quilt festival - fall 2010

It's time for the very popular Bloggers Quilt Festival. Thank you so much Amy for hosting this event for the 4th time!

I want to share a quilt that I recently finished. It is a wall quilt, and it started out with some "blueberry fool blocks" that I received in a swap with my friend Clare. Lovely palette of blues...

I started playing with them, forming them into a medallion. Adding some solids and a star.

By then the top reminded me of a norwegian winter landscape: snow and crisp, blue shadows...

So, I added a phrase from a favorite norwegian singer, Anne Grete Preus (in my translation it will say something like: the sun sits low on the horizon, under the tall sky).

The letters are inspired by Tonya.

The quilt is long and narrow, 30" by 60", fitting for a wall hanging.

I had a lot of fun quilting by hand, creating different textures.

Sometimes its fun to start playing with some fabric and see where it takes you. Trusting yourself to create as you go... Trying not to put on a lot of pressure.

Thank you for your visit! And please, enjoy more beautiful and special quilts at the festival here.

spring fever

The snow is slowly melting outside. Today it's raining, speeding up the process...

I dug out my collection of 6" vintage sheets charms. These dreamy, pastel watercolor, big flower prints are my little treasure - the result of a swap with lovely Evelyn of Use the loot. Just looking through them, sorting by color, is an instant injection of vitamin D.

These pretty fabric asks for a simple design. A checkerboard table top finished at 39"by 39". Now I'll be looking for a pretty backing...

Wishing you all some beautiful sunshine! And happy sewing, too...

winter blues

A little swap with Clare made these pretty "Blueberry Fool" blocks appear in my mailbox last week. Lots of lovely blue.

It has been a long winter. The snow is still around. (coldest, longest winter in 30 years in these necks of the wood). Feeling a bit of winter blues...

So I started playing, improv style.

Shaping a medallion.

Adding some letters - lyrics from an old song favorite by Anne Grete Preus:

lav sol (the sun is low)

høy himmel (the sky is high)

Adding the star.

The letters are 7" high. The full top is about 30" * 60":

I had a lot of fun, Clare. Practicing for my Lazy Gal Liberated Amish 2010 Get Together quilt.

Happy sharing, swapping, sewing and playing...

; )

sharing the joy ... an invitation

to participate in a different kind of swap...

I want to focus a bit more on how to quilt it, that is:

what texture and drape (stiff, firm or soft)

how thick or thin,

how warm or not

my quilt "ends up" after quilting. This goes for both my lap quilts and my wall quilts.

So far, it's been a lot of learning by doing and gaining experience. But I am ready to start organizing my knowledge and expand on it by focussing a bit more on two factors together:

batting + quilting

What I want is to build myself a personal "library of smaller quilted samples" to return to whenever I am planning the batting & quilting part of a project.

The picture above is of my recently modified Snow White. I added my first wonky star / maverick star / liberated star block to it. It's good to rest the eyes on after all the Christmas red...

I like the texture of this quilt, and I wonder what kind of batting i used? It's made back in

spring 2008, but did not take any notes about it.

After my last post, Janet kindly led me in direction of Debra at I've gone Completely Batty. She's on a mission to explore different kinds of battings, and have taken on a huge job, working through more than 50 different products.

Debra and I had a little exchange of ideas, and she is now posting to see if anyone is interested in a quilted sample swap. Please head over and see if this is a way to share and to broaden your quilting repertoire!!

This picture shows more of the quilting / texture. The modified Snow White is pieced of several white and off-white pieces of fabric, and then quilted with straight and wavy lines in a improvised manner. I used some heavier (Ikea) woven cottons from a flee marked find, it has a bit of weight and hangs nicely. The 5" star sits on the 32" * 57" backdrop.

