Looking Forward...Looking Back

After a year and a half I'm picking my blog back up. True to form I haven't started right on January 1..I'm nothing if not a procrastinator. I've actually been ruminating for the past ten days on what my quilting goals for the coming year will be and how I plan to get there.

This is what I've come up with for my goals

• I'd like to experiment with more improvisational quilting. Last year I bought the book Quilting Modern by Jacquie Gering & Katie Pedersen and I'd like to delve into some of the techniques they describe.
• I'd like to become better with choosing colors for quilts. It's been easy for me to use precuts because they come "pre-matched" so to speak. And it's been easy for me to stick with monochromatic color schemes. I'd like to get a firmer grasp on the color wheel and why certain color schemes work well together. I recently purchased the Fat Quarterly publication Quilt Color Workshop and believe working through some of the projects will really help the concepts gel.
• I want to join a quilt swap this year! A mini or doll quilt swap would be perfect. I have a couple ideas.
• Continue progress on my Tula Pink City Sampler. I never finished it, primarily because I'd decided to make it scrappy and didn't have a sufficient range of colors in my scrap bin. Now that I've got more, I can pick it back up again. I'm about 1/3 of the way through the blocks.

I'll continue to add to my goals, I'm sure. That's the way growth happens, and it doesn't just happen on January 1st.

Here's what I've been working on this week:

This is a little tumbler table runner I bought the fabric for last spring. The pattern is from Missouri Star's Block magazine, and probably one of their YouTube tutorials. It's easily made with the mini tumbler template, and that's what I was looking for: an easy, quick project for the week.

I'll close with some photos of some of the projects I finished last year:

A little paper piecing for St. Patty's Day

A Mother's Day table topper for my mom.

I went crazy with 8-Point star blocks!

I also had a year of pillows, as evidenced by the following:

A birthday cake pillow I made from Lori Holt's pattern on her blog.

A cute little ruffle I added to cover the zipper.

I made this for my daughter's birthday...the little scientist. Pattern was from borsedigaya.com.

I just love the fabric here, with all the chemistry figures.

This might have been the piece de resistance! I made it for my brother for Christmas. The pattern was from SewWhatSherlock...in case you're not familiar, it's the leg lamp from A Christmas Story.

I made these early in the year when my daughter and I were on and I were on a Sherlock jag.

This is just a sampling of things I finished last year. I also made three baby quilts -(I may post photos of one or more, later) - and a few smaller projects. In looking at the bulk of my work, however, I only finished one large quilt. I'm going to rectify that this year.

Long Time, Sew Much News

Wow, summer's almost over and I haven't written a word. Shortly after my last post I had a family emergency. After a cascade of bad health events, my dear Aunt Mary Kaye, my mom's "Irish twin," died. She was only 75 and she was just such a lovely person. She was a music teacher in Taos, NM for many, many years and after she retired, she taught herself how to play the harp. In 2005, she sent me a Christmas card with this picture on the front:

She was one of the best people I ever had the pleasure to know and I'm blessed that she was my Aunt. 

After I returned from Mary Kaye's funeral, my family had a vacation scheduled. Much as I didn't feel like vacationing, we'd had this planned for a long time. So off we went to Nevada & California! I won't bore you with details, but I'll share a couple of gorgeous pictures:

Yosemite

Calaveras Big Trees

Now, for some quilting news. I actually have been quilting...at least once I got back from our vacation I got back to the sewing machine. The first thing I did was finish the hexagon quilt. I'll post pictures of that tomorrow. I'll just say that I'm not thrilled with it. I started out thinking I was going to be in love with it, but by the time I finished it...not so much. And there were some areas I goofed up. I'll go into more detail on that tomorrow, as well.

Once I finished the hexagon quilt, I knew I needed a small project I could finish quickly. And I've recently discovered that I love Dresden plates. I was intimidated by them, but decided if I tried just one it would be manageable. The other thing I thought would be good about such a project would be trying applique, which is a quilting technique I've never tried. So here's what I did the other day:

I had so much fun making this! Selecting the fabric from my stash was fun, deciding on the quilting design was fun, making the binding was fun. I started this on Tuesday afternoon and finished the binding on Wednesday morning. Sometimes making something that goes together quickly is very satisfying, especially after a frustrating experience. Okay, this is far from perfect, but over all it's respectable and I got over my fear of Dresden plates.

Here's a close up of the center, which I decided to "pebble":

This was the first time I tried this, and my technique definitely needs to be refined. But hey, if I waited until I had a perfect technique before I quilted anything, I'd never quilt anything.

