A little Rusty

Last week I finally put a quilt on my Handi Quilter frame to start quilting. I've got a massive backlog of quilt tops that need quilting. Now that I've graduated (yay!), I can finally spend some free time quilting some of these quilts.

To start and get back into the swing of things, I loaded this mini quilt based on my Dazzling Diamonds pattern on the frame to practice with.

A while back, I snapped this photo above. One of the things I love about paper piecing is that I can sketch out a few quilting ideas on the back of the quilt before I take the paper off.

Unfortunately, I discovered that my quilting skills are a bit rusty. I started doing that back and forth in the white, but I hated how it was turing out. I just couldn't get it to look right, so I ripped it out, twice. I then turned to my trusted loop quilting and liked that. I'm done with the white and started to move onto the blue, but I'm having tension issues. I'll rewind a bobbin sometime this week and will give it another go since I think the bobbin I'm using wasn't wound tight enough. I've got more unpicking to do to take the blue out, but fortunately it's all loose on the bottom, so it should go quick before I dive back in. 

Simply Solid Quilt

What seems like ages ago, it was my month in the Simply Solids Bee (on Flickr) earlier this spring. I asked my fellow bee members to make improv blocks using mostly whites and creams with a few hints of a specific fusha, lime and navy fabric.

I made this test block to show everyone what I was thinking.

Blocks started to pour in and I was faced with turning all of these blocks into a cohesive quilt. For a while I wasn't sure where to start. Some of the blocks had teeny tiny pieces while others had larger pieces of negative space. After a while, the blocks sat in a pile... out of sight, out of mind.

But last weekend I finally had some time to sew for the first time in months. One of my first orders of business was to finally tackle this quilt. After hearing Victoria Findlay Wolfe talk about taking some bee blocks she received and cutting them up to use in quilts, I thought about dissecting some of these blocks with tiny pieces and inserting those pieces into some of the blocks with more negative space.

The result, I have to say, is pretty awesome! I'm really pleased with how it turned out. I quickly went online to order a backing print that I had in mind and have been thinking of how I want to quilt this one up. I have a few ideas, but until my longarm is fixed, I'm stuck contemplating the best way of quilting it.

Linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced.

Dazzling Diamonds Remix

When I taught my Dazzling Diamonds pattern at Quilter's Way a few weeks ago, I prepared some blocks in various stages to show how to paper piece.  Since I already had to make a few blocks, I decided that I would make another quilt to go in my guest room that I'm redesigning in blue, pink and green.

Well, I just finished piecing the remaining blocks and pieced the top together.  In my pattern, I offer up several different layout options, with this being one alternative to my original pattern.  In this layout, you lose the secondary design of the stars in the background.  BUT, you get this awesome sense of movement - your eye is directed to the center of the quilt.

I've enjoyed making this version in prints instead of solids like my previous version.  Like it's predecessor, this quilt measures 24" square and will be a wall hanging.

One of the things that I love about paper piecing is that you have a full-size template to sketch quilting ideas.  I'll occasionally use a light pencil to sketch out quilting motifs before I tear the paper off the back.  I don't recommend using a pen or marker (don't ask me how I know) since you can easily tear the paper with a pen and a marker can easily bleed through the paper and onto your fabric. 

WIP Wednesday: Modern Hexagon Quilt

Earlier this month, the owner of Quilter's Way asked me if I would teach a modern hexagon quilt class.  She said I could do whatever I wanted in terms of technique.  I toyed with a few ideas, but decided to go with a large hexagon quilt made using Jaybird's Hex N More ruler.

This is what I came up with.  I was inspired by several quilts out there on Flickr and combined several ideas to come up with this quilt.  It measures about 40" square. 

Clearly I needed to iron this before I took these pictures, but you get the idea. I used a variety of prints from various lines including Simply Color, Cuzco, Good Fortune, Quilt Blocks and more. 

I'm trying to decide how I want to quilt this now.  Do I do concentric circles or a spiraling circle? Do I echo the hexagon pattern? Decisions, decisions, decision... My goal is to have this quilted soon. 

Octagonal Orb Top Finished

Last night I put the final stitch on my Octagonal Orb quilt top.  It just might be one of my all time favorite quilts.  I feel like claiming A favorite quilt is like picking a favorite child, so I'll just say it's one of my favorites. 

Can you blame me for loving this quilt so much?  I had the hardest time getting the colors right in the pictures.  The teal in the middle left is darker than it appears and the aqua in the upper right is also darker.

