We Miss You, Paula!

Welcome to the Quilted Legacy Blog Hop, where we are honoring a friend who would have been 79 years old today. Paula Budinger was a prolific quilter and a personal friend to so many of us with whom she crossed paths over the last several years.

I first met Paula on the Rainbow Scrap Challenge linkups about 4 years ago. Over the months, as we wrote back and forth oohing and aaaahing over each other’s blocks and quilts, a friendship formed. We exchanged telephone numbers and tried to talk and gab about our quilts and our families about once every couple months. She became ill last fall and after a hospital stay was released into a rehab hospital. On February 8 of this year, Paula passed. So here we are this week, many of her friends gathering together to remember this remarkable woman. You can see some of her quilts at her blogs. From 2013 to 2018 (approximately), she blogged at Blogger HERE. After that she switched to Wordpress HERE.

Before we get to the quilts, I wanted to let you know that there will be prize drawings for following along on this blog hop! At the end of the post, you’ll see the links to all the participating blogs AND a list of the prizes. All you need to do is enter a comment whenever you visit a participating blog. How many you visit is up to you, but you’ll get one entry for every comment you make. I’ll talk more about this again below.

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A quilt that Paula made in March of 2018 is what inspired me to make this quilt (which turned into these quilts) in her honor. Paula belonged to a local quilt guild (she lived in Wisconsin) that supported the Project Linus charity. Making simple kids quilts from bright and lively fabrics was one of her joys. So, I channeled my inner Paula and decided that giraffes, yellow and green colors, and a simple layout would be the way to go.  

Giraffes #1

This is just a simple quilt. The focus fabric was some cute giraffes, and the yellow and golds, green and white of the print dictated the color scheme.  Because of the personal health issues in my immediate family (unrelated to Covid-19, which is also a major stressor), I chose to do very simple piecing - Happy Blocks and variations thereof.  I know Paula would have approved!

The white printed background fabric is also giraffes. It was a smallish piece, and I used it all to frame the alternate blocks. The gold strips were leftovers in my stash, and the giraffe fabric was added as a wider border on the top and bottom to give the quilt some length.  It finished at about 40x50”. It’s partially pinned and partially hanging from my design board, so please excuse the wonkiness.

The quilting was just a simple loop design. I used more of the giraffe fabric on the backing and binding in hopes of using it up!  This will be a donation quilt for Quilts for Kids.

Another closeup. It really is cuter and much more vibrant in person than my camera (aka my iPhone XR) can capture. 

But wait, there’s more! Here is Giraffes #2. The giraffe fabric was still going and going..... so I cut the remaining fabric into 20 more squares and pieced a second quilt because why not?

Now these quilts aren’t exactly Lookers, if you know what I mean. They aren’t meant to be. They’re cute-ish, simple and very soft and cozy. Perfect comfort quilts for some child who loves giraffes. And so that’s why you’ll see all sorts of scrappy strips and bits as I did my best to extend the remaining greens and matching golds and yellows into a workable size.

I made a mistake and tried quilting some fans on this quilt, starting at the bottom. It quickly became obvious that this was a missssssnake of epic proportions. I switched to doing echoing scallops that looked absolutely terrible on the front.  After a hissy fit and crying jag, I pulled up my big girl panties and unpicked all but a couple rows of the scallops. Then I finished with just a basic horizontal serpentine stitch with my walking foot.  I’m only showing you this hideous quilting so we can come back to this post in a few years when I’m a world-renown fan quilter and we can laugh together hysterically (without masks on). 

And finally, the two finished quilts, ready for their labels.

So, that’s my stop on the Blog Hop. But there is a lot more quilty goodness that’s been created to share with you today and for the next couple days. Here’s a list of the quilters participating with links to their blogs.

Wednesday, May 6

Karen @ KaHolly
Kate @ Smiles From Kate

Wendy @ Pieceful Thoughts of my Quilting Life
Bernie @ Needle and Foot

Linda @ My Sew-Called Quilts
Cathy @ Crazy By Design

Sue @ From the Magpie’s Nest

Thursday, May 7

Kate @ Smiles From Kate
Diann @ Little Penguin Quilts
Rose @ Something Rose Made
Nann @ With Strings Attached
Mari @ The Academic Quilter
Louise @ My Quilt Odyssey
Susan @ Desert Sky Quilts

Friday, May 8

Janice @ Color, Creating and Quilting
Kate @ Smiles From Kate
Joy @ The Joyful Quilter
Susan @ Quilt Fabrication
Edi @ Edi’s Crafting Life
Carol @ Quilt Schmilt
Preeti @ Sew Preeti Qilts
Emily @ The Darling Dogwood

And now for a list of the great prizes. Thank you to all these ladies for their generous donations. And a double thank-you to Lorna of Sew Fresh Quilts, who allowed us to use her design for the blog hop button. 

Lorna, Sew Fresh Quilts, $50 gift certificate for her pattern shop.

Yvonne Quilting Jetgirl, 2 PDF patterns of choice.

Bernie Needle and Foot, $25 certificate for her shop.

A fat quarter bundle from Figo Fabrics

A set of quilty gift cards from Initial Thought by DMF  Note cards set 1

A pattern of choice from Karen, Sugar Free Quilts

A $30 gift certificate for Doris, Cactus Queen Quilt Co

A PDF pattern of choice from Joanne, www.etsy.com/shop/CanuckQuilterDesigns

$25 gift certificate to Fat Quarter Shop (donated by Janice Holton)

HERE IS HOW THE PRIZE DRAWINGS WILL WORK:  You will get one entry per comment per blog visited. The more you visit and comment, the more entries you will have. The comments will be open until May 15, at which time our Blog Hop hostess, Janice Holton, will tally up the entries and use a Random Number Generator to determine the winners. They will be announced on her blog and on all of ours, too, so be sure to check back. Oh, and make sure that your comment contains a way for us to contact you. If it doesn’t link back to your blog or an email, please be sure to leave it in your comment. 

Good luck! And thanks for stopping by!

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Finally, a special thank you to Janice Holton for putting together this blog hop. You can visit Janice here:

Blog:  Color Creating and Quilting

Etsy Shop:   That's So Janice