Semi-new project - Down in the Garden

Darn, darn, double darn. I'm rolling along, sewing my circles for last week's new project, Jacks and Cats, when I catch a glimpse of a familiar project in the Sweet P sidebar, which takes me to Kaaren's blog, The Painted Quilt. The familiar project is Down in the Garden by Leanne Beasley, which I bought at the same time as Best Friends Forever (and Scandinavian Rose too, which is still in my stash), and which I have been working on now and then for the past nine months.

I showed it to you here, without properly introducing the project. There's been a lot of waffling since then! I said as much to Kaaren in the comments, and she encouraged me to just start anyway. I sent her a considered reply, explaining that I had just started a new quilt, and that although it was tempting, I could not possibly pick up this one too.

But here I am! With another new project to officially add to the books.

This summer I did most of the herb pots (two are left) that are scattered around the quilt, in addition to the Dresdens that I previewed back in March. I have used the same floss for all the herbs, DMC 4047 from their Color Variations line. I tried to differentiate the herbs by using different stitches -- fly stitch for the rosemary, stem stitch for the chives, round detached chain stitches for the basil, and backstitch on the sage.

I've been thinking about it constantly since I saw Kaaren's blog post.  She has started with Block Five, which has been the source of all my angst.

The designer has written a number of thoughts that are meaningful to her and framed them in the centre block. I'd like to keep this wall quilt in my studio space, so I thought the words should be meaningful to me. The core fabrics for my quilt will be Tamara Kate's Flight Patterns collection...

...which include a lot of butterflies. Four of the other blocks also have butterflies. I really want to include bees as well, because I think they will be a good industrious symbol for the studio. After many searches on keywords like "butterfly," "bee," and "garden," I've finally settled on two quotes. Andrew Marvell for the Block Five centre:

And, as it works,

the industrious bee

Computes its time

as well as we.

How could such sweet

and wholesome hours

Be reckoned but with herbs and flowers!

...and this great contrasting quote by Tagore for the surrounding blocks:

The butterfly counts

not months

but moments,

and has time enough.

Sometimes decision paralysis is the biggest obstacle for me. Now that's decided, maybe things will start to move along!

And hey, since it's still Wednesday, I'll link up with WIP Wednesday at The Needle and Thread Network as well.

New Project - Jacks and Cats

A funny thing happened to me back in August, while I was working hard to stay on schedule with Best Friends Forever. I ran out of ideas! That's never happened to me before, and it was kind of disturbing, to be honest. I know it was rushing through the project that did it.

So since my last post I've been taking a break. On Wednesday my Mom and I went out to the mall, and I said we need to look at different things in different stores for a change. But of course I still bought three quilting magazines, including the latest AQS magazine and this one:

Primitive Quilts, Fall 2014

I keep saying this magazine, Primitive Quilts, is not my style, but somehow this is the third one in a row that I've bought! Then, since we were in the neighbourhood, we stopped at Art of Fabric and I bought a few fat quarters and a half metre of this, just as something useful for my stash:

At home I spread out my spoils and sat down to read my magazines. I love magazines, but I have been trying not to buy too many, because there is always a new project that I must make. Sure enough, when I opened the page to this project, it fell on fertile ground:

"Jacks and Cats" is a flannel lap quilt designed by Emily McGlothlen of The Little Red Hen. All the background fabrics are fairly dark, and if you squint your eyes all you can see are the white eyes and teeth of the cats and pumpkins. Click the photo to see it larger. I think it is genius!

I meant to say now that I intend to make the quilt pretty much as written, but I've realized that I've already changed quite a bit:

• I scaled the blocks from 8" up to 9" to make it a bit larger
• I changed all the fabrics
• I changed the technique on the applique blocks
• I changed the border

BUT, hopefully I've kept the spirit of the quilt the same, lol!

The pattern calls for 6 different shades of mostly solid orange flannel. I quickly realized that I might shop for months before I could find six different solid orange flannels, and I remembered some fall coloured plaid homespuns in my stash that I bought from Keepsake Quilting a couple of years ago. I was going to make these stuffed pumpkins, but I never did. A quilt will be better! In fact, almost all the materials will be repurposed from my stash. Instant gratification! 

I matched the homespuns with some co-ordinating quilting cottons:

I still had that black fabric out while I was playing with these, and I thought it would be really interesting to use it for the applique background, instead of the solid black in the pattern. So I had to buy another metre the next day. 

Actually, none of my fabrics will be solid! I'll use the leafy green Asian blender in the photo background for the inner border, and I'll have to piece the outer border.

