Mariners Compass

I have so many unfinished quilts and projects sometimes it is difficult to know where to start. I guess that is a universal quilting problem!! I took this Mariners Compass workshop in September 2001 at my quilt guilds fall seminar. M'Liss Rae Hawley was the instructor. The fall seminar is planned and teachers are booked months in advance. The seminar was scheduled for the September 21 weekend. It was a hard time for everyone as it was just days after the disaster at the World Trade Centre. M'Liss Rae Hawley had a son that had just entered the U.S. Military and she was very concerned about him. I wonder how he is doing now.

It was a two day workshop and I enjoyed it. There were some interesting techniques I learned from M'Liss - how to make flying geese out of a bunch of squares and end up with 4 very nice looking geese - I still use that method. I had never done paper piecing and the middle medallion is paper pieced. The pattern in the book has another pieced border that has a kind of a trip around the world effect with small square which I left out and there was also a pieced fence at the bottom I left out. The piece of fabric I found for the bottom between the lighthouse and the sailboat and whale is a wonderful piece with blue and dragonflies and blades of grass. I thought it fit in there perfectly. I have had the top finished for a long time but it took about 2 years of looking to find a fabric for the border. It looks quite dark and plain in this picture but the border fabric is a burgundy with small blue stars and yellow moons.
My mariners compass is about 60 inches square and I am almost finished hand quilting it, but I have stopped working on it while I work hard to finish the big sampler quilt for the Quilt show in September. The Mariners Compass has a spot on the backside of a brick fireplace - that faces into the dining room just waiting for it - hopefully I can finish it in 2006.