I will say, it was pretty hard to get all of the blocks to be the same size.  With all of the pieces and the angle of each triangle to form the orb, things shifted quite a bit.  I ended up doing what the pattern said and focused on making each block square rather than all of the blocks the same size.  As a result, the sashing doesn't quite line up, but because it's all the same color, it's hard to tell.  It's going to require some heavy quilting to mask it.

Now to finish the quilting before the Quilt Festival in August.  I'm still crossing my fingers.  I know I'm going to have to head on another business trip this month, so its crunch time. 

BMQG Mini Quilt Challenge - Dazzling Diamonds

The Boston Modern Quilt Guild is having a mini quilt challenge for its members to create mini quilts, no more than 24" on any side, in the colors of QuiltCon, the inaugural conference and show for The Modern Quilt Guild.  The quilts will be displayed at our special exhibit at the Lowell Quilt Festival this year.  I designed a 6" quilt block for my quilt and made a mini quilt that measures 24" square for the challenge that I call Dazzling Diamonds.

Of course it's paper pieced, my favorite quilting technique.  I wanted to do something with diamonds on the diagonal, but I also wanted something more than just diamonds.  I love stars as well, so I thought about incorporating some sort of star into the block as well.  I determined that if I made the diamond fat, a nice star was formed when you put multiple blocks together.  I thought a giant diamond with a star in between would be boring, so I framed the diamond and added yet another star point to the block.  Voila, you have the block that you see above and below.

Here is the finished quilt top.  I really love how this turned out.  The colors in the above photo are the closest to what they really are. I'm not a huge fan of orange, but used in the right way, I don't mind it.  In this quilt, I actually really like it. 

I love the idea of a pattern creating a secondary pattern.  In this instance, you have the diamonds that form the diagonal lines, the Orange stars, and the grey stars are formed when you put multiple blocks together.  In my quilt you also have the darker grey that forms a pinwheel.

In this mockup, I used one color for the background, which really makes the background stars pop.  I also turned the four center points around to create a medallion effect.

And in this mockup, I rotated the blocks so that the points of the stars inside the diamonds all pointed towards the corner instead of creating stars.  You lose the background star with this layout, but you get this really cool visual effect where you eye is automatically drawn to the center of the quilt.  As you can see, just playing with color and the layout of the block can really give it a different feel.

I'm off to go make another one of these blocks so that I can send it in for the QuiltCon block challenge.

I created a pattern for this quilt block and mini quilt which you can purchase on Craftsy.

Storm at Sea Top is FINISHED!!!!

I finally managed to get some halfway decent photos of my completed Storm at Sea quilt top. I love looking at all of the different patterns that emerge as you look at this quilt.  When I show people this quilt, I'm always interested in what stands out to them first.  What pops for you? 

I LOVE this quilt top.  The colors are more earthy that I would have picked for myself, but because it's going to be hanging at my parent's beach house, on a yellow wall, this quilt will fit perfectly there.  It finishes at 57" x 66".

Here's a view from the side.

And here's a picture of the back.  I love how neat the back of a quilt looks when you remove the paper.  All of the seams are pressed so nice and it looks so neat.  I just have to go back with some tweezers and remove some of the tiny bits of paper before sending this along to Judi at Green Fairy Quilts to work her magic on. 

Quilt Top Complete

This weekend I finished a very large quilt top, a large queen.

The bottom (left) is made using a layer cake.  I used Frolic by Sandy Gervais.  I'm sending this one off to my quilter since I don't feel like dealing with a quilt this large.

Photographing this quilt involved moving furniture at my aunt's house to have enough space.  It's that big!

DQS Top Completed

Last night I finished the top for the Doll Quilt Swap.

Now to quilt and bind it.  I had the leftover binding from my Moonlit Sky quilt still out, so I put it up to this quilt and I really liked how it looks.  What do you think?

My other option would be to go with the orange or one of the light fabrics. 

Run, Don't Walk

I don't know how many of you follow the fabulous work for Judi over at Green Fairy Quilts.  If you don't you should.  She posted a blog post today about her sense of fashion and low and behold, in the background is MY quilt on her machine.  Holly Cow!!! I'm so psyched to see what she does with it.  Run over and see what she's done so far.  http://greenfairyquilts.blogspot.com/2011/02/attempt-at-fashion-ha-ha.html  Her work is absolutely amazing.  If you haven't seen her work before, scroll through her blog posts to see for yourself. 

This is the quilt that she's quilting for me.  

I can't wait to see the finished product.  You have no idea. 

Excuse me now while I go blow up those photos and stare at them for the rest of the day.  :)

My UFO Collection

Have you ever stopped to check out your UFO collection?  Yeah, I did that recently and realized I have quite a few.  Here are some of them and what I plan to do with them (schedule, if I have one, etc.)

