We’re getting down to the wire with our UFO challenge and looking for more entries: our quilt detecting antenna detect UFO’s everywhere… we know they are out there!

Quilting Gallery and Quilting Is Murder teamed up earlier this year and created a challenge to quilter’s everywhere: finish up a UFO and you could win a bernette 25 sewing machine. Remember, you don’t have to totally finish your UFO: just make significant progress. The goal is to quilt and have some fun while doing it. Read about the Challenge here.

Here is the link to our Flickr group. Take a minute and click through the photos and add yours to the entries.

Spool_dust queen finished hers already! A big hurray goes out to her. :)

justcrafty1 has BEADS on her quilt!! We love beads!!

Ten Quilts has a wonderful set of Jacob Ladder blocks she’s pulling together: let’s give her some friendly kudos and encouragement to get them quilted.

thePieceCorps has VeeDub group of block ~ blocks of VW bugs she’s putting together. Fun!!

Hurry – get your UFO entry in: it can be anything from a quilt to a table runner to an oven mitt ~ we all have a UFO or 25, so there is no excuse for you to pull one out and git ‘er done.

Chief Inspector Jean’s UFO update: “I haven’t touched my UFO since putting it up for inspection on the Flickr site…. I’d better get moving! My entry is just there to give me incentive: it will not be considered to win, of course. However, I did finish up a table runner last week as I made room to move my UFO quilt into the sewing area….”

Deadline to submit your quilt photos to the Flickr group is this Saturday, February 11th. Be sure to leave a note in the discussion too with your official entry info.

Please join me in welcoming today’s guest blogger Nan Baker of Purrfect Spots – A place where needlework and animals are loved. She’s sharing her love of crafting and the inspirational work she’s done teaching and helping others to learn how to take care of pets during disasters. She’s also put together a slide show on “Safety Tips for Pets” and is giving away a gift too.

My grandmother taught me to knit and my first project was a doll skirt. My first cross stitch project was a rooster on a red cloth with black floss. I embroidered a pillow case at camp. I made my first outfit in middle school (then it was called junior high)! And I made all my clothes when I went to college. And it didn’t stop there. I always had a project going my entire life and I still do today. But if you would have told me that I would become a designer with my own company because of a cat – I wouldn’t have believed you.

Twenty years ago we moved to Florida with our 2 cats. My family had vacationed there and I loved it. It was my dream to become a "little ol’ lady on the beach with lots of cats"! Be careful what you wish for! Thanks to a loving husband, I am living my dream!

However, one thing I didn’t anticipate was having lots of hurricanes (a few maybe, but not lots)! We evacuated many times. Not much fun, but very necessary. We always took our cats – there was no way I would leave them behind. But 20 years ago, not much thought was given to animals in emergency situations. Hurricane Andrew in 1992 changed all that thanks to the many animal agencies that responded to that disaster. Emergency Management officials saw the need, but it was a slow learning process. The issue was raised again with Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and fortunately, since then, emergency officials have listened.

There was a little black cat that came into my life right before Hurricane Opal in 1995. Casey was a feral cat and I couldn’t get close to him when we evacuated, so I had to leave him behind. The next day when we returned (and that is another story) Casey ran to my arms. I became very attached and when he passed, I decided his little life should not be in vain. Read the complete story of Casey on my blog!

Because of Casey and my love of animals, I became involved with The Humane Society of the United States and was part of their Disaster Animal Response Team (DART). As a result I worked fires, floods, tornadoes and hurricanes. I saw firsthand the need to get the word out about taking care of pets during disasters. Therefore I created The CASEY Plan (Caring for Animals Safely in Emergencies during the Year) in memory of my little black cat to help promote animal disaster preparedness.

And that is also when I created Purrfect Spots. Living in a resort area, I designed cross stitch patterns of local landmarks. A portion of my sales goes to The CASEY Plan which promotes animal disaster preparedness. My first effort was the Seaside Post Office (Picture).

One thing led to another and I started creating all sorts of cross stitch patterns and then added needlepoint.

Well it was only natural to go into quilting as a lot of my patterns worked beautifully as appliqué.

I fell in love with quilting and that is what I design today, both applique and pieced.

