Design Wall Monday

I am still working on a couple of things, Stars Over Texas in particular, but I put them on the back burner to finish up a few other projects. In reality, this is what I'm saying is on my design wall:

I need to get these two quilts trimmed and bound this week! I don't mind binding. I actually like it; but there have been deadlines to meet, places to go, grandkids to entertain, etc. and these have just gotten pushed to the side.

Do you see the round quilt in the background? That's my Modern Quilt Guild Fabric Challenge project. I submitted it yesterday and am very happy with it.

I blogged about this yesterday, and you can read about it HERE. In the meantime, here are a few pictures.

What's on your design wall today?

Check out Judy L's Patchwork Times

and

Beth's Monday Making

Thank you Elias Howe!

I finished my Modern Quilt Guild 2017 Fabric Challenge quilt!

I am proud to show you:

Thank you Elias Howe!

The challenge requirements were to use the Riley Blake Creative Rockstar collection and confetti solids. I loved the fabrics as soon as I saw them and started sketching ideas right away. After I had three or four sketches, I set everything aside and let them sink in.

After a couple of weeks, I looked at the sketches and decided that I didn't love any of them and realized that I needed to go back to square one. It was actually a relief to do that because I felt like I was trying to force myself to use one of the sketches and get started. I've finally learned that when I put off starting a project, I need to understand that has happened for a reason and I need to take a step back and relax. I set it aside for a while and and revisit it with a clear and open mind. I may end up doing exactly what I had planned, but more often than not, I start from scratch and make something completely different. That's what happened with this project.

I decided to think about the fabric line in a new light - it's name. What constitutes a rockstar - MY creative rockstar?

It didn't take long for me to realize that a sewing machine is my tool to creativity and artistry. I quickly sketched a sewing machine and then created radiating lines from it. Yep! That's what I wanted/needed to do.

This may not be modern in the true sense of the word, but it works for me and I didn't want to force anything else into the quilt. In my mind, the 66 simple and colorful radials come together in the center of the quilt and showcase the center of my creative world - my sewing machine.  And because of that, I have Elias Howe to thank. 

Jack usually helps name my quilts and this one was no different. Even with just the sketch, he began thinking of names for me to consider. We tossed around a few and none of them really wowed us, but since the quilt hadn't even been constructed yet, we weren't too concerned.

The day that I started putting wedges on the board to determine placement, we started with the name discussion again. Again, nothing was popping out at us so I went to make lunch. Right after we sat down, I laughed and said, "Thanks Elias Howe!" Jack looked at me and said that he was thinking the exact same thing. How could we not use that name or some derivative of it?!?

Can you see the thread tail going off to the left in the picture below? It's just hanging loose from the needle. Perhaps I should have taken a picture of all the threads hanging off of me. 😄 

In this picture, the thread is hanging straight down. If you look closely, you can see how I have it going through the needle.

Gee, this picture made me realize that I didn't quilt the center circle! DUHHHH I wasn't sure if I wanted to and then I completely forgot about doing it.

Here's a picture of the back. I even like that.

Check out the bottom left edge - in the aqua. Can you see the little bit of painter's tape sticking out? hahahah  I guess I should have been more careful.

Here are some close ups of the quilting - front and then back. I basically just echo quilted 1/4" away from the wedge seam lines and then outlined the sewing machine applique.

I changed thread color in both the top and bobbin to match the wedge color I was quilting. I like how that looks on the back.

