A Shamrock for March

There was a point in time when I considered this a finished project. It is a pattern from one of Nancy Halvoren's books. Both the shamrock and the lettering had been quilted around with a sparkly gold thread. But after taking Angela Walters Quilting Negative Spaces class, the background became a blank negative space that needed something more.

I decided this quilt needed a pile of gold coins to make it more complete.

I used a blue water soluble marker to make a gentle curve for the top of the pile and lines radiating out above it.

The same gold, sparkly thread makes both the coins and the lines. It was great practice stitching all those gold coins. Because this was already a finished piece, the heavy quilting at the bottom and the lighter quilting at the top made it get a little out of square.

It's okay though. I consider myself very lucky to have all these projects to practice on and hopefully, improve upon. Here's a famous Irish saying to end this St. Patrick's Day post:

"May your pockets be heavy and your heart be light,May good luck pursue you each morning and night."

Triple Irish Chain in Pink Finished

I suppose it is fitting that I finished my Triple Irish Chain quilt on St. Patrick's Day weekend. If there was ever a quilt sitting in my sewing room saying, "You're never going to finish me, are you?", this is it. Makes the finish all the more fulfilling.

The design of this quilt was figured out along the way. The intention was to experiment with Triple Irish Chain blocks while using up some stash. When the center was finished it seemed too skinny. Never fear, half square triangles here! Keep in mind that I pieced this quilt many, many years ago and am only now getting around to finishing it. I didn't even think through the size of the half square triangles. So when it came time to attach them to the sides of the quilt, I just whacked them off to match the length, leaving a tiny triangle in two corners.

I would handle that differently now, though it adds a bit of character to this quilt, I think. The quilting on this project was fun in that it was a great combination of free motion and straight line quilting.

The Triple Irish Chain has diagonal lines going in both directions through the off-white background squares for a pretty cross-hatch look.

The centers offered a good place to practice free motion flowers. When I finished quilting the main body of the quilt, it looked odd having the centers as the only area with free motion quilting.

To complement those centers and add balance between the straight line and free motion quilting, both borders were treated as one and smaller versions of the same flower were quilted all the way around the outer edge. I love the way the flowers really stand out against the darker fabric.

Sometimes I don't realize how much an unfinished project weighs on me. This finish has really set me free. I'm about to go put this quilt in the wash to give it even more of that soft, comfy, old fashioned quilt feel. This one will eventually be given away but for now I might just snuggle up under it for a bit
.

Works in Progress - Treadle Piecing and Machine Quilting

No finishes to share yet this month, but certainly some fun in progress happenings are going on. First, I'm in love with my grandmother's treadle machine which returned very recently to working condition.

I'm making a scrappy trip around the world quilt using Bonnie Hunter's tutorial. I have a basket of strips next to the machine and every time I have a few minutes to spare, I sit down and sew a strip or two. This is going to be a fun, long term project that will hopefully, make a great dent in my scrap pile. My family is a little bit nervous about this one, since I am intentionally using fabric that might otherwise sit neglected for years. My husband, Duane, isn't so sure he wants to be sleeping under ladybug fabric, but he knows better than to judge a quilt by just one block. I'm looking forward to seeing how this one develops.

My other major work in progress is this triple Irish chain quilt.

I want to say this is the third quilt top I ever pieced, back in the 1990s, but I'm not positive about that. It's at least among the first five. My stash was very limited then and I remember deciding on the color scheme simply based on which color I had the most of. I pieced and layered this quilt, then promptly set it aside. The quilting step was way too scary back then. 

Since this is a year for finishes, it was time to get this one done. Also, the quilting step is becoming one of my favorite parts of quilt making these days. I decided to quilt a large flower in the center of each block. It is from Leah Day's Flower Ball free motion pattern.

The rest of this quilt will be taken care of with my walking foot. I plan to cross-hatch all the cream squares in the Irish chain, and then think about how to quilt the borders.

This shouldn't take too much longer to finish. I'll be sure and take some daytime pictures once this project is completed.

A Lovely Year of Finishes - March Commitment

 

 It's time to make a new commitment for another month of "A Lovely Year of Finishes". 

This month, I'm committing to finish this quilt top, which was made as a class sample for the "Classy Ladies" club back when the shop was open. Wow, we sure had some good times in that club. Our name came from the pattern set we were working with. They were all Debbie Caffrey's Classy Patterns, and the goal of each class was to improve cutting and accuracy while making small samples from those patterns. Fun, fun, fun.

My first thought was to quilt one big set of concentric circles over the whole piece, but I'm not sure how that will translate with the strong contrast from blue to cream. It would be a challenge to find just the right thread color. I'll probably end up doing a different quilt design on each color. We'll see. This project is still in the "thinking about it" stage.