And here's a close up of my "butterflies" quilting:

Now, I'll admit something...these were supposed to be flowers. But when I showed it to my 14-year-old daughter, she said, "Oh, I like the butterflies!" So there ya go. Again, they're far from perfect. I was having trouble controlling where they were going, and the spacing. But therein lies the silver lining!

I hadn't done any freemotion quilting since my last "Wiggle Whimsy" quilt back in April. And making this little Dresden made me realize how rusty I'd become, and how much I enjoy it. I'd been working along with Leah Day's Freemotion Quilting Project earlier in the spring, so I decided to get back into it. So I spent yesterday just practicing on samples. This is what I did:

Freemotion quilting along a line is really hard for me. I'm okay at it while the fabric is moving directly away from me, but in other directions it's just really hard for me to keep the stitches straight and evenly spaced. I also tried Leah's cursive f's on the lower right flag and found them to be fairly difficult. I couldn't figure out how to connect them from line to line. When I ended one line I was at the right end, then I dropped down and had to work from right to left. That meant making f's backwards, which is hard! I'm not sure that's the way to do this. Anyway, I was getting tired by then, so I let things get sloppy, signed my name just for fun, and called it a night.

Today I think I'm going to do some work on my Tula Pink City Sampler blocks. I'm way behind on those. Follow the link on the sidebar if you're interested in more information on that project. I'll be sharing my progress on those blocks in the days and weeks to come.

So Much Going Quilting Going On Humpday

I guess it's been almost two weeks since my last post! I hadn't felt much like blogging due to a sinus infection, which is on it's way out now, thank goodness. I have lots of quilting things going on!

I've had a quilt top for another Wiggle Whimsy quilt pieced for several weeks, but for some reason hadn't felt like quilting it. I think it's because I used a Moda Marbles background, and this gave the quilt a totally different look from the one I made using the solid white. And to be honest, I think I just don't like it as much as the one I made with the solid white. But I had a hankering for doing some machine quilting and this was the only thing I had ready to quilt, so I decided to finish it up.

I also decided to try something I hadn't done before: piece a couple batting remnants together. I had read somewhere that you could do this and I had one piece that was about 18" shy of being wide enough for this quilt and I had another piece that would fill that bill. So I tried zig-zagging them together on my machine. It turns out this is a terrible idea. When I was basting the quilt sandwich together I couldn't, for the love of all things good, get the wrinkles out! It turned out it was because the process of zig-zagging ever so slightly puckered one side of the batting. I ended up, in frustration, cutting about a 1 cm strip out of the batting right where I stitched it together and moving my small side back to snug with the other edge and then finish basting my quilt sandwich. (I have since read that one way of securing batting pieces is to use lightweight fusible interfacing...I'll try that next time). I did not secure the two pieces of batting together at all, and it seems to not have had a negative effect on my finished quilt, but I wouldn't do this intentionally in the future.

The other thing I did that was new to me on this quilt is that I intentionally practiced making my stipple bigger. I watched some of Leah Day's freemotion quilting videos on YouTube (she has a whole set of tutorials for the Freemotion Quilting Project as well as a blog); she's just and excellent teacher. I learned from her that it's much easier and faster to stipple in rows...and I tried it on this quilt and found that to be absolutely true! Anyway, wait no longer, here it is:

On the literary front, I went to the library with my daughter the other day and picked up major amounts of quilting books.

I haven't even begun to read all of them, but two of them stand out to me as ones that I may actually want to add to my quilting book library.

I've decided that my quilting "style" definitely leans more modern rather than traditional. The modern quilting book has some really stunning quilts in it. And the 130 mini quilt block book has some adorable blocks. There are two chapters that I particularly like, one entitle Retro Revival and the other Thrifty Thirties. The blocks I'm most taken by are the houndstooth and whirligig blocks from the retro chapter and the airplane and propeller blocks from the thirties chapter. I could see all of these blocks making very cool modern quilts in their own right. I just may make one of these blocks into my next big project.

Which brings me to my current project. I started my daughter's quilt the other day. Remember that jelly roll of Notting Hill I mentioned? Well, here it is in the beginnings of Isabel's quilt:

I just have to mention that I'm really disappointed in this fabric. I love, love the design and colors. But the quality of cutting of the jelly roll is absolutely horrible! The strips are not an accurate 2 1/2 inches. Not only are they not  accurately  2 1/2 inches, but they're wedge-shaped. They're most close to the 2 1/2 inch width in the center of the strip and they get skinny at the ends. It's made it awful to try to get square blocks. I have two jelly rolls and they're both this way. The other thing that bugs me is that many of the prints in this line are quite obviously directional, but the jelly roll strips aren't cut straight with the direction of the print. So, for instance, when you have a stripe, it looks like it's running off the jelly roll strip. I just hope when the whole quilt is put together and quilted this won't be obvious and mess with your eyes. (Because it's seriously messing with mine as I sew it...and I hate it!)

