Wednesday, December 7, 2011

WIP Wednesday


Go figure that the week I get my act together and write a WIP Wednesday post, the linkup goes on hiatus!  I'm posting anyway, and this week the linky icon goes just to the main page of Freshly Pieced.  Maybe I can do it on my own through January when the linky comes back!

Completed Projects: 

Spring Zig Zag! - I got some time over Thanksgiving to sit and do some hand-sewing on the binding.  I think I have a couple of stitches left to put in the hanging sleeve, and it needs to be labeled, but it's completely bound, and I'm counting it as a win.  I mean, a finish.

A couple Christmas presents (new and completed, so I'll count it as one unit).  Secret, of course, until after Christmas.  There are a couple more to work on and to finish, but I'll plan on posting on them all after the holidays.

New Projects: 

Diamond Throw - Remember those diamonds I posted about my husband playing with a couple months ago?  They have evolved into a set of blocks and have been hanging out on the design wall.  Eric and I had a great morning playing with the diamonds and rearranging them.  

Ongoing Projects:

Secret Project - Finally making some progress on this - I need to quilt the border and bind and label it, and it can be off!  (And then, like the Christmas presents, it can stop being secret!)

Placemat Pair - One quilted, one to go.

No Progress/On Hold:
Crosses and Losses
Curtains for the dining room
Fall wall hanging of maple leaves
Orange and aqua throw
Sisters Sampler
Wedding Quilt
Old Timey Stars
Dad's Sudoko Puzzle
Hand-quilted dresden plates
Orange and aqua pillow covers - based on my new living room, I may be abandoning these.  I just have to convince myself that it's okay to drop something off my list!

This Week's Stats:
New projects - 2 (counting Christmas gifts all together)
Completed projects - 2
Currently in progress - 13


WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced

Sunday, December 4, 2011

Back From Hiatus

I've been on an unintended hiatus - looking at my last post, since September.  I've been distracted and busy, and once I fell behind posting, I just kept staying behind.  (Every Wednesday I tell myself that THIS week, I'll at least link to WIP Wednesday - oops.)  Mostly I've been busy because I'm working six days a week now, which kind of puts a damper on down time at home.  On top of that, my camera had an incident (note - cameras don't like falling, even only a couple inches) and had to be replaced.  The upside of that means I've upgraded!

The other contributing factor in my delinquency has been a complete reorganization of my sewing space, with the accompanying chaos.  My darling husband has finally (almost) finished building us a custom room-divider/cutting counter/bookcase.  Almost because staining and really finishing won't be happening during either finals period or winter; however, it is fully assembled and a functional surface, which is a vast improvement over the folding table I had been using.

Before: 




During


Current:


As you can see, it's actually gone through several stages of rearranging and new furniture, including the addition of those awesome Ikea EXPEDIT shelves.  It's also gone through MANY stages of cleaning - somehow the piles of fabric have a tendency to just keep growing on their own!

If I start writing now, perhaps I can get myself caught up and posted for WIP Wednesday?

Wednesday, September 14, 2011

WIP Wednesday #3

Well, nothing new and nothing completed, so I'm afraid I'm pretty boring this week.  

Ongoing Projects:

Crosses and Losses - More HSTs and blocks this week - I'm at 15 12" blocks now.  I laid it out on my bed, and I'm thinking I'm not quite halfway there.  I'll keep chipping away at it, stacks of HSTs at a time, and maybe by the time it's cold enough, I'll have at least the top done.  



Tops Awaiting Quilting:

Placemat Pair

Quilted Awaiting Binding:

Spring Zig Zag (still)

No Progress/On Hold:
Curtains for the dining room
Fall wall hanging of maple leaves.  
Secret Project
Orange and aqua throw
Orange and aqua pillow covers
Sisters Sampler
Wedding Quilt
Curtains for the dining room
Old Timey Stars
Dad's Sudoko Puzzle
Hand-quilted dresden plates

This Week's Stats:
New projects - 0
Completed projects - 0
Currently in progress - 14
WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

WIP Wednesday #2

I had a nice long three-day weekend for Labor Day, with two days all on my own.  I felt so productive!  I cut half-square triangles while watching the entire first season of Glee (yeah, I'm late to the party).  


Completed Projects:


Nada.

New Projects:

Fall wall hanging of maple leaves (no pictures yet).  

