Monday, December 19, 2011

The Storm at Sea Continues

Well, I haven't finished all of the 72 diamond blocks, but I've begun assembling the quilt top with what I have done. 
I was losing interest in this quilt with the monotony of the blocks, so I went ahead and began piecing the top together despite not having all of the diamonds done.  I'm so glad I did!  Seeing this begin to take shape has really motivated me to keep moving and try and finish up. 

The stars you see below the Storm at Sea are some UFO blocks that I was thinking of turning into a baby quilt.  I know of at least 11 people that are having babies in the next 6 months, so I'm sure I'll be making some baby quilts in the near future.  These stars were supposed to be part of a larger mystery quilt, but I hated the final quilt, so I've decided to turn the random blocks into smaller quilts instead of one large one.

Sunday, December 18, 2011

Mini Feather Quilt Finished!

I finally finished putting the binding on my mini feather whole cloth quilt last night.
 Here it is hanging up in our guest bathroom above our medicine cabinet.
Here it is before I sewed the binding down. 
I used a silver metallic thread by Superior Threads to do all of the quilting.  My machine quilting is FAR from perfect, but I think I've come a long way from when I started. 

All in all, this was a fun, QUICK, mini quilt to make.  I could see myself making another one in the future.


Friday, December 16, 2011

Drawing Fabulous Fun Feathers

Last month I took a class with Sue Nickels at A Quilters Gathering up in Nashua, NH.  The class, drawing fabulous fun feathers, was a three hour class on Saturday evening.  No sewing machine, no fabric required, just some paper, a pencil and ruler. 
Sue was a fantastic teacher and really helped us understand how to draw feathers.  The technique we learned was to draw feathers on paper to then trace onto fabric and quilt.
This was my first attempt.  Eh, not that great. They look very stiff.  You could see them becoming less stiff towards the top as I got the hang of it more and more.

Sue's were much less stiff looking than mine started out as.
I slowly got the hang of it though.  See, these flow much better.
The circle was a bit challenging.
The heart was interesting.  You draw one half and trace it onto the second half by folding the tracing paper in half.
I then created this design which I later turned into the quilt from my last post.
To start, I traced the design with a permanent marker and then traced it onto the fabric before quilting it.  I'm pleased with how it came out.

Now I need to figure out how to "funkify" my feathers.  

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Progress on Storm at Sea

I've been trucking along, working on my storm at sea quilt whenever I have a few minutes here and there.
I have stacks of blocks in multiple stages of completion...
I would say I'm probably 2/3 done with these diamond blocks.  Once I finish them, I can begin assembling the quilt top.  So far, these diamonds have been the most tedious part of this quilt.  I think it's because I'm anxious to begin piecing the top and see how it's going to look. 


Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Kitchen Swap Received

I was lucky to have Alice pick my fabric for the BMQG kitchen swap. Alice is an awesome quilter and I couldn't wait to see what she came up with.  As expected, she created an unbelievable wall hanging that I absolutely love.
Thank you SOOOO much Alice.  I can't express how much I love this quilt.  I plan on hanging it up in my dining room this week. 

Monday, December 12, 2011

Kitchen Swap Reveal

On Saturday at the BMQG meeting we swapped our kitchen swap items.  As a result, I can finally reveal what I made for Rebecca out of the fabric she provided.
I made two pot holders and two dish towels.  Rebecca provided the background fabric in the star/the stripe on the towel. I added all of the solids.

The star is made using a Moda Bake Shop tutorial for a folded star potholder.
You can really see the 3-D effect that the folded star has on the star in this photo.
I love how this came out.  I ended up loving it so much that I kept the first one that I made that had a few errors in it for myself and plan on adding a binding and using it as a wall hanging.