Star Quilts

I must like stars more than I thought! Many of these quilts were machine pieced and hand quilted, but since discovering machine quilting I've done just as many by machine piecing and machine quilting. There are even more stars on the next two pages (Feathered Star Quilts and Lone Star Quilts)

On this page:

Amish Star
Morning Star
Mariner's Compass
Rolling Star
Patriotic Banner
Compass and Stars
Hunter's Star

Amish Star

This one was completed in 1988. Thank goodness I've improved since then. I was influenced here by the typical black Amish background, but I used pastels (pink, lavender, aqua) for the pattern, which was machine pieced and hand quilted. The quilt has now gone to live with my twin sister in France.

Morning Stars

I fell in love with a sketch in a magazine and drafted this quilt from that. I finished it in 1990, machine piecing and hand quilting it. I'd never done eight-pointed stars before, so the centers were a bit "hilly" until they were quilted. But the quilt won Best of Show at our county fair! This one measures 43 1/2" x 35".

Mariner's Compass

This is another project from Quilt Camp in the Pines (1999). It's the result of a class with Gail Garber, which taught us how to draft and make this pattern. It's machine pieced and hand quilted, and I left it small in order to hang it in a small spot in my kitchen.

Rolling Star

In January, 2000, I took a class from Jodi Barrows, using her Square in a Square techniques to make this star quilt. It was machine pieced and hand quilted. I know some people think this technique might be difficult because of the many bias edges, but I found it quick and easy -- if you've starched the fabric first to prevent the otherwise inevitable stretching! It measures 35 1/2" x 46 1/2".

Patriotic Banner

Following the tragic events of September 11, 2001, it was impossible to find a flag to hang at our home. However, I did find a pattern for this banner, thanks to Julie DeGroat's web site! It can be found here. The banner measures 14" x 36" and was machine pieced and machine quilted on my little Featherweight.

Compass and Stars

In July, 2001, I took some classes at Quilt Camp in the Pines. This was my fourth year there, and it gets better every time! I had two days of classes with Sharyn Craig, one of which taught us a technique to make LeMoyne Stars (with their set-in seams) all but painless. I also had a two-day class with Judy Mathieson. In that one, we learned to draft any size and shape of Mariner's Compass, as well as curved flying geese to surround the compasses. I wanted to make an oval compass, and I also wanted to use some of those wonderful LeMoyne Stars with it. This quilt is the result of that idea. The quilt is entirely machine pieced and hand quilted.

You can see the quilting better in the close-up below; I did partial compasses in each of the large triangular areas between the narrow navy border and the stars, some simple shapes to accent the compass and the stars, plumes between the flying geese and the narrow border, small feathered sprays between each star, and a large feathered vine in the outer border. I finished it in May of 2002, and it measures 51" x 57".

In April, 2003, I entered this quilt in our local quilt show, where it took second place in its category! Here it is all dressed up with its ribbon:

Hunter's Star

Here we go again. ;) I went to Quilt Camp in the Pines in July, 2005, and took classes, as usual. One of them was Jan Krentz's Hunter's Star. I chose a slightly different layout than the one featured in the class, with the border that "finished" the stars at the edges of the main portion. The quilt was made from Jan's strip piecing method. Her book and sample showed 8" blocks, but I chose to make 4" blocks and a 3" border, so my project, finished in August, 2005, measures approximately 30" x 38". I laid this quilt out in Quilt Pro.

I used oriental-style prints in indigos, blues and purples; some of the fabrics had been in my stash for years. <G> The quilt is machine pieced and machine quilted, using navy silk thread in the body of the quilt and a blue/purple variegated thread in the outer border. There is a corded piping between the outer border and the binding; it is in the same fabric as the inner border. Here is a detail where you may be able to see the quilting a bit better:

Update: In March, 2006, this quilt won third place in its category at our local quilt show! Here it is at the show with its white ribbon:

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