Ongoing Projects:


Crosses and Losses - Lots and lots of cutting and sewing HSTs and trimming.  Eight twelve-inch blocks down, I'm not sure how many to go.  I'm thinking that I'd like to make it bed-sized, which means a couple more weekends of sewing.  


Curtains for the dining room - One panel is done, one needs to be hemmed still.  But it's pinned up and hanging, so it's a partial win, right?

Tops Awaiting Quilting:

Placemat Pair - Finished the second front and cut batting.  Still debating cross-hatch and organic wavy quilting.

Quilted Awaiting Binding:

Spring Zig Zag (half-bound)

No Progress/On Hold:
Secret Project
Orange and aqua throw
Orange and aqua pillow coversSisters Sampler - found out that I'm more behind than I realized, made a list, and got copies of my sister's drafting
Wedding Quilt
Curtains for the dining room
Old Timey Stars
Dad's Sudoko Puzzle
Hand-quilted dresden plates

This Week's Stats:
New projects - 1
Completed projects - 0
Currently in progress - 14
WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced

Saturday, August 27, 2011

In Irene's Path

I missed WIP Wednesday this week, which I feel guilty about - but I haven't made any progress except for finding out I'm more behind on my Sisters quilt than I thought.  This weekend will either be very productive or see no work at all - we're hunkering down tonight and expecting Irene to hit at some point tomorrow.  If we don't lose power, I'm hoping to make some progress on Sisters blocks and some quilting. If we do lose power... hey, maybe I'll finish that hand-stitching of binding by candlelight or get my Singer treadle functioning!

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

WIP Wednesday (#1!)

I'm joining in the Freshly Pieced WIP Wednesday for the first time this week.  It seems like a perfect linky for me - I love lists, and I have plenty of things in progress.  

I've been a little stalled in progress because of a living room makeover (involving *three* trips to the furniture store, one failed delivery of a couch that wouldn't fit, and four to seven more weeks of waiting) and a smelly washer, but I have made some progress!  I'm hoping that this linky (and especially those stats at the bottom) give me a push to at least move some things from the "On Hold" list to the "Ongoing" (or *gasp* "Completed"?) list.  

Completed Projects:






Sewing Machine Cover - This one was new *and* completed!  Start to finish in two days!  It's not the most shapely, but it will keep dust off and out of my machine.  

New Projects:



Crosses and Losses - Fabric acquired (Kona? Ruby and White), but not even washed yet.  I did do a mock-up in purples of my cheater plan for the block - all HSTs and squares means no evil bias triangles.  (The mock-up block doesn't count as a project, does it?)

Ongoing Projects:




Spring Zig Zag - Finished quilting and attached binding, just need to hand-sew the rest of the binding, add a hanger and a label!  Just in time for fall!

Orange and aqua pillow covers

Placemat Pair - One top is finished, and then I ran out of a fabric.  I'm trying to decide what quilting to do on these - crosshatch, squiggly lines, or taking another stab at free motion.  

Tops Awaiting Quilting:

I really thought there was something to go here.

No Progress/On Hold:
Secret Project (need to get moving on it!)
Orange and aqua throw
Sisters Sampler - held up by wedding and now sister's summer school schedule
Wedding Quilt
Curtains for the dining room
Old Timey Stars
Dad's Sudoko Puzzle - I have all nine blocks for this one, I just have to decide how to sash and set them, and if I want to make the quilt bigger somehow.  
Hand-quilted dresden plates
This Week's Stats:
New projects - 2
Completed projects - 1
Currently in progress - 13

WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced

Tuesday, August 9, 2011

Perfection

I've been struggling in my quilting with perfection.  Not that perfection is a problem, but my desire for it has been holding me back, making me afraid to try something lest I screw it up.  To illustrate: I have four projects sitting in my living room that are half-quilted.  (Okay, so part of that is that I have a lot of loose ends to weave in before I move on, and it's been HOT.)  But I keep second-guessing myself on how I want to quilt something or if I can execute what I imagine.  I'm making a resolution to go ahead and just finish some things.  If I botch it, I have my handy seam ripper and I will learn something from the process.

All that said, this (found here) is exactly how I want to finish quilting my zig-zag quilt - yes, the same one I've been waffling about since, oh, March?

Saturday, July 9, 2011

Diamonds are a Man's Best Friend

I don't know if I've mentioned this, but my husband is crazy.  I've gotten him into quilting, and he made a very nice, simple, Christmas lap quilt in December 09:
I really should take a better picture with natural light now that it's sunny and it's all finished and bound.
And now he's upped the ante.  Remember those reproduction prints I posed about?  He is turning them into a bed-sized quilt of pieced diamonds.