So, if you are game to play, or just interested in knowing more about batting, please take a look over here...

a finish

The top in the second layout, ready for basting. First attempt, using safety pins, resulted in too many crinkles on the back. Second attempt, backing taped to the living room floor and then pinned, worked well. I was a bit worried the glue of the tape would leave marks on the floor. It worked well, the pinning didn't take so long ; )

I used some off-white fleece for the back, also replacing the batting. This had been in my stash for a couple of years, after being recommended to me by an experienced quilter.

The quilting is just not-so-straight lines 1" - 1.5" apart:

I used some stripes for the binding, adding a bit of red with white dots when I ran out...

This 48" * 60" quilt is my warmest yet, thanks to the fleece backing. It will be a seasonal lap quilt to warm my body and soul, thinking about the friendly community of bloggers who both are generous enough to host and participate in a swap. So, I guess I have to put this one under the tree for me?

and another wip

I have started putting together the top for my Scrappy Swap Christmas Hedgerow blocks. 6 of them are swapped from Nicole, Melissa D and Leisel and 6 of them are made by me.

Putting them up on the "design wall" and playing around a bit, I decided to make scrappy strippy borders out of the rest of my strings that were cut for the blocks. Starting out, I just alternated light and dark strips.

Then I sped up the progress by using longer strips, sewing 10 into one strata that got sliced into three 5" pieces. These three pieces was placed next to each other on the design wall with one open stripe between them. Quite happy with the repetition this provided, I continued doing so. One strata for each of the 4 sides. Spreading these out around the center, I then added the green strips to bind it all together. This "design as you go" worked out like a charm this time.

I guess this "controlled randomness" is a compromise between very scrappy, and very organized, and suits me very well.

The sashing is next. Think I'll go for solid white Kona cotton. If you feel up for some more pictures to get you in a mood for Christmas, there is more pictures of these swap blocks in the flickr group over here.

This is the first quilt I'll make with blocks from a swap. It was great fun and I am very happy to look at these pretty blocks - thank you ladies!!!

Anybody else started thinking about Christmas, yet?

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!

swap twins

This is the placemat I made for Michelle in the placemat swap.

She mentioned a little design I made earlier, so I wanted to make her a little girl with an orange dress. When I saw her, I knew she wanted a twin, for me to keep... So I had to make one...

swap happy

I have been participating in a placemat swap organized by the lovely krom mama. I was lucky to get hooked up with Michelle B from MichelleSews. This was a two way swap, where you could exchange wishes and requests before you got started with the sewing. I have sent off the placemat I made for Michelle.

Yesterday I received the quilt she made for me. I am SPEACHLESS and IN SHOCK. It is a piece of art, beautiful and very special. Beautiful fabrics and lovely quilting. Even my hubby gave it big praise. Michelle, maybe you should have put it in an exhibition? I have put it up on the wall, on my Snowwhite. It is so Summer and I LOVE IT! Thank you, thank you!

4SQS5 - swap recieved

Today I recieved "Snowy Windows at Night", my 4SQS5 from Cathi in Toronto. It is very pretty. She made all those beautiful curved seams perfectly! I am very happy for the quilt, it is lovely! Thank you Cathi!

She also send me some lovely blue batic fabric. I am sorry the light is poor in the picture, it does not do the quilt justice. Cathi has posted a picture here with better light. You may notice two white pins in the picture, they are just holding up the quilt for the picture. I will hang it properly using the hanging sleeve.

goodbye...

This is the quilt I made for the 4SQS5. The challenge was to make a monochromatic quilt, only adding black and white. It turned out cheerful and summery.... always a bit sad to let your swap quilts out of the house. But now its on its way to ..... a good home.

swap received

These pretty fabrics arrived yesterday from Andi in Australia. She chose two fat quarters with lovely turquise colors, and generously added three big pieces of Prints Charming designs. There is also included lots of red ric-rac and a very pretty card. I am one lucky swapper! ; ) Thank you Andi!!! And thank you Katy for setting up this swap!

two bindings done...

First two finishes of 2009. My Mermaid Song and a secret swap...