This experience on Isabel's quilt has led me to a decision: I'm not buying any more precut fabric. To be honest, I've not bought any that was accurately cut. The first charm pack I bought was 4 3/4" by 5" and it seems like every time I buy a precut, it's off. Let's face it, I have enough trouble getting an accurate scant 1/4" seam. I don't need inaccurate cutting messing me up.

And speaking of accuracy...I try not to obsess about it. I know we all have our own standards, and there has to be a balance between those questions of "How crazy is this going to make me that those seams don't match up?" and "Am I still having fun?" One thing I've realized is that, once a quilt is completed, quilted and washed, if seams are a couple needle widths from perfect, no one is going to notice. (And I'm not making quilts to be judged, mind you...I know that's a whole different world and a different standard). I recently came across a blog...sorry, I don't remember whose it was...where the writer was giving tips on how to get your seams to match up. And when she showed the ones that weren't "perfect" that she would rip out and re-sew, I was dumbfounded because they were, literally, a couple needle widths off. But perhaps she is making show quilts. 

In the case of Isabel's Notting Hill quilt, those blocks are really going to be a challenge because the jelly roll strips literally vary from 2 1/4" to barely 2 1/2". I'm trying to make up for the difference by fudging my seam allowances, but it's not working out perfectly. I've already discarded a couple blocks because they're just so out-of-square. Ah, well, enough ranting...I'd rather be sewing. I'll make it work because one thing about me is certain: I'm determined.

Hexagons, Hexagons Everywhere!

Despite the fact that I haven't blogged in a few days, I have been quilting. It's just been a bit of a mish-mash. I spent most of Sunday cleaning up my scraps, sewing some squares together so that eventually I'll have enough for a scrappy quilt.

Monday I started a new project. Several weeks ago I bought this half hexagon template from Missouri Star Quilt Company:

And I had this gorgeous jelly roll called Indigo Crossing by Minick and Simpson for Moda. I decided to combine some red with the indigo jelly roll and put together a hexagon quilt. I am hoping to get something that has a bit more modern flare to it, so I don't want a border. Here's what it looked like a little earlier today:

This type of quilt is actually a bit tedious. Each complete hexagon takes two rows, so layout is critical. You can't chain piece, so it's time consuming. And something about sewing along the diagonal, I end up mis-matching my pieces at least a couple times per row. What I mean is, I sew the new piece either too high or too low to the adjacent piece, then have to rip it out and re-sew it. I'm glad I like the fabric so much and how well it's turning out, otherwise I'd be tempted to put it aside for now. But I'm actually quite excited to complete it.

The other thing I wanted to share is  this:

The UPS guy has been at my house a couple times this week! I've been ordering fabric like crazy, for a few reasons. One is the jelly roll on the left is for a quilt I'm making for my daughter. (Did I mention I have twin daughters?) It turns out she loves the Notting Hill line, so that's what I'll be working on next. That jelly roll in the middle is called Jubilee and I just ordered it from Missouri Star one day when it was their daily deal; I really like it. The second reason I've been ordering fabric is because it seems several of the online retailers have been having sales recently (I think to make room for their summer inventory). It just made sense for me to buy at $5.50-$7.50 per yard, rather than what my local stores charge, which is considerably more.

The third reason I've been ordering fabric is because I've got a couple quilts I'm planning for gifts. I'm going to sign off for now, but stay tuned for more info.

Sew Very Very Small Sampler...My Attempt

Happy Saturday! I've been working on this little sampler with 3 1/2"mini blocks. I found it here: http://weddingdressblue.wordpress.com/2012/01/26/tutorial-sew-small-sampler-quilt/  I thought it would be a great little project to get me acquainted with some traditional blocks, be a small project that I could complete quickly, and use up existing scraps. I also thought it would be fairly easy. As it turned out, it met all those challenges except the last.

Two of the blocks, the log cabin and the sawtooth star, I had to make twice in order to get them done to my satisfaction. The main difficulty I had was simply dealing with how small these blocks are. Each block is 3 1/2" (unfinished), so the individual elements were sometimes as small as 1" square. Small, indeed.