Which means matching points and offsetting pieces so the allowance comes out right.  It's taking some trial and error, and he's still working on his quarter-inch seam, but I think it should come out pretty well.  How he plans on quilting a full-size quilt on my very basic Janome is still a mystery - I don't think he's thought that far ahead yet.  For now, diamonds:

Monday, July 4, 2011

Happy Fourth!

Happy Fourth of July!  Nothing like a solid deadline to get some projects finished!  We went to the Boston Pops dress rehearsal concert last night - and I realized Friday morning that we had nothing to sit on!  I took a top that I made in high school and had no idea what to do with:


I got the set of fat quarters as a freebie from a Shop Hop back in the day - and they are so wild they don't match anything else in my house or tastes.  So I threw on the borders, and in between other projects I got the whole thing quilted with a denim backing!  I finished the quilting with minutes to spare before our bus, so we took it unbound and sat on it.  No action shots from last night, though, because my husband liked it so much he wouldn't get up!  

A note about the photos - this is the first time I've really done a photo shoot of my quilt projects.  For the top one, I climbed up on a stone wall to put it up there, and may have attracted some strange looks from my neighbors (the downside of living in a city).  And then I decided to take advantage of our blooming hydrangeas and get more creative:


So, maybe it will get bound before we go out to the fireworks tonight.  For now, I'm nerding out with 1776 and homemade burgers, potato salad, and cake!  Yum!

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

I have a confession - I am a nerd.  I am actually a nerd of many kinds - a science nerd, a history nerd, a quilt nerd, a museum nerd, a Park Service nerd.  And yesterday, my dear bloggies, those last three collided in a fantastic way.

Last Sunday my husband and I took a trip to the New England Quilt Museum, in Lowell, MA. We took a detour on the way into the NPS Visitor Center to pick up some yardage woven at the Boott Cotton Mill (we saw the exhibits there on a whole other trip, and that's a whole other post).  We also picked up some repro prints at NEQM at the end of the day (more on that later) - so, yes, we went to Lowell to buy fabric.  (I repeat, I am a huge nerd.)

From the Bancroft Collection, Marcus Fabrics for NEQM.


The current exhibit at the New England Quilt Museum is One Foot Square, Quilted & Bound - a collection of quilts (including several Civil War hospital quilts) constructed with quilt-as-you-go techniques that result in "potholder" blocks, which are then whipstitched to assemble the quilt.  Many of these were signature blocks, and the curator's speculation (which seems quite plausible) is that this construction method was a way of speeding up construction of bee quilts.

The biggest downside to the museum, in my mind, is that they do not allow photography in the exhibits.  So this post will be picture-poor, but I will try to describe our favorites the best I can.  On the plus side, they did give out a mini-catalog of the exhibit that lists the titles, dates, makers, and sizes of the quilts exhibited.  My not-so-inner museum nerd loves it, and only wishes they'd included catalog numbers for future reference.  While I'm on the subject of the collection, the museum does have a very limited online gallery; however, only the Cook-Borden star quilt is currently displayed.

Two of the standout pieces are actually sister quilts, both made by the Portland Ladies Aid Society in Maine in 1864.  They share fabrics, embroidered and appliqued motifs, and makers - which makes them incredibly rare.  As a quilter, I think they are pretty; as a historian, I think they are amazing.  They feature motifs of cannons and mortars, Masonic compasses, and an observatory that was a landmark of Portland.  One is in much better condition than the other - not surprising given their age and the use of silk.

I was struck by a third Maine Civil War quilt as well.  There was a red and white Crosses and Losses quilt made with the same "potholder" technique.  It is dated 1863, but with the two color solid blocks it could have been made by a "modern" quilter yesterday.  I have added Crosses and Losses to my to-do list - now the question is solids or prints?  Two color or rainbow?

The final highlight for us was a diamond quilt made in New Hampshire in 1876.  It was essentially a nine-patch made out of diamonds.  Eric was fascinated by it, and studied it while I looked at the rest of the exhibit.  Each block was individually bound - they started with a red stripe, and apparently ran out and replaced it with a red check.  It was a signature or presentation quilt, and Eric was finding patterns in the use of the red check and common surnames.  This is the quilt that inspired Eric to go back to the shop and pick out reproduction fabric.  He's been playing with drafting his design, and it may be taking a more modern direction, which will be fun.  I'm still having visions of those period prints in diamonds on my bed, though...  So there might be two diamond quilts in our future!