When I was getting ready to take pictures, I really thought I wanted to hang the quilt on the doors of the back building. It was a good plan, but I think the white cross bars of the doors are distracting. Even if I cropped them more, it just didn't look right. I guess I'll try it with another quilt. Of course I'll probably want to clean the stain on the bottom left before I do that though. ☺

Here are some quilt stats:

Size: 42" diameter

Wedges: 66 - 20" long, 2" at widest part down to 1/2" in center

Fabric: Riley Blake Creative Rockstar Fat Quarter Collection and Confetti Solids (Black, Gray, Yellow, and Aqua)

Thread: Superior Threads Sew Fine! #50 - Black (#411 - Black), White (#451 - Blizzard), Gray (#408 - Silver), Yellow (#420 - Daffodil), Aqua (#470 - Sky), and Red (#413 - Scarlet) 

Batting: Hobbs 80/20 cotton/poly blend

Weekend Progress

I try to set quilting goals, but that doesn't always work for me. For a long time, and still so today, my goals are often too lofty and then I find myself disappointed and frustrated that I didn't get everything accomplished. So, I've worked really hard this year in setting realistic goals; and so far, I'm having pretty good success with that.

On Monday, I posted this picture of my Modern Quilt Guild Fabric Challenge piece.

I am thrilled that I had time yesterday to complete the applique and get it all quilted. I didn't get a picture of the applique, but I did get one while I was quilting.

I even got the binding started.

I like this quilt and am looking forward to getting it finished. I have to find a fun place to take some pictures, but doubt that will happen for a few days. In the mean time, I'll just take some boring pictures here and share them.

I hope your weekend is productive; but even if it's not, I hope you have fun doing whatever you do. 😍 

Design Wall Monday

I'm working on another challenge quilt, this time for the Modern Quilt Guild 2017 Fabric Challenge. We are using Riley Blake's Creative Rockstar Collection and you can add any Riley Blake Confetti Cotton Solids. 

The challenge rules are easy:

1) Make something fantastic that is quilted.

2) Use Riley Blake "Creative Rockstar" Collection and any Riley Blake Confetti Cotton Solids.

Easy, Peasy, Lemon Squeezy! (That's what my grand kids like to say. 😊)

Well, I don't know about fantastic, but this will be quilted (after I put on some applique), and I used the required fabrics so I guess I'm good to go.

This is quite different from how I normally work, but it was fun. I first had to determine how many fabrics I was going to use, decide how many times I wanted to use each one, and how large I wanted the wedges. 

Armed with that information, I sketched out my circle and did some math. Jack and I worked together on this because he had some ideas to share and since I really wasn't sure what I wanted to do, it was nice to bounce ideas off of him. Plus, he REALLY likes math, and it is always good to have someone double check my math.

Once the math was done, I cut my wedges. Using the scraps from cutting, I started playing with possible layouts.

When I was happy with the scrap version, I started putting the wedges on the design wall. I let this sit for a day and checked it off and on to see if I wanted to change anything. At first, the extra yellow at the top bothered me, but I decided to leave it because it would screw up the rest of the circle if I tried to change it. Plus, I'm adding applique to the center area and think that extra yellow will work perfectly with it.

I forgot to take a picture of the circle before I added the center. I did however make a test circle before I started so I'll show that. It's amazing how small the center hole was when I was done. Do you see that little yellow dot in the center? That's the size of the center after sewing all the wedges together. It's tiny compared to how it starts out, isn't it?

So here we are, the final circle. I had to play with the size of the center yellow circle because I didn't want it to get lost, but I also didn't want it to overwhelm the applique or lose too much of the radial lines coming to the center. This works perfectly!

I'd love to get the applique cut and started today, but we'll see. I have a bunch of other stuff to get done before I can work on this. Tomorrow is a sub day for me and I have a meeting in the evening, so if I don't get to it tonight, it will be at least Wednesday before I work on this again.

On another note, I forgot to show the back of the Bundle Buster quilt I posted yesterday. I think this backing is fun! It looks like rick rack and for some reason, I had a bunch of it. I was glad to be able to use it for this quilt. 

Check out what other quilters are working on today.

Go to Judy L's Patchwork Times

and

Beth's Monday Making

Design Wall Monday

I've got a lot of quilting stuff on my plate right now and some of it I can't show. That's the bad new. The good news is that the Christmas in July Blog Hop is getting closer and I can show some of it then. Yay!

