Pirates, parrots, and pretty posies

Detail of first quilt pieced by a local 13-year-old boy.

I was sitting in the foyer of our Harbor History Museum this afternoon doing hand embroidery and selling tickets for our guild's opportunity quilt when a couple carrying a big bag stopped to chat.  Soon I was being treated to a show-and-tell of the treasures in the bag: a full-size pirate quilt meticulously pieced by the couple's 13-year-old grandson, plus embroidered pillowcases and a parrot pillow by grandma.

This is only HALF of the quilt, which is the first quilt made by Rhys, of Buckley, WA. He selected the fabric and did almost all of the piecing, and his grandmother embellished it with the machine embroidered black skull below.

I was so excited about discovering that a kid had done such a terrific quilt that I asked to take photos for my blog. Then grandma and grandpa pulled out the next treasure, this pillow that she embroidered with colorful parrots. They got the idea for it after seeing a bumper sticker that said,

"A parrot is my co-pirate."

As if that wasn't enough fodder for the blog post, the final treat came out of the bag:

 Pillowcases with pirate skulls machine embroidered

with GLOW-IN-THE-DARK thread!

 So what do pirate skulls have to do with the flowery quilt below?

Well, the "Whimsical Garden" quilt is the opportunity quilt I mentioned earlier. If I hadn't been sitting there selling raffle tickets for it I never would have met the proud grandparents and seen the pirate treasures in their bag.

Members of our Gig Harbor Quilters guild colored the flower drawings with crayons and heat set them before outlining the shapes with hand embroidery. Lynne Burkhardt did a beautiful job of designing the quilt and putting together kits for each block.

Have a colorful day!