Friday, June 24, 2011

I'm Back!

After a month and a half of silence, I figure I'm due to check in.  I've been AWOL so long because life got pretty busy leading up to my wedding last weekend!  I'm now an old married woman (of 6 days) and I can move from wedding crafts back to quilting crafts.  My mother was amazed at all the crafts that went into our wedding - handmade invitations, announcements, pieced table runners, flower arrangements, etc.  I will do a wedding recap shortly with pictures to make up for my silence.  Now on my WIP list - picking up my star blocks with my sister, and prepping and piecing the signature blocks we collected at the wedding. 

Sunday, May 1, 2011

Catching Up

As my sister helpfully reminded me last night, "you're now 3 weeks behind on your blog!!"  Mea culpa.  I'm here to try to remedy this.

It has (finally) been beautifully sunny out here, so my sewing time has been taken up by walks and a wee bit of spring cleaning recently.  And a couple of my projects are destined for other people, so they're not ready for sharing yet.  But I'm not holding out on everything - I have a couple experiments in quilting to share.


First up: Two completed pillow tops, which match the orange and blue lap quilt that is half-quilted and intended for the living room.  The quilting on the nine-patch seemed obvious - dense, straight-line quilting emphasizing the nine-patch block.  



I love the way the grid looks on the back - I'm almost disappointed that this part will be hidden!  Now that it's quilted, I need to figure out how to finish the cover - and decide whether I'm brave enough to tackle a zipper.  Can we do it?


And my spring zig-zags at last.  I straight-line quilted in the ditch along the diagonals in dark purple, and I love the way it turned out.  I debated adding a second line of quilting echoing the zig-zags in the middle of the rows, but I think I'll leave well enough alone on this one.  One of the reasons I never finish things is that I'm afraid it won't turn out perfect.  And you know what?  This isn't perfect, and it won't be, but it will be done, and cheery, and look wonderful on the spot I have picked out for it on my wall.  Or so I have to keep telling myself...

And now I'm back to my machine, hoping to have some finished table runners to share sometime soon.

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Indecision

Well, not much quilting this week.  We've been preoccupied all week with tracking the near-shutdown of the federal government, which would have left me with a lot of free time to quilt.  However, I'm now on my weekend, and making it my goal to catch up with my sister.

In fact, I'm skipping ahead a bit - she finished one called the "Spinning Star," while I'm working on the "Twirling Star" simply because I had a clearer vision of the fabric choices for it.  That is, for two of the fabrics.

Option 1
Option 2
Option 3


I'm stuck on choosing the right medium pink.  The first option is bright, vivid pink - perhaps too bright.  The second might not have enough contrast.  The third has a wide stripe that could mean a subtle variation in the points that would emphasize the twirling of the block.  It's actually a reclaimed pillowcase that I'm also contemplating using as a backing for my zigzag wall hanging quit:


The purple will be the binding - I'm going for a very narrow 1/4" binding.  I'm not sure how I feel about the stripes with the zigzags, but then again, it'll be against the wall and nobody will see it anyway!  




Now if I could just stop dithering and get something finished....

Monday, April 4, 2011

Dresden Plates

My fun project this weekend was playing with dresden plates.  I want to use these to make a small wall hanging to use for our wedding.  It'll have a purple flower and an orange flower - I'm currently playing to figure out how many different prints to use in each and what styles to use.  Right now they're just petals up on my design wall.


Sunday, April 3, 2011

Quilt Along Update

My sister has been complaining that I haven't posted in a while.  Sadly, that's mostly because I haven't had enough time for quilting projects since my last post.  Lots of wedding stuff (cakes tasted! rehearsal dinner located! invitations sent!) and home stuff (curtain hardware hung! tables replaced! curtains in progress!), but little in the way of quilting.

I am behind in posting our quilt along blocks, so here are two more pairs of blocks:

Karen's Star Dreams

My version of Star Dreams
Karen's "54-40 or Fight"
My "54-40 or Fight"

Now I'm off to watch Sister Wendy talk about art and play with fabric a little more!  Maybe I'll catch up on the next block...

Sunday, March 27, 2011

(Mis)Adventures in Free Motion Quilting

Remember how I promised, I would talk about my failures?  This is one of those stories.