This quilt was one of the first ones that I featured on this blog.  I still need to have this quilt quilted.  I might send this one out.  Basically, I'm not sure yet when I plan to have this finished.

Yet another quilt top that needs to be quilted.  I started to piece the back to get this quilted, but again, I'm not sure when I'm going to finish this one. 

This quilt also needs quilting.  I don't even know how I want to quilt it, so it will likely stay unfinished for a while.

This quilt is partially quilted.  I had issues with the tension with my old sewing machine, but I've yet to take it back out now that I have had my Bernina for the past year. 

 

These two are blocks from the McCall's Mystery quilt.  I hated how the quilt ended up, so I stopped making the blocks and put this one aside.  I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it now.  I'll have to find something else to do.

I still need to quilt this quilt as well.  I really love this quilt.  I've been waiting for my machine quilting stills to improve before I dig into this one. 

 

I made all of these hexagons from a 2.5" charm pack that I won but I haven't finished piecing them together.  Who knows when I'll get back to this.

I just have to get the binding on this quilt.  I plan to give this as a wedding present this year, so this will be finished by the end of the year.

I still need to quilt this quilt as well.  I'm thinking of doing something simple because there are so many small pieces, so hopefully this is one that will be completed this year.

I'm actually in the middle of quilting this top, so I should have this quilt finished once I get my sewing room back in shape. 

I still haven't received all of the BOMs for this quilt, so it is still in progress.  I would love to have it completed by next Christmas, but I don't know if that will actually happen.

These are the blocks I got back from the NEMQG bee.  I now need to figure out what to do with them all.  Hmm...

I made this block when I was learning to hand applique.  I now need to figure out how I want to finish it.  Hmm...

I need to figure out what I want to do next with this block.  Do I want to add a border, just quilt it.  I don't know.  I'm leaning towards a small border, but we'll see. 

My goal is to have the Fiesta! quilt top completed by mid-June so that I can send it off to the quilter then.  I just added myself to her schedule for August/September, so I should have some time. 

I have three more blocks that have been released for this BOM to catch up on and make all of the setting blocks.  I don't think I'll have this top finished by the end of the year, but we'll see.

This is a block I made that Carol Doak released to celebrate 4500 members in her Yahoon group.  It's now over 7000 members and I've yet to do anything with it.  I am so stumped with this one.  I don't know if I will ever finish it. 

Phew, that's a lot.  ::Sigh::

Basted and Ready to Go

A while back I posted a picture of a quilt I had up on my design wall to work on placement of the blocks.  I moved a few blocks around and pieced the top together.  This weekend I based the quilt and began quilting it this week.  Made using a Wonderland honeybun.

The lighting was terrible, so the colors aren't exactly accurate, but we've had rain for the past 4 days, so I haven't been able to take advantage of any good natural light.  

I began quilting it with some straight lines lengthwise about 1/4" apart.  I'm loving the quilting.  I wasn't too crazy about this quilt before hand, but now that I've began quilting it, it's really making the top.  It's amazing with quilting can do to a top.  I'll post more pictures of the quilted top soon.

Eva "Package" Quilt

I finished piecing the top of what I refer to as my Eva "Package" quilt because it reminds me of a wrapped present.  I love how it turned out.

This was an on the whim project.  I got together with my aunt to work on a quilt made with Hawaiian fabrics that we both got on our own trips to Hawaii, but it just wasn't working out, so we went to a LQS that was having a sale on fat quarters.  I got the fat quarters for $1.50 each when this line just came out, which was awesome.

Now the biggest question is what thread to use for the quilting.  I tried out a King Tut thread that I had on hand.

I think it works OK, but I'm not sure about the light pink fabric with the thread.  The light pink appears the least in the quilt.  There's so much variation in value in the quilt that if I go with one thread it's going to contrast with one fabric.  I was thinking of doing a simple all over pattern on this quilt, so I don't really want to switch threads.  But will I be unhappy if I don't switch thread?  I just don't know.  I think this is going to be one of the quilt tops that I have to ponder about a bit.  I'll probably bring this with me to the Lowell Quilt Festival in two weeks to see if I can find a better thread to match, if not, I might go with this one.

Thoughts?

Scenic BOM Completed Top

So after a lot of debating, I decided to add a border to my scenic BOM.  I brought the quilt with me to several stores, unsure of what I actually wanted to use.  When I came across this one fabric, I knew right away that it was the perfect border.

Now to think about how I want to quilt it (which, given my track record, probably won't happen until next year ) ;o)