The pattern calls for fusible machine applique, several layers of it, with a few hand stitched details on top. My hands hurt at the very idea of stitching through all that! Plus, I have some really nice felted wool in fall colours in my stash, from another unstarted project. So the faces will be felt applique, the stars underneath will be the homespuns, hand appliqued, and the circles under that will be quilting cotton, sewn into my new black fabric. At most there will only be three layers to sew through.

That gives me several new techniques to try with this quilt! I've already made a start on sewing in the circles:

I think the fabric mix will work! It looks like a harvest moon, doesn't it? And the black could be stars, or it could be spider webs. 

The circle is 8" across, and I used 32 pins to coax it into the background:

The AQS magazine I bought conveniently had a good tip for sewing curves. They suggest that you cut the curve that has to stretch, in this case the black, with pinking shears. Then you don't have to clip it:

It worked really well. My first one, the one above, came out nice and flat. The second one is never as good as the first one, I've noticed. Does that happen to you too? But I love the fabric:

Not much of the gold background will show once the applique is on, and I don't think it will detract from the glowing eyes. Plus, most of the rest of the circles will be quite dark. I'm really glad that the hardest part of the project, the sewn in circles, will be first, when my motivation is highest! After they're done, everything else will be easy.

I'm under no illusion that this will be done by Hallowe'en, but it is fun to work on a seasonal project in the right season, for a change. They say a change is as good as a break, and now I've had both!

25 Trips

I finally finished my last four Scrappy Trips blocks today. This brings the total to 25 of the 12" square blocks, which will make a comfortable 60" square lap quilt.

I started these blocks on a snowy day in February 2013, after seeing them here and there around the blogosphere. 19 months ago! It was the great quilt at Nifty Quilts that started me thinking. Her quilt is 96" square, or 64 blocks. I feel like I have been sewing and sewing and sewing, and I am relieved that I only wanted 25!

Remember that pile of off cuts from last time? I used 6 of them for the 25th block of the quilt:

I've learned more about my preferences while making this quilt. Repetitive machine sewing like this is not my thing. I'd rather have more challenge, or at least more variety, as I go along.

And although I love scrappy quilts, I've realized that I don't much like actual scraps. All of the strips for this quilt were cut from yardage in my stash.

There's only one fussy cut square in the whole quilt:

I just had to tweak it a little to get that seated figure to fit in the square.

The layout is the whole raison d'être for this quilt. I'll show that next time, when the blocks are joined. When I had it up on my temporary "design wall," it was clear that I'd have to put it together very carefully, without rotating any of the blocks, or the pattern would be lost. So, I labelled each block in the upper left corner, so I'd know which way is up:

I noticed that not all the blocks were as square as they should be. Let's hope it goes together well!

Highlands Houses Finished

I've been debating whether I should put a question mark after "finished," but I think my little Highlands Houses quilt is done:

Highlands Houses, 19" x 19"

I started this quilt just under a year ago, when I rescued a plaid shirt that my Dad never wore from the donation pile:

It was one wrong turn after another with this quilt, and the challenges continued with the quilting! As a beginner free motion quilter, I decided to do a loose stipple with fine thread, and let the quilting fall into the background. My practice pieces looked reasonable, but it all went out the window once the real quilt was under the needle!

I learned that:

1. Shirting is stretchier than regular quilting cotton.
2. Paper pieced blocks are stretchier than traditionally pieced blocks, because the grains are not usually lined up.

So, there are a few bumps in the middle, and a few tucks under the binding, but at this point I'm going to call it a day and move on to the next project! 

The whole time I was quilting I had this song from Cathy Miller, The Singing Quilter, going through my head:

Three quilts done, a gazillion to go!

Wordless WIP Wednesday -- BFF 5.3

WIP Wednesday Link Up

100 to go!

First, I want to say thank you to the Slow Stitching group over at Kathy's Quilts. What a warm welcome! It is nice to have the extra encouragement (in addition to my wonderful regular supporters), when all my projects are such long hauls. :D

If you missed the finish on the stitchery project I showed two weeks ago, it is here. And the second motif, which I was just starting two weeks ago, is finished here. I just made it under the deadline for that one! This one will be next:

But today's post is about my ongoing Texas Star English Paper Piecing project. I started it back in October 2012, and work has been sporadic. I've been keeping track of my progress with the "Texas Star Ticker" in the right sidebar. Then last week I cut the rest of the gold squares for the middles:

About 120 x 2" squares

It is amazing how hopeful I felt with those squares cut! I felt like a horse that perks up when it smells home. And felicitously, this batch of five stars brings the total to 233:

Which means there are just 100 to go!!