I got inspired by Mug Rug Madness, linked by another blog, to try my hand at a mug rug.  I've been wanting to try free motion quilting, so I could expand beyond in-the-ditch and grids as quilting options.  I also have a bunch of 2" strips left over from a log cabin that I've been itching to use.  They are a star patterned, and I found a tutorial for an awesome star free-motion quilting stitch.  So I grabbed a handful...

...made an itty bitty top...


...sandwiched, basted...


...rethreaded my machine and dropped my feed dogs...


...and made friends again with my seam ripper.  :-(


I was using slightly heavier thread than usual (in an awesome deep purple!), which may have contributed to the issues.  I also don't have the proper foot to use, but I'm not sure about investing in one without knowing that I will use it.  (Though I know I do want to invest in a walking foot, and soon.)  Now the question is to try it again with my usual thread, or to try some straight lines or wavy lines with the purple thread to get used to it, or something else.  For now it's set aside while I whipped out a dishmat (success!) and two more quilt-along star blocks (successes!) that I will write about in just a bit.

Saturday, March 26, 2011

The Process Pledge

The Process Pledge


I have taken the Process Pledge over at r0ssie's blog.  This was actually one of the first quilt blog posts I bookmarked, and one of the reasons I started thinking about blogging myself.  I don't necessarily fit into the "modern quilter" mold, since I love traditional prints and patterns, but I love talking about the process and the choices made that take a pile of fabric to a beautiful and functional quilt.  So without further ado:


I, Kate, pledge to talk more about my processes, even when I can’t quite put them in the in words or be sure I’m being totally clear.   I’m going to put my thinking and my gut feelings out there.  


I am going to share my thoughts, visions, techniques, changes, finishes, and failures.  I use this blog as a notebook, to track my ideas and my progress - so writing about the process is an obvious choice, but one I'm recommitting to.  

Quilt Along

I'd like to share with you the very first block made by a young quilter (I think 14 years old).  It's got beautiful colors, and the points match beautifully.  The seam allowance turned out to be a little off, but hey, it's her first block.

"Eliza's Nine-Patch"
The pattern came from a "Shop Hop" star sampler quilt, and the quilter is my little sister - in 2003.  She made two from the pattern and then got distracted by school and life.  Eight years later, she dug up her stash, the two blocks, and the patterns, and wanted to get going again.

"Eliza's Nine-Patch" and "Star Dreams"
So I challenged her to a quilt along.  We are making the same quilt in (very!) different colorways, a block at a time.

My pink and green "Eliza's Nine-Patch"
I haven't made a sampler quilt, and I feel like I should, to practice lots of different shapes and types of piecing.  It's a sampler of stars, so there are plenty of triangles, and some inset seams (my nemesis).  My biggest challenge so far, however, is giving up my rotary cutter.  I'm using freezer paper templates, but cutting individual pieces is very slow going compared to my usual methods.  I'm almost caught up to her first two, and I'm really enjoying the challenge!

Saturday, March 19, 2011

Happy Spring, Part 2



With the temperature passing 60 degrees, it is pretty clearly spring this week.  And my zig-zag top is mostly done!  I'm debating whether to add another row of yellow at the bottom.  Binding will be in the dark purple to frame it nicely.  Now to find a backing fabric...

Wedding Colors

Well, for the first day of Spring, it snowed.  Go figure.


Back for Valentine's Day, Eric brought home flowers for me.  He stayed away from red roses and instead picked out gorgeous orange roses with a beautiful shading across the petals from yellow to bright orange.  He paired them with purple mums and left me not one, not two, but FIVE vases going up the stairs.  The color combination isn't new to me - purple and orange are our wedding colors - but I loved how his particular combination made them pop.

Some of Eric's arrangements rearranged on our dining table.
Since these are our wedding colors, I've been working with them pretty constantly - the most recent being searching for the right combination for a flower girl dress.  I'm pretty excited about the look of a deep purple dress and a bright orange sash.

Not my actual flower girl!  Image is from the Dessy website.
I've been collecting purple and orange fabrics - and I've even managed to find a couple that use both - but they feel scattered, not a cohesive collection.  Part of this is because my tastes range from fresh and modern to historic reproduction prints, which don't always play nicely together.  

I've actually added quite a few more to the group since I took this photo.

I have grand visions of pieced table runners from these fabrics, but since I only have three months to go, I'd better get started!