Tilly Quilt - A Fast Finish

Wow, I didn't expect to finish my Tilly quilt in a day, but here it is.

This trio of Tilly projects is now complete...a recovered cedar chest, a pillow, and a lap quilt. For the quilt, I continued the large flower motif in the quilting. The first flower was quilted before the free motion foot breakage that I wrote about yesterday. The super-glued foot is working nicely so I added two more partial large flowers along the edge of the quilt and two smaller flowers to fill the blank spaces. I decided not to add a darker quilted center and stamens to each flower. I thought it would be too bold and detract from the overall project. It is bound in a dark red Kona solid.

Here is one of the smaller quilted flowers.

I tried to get a good picture of the quilting from the back, but my limited photography skills didn't allow that to happen. All of the pictures just look like a big cream colored piece of fabric. You'll have to imagine that part.

It feels great to add another finish to my quilting year.

Quilting on Tilly

I was cleaning out my photo files and noticed that I finished my Tilly quilt top waaayyy back in January, and haven't touched it since.

Part of the reason it isn't finished is because I couldn't decide how I wanted to quilt it. And looking at it again, I still couldn't decide. I *thought* I wanted to focus on each rectangle separately with my quilting so rather than put it away again, I quilted straight lines 1/4" away from each vertical seam while I pondered the possibilities (sorry for the blurry photos).

While I was stitching away on the straight lines, the larger flowers in the prints started calling to me. Wouldn't it be fun to quilt some big flowers?

The idea stuck, but what color thread to use? Stick with the neutral or go for some color?

I really liked the gold, but it didn't look different enough from the neutral color (Aurifil 50 wt color 2325...one of my favorites!). I decided to be a bit bolder and use the rusty orange for the flower and the dark brown for the center stamens. Hooray, I have a plan, or at least the start of one!

The next step was to draw the flower. I recruited my daughter for that. She's great at freehand drawing, especially doodly sorts of things. We used four sheets of copy paper taped together. I originally intended just to quilt right on the paper but decided that it would be a big pain to tear out afterwards. If I do this again, I'll use Golden Threads paper (that I have and totally forgot about until after this was done).

It was easy enough to cut around each row before quilting it and just quilt using the outside edge of the paper as a guide. It's an added bonus that this is not a precise pattern so if I get off a little bit, it's no big deal.  There are five or six rounds to the flower. I had finished two rounds when disaster struck...

My free motion foot broke!! It's really a miracle that it has lasted for more than five years. I'm all the time pulling, tugging, and rearranging as I'm quilting. I tried to free motion with no foot at all, but that caused all sorts of tension issues. Since the lines on the flower weren't overly curvy, I opted to use my walking foot to finish up the main flower.

If I had thought of the flower idea sooner, the straight lines would have stopped at the edge of the flower. But it's okay, I am not going to take them out. This is a quilt that is for fun (aren't they all!) that will stay at my house, so I'm exercising my creative license to leave it this way.

Here it is from the back. I rarely use a light and plain backing. This is a Kona...not sure of the official color. Since this is supposed to be more of a light, summer throw quilt, I thought the light color backing would be appropriate, and now that I'm going quilting crazy with it, it will be fun to see all the stitching.

My husband and rescuer repaired my free motion foot with super glue. I haven't tried it out yet, but hopefully it will hold together long enough to finish this quilt. Look for another finish soon!

Aw, rats! Time to catch up

It's been a few weeks since my last post, and there has been much happening around here. Thought it might be time to catch up. First up is how I did in the Patchwork Prism Quilt Along.

 I didn't win for my quilt, but I was selected as a winner in the random drawing part of the quilt along. My kids keep saying it's an honorable mention, which is funny...more like a random mention, but I'll take it any way I can get it. Here's Sweet Diesel's blog post revealing the winners.