Quilt Show Eye Candy

Every two years, the Cotton Patch Quilt Guild puts on a quilt show for our community. Though I'm not a member of that guild right now, I have been in the past, and I know how much work goes into putting on a successful show. This year, it is happening March 1-3, so if you're thinking of going, you still have tomorrow afternoon to check it out.

Erica and I headed over there today to ogle and drool over the great display of quilts. I believe there were about 180 quilts there and all of them were spectacular. I only took pictures of a few, and I'm sorry to say that not all of my pictures are super clear, so you might have to use your imagination just a little.

**Note** If you see your quilt here and would prefer that it not be shown, please let me know and I'll take it down right away.

This is only a very small sampling of my favorites.

This quilt was made by Cleo Ward and is both hand appliqued and hand quilted. I don't think I've ever seen this much hand quilting on one quilt before. 

She has some great color choices here, too. Someday, I hope to have the patience to do more hand work.

This is Sylvia Schaefer's quilt. I love this one because of its crisp colors, gentle curves, and modern appeal.

Unfortunately, I can't remember who made this one, and I'm not usually drawn to quilts with Asian flair, but the geometry of this one pulled me right in.

The fun thing about this show for me is that I know most of the participating quilters. That adds an extra element of fun in that I can try to guess who a quilt belongs to before getting close enough to read the tag. This whimsical piece was made by Fay Rawls. I used to see Fay on a regular basis and I would always learn some new quilting something or other from her. Miss you, Fay!

This quilt won best of show and was made by Terri Jarrett. I love Terri's depth of design, both in her piecing and in her quilting. Terri also has a great sense of humor. Her studio is "where the magic happens," she says. Her quilts are definitely magical.

Here's a close up of Terri's quilt. I should have put my hand up so you could see how tiny those four patches are. They finish at two inches, I think. They may be even smaller than that. It was impressive, for sure.

There was a section of quilts that were part of a one word quilt challenge: zoo. This quilt was made by Frances Arnold. Erica is a big fan of zebras so this quilt was a favorite for both of us.

 

This quilt was made by Marybeth Tawfik. Marybeth has a long arm quilting studio in Athens, Georgia, and has won many awards for her work. This quilt was part of a quilt challenge that required using two complementary colors.

Here's a long view of one row of quilts,

and here's another.

One of the things I enjoyed most about this show is the variety of quilts included. Often, local shows have strong leanings toward traditional or modern or some other narrow category of quilts, but this show had a very diverse range of styles, which I found both inspirational and refreshing.

Thank you Cotton Patch Quilt Guild for another great show. See you again in two years!

Pin and Earring Quilt

Recently, I wrote about all the dragonfly decor around my home. There's also quite a bit of dragonfly jewelry in my life, too. Rather than have it hidden away, I thought it would be fun to make a quilt to display it.

There's also this pretty fabric that was gifted to me by a friend who brought it back from a trip to India a few years ago. Brightly colored, beautiful fabric from India paired with sparkly dragonfly jewelry seems like a good combination.

Light background or dark background? After auditioning several options, I settled on a dark, chocolate brown solid. It's an older piece from my stash, most likely a Robert Kaufman Kona, but I'm not positive about that.

The India fabric consists of eleven, 6 1/2"-ish squares, so I needed a design that would make the most of it. A one-inch diagonal strip on each block did the trick.

The squares were cut into four 1 1/2" strips, with a little leftover, and the background was cut into 5" squares. I didn't have a specific block size in mind, but wanted to go as big as possible. After cutting the background squares in half and sewing them on each side of a strip, I was able to square it up to 4 5/8".

Once all the blocks were made, it was time to play with the layout.

 

I got a little carried away with this part, 

but it was lots of fun.

I had to ask Erica to help with the arrangement, just to get myself back under control.

She captured the essence of the original design perfectly.

Thank you, Erica. Quilting is next. I wanted the center of each square to remain unquilted so that it would stand out more and be more amenable to having pins attached. 

I decided to quilt circles around the edge of each square.

The circles remind me of  a string of beads surrounding each center.

Then there is the larger space at the bottom. It needed some filler. I chose a design from Leah Day's Free Motion Quilting Project. I chose the design Pebble Paisley to fill in that area. A simple curvy loop takes care of the small outer border. I didn't have a dark brown thread on hand for the quilting so I used Aurifil 50wt cotton in black. It worked just fine. I like that the quilting recedes on the front and simply adds texture.

The back is another matter.

There are no secrets on the back. Every wobble and jerk can be seen. It's okay, though. The wall will never give away my secrets once the quilt is hung.

Time to add the pins and earrings!

There was a happy surprise as I was pinning everything on. I thought I was going to have to rig up something for the earrings, but I accidentally let one of the earrings slip into a seam. Aha!

The seam worked perfectly. Nothing extra needed.

It makes me so happy to have found a way to show off my collection of dragonfly jewelry AND use some very special fabric.