Another finished top, and some play time

I added the borders to Tom's Primitiva quilt, and now it is ready for quilting.  It is bigger than I usually do, so I hung it over the backdrop in Tom's photo studio to take a picture, since it doesn't fit on the design wall very well.  Here is a close up of the corners and the border fabric.

I love this fabric, but it does two things that make me crazy.  It sheds strings everywhere, and they all stick to the orange.  The other thing is that the orange is the most wrinkle catching fabric I have worked with in a long time.  I iron it and by the time I get it ready to hang up, it is wrinkled again.  Hopefully, this won't matter when I get it all quilted.  I have no idea what I am going to use for a backing for this.  I have looked in my stash, and there is nothing that will work.  I may have to take Tom to the fabric store to select something he likes.  It is a good thing he likes to visit the fabric store.

After I finished that, I decided to work on my Modern 8 March challenge.  The challenge is to take an orphan block, and make something small just for ourselves.  I have a ton of orphan blocks from when I first started quilting and thought I would be a traditionalist.  I looked through them, trying to find one I could cut up and do something wild with.  Then I found the little moth.  The original block only goes out to the gold/orange squares.  I made it because I found this 3" square with the moth in my stash.  I fell in love with it and didn't want to lose it.  Today, I added the turquoise border, the quarter inch "flap", and the leaf border.  My new thing to learn with this piece was to include a three dimensional "flap" portion to the border.  I realized, too late, that to get what I wanted, I needed to miter the flap piece and the leaf piece.  I still like it, but next time, I will remember before it is too late.  I have drawn on some quilting marks and will do that tomorrow.  It will finish up just over 12" square, and I will hang it on my wall of mini quilts. 

The last thing I did was play with some of my improvisational blocks and see how they would look with

the turquoise.  I still have more blocks I want to make before I fully commit to a layout, but I am leaning toward the turquoise for improv sashing.  What do you think?

I have a few bee blocks I need to get done, and a doll quilt to start, and all those tops to quilt.  Where is my resolve?  Until tomorrow, joyful quilting, everyone.

Something new

Does your normal everyday life ever intrude seriously into your quilting time?  That is what happened to me this morning.  I had to spend far too much time dealing with state bureaucracy and a financial institution this morning.  Unfortunately, it was necessary.  Fortunately, it all worked out well.  After I got that taken care of, I got the Primitiva top put together and ready for borders.  The border fabric arrived this afternoon, so I will put it on tomorrow and post another photo.

Then, I had room to put this newly arrived work on the design wall and audition some fabric for my addition.  This is round three of the Improvirobin I am taking part in.  Willa, my wonderful sister in law, did a stunning and incredible piece of transformation on my round one piece.  You can see it here.  It has now traveled on to a new person for round three.  The piece on my design wall was started by Stephanie at Venus de Hilo, and added to by Jackie at Canton Village Quilt Works.  I have some ideas what I want to do, but I will let it gel for a few days before I jump in.  I will post what I do at the end of the month.

Tomorrow, I have a bunch of little projects that need my attention in the studio.  Until then, joyful quilting, everyone.

Primitiva quilt update

All the snowball blocks are now pieced and everything is on the design wall.  It is always amazing to me how the camera will pick up and focus on oranges and yellows to the detriment of all the other colors.  This entire quilt is very vibrant, and while the orange is very bright and exciting, it doesn't dominate this much in real life.  Tom is really happy with how this is coming along.  We had an interesting discussion about adding a border or just binding it as it is.  I was in favor of the latter because I felt a border would put a stop to all the energy flowing out of this quilt.  Then, we started looking at some of the different fabrics, and found one we thought would encourage the movement.  I decided to order it, and will add a border after all.  It is really great to have a husband with a good sense of color and design who is willing to enter into these discussions with me, and understand what I am talking about.  I am already thinking about quilting.  I would like to hand quilt a motif in each of the orange blocks, but I haven't come up with a brilliant idea yet.  There are some really big and bold flowers in some of the prints.  Maybe I will do something like that, and probably do it with the machine. 

After I cut off all the snowball corner triangles, I ended up with 84 half square triangle units to play with.  I am looking forward to making a smaller quilt with these later in the spring.  For now, I am going to put them away.  I need to get my stack of finished tops quilted.  Starting Friday, I am going to start getting some things quilted so I can get them finished.  Having a bunch of tops around is fun, but it will be more fun to have finished quilts.

Tomorrow, I start my weekly three days with Bella.  Until Friday, joyful quilting everyone.

Making progress, and a wonderful gift in the mail

A week ago, I won this fantastic giveaway at Spontaneous Threads. Stephanie is cleaning out craft and quilting supplies.  The box arrived today, and it was jam packed with goodies, like this fabric above.  Look at this one.  It is so stinkin' cute.

See the birds on the chairs?  I am going to have to find something wonderful to make with it.

Look at the cute coin purse.  She also included three extra zippers just the right size and one of those metal purse clasps.  I have long wanted to make a purse with one of these.

Yummy yarn.  Now I can crochet that scarf I have been thinking about.

Lastly, there is crafty goodness for projects with Bella. 

Stephanie is going to be doing another giveaway in March.  I suggest that you keep watch over at Spontaneous Threads so you have a chance at getting the wonderful March box.

The Primitiva quilt is coming along.  I got all the nine patches done and put up on the design wall.  I then started putting up squares in the corners of the orange blocks so that the snowballs would all be as random as the rest of the quilt.  I may have done this in a very inefficient way, but it worked for me.  After I had all the blocks the way I wanted, I carefully pulled the orange blocks down and stacked them neatly.

I nearly finished marking the squares and pinning them on this afternoon.  Tomorrow, I will start sewing.  I have marked them so I will get the extra half square triangle units I want to use in the second quilt I will be making with this fabric.  Whoo hoo!  A two-fer.

