Studio weekend

Last weekend, Tom helped me switch my studio to a larger room, trading with a bedroom.  Now there is room for Bella and me.

Bella's corner of the new studio - or at least part of it.

My corner of the new studio.  The design wall stayed in the other room, but I am now in with all the fabric and there is much more room for both of us. That is very important on Wednesdays when we have our shared studio day.

The first thing I did this weekend was finish up my addition to the April Improvirobin block that came my way.  It started out like this.  I am the third person to add to the original.  As you can see, there have been big changes.  When I first saw the original, I fell in love with the rich reds, oranges, and golds in the center.  When it came to me, I decided to make some fabric of those same rich colors to add to two of the sides.  It will go to three more people before it goes back to the originator.  If you are interested to watch the progress of all seven quilts, take a few minutes to look through the Flickr site.  This year's group starts with this one.

I also worked on one of my H2H quilts for this year.  You can read more about that project over at Confessions of a Fabric Addict.  These blocks are going to make a D9P.  I do like that pattern.

Last, but really not least, I participated in a scrap swap over at 15 Minutes Play.  Margaret from New Jersey, and I decided to fill the small flat rate boxes from the post office.  I think she got more fabric stuffed in the box she sent me than I did for her.  These are just a few that I pulled to play with today.

This New York City scrap was my inspiration.  Don't you just love it!

After fun sewing, cutting, then sewing again, I came up with this 24" x 24" beauty.  The amazing thing about the box of scraps is that there was only one very small piece of fabric that I actually had in my stash.  Everything else was totally new to me.  What fun it is to improve together something from new scraps.

My new job is keeping me very busy, so I probably won't post again until next Sunday.  Have a great week, everyone, and joyful quilting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



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.