but not my inspiration song, which was "Seattle" sung by Perry Como. Or as I think of it, "The bluest skies you've ever seen are in Seattle." I remember it often being on the radio here in the Seattle area when I was a kid.

It was actually composed by Hugo Montenegro with lyrics by Jack Keller and Ernie Sheldon. It was the theme song for "Here Come the Brides" TV show, and also sung by Bobby Sherman, my teenage heartthrob. Yeah, I have fond memories around this song, and think of it often when the skies are blue here in the PNW.

"Surrounds," inspired by Seattle by Perry Como, created by Debbie Jeske

I took photos of several other quilts that caught my eye (and that I was tall enough to get a photo of), and I hope you enjoy seeing just a smattering of the gorgeous work displayed.

"Hooray for Hazel," inspired by Horray for Hazel by Tommy Roe, created by Cordelia Nance @notmadebyrobots

"Modern Pop Sunrise," inspired by Here Comes the Sun by The Beatles, created by Karen Braitmayer @kbrtymr

"Into the Woods," inspired by Into the Woods by Stephen Sondheim, created by Jackie Benedetti @tinwoman48

"They Say the Neon Lights are Bright," inspired by On Broadway by George Benson, created by Martha Peterson @onceawingnut

"A Day for You," inspired by If I Had Words to Make a Day for You by Scott Fitzgerald and Yvonne Keeley, created by Linda Kucera @lkhomework

"Hum Along with Me," inspired by Stop by Jane's Addiction, created by Louise Wackerman @imfeelincrafty

"Sunshine and Spider Webs," inspired by Sunshine by Frozen Orange, created by Rachel Berryhill @rachel_lynn000

"Fade to Black," inspired by Fade to Black by Metallica, created by Rachel Singh @liketosew

"They/Them," inspired by Deadname by Flasch, created by Tiffany Muskrat

So hope you enjoyed a little glimpse of the exhibit. Honestly, I was so impressed with the exquisite modern quilts created by my fellow members. The exhibit was a joy to see and experience.

The Like, Totally Quilt

Boy it feels great to have this quilt done! Begun back in February, with my good friend Louise @imfeelincrafty as designer and hostess, I've been making blocks month by month pretty much on schedule. My Seattle MQG guild mates - and others! - have been actively making them as well, so it's been fun to follow along with them too.

A pieced quilt back seemed in order, and I started with extra blocks from the front but then made a bunch more HRTs and HSTs from scraps.

The overall quilt is 56" x 56". I went pretty simple with my quilting, using the serpentine stitch on my backup machine, with Aurifil 40wt 6722 [Sea Biscuit]. Gotta say, that serpentine goes pretty quickly, and before I knew it, I was binding the quilt in Kona Pacific, one of the colors used in making the blocks.

I haven't been quite as good with having a monthly quilt finish this year, so it feels extra good to have one for November. Plus, a nice, cozy quilt finish is always a good thing.

Linking up with quilting JETgirl's Favorite Finish for November 2024.

Matchy-Matchy

Last week at Seattle MQG, I participated in what we call a 'Round Table' - a chance for several members to share a skill with the rest of the group. I was asked a while back to share about matched binding, which I was happy to do.

I took a few samples of finished quilts with matched binding, necessary tools - minus my sewing machine - and also made up a small (16" x 20") sample quilt to demonstrate the technique.

I shared the same demo with five different groups of about eight people, using a glue stick and wonder clips in place of my machine at each of the color-change junctions. Sorry, my hands were too busy to take photos, but it worked well enough! Once I was back home, I sewed the binding with my machine, hand-stitching on the back as I normally would.

The piece, which I'm calling "Matchy-Matchy," was quilted with an uneven grid using Aurifil 50wt 5021 [Light Grey], which I actually thought looked more like a light tan. Whatever, I liked how it let the grid show off without being too stark color wise. 

The demo got a great reception from my fellow guild members, some of which had never seen the technique before. I think I even convinced some of them to give it a try! 

P.S. It was surprisingly, harder to catch the true colors of this quilt in the natural light than inside. The second and fourth photos are most true - with the pink more of a peach color, and the medium blue more of a light teal.