Happy swapper

Coming back from our long summer holiday I found the sweetest 4SQS waiting for me:

Paula W have send me this beauty, and she also included some sweet buttons, chocolate and fabric used in the quilt. The quilt is handquilted. And I simply love it! THANK YOU Paula W!

I feel like a very happy swapper. And the quilt is already up on the wall in the kitchen, and looking good there too.

We have had a very nice stay with family in Washington, US. I have done a lot of quilt shop hopping, seen some pretty quilt shows, visited quiltfest in Seattle and much more. Lots of inspiration, some quilting fabric, notions and patterns, filled up my suitcases as we returned back to Norway.

Here it feels like fall is coming. Rainy days. Still good temperatures.

fly my pretties....

I have parted with the 4SQS Summer quilt, and sent them flying off to their new destination. They are cheerful and bright and wishing a happy summer for all off you!!!

Swap recieved

Yesterday there was an envelope from Teresa waiting in my mailbox. Inside it was this sweet quilt! I have put it up on my Snowhite, admiring it everytime I walk through the house. There are lots of hearts in pink and yellow around fresh green squares. I am the lucky owner of this welsh little beauty. Thank you Teresa for your lovely creation! And thank you Margaret for hosting this swap!

Cat Quilt 2

I am doing a lot of stitching by hand on this quilt and trying out new technics, testing and experimenting a bit. This will be my own design and end up (hopefully) as a big wall hanging. I am adapting the metode of english paperpiecing on thin batting instead of paper. This stabilises the different fabrics: silk, linen, velvet and cottons that can be a bit flimsy. The patches is 6" and I am putting them together in 9 patches. The full quilt will probably be 16 * 12 of these 6".

This is one of my 4 butterflies that I've made so far. It is velvet with silk on linen. I am going to add emboidery and embellshment as step 3, after adding a backing. Have considered adding backing to every 9 patch, and then put them together as a grid maybe using safetyneedles. That way the quilt can transform; change size and organisation when I want to move it or add seasonal elements....

Lots of ideas, we'll see where it will go from here. So far I'm making the 6" patches enjoying the handsewing and feel of the different textures. I want this to be something I can bring along for my quilt meetings and so.

Also recieved a nice e-mail from Cheryl in Florida telling me my 4SQS quilt arrived safely and that she likes it ....

4SQS

This week I fininished my spring 4 season quilt, and sent it off to its new home. The backing is Aunt Grace Friends Around the World by Judith Rothermel. Very fitting name! So I wrapt it up using the selvage as a ribbon. This is the first time I have made a quilt for somebody I don't know and sent it off. Feels a bit strange. All I can do now is hope for a safe trip, and a warm welcome...
And of course - visiting the mailbox for the next weeks will be exiting. Is there a small quilt for me today?

Scrap swap

This week I got the envelope from Bea for the Scrap swap organised by Melly. I am a lucky woman! Beautifully wrapt she had put a lot of different fabric strips together for me.

Sorting them by color and adding a few of my own scraps I decided to start playing a bit with the log cabins. I cut the strips down to 1" and the center 2" and started sewing without any foundation.

Here is some Courthouse Steps:

Then some Log cabins:

All the blocks layered:

This was fun. Maybe the Courthouse Steps will end up as a little tabletop or I'll put all of them together as a log cabin sampler?? Hmm

Thank you, Bea and hope you'll have fun playing with the scraps I sent you.

Sweet Spring Treats

One of my spring favourite treats are these marzipan eggs from a Danish company called Anthon Berg. They are a part of a Norwegian Easter tradition - chocolate and marzipan sweets. They taste great and are also supersweet and decorative with their pretty pastell colors. Here they are (until I eat them all) looking good with the spring quilt I have made for the swap. It is quilted by now, needs a good binding and a proper label too. Well, there is still plenty of time.

It may be a silly thing to say but I like it, it is sweet. I hope my swap partner will like it to. And now I am curious to see if there is anybody else posting about their spring quilts...