friday finish

Outside pictures taken earlier this week of my finished quilt sunny, measuring 60" by 75". 

It's machine quilted in the ditch and hand quilted with perle cotton 16. Light and summery with the thin Hobbs Thermore polyester batting. I put the batting in the dryer for 20 minutes before basting the quilt. This made the batting soft and puffy, removing the wrinkles from being folded up and stored in the bag.  Happy with the effect, I will do that again...

The quilt is made from 2.5" strips, playfully arranged on my design wall. I blogged about making the top earlier. Mostly yellow fabric with splashes of contrasting purple makes for an easy recipe! What color is next?

; )

I am working my way through the stack of tops waiting to become quilts. The plan is to keep quilting until I get too distracted and need to start another top.  So, I'm trying to stay in quilting modus...

Happy friday and happy stitching!

a little red and green...

... to get into the spirit of the season. You may recognize the pattern from Denyse Schmidt's book, it's called Any Way You Slice It. I searched my stash for seasonal colors, some solids and some of Denyse's prints from Greenfield Hill.

The blocks are made loosely based on her templates and in a slightly smaller scale. They end up at 7.5" and are put together into two smaller pieces for the table.

The inspiration was found at LeeAnn and Jolene's .... Now, all I have to do is completing the quilting. Slowly quilting these by hand. Trying to pace myself and rest the arms a bit. No hurry, except the fact that I would love to put these on the table in a weeks time...

; )

Have a nice weekend!

october finish

After a year in the making, my Ghastly spiderweb quilt is ready to be used. And today I'm happy to share some pictures:

A blue sky and sun has been rare around here lately. The sun bleaches out the colors a bit on the pictures...

For a while I was planning to do hand-quilting with big stitches and perle cotton. I ended up quilting this by machine, following the edges of the webs and extending the lines across the border.

This last picture shows the quilting from the back. A "photo - strip" is incorporated with two Hope Valley prints. I was a bit short on this backing fabric, and had to be very frugal making the back big enough. Basting a quilt with a small back is no fun, so I'll try to avoid that next time. The quilt measures 58" * 74". I used Quilters Dream cotton batting, again...

Outside, the trees are looking more and more like the mix of green and orange in this quilt. There's no doubt about it fall is here! Hopefully this weekend we'll see some more of the blue sky.

Thank you all for leaving me such nice comments on my last post! The 30's stash buster tumbler top has inspired me to think of 2012 as the year of using from stash, daring to dive into the collected designer fabrics. At least that's an ambition!

Wish you all a lovely weekend, with or without fabric and thread!

; )

bee friends flimsy

First letters of 2011...

This weekend I pulled out my bee blocks from the Eurovision Quilters. Sketching a bit brought out an idea of organizing the blocks into columns.

Putting all the blocks up on the design wall, my first step was to put their bare feet in some grass, connecting them and emphasize the columns. I chose white to bind it all together, contrasting the sky blue background in the blocks.

Then there was room for more. I had an 10" by 11" free space to fill... and I wanted to add some letters. A bit more planning on paper first:

The dresses are partly from Denyse's Katie Jump Rope line, and as a play on words this phrase just stuck on my mind.

Here they are, all playing nicely together...

The top is 50" * 67" and I have started thinking about batting and backing. One step at a time...

; )

Wish you all a lovely week!

one last flimsy...

"There's always room for one more" - I think this goes both for christmas cookies and new quilt projects...

After sewing together my warm palette cherrywood top in improvised strings, I found the cool palette scraps kept popping into mind.

I find myself often doing quilts in odd pairs, twisting the palette or the pattern a bit(theme for another post - next year).

I mentioned in my last post how much I look forward to Denyse Schmidts new fabric line. She has a picture of a lovely quilt made up. So the two ideas brewed in my mind for a while. And I decided there was time to whip up another quick and easy recipe:

ingredients: 3 or 4 packs of cherrywood scrap bag + 2 yrd of indigo

preparing: divide the scraps into 2 groups by length 9" and 6"

• • 1. then cut or rip each group of scraps into strings of random width

• 1. 
     

• 1. mix: working with the two groups separately, randomly pick strings and sew together

1. distribute light and dark colors, and group strings in pleasing neighborhoods

arrange: using your design wall, pair them up in columns of one or two

cut, distribute and rearrange until they have reached the same length

cut: take your yardage piece and rip or cut into strips, including a top/ bottom one

final step:sew the bars together, using random widths

Mine ended up at 60" by 72". I think I'll use wool batting. Just leave it to cool off a bit...

Wishing upon a star...

Someone special is still sick - poor thing.

It's time for me to wish you all a happy, peaceful, safe and creative New Year!

And may 2011 be a fun one!

; )

hommage a Denyse

It's cold and dark this time of year. Time for a taste of colors. So I cooked me up some colorful cookies. An easy recipe:

one small piece of pattern per block, add solids strings from the scrap bin

Courthouse blocks, inspired by and infused with Denyse Schmidts lovely products.

