fiesta, forever...

A few snap shots of  my fiesta, forever... from a freezing outdoor photoshoot. The quilt is big, 64" * 80" using quilters dream poly batting and a fun alexander henry print as a back. Not easy to capture in good light this time of the year.  More lively in real life than in these pictures, I'd say...

This has been a long term scrappy project, based on the lovely pattern scrapper's delight from the book sunday morning quilts. It is a mix of blocks with very random strips of colors, and blocks with more coordinated colors. As I was putting this wip up on my design wall after finishing ziggy stardust (previous post), the inspiration hit to try a similar layout. 

Some of these blocks have had several different tryouts for other layouts over time, some are freshly made for this one. A lucky find of light blue solid from stash pulled it all together. The back has been waiting patiently in stash, too. It's a mexican themed dia del morte, fun print. (There's a little showing in the middle picture, above.) As much as I would like this one quilted on a long arm, I decided to try it myself. ( The back was not big enough for the extra inches needed to attach it to the long arm.) So, using all the different colors of thread to quilt the different colored strips I took my time and quilted it over several days, a few hours at a time. 

Happy with the result. The vivid colors complement the "fastelaven" (norwegian custom similar to carnival season) and easter season both. A good dose of colors are just what I need this time of year.

; )

five

My latest quilting adventure started with some beautiful field study fabric and a wish to try making Kathy Doughty's Fractured pattern using 2.5" strips WOF.

I pulled out a warm palette to complement Anna Maria Horners Field study from my stash: orange, pink, red purple and gold. Making blocks and putting them up on my design wall I decided my fabric selection didn't work out, so I put some of the blocks and ready cut strips aside. Then I finished the purple fractured top shown in picture 4.

The spare blocks from this first fractured quilt top kept calling me. I put them on my design wall and decided it was half a top worth of pretty blocks. So I pulled more fabric from stash and made the pink fractured quilt top shown in picture 2.

This second fractured top is slowly being hand quilted on wool batting and a voile backing. (see picture 3). It is softer than butter and oh so tempting to work on.... The key for me is to go slow with the hand-quilting. I have spent all my money at the chiropractors office lately. Not fun! I have to find a way to go back to spend my money on fabric instead.

The center 4 patch in the first picture are made from spare parts from the second fractured top. They were just winking at me saying "don't we look pretty? All we need is a few star points from the scrap bin."

So we are down to picture 5. The spare parts from the spare parts formed a figure of five stars. Reminding me to tell you it's been 5 years since I started this blog. Thank you all for making it such a great place to share ideas and inspiration!

Wish you all a great wednesday and hope you will have some pretty spare parts tempting you to get creative! Me, I am trying to go real slow. 5 years is not so long, I do not want to stop quilting and blogging just yet!

; )

transit of venus

A finished quilt is usually a happy moment

my transit of venus finished at 50" * 70"

hand-quilted on quilters dream request cotton batting and the soft voile backing.

Last week we witnessed the rare astrologic occasion of the transit of venus, blissfully unaware...

that by the end of the week...

our very own, sweet furry companion would suddenly leave us confused and hart-broken...

She has been my sweet helper and quilt inspector, a frequent star of this blog. (My very last picture of her is included in my previous post - before the horrible truth of her fatal injury was revealed to us.) I needed to share these sad news with you all. 

The full story includes a few trips to the vet, who did all she could. I can not even type this without crying, so please let me stop now. The house is suddenly turned oh so quiet and I am being very lost for words. For that very reason I disabled the comments to this post. Please understand.

Promise to be back, but for now ...

rip my sweet venus

finished top

Thank you for all the lovely comments on my star blocks! It is time for a little update on my last post. The stars are put together on a dark blue (Kona Nightfall), that changes color when photographed in different angle and light.

The blocks were cut down askew from 6.5" to 5.5". Ending up 5" in the finished top. This way they are twinkling a bit more. Some of the star points were cut off in the process, too.

I added three more rows, aiming for a 50" by 75" size lap:

Now to ponder quilting it myself or sending it out. So many options, such hard choices to be made...

; )

I will probably have to sleep on it!

Hope november is treating you all ok. It's getting cold around here. I am glad I have a pile of quilts to keep me warm!

stars, stars, stars ...

Very inspired by the lovely and talented Kerry i have been diving into my small scraps for some scrappy stars. Wiping out the supply of the smallest pieces... These stars end up as a 6" block, the circle of stars at 22".

In may I also got to send out my pif to 9 lovely ladies:

The mug rugs are 6" * 9". And more stars are still on my to do list...

; )

Ya'll have a lovely sunday!

a little finish

This little 26" by 29" is fresh from the washing machine. Scraps leftover from another quilt with some wonky stars. One of my oldest ufo's. It is quilted by machine in straight lines 1.5" apart, and has cotton batting. Soft and sweet...

We have beautiful, WARM summer weather, and I am slowly working through some ufo's and wip's.

Happy quilting, folks...

wonky stars

stars and stripes ...

With a bit of "help"? I put together this top. The stars were made earlier. Not sure how to quilt it...

stars

Two different quilts with stars I am working on in parallel. Same theme, different technique and size. The above is all handsewing, handquilting, the one below is machine piecing and quilting. Star constellations are the inspiration for the choice of quilting. In both quilts I have used straight lines drawn by chalk pencil as the basis for the quilting. Still works i progress, both. I have posted about the handstitched blocks earlier.
I am sure this is not the end of my fascination of stars, love them....

2009 challenge

Scraps from 2008 and new scraps to be produced in 2009 will go together into this classic Spiderweb design. In a way it's a spin on the scrap challenge by Melly and Me from 2007. So to all of you that needs some inspiration to use up your best scraps: please join in ...
I started with a 12.5" square of Kona White. Anyone up for trying this?

a new beginning ...

Brightest stars in Bonnieville?

What if? What if I try making maverick stars in blue and yellow? What if I try light on dark? What if I go more random with light and dark? I have been reading on an amazing blog, and now these two kind of innocent words stick in my mind - what if? Testing out and seing what happens. Its a way of learning what works and what does not. And then you get more ideas - what if .....

Here are my new storage solution for fabricscraps and more... Found the shelf and plastic boxes at IKEA. Really happy with these boxes, nice to see what is in them and a great way to store smaller patches, blocks, charm packs, jelly rolls and so on.