I love to hand quilt as I find it very relaxing and good therapy. It is one place in my life that I can make the pieces fit (if they are cut right). I am also the Marketing Director for The Quilt Pattern Magazine. However I still am very much involved in the promotion of animal disaster preparedness and safety. Casey’s legacy lives on! That is why I created this “Safety Tips for Pets” slide show for all my sewing friends with pets.

Give-Away

I have enjoyed being a guest on the Quilting Gallery today and I hope you have enjoyed the story of my journey as a quilter and animal lover. In appreciation of your visit, I do have a contest!

Leave a comment below telling me if you have a pet, (name & description) plus what poses a threat for them in your sewing room. There will be a random drawing for a special gift next Wednesday!

Thank you again for visiting.

For the animals,
Nan Purrfect Spots

Please join me in welcoming today’s guest blogger Linda Hubalek as she reflects on the value of quilts. Linda’s also giving away a Kindle copy of one of her books too for those that help name one of the quilts she used as a child in the comments below.

Author Linda Hubalek

Isn’t it funny how we used "old bedding" when we were growing up, and now realize how valuable these antique quilts are due to the work and love put into each of them?

This fall I moved my parents from the farm they had called home for 65 years to a smaller home in town.

Because my parents didn’t have room for two trunks of quilts, I was lucky to inherit them. Inside these wooden chests were the handmade quilts, made by my great grandmother and grandmother, which we had used on our own beds when I was young.

Oil tinted photos of Kajsa Swenson Runeberg standing in front of her house featured in Linda K. Hubalek's book Butter in the Well

My childhood years in the 1960s were spent in a wood frame house built back in 1870. The only heat for my upstairs bedroom came from a floor vent, which let a little warmth drift up from the room below. Therefore, during the winter months, there were "blanket sheets" on my bed, plus three or four quilts on top.

Author Linda Hubalek and her little sister in front of the "Butter in the Well" house in 1966

Then I grew up, left home, and started using the light modern blankets on my bed.

Looking through the inherited quilts again brought back many memories. Not only of the quilts, but other flashes—like tucking my feet up inside the flowered flannel nightgown I wore to bed, pink sponge curlers, and having only my nose sticking out from under the pile of bedding.

Now I think of how I treated those quilts that we had used for everyday bedding, and am amazed that they survived.

Pink quilt used by Linda Hubalek while growing up in the "Butter in the Well" house

I marvel at the thousands of tiny handmade stitches and the variety and colors of the fabric—all scraps from past clothing of my ancestors.

How many hours did the quilters spend cutting out the block pieces, and then sewing them together?

Who sat around the quilting frame to quilt them?

What was the conversation those days back in the late 1800s and early 1900s?

Pink quilt used by Linda Hubalek while growing up in the "Butter in the Well" house

Did these women ever consider their handwork would keep their decedents warm after they were gone? Or that I would treasure these quilts and the memories of the quilters a century later?

Just think, whether it was a hundred years ago—or present time—a quilt made by someone’s hand, is keeping another person warm.

How valuable is that? Priceless…

About the Author of Today’s Post

Hello from the Kansas prairie! I’m pioneer writer Linda Hubalek. Because one of my book series, Trail of Thread weaves stories and quilts together, the Quilting Gallery is the perfect place to share some thoughts about antique quilts.

Book series by Linda K. Hubalek

Today I’m thinking about my first book series though as I write about the quilts I used while growing up. Butter in the Well series, written in dairy form from 1868 to 1888, features the Swedish woman Kajsa Swenson that homesteaded the farm I grew up on. The series continues in Prarieblomman as her daughter Alma Runeberg blossoms into a young woman. Egg Gravy is a reading recipe book that features quotes from the first two books about food, and then features the old-time recipe. The series finishes with Looking Back as Kajsa reminisces her final week on the land she homesteaded.

Enter a Give-Away

Want to win one of my ebooks for your Kindle? Please enter my ebook give-away by leaving a comment below, and a randomly picked lucky reader will receive a Kindle version of Butter in the Well, featuring the old house I grew up in.

Because quilt patterns can have more than one name, please tell me what you’d call the hand tied quilt I used growing up (pictured above – that I got in trouble for pulling out some of its yarn ties) as your entry for the ebook drawing. Winner will be chosen next Tuesday.

Many thanks from the Kansas prairie for following my trail of thoughts about quilts!

Linda K. Hubalek
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