When I had all the blocks finished I thought the hard part was behind me. I started merrily on my way, sewing  3 1/2" white squares in between the blocks, with half square triangles and quarter square triangles (around the perimeter) that I cut from 3 1/2" square blocks. If I were a more experienced quilter it would probably have been obvious to me that the perimeter blocks had to be cut from larger squares than the typical blocks in order to leave room for the binding. But me, I had to actually get the first corner completely sewn together to realize that  if I put the binding on  the quilt I was currently making, I'd end up the corners of my patchwork blocks covered up by the binding.

That's when I put my thinking cap on and went back to my engineering / math background. Well, really it was just a little simple geometry...but I figured out that my perimeter HST's needed to be cut from squares that were 3 7/8" square and the four corner triangles needed to be cut from squares that were 3" square. Voila...it worked perfectly:

(Bravo to my daughter, Megan, holding the quilt for me!)

Of course, what you're seeing is the aftermath of the flubbed first attempt. There was a point when I had it all ripped out, my little blocks looked horrible with their edges all stringy and somewhat misshapen I wondered if I was going to be able to recover this project. Hence I'm doubly happy with how it turned out. I know it's hard to see in the photo, but I decided to quilt the patchwork blocks with a single circle. This gave me a chance to learn how to use that feature of my new sewing machine. (It's a little fussy, actually.)

Winding down the day, I can't omit mentioning that today is my dad's birthday. If he were still alive he'd be 74. Hardly a day passes that I don't think about him, but on his birthday those memories he left me are extra special. Sixteen years ago it hardly seemed possible to think about him without crushing grief; now I just have happy memories and feel blessed to have had such a special dad.

My Foray Into Quilting

I admit it...I have an addiction. I think about it all the time. I wake up in the middle of the night and find I'm dreaming about it. My mind is wandering always in the direction of textiles, thread, geometry, colors and combinations of colors, batting, binding, starch, my "stash"... my quilting addiction. What's scary is how quickly I've slid into this. I dusted off my sewing machine to whip up some quick Christmas gifts last November, and sometime in December something clicked in my brain. By January I was watching Youtube videos, lamenting I'd never had my grandmother teach me how to quilt while she was still alive. (Alas, not the grandmother in my profile photo, but my paternal grandmother).

Sometime in Early January I embarked on my first quilting project, a simple table runner in a "Crazy Quilt" style:

I even made my first attempt at machine quilting with this little number. It's pretty bad, really, but I'm proud of it because I just dove right in and went for it, and in doing so, I learned a lot.

My next attempt was a lap quilt using charm packs and a tumbler template:

I had lots of trouble getting my corners matched up, as I realized how inconsistent my "scant 1/4" seams were. My quilting was also disastrous. But again, I learned alot. 

I practiced on a couple smaller projects, like this little scrap bucket:

And I made a couple table runners just sewing blocks together. One major thing I did was buy a new sewing machine (yay!) That was a huge splurge but it's awesome. And best of all, it has a 1/4" foot with a guide. (Try as I might, I couldn't get one for my other sewing machine).

Now things are starting to turn out better for me, and I'm seeing progress in my quilting. There's not as much frustration and I no longer think it's something I'm not going to be able to master. (For a while there, I really thought it was beyond me. Designing buildings in my former life: yes; quilting in my current life: kicked my butt).

Anyway, here the last three quilts I've made:

This is a design from the Moda Bakeshop web page called "Wiggle Whimsy" (here's the link http://www.modabakeshop.com/2012/08/wiggly-whimsy-quilt.html)  and it's made with a charm pack and a jelly roll. It's sort of a secret, so don't tell her, but I'm giving it to my mom for her birthday next month.

This is a "jelly roll race" made from the "Little Matryoshka" line by Riley Blake. My daughter is really into all things Russian right now, so I made this one big enough for her twin sized bed. She (and her kitty) love it.

Did I mention that I'm quite fond of the "Little Matryoshka" fabric line, too? Well, I made another tumbler lap quilt out of 3 charm packs. I'm happy to report that this time, I had no trouble getting my corners to match up. Yay me...progress!

All three of these I quilted on my machine using a basic stipple. Each time I sit down to quilt, I'm chomping at the bit to get started, thinking "this is my favorite part". By the time I'm done, though, I'm ready to start piecing again. Bottom line, I don't know what my favorite part is.

And if you're wondering, I have tried to do something other than a basic stipple on sample quilt sandwiches, but with little success. That black and white tumbler was a mess, and I did a sort of fan pattern on it. I'd like to venture into more challenging freemotion quilting patterns, but clearly I need to wait until I master the basics first. 

Thanks for reading. Have a great day.