As many of you know, my brick and mortar quilt shop closed at the end of last year. After getting everything moved out and packed up, I took a nice, long play break. Well, I decided it was about time to get back to work. Over the past few weeks, I have sorted, organized and posted most of the remaining inventory in my Etsy shop, Dragonfly Quilt Shop. There are fabric, books, patterns, and notions, all at ridiculously discounted prices. The remaining items that haven't been listed there are large or odd shaped things, or things that are really too inexpensive to bother listing in the Etsy shop. My quilt guild will enjoy some nice door prizes for the next few months as I move it all out of here.

There's been one more distraction that has kept me from sewing and that is the addition of some new pets to the household. We already have a dog (he belongs to my husband) and a cat (which belongs to my daughter). The three boys, especially the younger two, decided they needed a pet of their own. My oldest son has wanted a ferret for many years, but I never agreed to that one. I did not want anything that was going to require a lot of expense. So, they went to the pet store and found the least expensive pet there, a rat.

My first response was NO, NO, NO way was a rat going to live at my house. They did their research, rallied the troops, and worked on me until I changed my mind. So, the first weekend in July found me welcoming not one, not two, but three adorable rats to our home. Each son had to have his own of course. They are from Legends of Rock Rattery, which we learned is a much better way to purchase rats than the local pet store. They are named Juno, Hera, and Lady and I must say, I'm becoming rather attached to the cute little things. Here is Hera; she's a shoulder sitter. 

They are all girls, 'cuz we don't want any baby rats, that's for sure! This is Juno.

And this is Lady. She's older than the other two (five months) and full grown. The other girls are just six weeks old.

This is their cage and it might be decorated better than my bedroom.The dog hasn't decided if they are little dogs or he is a big rat!

I'm certainly ready to move back into play mode. There are a few quilting projects to be finished and I'm sort of shopping around for a new quilt along. It's been great to see my stash put to good use and quilt alongs are the perfect way for a busy working girl to use stash, try new things, and make new bloggy friends.

Back in the game with Craftsy BOM

Now that the Patchwork Prism Quilt Along is no longer distracting me, I finally caught up with my blocks on the Craftsy Block of the Month. This project is turning into what I would call "eclectic". There is sooo much variety in the block styles from month to month. I'm hoping the consistent colors and fabrics will hold it all together to make a beautiful quilt.

In April, we learned English Paper Piecing, hexi style. I had never tried this technique so it was exciting to learn something totally new. The hand stitching slowed me down a bit, but was well worth it. I learned new admiration for anyone who makes an entire quilt out of hexagons.

The background is a Kona Ash and it is saving me on many of these blocks. I am terrible about choosing all mediums and darks for quilts, which often makes for a dull quilt. The Kona Ash is plenty light enough so it makes up for my leaning toward darker fabrics.

All that light background just begs for some interesting quilting. In May, we learned about Wonky Log Cabin blocks. These were fun to make because perfect piecing was not required. Neither was perfect measuring. I enjoyed feeling a bit improvisational while making these blocks.

I was a little disappointed that two sides of my center ended up parallel to the edges on the second one. That took just a bit away from its wonkiness. This version of the Wonky log cabin is essentially string piecing without a foundation so I had to be careful not to stretch or distort my strips as I made my way around the block.

In June, we learned about Modern 9-Patch blocks. It was nice to go back to some standard techniques with these two blocks. I can't say enough good things about this FREE class and the instruction offered with it. Amy Gibson is an excellent teacher. Each month offers a video lesson that runs a little under thirty minutes. My theory on classes is that no matter how skilled you are, there is always something new to learn.

When I'm all caught up, it is hard to wait for the first of the next month to get here. There aren't many more days left this time and in July we'll be learning about Dresden Plates. August is Stars and September is Curved Piecing. Here's how April, May, and June look all together:

Add those to the blocks from January, February, and March...

...and we're well on our way to a quilt!

Patchwork Prism Finished

My first big finish for the year! I am so pleased with the way this quilt turned out. It's one of those quilts where I just had to go with the process. There were certainly times where I thought, "I don't know about this," and I'm glad I didn't hesitate.

