This is a postage stamp quilt with appliqué in the middle.

I made this quilt back in the late 90's.The center medallion was pieced first, then sat in my UFO box for a couple years. I had enjoyed drafting it, and decided to complete it with stars drafted from octagon wedges. It is an original design, drafted on graph paper using plastic mylar templates for all the star pieces. They were "fussy cut" and sewn together. The rest of the design followed after. 

Medallion quilts are enjoyable for me, as you start with a spark of inspiration and build on it throughout the quilt making process.

It is a throwback, I got a laugh out of Pantone's color (s) of the year this year...yep I've done that back in the day, twice actually in my beginning quilt days. 

I am sure I got the basic octagon wedge from Jinny Beyer's book The Quilters Album of Blocks & Borders. A wonderful reference and source of inspiration.

This quilt is 102 inches x 104 inches.   It is double batted with Hobbs Heirloom Premium Wool and a layer of Legacy Bamboo Blend Batting on the back.  The whole thing is flannel.  She's pretty heavy!  I expect it will be warm during cold winter nights.

I designed the quilt using Electric Quilt 7.  It's a simple pattern that shows off the quilting well and went together quickly.  The backing is a lovely tone-on-tone in grey, which I used in one of the borders then feathered around it to frame the inside medallion.  

I used Glide Cool Grey on both front and back.  Glide has become my 'Go To' for most of my quilting.  It's strong and doesn't cause a lot of dust or breakage during the stitch-out.  992,861 stitches in this baby and not one break! The quilt was finished using my Statler by Gammill combined with some ruler work.  The designs (and - of course - my inspiration) came from Bill Hibbett and Karen McTavish  (both from Legacy Quilting) and Christy Dillon from MyCreativeStitches.com.  I also used a Digitech Patterns from the Heart of my Heart collection in each of the corners, pulling together the outside borders.  

This quilt started out as a geometric doodle I did on graph paper. I wanted to make a "Modern Quilt". I refined it, so that it could be machine pieced. It was challenging, but doable. Adding to the difficulty was the black and white wavy background, which I needed to align and match  across the quilt.

I included the "Flying Geese" traditional blocks in the "Modern" pieced design. It reminds my son of when the planets align. This quilt certainly challenged my skills in conjoining, so I call it "Conjunction".

I made this quilt after watching a "Simply Quilts show episode. I took fabric from my stash that matched a love seat I had at the time. Alex Anderson instructed us to cut a bunch of different fabrics into 2 inch squares, then put them in a bag and shake them up. Then pull out a square and lay it out in a square grid, as they are picked. I only changed 3 squares positions once I had done this. I then expanded the quilt, by adding the larger squares, rectangles and an inner border. To finish, I hand quilted each square with a different design for each fabric. 

This quilt has been hanging over our changing T.V.'s for the last 13 or 14 years (Date made uncertain). I've made quite a few quilts since then, many more technically challenging, but this is one of my favorites.

The inspiration for this quilt came from a visit to the V&A Museum’s 1700 Quilts Exhibition and Lily Rose has the best of what I love from the era in one simple design- floral applique and wonderful patchwork.

'Red Delicious' was my first BOM! Celebrating all the red things in life which I love. 

This quilt generated so much interest that it inspired me to start my own Yahoo BOM Group! That Group has since moved over to become a Facebook Group, and it all started with this simple and lovely red design. 

http://estheraliu.blogspot.com.au/p/red-delicious_19.html

This is a quilt made for the son of a friend from t-shirts he gathered will on holidays.  The quilt his machines pieced and quilted.

This is my first Dresden plate quilt; the blocks are 20" square.  The plates are machine appliqued using a blanket stitch.  I also made the pillow shams.  I am usually drawn to earth tones so working with these colors was a bit out of my element but I really enjoyed the challenge.  

This wild tree is set against a fiery sunset.

The image is a wild tree sent against a fiery sunset.

A wild tree set against a fiery sunset. 

This was the 2015 Block of the Month four-part pattern named Blooms for Julie.  I was able to use fabrics from my stash, especially border prints collected at a previous quilt run.  Lots of fun techniques were used such as making templates and using them to cut patches, several ways to applique, bias strips, partial seams, working with stripes, and creating 3-D yo-yo and folded-hexagon flowers.  This was my first attempt at raw edge applique.

This is my entry in The National Quilt Museum's contest "The Gala if the Unexpected".  It is a tradional log cabin with "applique" constructed entirely from duct tape.  It involved lots of head scratching but I had more fun making this than almost anything else I've done.  It has a piped binding and was hand-quilted by punching over 12,000 holes with a leather punch so that I could stitch through all layers.

Fancy Dancer is the first piece in my Dancing Feather series. The feathers are raw edge applique and the rest is fused.  The pattern is available on my web site www.barbaraolsonquiltart.com. Feather templates are also available. 

Fancy Dancer is the first in my Dancing Feathers series. This piece is raw edge applique and some fusing. The pattern and templates are available on my web site www.barbaraolsonquiltart.com

Wool applique.  Primitive Gatherings pattern by Lisa Bongean.  

This table mat was made from a Primitive Gatherings pattern entitled Christmas Time Table Mat by Lisa Bongean.  The TQS Sue Spargo show was the catalyst for my interest in wool applique and it has become one of my favorite hand stitching methods.  Wool really is delightful to work with and is very portable.  Thanks to TQS for providing quilters with so many wonderful opportunities to expand our knowledge and interests.