The last thing I did in the studio today was to play with some scraps.

I got some pieces sewn, but mostly I just pulled more scraps to add to what I was building.  I have missed just playing.

It will be interesting to see what comes of tomorrow.

Joyful quilting, everyone

Don't forget to go here to enter the Pass It Along Box giveaway contest.

Bella's pre-school class (read moms here) is making a quilt for their annual auction.  I have nothing to do with this project except to make Bella's block. (You may read a little frustration here, but it is a story for another day.)  Bella said she wanted cats in a window and hearts on the front. I was given the green pieces and a bunch of scraps.  The only thing I pulled from my fabric is the kitty print.  The name is embroidered, as well as the stems and leaves of the flowers.  I haven't done much embroidery for a very long time, and I really enjoyed doing this.  Maybe I will do more for another project.

The other thing I worked on today is Tom's Primitiva quilt.  It is really hard to get all the colors right for these fabrics.  I am close on the orange, at least on my computer screen.  I have sewn a total of nine of the nine patch blocks.  Keeping them random has been interesting.  The orange blocks will become snowball blocks, creating a secondary pattern of stars, and I want to make sure the corners are different from the squares they will touch.  This is going to be a very bold quilt, and it is great fun to work with all these wonderful colors and designs.

I will work more on this quilt over the weekend, but I also want to get started on a couple of other projects.  I would like to get started on my lone star quilt.  I am debating whether to cut individual diamonds or create strata and work from those.  I have seen it done both ways.  Do any of you have words of wisdom about how I should proceed?

Joyful quilting, everyone.

Organizing for Randomness

Do you remember this beautiful group of Primativa from Andover that I bought from the wonderful Julie at Intrepid Thread?  I started cutting into it Saturday morning, but not until after I did a bit of quilter's math.

(I would love to teach classes on quilter's math the way I do it.)

Anyway, I knew I had to figure out a method to get random in an organized way since I was using these 18 fat quarters to make Tom's quilt.  I saw a quilt on a blog and asked the maker if she used a pattern, and if so, where she got it.  She said she saw the quilt in many places, and just made her own pattern.  I love to make patterns, so I drafted one that would work with the Primativa.

The first thing I did, after figuring out the math, was to cut the fat quarters into 3.5" strips.  I got five from each piece with a narrow strip left over.  I cut two strips from each piece into 3.5" x 3.5" squares and set them aside for the snowball blocks.  The first blocks I need to build are nine patches.  I wanted to sew random groups of three 3.5" x 22" strips together to make this work.  In order to get these really random, without repeats, I used the narrow left over strips.  I cut them into thirds to have three of each, then put them in groups on the cutting board.  Then I built the strip sets, following the mini examples.

I was so excited when I got them all together, and it all turned out right.  The bonus is that I can now build mini wonky nine patches for another project.  Maybe a baby quilt or a doll blanket. 

After I sewed all the sets, I cut a series of 3.5" strips.  Of course, I had to put a nine patch together to see how my plan was working.

One of the things I had the hardest time with when I started quilting last year was to get the seams ironed the right way.  I don't like open seams for many reasons, so I need to make sure to get them pressed in the right direction for nesting.  Sometimes, that is just really hard for me to figure out.  This time, I made sure all my seams were pressed in the same direction when I built the strip sets. Then I could turn the center one around as needed.  Here, on the backs, you can see that seams are going just the right ways for great nesting.

All that prep payed of in a beautiful random block with corners that meet nicely and lay nice and flat.  Now, I have 27 more of these to make, and no two will be alike.

As you may know, if you are a regular follower of my blog, I am not one to go out and buy a bunch of fabric from one line.  I don't often see many that I like that much, and I am very mindful of how I spend my limited fabric budget.  When I first saw this line, I immediately fell in love with the colors and the designs.  As I was pressing each piece before cutting, I couldn't decide which design was my favorite.  These are colors I love to use together, and I couldn't believe someone would put them all together in one line.  I think of this as my first "Modern" quilt.  Wait until you see tomorrow's post with the bright orange snowball blocks!

I am having a very good project year so far.  I am not finishing much, but I am having a great time creating tops.   I hope you are having a great quilting year, as well. 

Joyful quilting, everyone.

Another finished top

I think the top is finished.  The working title is Quilt Provencal.  The very dark piece on the right is not as noticeable in real life, but I may have to change it out.  I learned many things in making this top. 

1. Triangle spike borders are not as difficult as I thought they would be.  Of course, I took the easy way out in the corners because I wanted to use more of that fabric, and I only had enough to do the corners.

2.  Allowing the process to be the most important thing helped me to focus on what I was doing at the time.  That helped me to work on skills development along the way.

3.  I shouldn't be afraid to play with colors in all their varieties.

4.  Paying attention to fabric patterns can be fun.

5.  It is okay to have fun and focus on only one project at a time, sometimes.

6.  It is good to challenge myself to continue to learn and grow, and jump outside my box.

I am very happy I took up this self-imposed color challenge.  I will continue to look for more.

This is Primitiva by Jane Dixon for Andover.  I fell in love with it when I first saw it at Intrepid Thread.  I started saving my pennies, then Julie put it on sale so I was able to get a fat quarter bundle of the entire collection.  I saw a quilt I thought would work great with this collection over at Michelle's.  I thought I would use the Primitiva for the scrappy blocks and an orange that Julie found for me as the snowball centers.  This one is going to be for Tom, and he approves of my color choice.  He needs another bright lap quilt to keep the beauty his sister made him company.  I don't think one can ever have too many quilts.  I plan on getting this one started after I finish up some small projects I need to do because they have deadlines.

I look forward to a weekend in the studio playing and enjoying the process.

Joyful quilting, everyone.