No sugar, no calories, no regrets...

test pilot...

quilts are softer and warmer than snow...

My little Hommage a Denyse measures 26" by 28", uses the leftover piece of Kyoto bamboo batting and is quilted with perle 16 in my favorite baptist fan pattern.

Grey, dark, cold days...

is enough to make us all dream of new adventures....

It's a busy time of the year. Hope there's still time for you to do some sewing, or if not, to dream up some new quilting adventures!

(I'm dreaming of Denyse's latest fabric line, still not available from the stores yet)

; )

friday flimsy

The maple tree outside our house is gradually turning from green to orange -

inspiring the color palette and shift of colors in my spiderweb flimsy...

Thank you for all your encouraging comments about this wip! I have spent some time sewing, and some time with my trusted seam ripper.

I started out using several halloween themed fabrics. The blocks got quite busy, so I changed the mix a bit, removing most of the halloween prints and keeping the cats and some bats...

The halloween spiderweb quilt-top is now finished at 45" by 60". I am considering framing it with a white border. What do you think, does it need a frame or not?

Fall is being challenged by a (hopefully) short visit of winter. These last pictures were taken yesterday. The crows are regular passers by. Snow in october is too early, catching everybody off guard...

Wish you all a great weekend!

wip wednesday

I have wanted to make a halloween spiderweb for a long time. Pairing up Denyse Schmidt's Hope Valley and Alexander Henry's The Ghastlies, I decided to give it a try...

I have modified my recipe / tutorial for this one:

Using bigger blocks: starting with a 17" square.

Making the stars more narrow.

The spiderweb blocks are still fun to sew. Playing with different ways of combining the fabric, aiming for good contrast between the strips...

Picture is taken on a grey, overcast october morning. The trees outside are starting to turn orange. Fall is here...

short stories

A finish! I have been following Penny's quilt-along. It has been a lot of fun.

All the fun Heather Ross prints in the center of the blocks gave name to this quilt - "Short Stories".

Here the quilt is on display for the photographer. You can see the curtain clips holding the top edge. I used them to wall baste this quilt, and am quite happy with my new technique:

the quilt was hung on the wall, secured by the clips, top facing the wall

I used some painters tape to stretch it out and fasten the sides and bottom to the wall

the backing was aligned (center length and width) to the top and pinned to the top edge with quilters safety pins

then I just kept smoothing out the back and pinning ...

In addition to the 'quilt as you go', I quilted in the ditch between the blocks, and added some additional L shaped in the ditch quilting in each block a well. The batting is Warm and White 100% cotton.

My blocks ended up 13.25" from a start at 14.5". I think calculating an additional 1.5" to your finished block gives you a bit of room for squaring up your blocks.

The finished quilt measures 66" * 80". It is backed and bound with some of my favorite fabrics from Denyse Schmidts' "Katie Jump Rope" line.

Thank you Penny for hosting this fun quilt-along! Next time I may try making these blocks in a courthouse style. They are a lot of fun to make...

; )

improv top

The improv top is coming together. I am thinking about calling it "There's always two sides..." Just because...

It was intended as a lap quilt, a gift for somebody who will be 40 next year. So there is 40 strips or candles lined up. Then I decided to add the solid squares. And at some point I figured out it was the new wall quilt for the dining room I had been wanting for a long time. All that pretty aqua and a bit of sunny yellow:

I am going to add some white both to the top and bottom to complete the design and make it a good length for the wall. The finished size will be 60" * 85". All the white will look nice quilted with straight lines, something like this.

There is still enough time to make the gift. I have a finished quilt top that might work. Or I could go back to one of the two patterns that was a mixed inspiration for this improv top. I like them both...

12.5"

These are for Wendy, the first of the Eurovision Bee to send out her fabrics and instructions. The blocks are supposed to be 12.5". Not easy. Practice makes perfect? She chose these pretty Denyse Schmidt fabrics from the Kathie Jump Rope line. There is a peek of DS soon to be released line here. Love these!

Next is a 12.5"and a 9.5" Double X for the Winter Wonderland stitchery / quilt I am working on. These are my first "snowflakes". I made them without paper-piecing, practicing my seem allowance. The dark half square triangles for the 9.5 block came as "bonus" squares from the bigger block. Thank you Bonnie, for good tips on how to do things.

Here are two of the 12.5" scrappy christmas blocks for this swap. The trick is to make the last row of strings a bit wider, and square the block up to a perfect 12.5".

These blocks are also 12.5" for the same swap, but in other colors. The last of my 12.5 block is a charity block for the lovely lady who organizes this swap.

So, I have had a bit of practice on the 12.5" blocks. And there will be more to come. We are 18 ladies in the Bee, so I am in for a new challenge or two each month for the next year! I look forward to see a lot of pretty quilts being made!