Some of you may have wondered where the plan for 333 stars came from. Well, I wanted a quilt that would finish at about 60" x 80", and I thought it would be easier to sew the stars together in diamond-shaped blocks, and then sew the blocks together. I drew up a complicated plan:

And when I counted up how many stars I would need, it came to exactly 333! So obviously, it had to be. I am pretty sure that "333" will be the title of the quilt when it's done. The complicated plan, though, has been abandoned, because with all the points the blocks are just too hard to manage. I will start at the bottom, add each randomly selected star one at a time, and build up row by row.

According to my Daytimer, there are 143 days left this year. 100 stars, 143 days, it should be doable, and I am going to make a push! Also according to my Daytimer, today is the 222nd day of the year. Cool, eh?

Cottage Garden Needlebook

Here, at long last, is my Cottage Garden needlebook, made up and ready for service. It is the cover project from Inspirations #53, designed by Kris Richards. I bought the kit in 2007, started the embroidery shortly thereafter, and finished the stitching early last year. 18 months ago!!

It's been languishing because I wanted to change the inside design to add pockets for needle packets, but there wasn't really enough fabric in the kit. And I really liked the pink and cream yarn dye that came in the kit:

But finally I realized that with a basement full of fabric, I could surely find something else that would also be nice. I came up with this romantic print from the Mary Rose collection by Quilt Gate:

The needlebook measures about 6" x 6" closed. I'm using it to keep all my milliner's needles in one place. So I added three 2" x 3" pockets to the inside front...

...and the inside back:

A nice thick wool felt came with the kit for the pages, which I cut to 5" x 10". It stays well inside the cover, which was my intention!

There is a three loop closure made from ribbon and beads, which was only partially successful. My first plan was to use elastic. That would have been better, but I couldn't find it in the right colour. Next time!

With this design, the back cover is just as nice as the front:

So, there it is, only my second finish for 2014, and it's already August! Time to pull up my socks and finish off a couple more that are close to the end. Now the challenge is to avoid pulling out another Inspirations kit from my stash until I get at least a few more things done!

Wordless WIP Wednesday - BFF 5.2

Accidental Daffodils!

WIP Wednesday Link Up

Another Blanket Stitch Variation

Isn't blanket stitch a great stitch? This time I used it as bunting:

It took a bit of trial and error, but I got there in the end! Surprisingly, it seemed to work best with four stitches up to the point, a catch stitch at the tip, and just two stitches back down.

As you can see, colourful bunting was a must on this motif:

This is one of my favourites so far. Bunting is always fun, and I love the lines of the elephant, too. Plus, I think the cardinals are becoming the spirit animals of the project, the way they keep showing up.

I'll leave you with a final detail, before it's on to the next! Don't forget to check out all the other links at WIP Wednesday, too.

Slow Stitching Sunday

While every day is a slow stitching day around here, no matter what I am making, today I am organized enough to link up with Slow Stitching Sunday over at Kathy's Quilts.

My ongoing hand stitchery project is Best Friends Forever, a block of the month from Australian designer Rosalie Quinlan. There are eight months in total, and each month has four different stitchery motifs. I am halfway! Today I will be putting in the final stitches on the first motif of Month 5:

The linen fabric is white, actually, and has been an ongoing challenge to photograph! Right now my plan is to get one motif finished and posted by every Wednesday. Check in with me then for the final reveal!

I'm hoping to get a start on the next motif as well today:

I have been choosing my own colours and stitches for this project, and I have done all the birds as Northern Cardinals, with their distinctive red and black colouring. Here's a finished motif from Month 1 as an example:

The female cardinal is tan, with the same black marking and coral beak. Cardinals mate for life, so I thought they were a good fit for this project.

I'd better get to work. See you Wednesday!

Wordless WIP Wednesday - BFF 4.4

WIP Wednesday Link Up

Moving the Chains

It is now well over a year since I last posted on this project, which is my variation of Bonnie Hunter's Scrappy Trips Around the World. After I finished Edward's quilt this project became more insistent, so I have been working on it again, on and off. In American football they say "moving the chains," because if you keep moving steadily down the field, 10 yards at a time, eventually you will score a touchdown.

I think this is going to be a whole summer of "moving the chains" as far as my projects go. No exciting plays, just steady work. For example, this Scrappy Trips project is not great for blogging. With its two colour scheme, all the blocks look pretty darn similar:

Although this second block shows the danger of text-based fabrics in the upper left corner, where "hello" has become "hell," lol.