This quilt was made "charm" style, meaning there are no fabric repeats in the quilt. It is also made entirely from my stash. The only purchase for this quilt was for the batting. For the quilting, I wanted to accent the fabric without taking away from it so I went with simple quilting 1/4" away from each seam. It's been a while since I quilted something this large so I added extra support around my sewing machine to hold the weight.

The ironing board was lowered to the same height as the sewing machine, and a folding table was set up behind the sewing machine cabinet. It worked great. This really helped the quilt move smoothly through the machine without a lot of pulling and tugging.

I had a few large triangles leftover that didn't make it to the front of the quilt. They worked nicely into the backing which kept them from going to the scrap bin and added some interest to the back of the quilt.

The fabric on the back is a Kona solid. I don't have the exact color name, but I've been calling it cranberry. I also used it for the binding. Here's a close up of some of the quilting as seen from the back.

And here's the finished front.

This quilt was made as part of the Patchwork Prism Quilt Along. The deadline to finish is this month and there are some great prizes for winning participants. That gave me just the motivation to get this one done on schedule.

There are lots of beautiful quilts being finished with this quilt along. Some have used all solids, some have changed the color placement, and there's even one being made in neutrals. I always love seeing how the same pattern can turn out so many different ways. You can check out all the quilts that have been posted by going to the Flickr group.

Patchwork Prism Progress

The Patchwork Prism quilt along has been keeping me occupied for the past few weeks. After combing through my stash to choose enough fabric so that there would be no repeats in this project, I started cutting. Because this project uses templates, it took a while to get all the pieces cut.

This pattern has great cutting instructions along with a full color map for laying out the pieces. My design wall would only hold a little less than half the quilt so I laid out as much as I could, then started sewing. Laying out the second half was a bit more challenging since there were fewer pieces to choose from for placement. I ended up replacing a few of the pieces to get the light/dark and color transitions to work a little better.

I am pleased with the results. The secondary designs stand out much more than I thought they would. There are a few leftover triangle that will be incorporated into the backing, which will be primarily a solid Kona berry (I don't know the exact color name). Originally, I planned to choose a single thread to use for quilting, but after auditioning just about my entire thread collection, I decided to use a different color for each color ring in the quilt (purple in the center, then pink/magenta, then orange/red etc.).

The quilting will likely be all straight lines, highlighting the secondary patterns in the quilt top. I hope to have this one quilted and bound by June 12 so I can participate in the linky party that will conclude this quilt along. Fun times; fun quilt alongs!

Here, There, and Everywhere

This is my 100th blog entry. It's hard to believe that I was nervous about sticking with it when I started this blog. I love writing here. When my sewing mind gets a bit foggy, writing here clears it. This is also my way to keep track of my projects...when I started, when I finished. I'm terrible at keeping up with it any other way.

So, I've been up to a little bit of everything this week. I made part of one block for the New York Beauty Quilt Along. I love the colors in this one.

For the Craftsy Block of the Month, I finally started working on April's blocks. They use English Paper Piecing which I had never done. I don't do a lot of handwork, but this technique is perfect for a take-along project. I am keeping all the pieces in a bag and they go everywhere with me. This is also another great use of scraps. There may be more English Paper Piecing in my future.

All of the fabric for the Patchwork Prism Quilt-a-long has been selected.

I started cutting it this weekend. I was able to find enough fabric so that I can make this quilt with no repeats. This one is going to take a while to cut so I'm hoping to do a little bit each day.

As I have been scoping out fabric for this project or that in my stash, I've been keeping an eye out for bigger pieces to use for summer skirts. My wardrobe needs a bit of refreshing and I don't have a lot of yardage in my stash. This weekend I made this cutie, which will look great with my pink t-shirt. It hits just below the knees and will be a great addition to my summer work wardrobe.

It's been kind of fun bouncing from project to project this week. Here's hoping for another week of sewing fun!