In my quest for organization, I was getting some things together for my Tuesday night Cleveland Modern Quilt Guild meeting. Imagine my surprise when I realized that I did not finish my previous month Everything Old is New Again challenge block. AARRGGGGHHHHH 

I know exactly what happened. I got stuck on one part and set it aside to work on later, but later never came. Later is right now and I have no choice but to buckle down, do the math and figure it out so I can get the block sewn.

I have to give a bit of a background here about this challenge. We are given the name of a traditional block and we must create a modern version of it. So far we've had Log Cabin, Flying Dutchman, Dresden Plate, Churn Dash, Ohio Star, Clay's Choice, Broken Wheel, and now Chinese Puzzle. I am not a huge fan of sampler quilts, which this will turn out to be, so I tried to make it a bit less painful for me and am using basically the same fabrics with each block. I have one fabric that will appear toward the center of each block and white is my background fabric. I have a handful of blues and greens that I am using and that's it. My hope is that I'll have an easier time making it all work together.

Because it was a challenge, I decided to challenge myself in another way as well. My blocks are not square. They all will finish at 9" wide by 11" tall. When I first started this, it was pretty easy, but I've run into some math challenges and that is exactly what happened with the Chinese Puzzle.

This is the block that was giving me fits. It's a rectangle that measures 2 3/4" wide by 3 1/4" high unfinished. The half rectangle angle was easy. It's the other angle that was a pain - and there are four of these units in the block. After getting out the calculator and trying to remember high school trig, I had the proverbial "AH HA" moment and realized that I could draw this in Electric Quilt and it would do the math for me. (I know, some of you may think that is the cheater way, but I'm ok with that.)

 

I drew the entire block in EQ and then isolated the "problem" units.  Numbers 11, 12, 13, and 14.  

 

 

 

After realizing that I was going to have to cut weird angles, I decided to make this with paper piecing. Bingo!  (I've already sewn the first two pieces here before I remembered to take the picture. (The number 13 refers to the unit in the final block.)

 

 

If you've never paper pieced before, don't let it scare you. It really made short work of this unit and it was precise. Here's what it looks like from the back after I sewed the first tow sections together. I know it's hard, but can you see that the white fabric is not lined up exactly with the green fabric on the right side? I did that to avoid having the green show through the front in the seam allowance.  

 

It's pressed out and in the following picture, I've sewn the final piece (large triangle) to the other unit and it's ready to press. 

 

Here it is all pressed out. Looks ugly, right?



Ill just trim along the outside line, which is the 1/4" seam allowance.

 

It looks so much better!

 

Here's the back...

 

And the front. Much better!

 

I'll just plop it in where it need to be...

 

 

 And now I'm ready to sew the rows together.

 

I've got to remember to use EQ more frequently. It would save me so much time.  :-)

 

What's on your design wall?

 

Check out what projects are being worked on out there in "Quilt World"

 

Go to Judy L's Patchwork Times

 

and

 

Monday Makings



Modern Quilt Guild Meeting

I just returned from my first meeting of the Cleveland Modern Quilt Guild. 

I had a really good time and met some very talented people who were not only friendly and inviting, but excited about what they do. After a show and tell segment, members shared their favorite quilting book(s) and passed them around for the rest of us to peruse and ponder a new purchase. I have to admit that I have a list going.  :-)

For the next month's meeting, we are going to be making improvisational pot holders. We can make one or one hundred and if we desire, we can swap. Doesn't that sound fun? I think I'm going to have to spend some time fondling some fabrics and get busy sewing.

We also discussed, and are going to finalize our very own block party. WooHoo! We're basically following the concept from this book:

 

Block Party: The Modern Quilting Bee - The Journey of 12 Women, 1 Blog, & 12 Improvisational Projects 

I think this will be really fun!

Thanks ladies! I had a good time.

By the way, it's been mentioned a couple of times now that I haven't updated my Quilt Gallery lately. I will do that very soon.I promise! It may be after I finish my Prairie Star, the Fish and Cat quilt, and the Little Black Dress quilt, but it will definitely be before I completely empty the Tub of Shame, which is actually two tubs.  :-)