I also will have quite a few offcuts left over:

Each strip set yields seven or eight 2.5" slices, and only six are needed for each 12" finished block. With 12 blocks finished, I already have enough leftovers for more than 3 blocks, and I am debating what to do with them:

• I could add another row to my quilt, which is currently planned to be 5 x 5 rows, or 60" square. My planned layout requires an odd number of blocks though, so it would have to go up to 5 x 7 rows, or 60" x 84", which is quite a bit bigger and a whole different quilt, really.
• I could put them on the back, but it wouldn't match up well with my quilting plan.
• Pillow covers. Maybe more pillow covers than I really need.

I'll have to see how it goes. In the meantime, I'm also still trimming hsts for my redesigned double star blocks, sewing a few hourglasses for the Hourglass Ticker in the right sidebar, piecing Texas Stars, cutting and appliqueing baskets, and doing a whole range of stitchery projects. I have a vague plan to finish one BFF block every Wednesday until that project is done. That will take me through to November!!

So, lots to do. :D

Wordless WIP Wednesday - BFF 4.3

WIP Wednesday Link Up

BFF Month 4.2 Stitching

Yesterday I was finally able to put the last few stitches into the second motif from Month 4 of Rosalie Quinlan's Best Friends Forever. It's been a frustrating time since my last post because I spent most of last week flat on my back after a stretch intended to make my back better made it much, much worse. I should know by now! No machine sewing to show, but at least I was able to do this hand stitching.

I tried a different stitch combination on the leafy border this time. Here's a (very dark) photo of the work in progress:

It looks like the middle of the night, doesn't it? Actually it's the reflection of the blue sky through my north facing window. This project has been a real trial to photograph...

But anyway, you can see that the pattern had the same rounded leaves that so far I've been backstitching. I did still backstitch the leaves in the centre for variety. For the leafy border I used a light green twisted chain stitch for the middle of the leaves, and a darker green regular chain stitch around it to preserve the feeling of the "line." It took a few tries to get right, but I'm very happy with it!

And, since it worked so well, I tried the same technique on the tulips at the sides:

I'm pretty sure I'll be doing this again.

I'm halfway through the next motif as well, but I'm keen to get back to my sewing machine now that my back is feeling better. And I'm finally getting organized on this project too. I'll try to post that one next!

Planning the Basket Quilt

I am thrilled with how these big prints* are working with the little baskets so far! And I am realizing that the whole quilt will be fussy cut...even the backgrounds!

It just doesn't seem right to leave the large background prints to chance, when the baskets are so carefully composed. The dotted fabric above, and the zig zag below, are all scissors-cut. It's not actually that bad. Easier than trying to line up the rotary cutter, I decided.

The quilt will not be particularly scrappy. I have four background fabrics in the "dove" colourway -- the dots, zig zags, some butterflies and stylized flowers. I also have four main basket colours -- green, turquoise, orange and pink. Since everything is already so structured, I've decided to use a consistent formula matching up the baskets and backgrounds. All the zig zags will have green baskets, and all the dots will have turquoise baskets (although the fabrics themselves have a lot of variation).

I expect that this will make the final layout a breeze. Plus, it will reduce decision paralysis along the way, while making it easier to keep track of where I am. Especially since I don't have a permanent design wall.

So, 8 down, either 171 or 305 to go!

*Note that the green bamboo fabric is my stock, photo-background fabric, not part of the block. It's so useful for photos that I may never put it in a quilt!

Reconstruction

Now that Edward's quilt is finished, I've been thinking about this project, which I started at the same time in November 2010. The last time I pulled it out I had taken apart all these squares and I planned to wash them, re-cut and re-assemble them. This week I decided to skip the washing and go straight to the re-cutting.

All the red HSTs went from 4 1/2" to 3 1/2":

And all the yellow HSTs went from 2 1/2" to 2":

Is this a good idea that I would recommend to others? NO! This is pure stubbornness on my part. I have been using the June Tailor half and quarter square triangle ruler, which is very accurate, but still awkward and tiring to use. I started with a plan to make four blocks in a single batch, and I ended up just managing the one, because I simply couldn't cut any more HSTs.

The block is now 12 1/2" unfinished. It's not perfect, but it'll do. I have redesigned this quilt at least a dozen times, and I am ready to see the back of it. As it stands now, I will only need eight of these large blocks. Hopefully I can manage that!

I am worried, though, that I may have to buy more of the purple and black background fabrics. Those corner squares weren't in the original design! It's Kaufman Kona, so at least more will be easy to find.