Trees - a story of evolution

I am SO slow on this project. I will usually concentrate on it for a day, and then do nothing on it for a week or two. In that time, my mental design evolves so much that I return to work on a totally different plan! LOL Ah, but that's the fun of it.

My very first idea for this quilt was small and structured, loosely patterned after another quilt I've made. When I started making the letters for the borders, the shape and size of the quilt shifted, and my structured plans went out the window!

A few days ago, I had to move all my pieces into a corner of my design wall to make room for another project. So now everthing is crammed together. And yet, as I stare at this photo, yet another (better?) setting idea has come to me. Who know where it will all end up?!

Deadline Met!

Constrution finished.






All we have to do now is tidy up the neighbourhood and build the infrastructure.

Hearts for Fredi

Well, I'm done piecing the top. This is all the bigger it's going to get (about 23" x 20"). I'm going to have to put it aside for a while though in order to finish up some other projects. They are going to miss their respective deadlines no matter what, but I don't want to miss 'em by more than I have to!

The next step is to do the hand quilting/embellishing. I haven't entirely decided what I'll use or how I'm going to embellish this quilt. I may seed stitch with rayon floss in the purple areas around the hearts. That odd bit of purple at the top left may get a row of red sequin hearts, just to keep the theme going. We'll see. I'm learning that it's better to do just one step at a time and make the design decisions as I come to that point in the process, not before. It's a hard habit to establish!

My first bit!

Lazy Gal Class
Originally uploaded by Rae4beach

This weekend, I did a little quilting and tried my hand at doing words! I think I'll do 2 more "laughs" and think of some fun border pattern. That was a lot of fun and I can't wait to do more.

housing project continued

I made more houses yesterday, and I am having such a fun time making them.





(i was too lazy to move them off my bed to take a proper picture)



I think I might just stick to houses and not add any other elements. I like the idea of just houses. I didn't post these construction "guidelines" for myself here on my last post, but they were on my blog. The main parts of the houses will be dotted fabric, yellow windows, black dotted roofs, color coordinated doors and the background will be lime/bright green. I set these guidelines for myself for two reasons. First, I wont agonize over each fabric selection while constructing houses. I know I can pick dotty fabric with a "matching" door and any black dotted roof. Second, I think it gives the quilt unity and will be easier to put the top together when I'm done. While on one hand it is slightly boring, on the other hand I find the overall effect very pleasing.



more pictures on flickr

Past the Planning Stage - Construction has Started!

The plans were proving difficult. The houses did not look good.

The architect had a consultation with the structural engineer (aka Tonya) and construction finally started yesterday.



Building is continuing apace. The deadline has been fixed for the end of this week and hopefully we'll meet it.

Hey There!

Hi everyone! I'm new here and wanted to say hello! I'm excited to be able to join the group - thanks, Tonya! I've been a voyeur here for a while and I'm inspired by all the fun crafty quilts I'm seeing. I'm still debating what my repeated form will be, but I'll post as soon as I know.

p.s. I figured out this whole posting thing, Tonya! :)

housing project

I have gotten my swaps under control, and had time to work on something new. Hurray! Here are the blocks I've done so far.



I want it to be snuggle-on-the-couch size, and I'm not sure if I will just do houses or add anything else yet.

New Girl!

Hi I'm Rachel and I'm new today (thanks Tonya)! I will be brainstorming today about a project. I've got some inspirational words floating about in my head, so I'll play with that on paper. I'm very excited to be here. All of the quilts look lovely so far. Have a good weekend.

Border questions

I have been making letters/words/phrases to use in the borders of my quilt. I haven't made enough trees to fill the middle yet....so I'm going about this backwards, I know! ;-) The word "forest" will 'read' vertically along the side border. The letters are skinnier than I want the border to be, so I will need to add fabric on each side of the letters.

Should I add extensions to each individual letter? The block backgrounds are scrappy, so I would make each extension from a different print to maintain that scrappy look.

OR.... Should I sew the letters together and add long strips to the sides of the word to bring it up to the correct width? This would be easier (maybe...my letters are not uniform in size) but would it look as good?

Another question-- I am going to have large spaces occurring between my phrases. Is it generally better to use background fabric (in my case, beiges and creams...too light?) or to fill in the empty space with blocks (in this case, trees)?

Lots of love

I have finished my repetition quilt, and am delighted with it!

I really enjoyed making all the 'LOVE's and decided that I wanted the letters to be the focal point, so hand quilted just inside each letter to make them all stand out. I nearly didn't give it a border at all, but am very glad I did, as this plain pink border throws the attention back onto the letters, which is what I wanted.

I machine quilted the border in a toning thread with 'love' repeated over and over. It adds texture to the border without pulling attention away from the letters.

I have decided to call it, 'But the greatest of them all is love', a quote from I Corinthians 13 v13. I'm not religious myself, but the Bible is a rich source of wisdom, and that quote sums it all up for me. I have to do the label and sleeve, and then it will go off to a charity exhibition at The Bramble Patch in June.

Many thanks, Tonya for giving me this opportunity to do something different and so satisfying!

Coming to Life

I set my hearts together. I had thought I would keep them in the vertical orientation I originally laid them out in...


but after I'd auditioned several potential sashing fabrics they ended up horizontal!

It was quite a struggle to find the right sashing color/print. I started with the purples I had used around the hearts, thinking I would simply float the hearts. It was flat and boring. I must have spent two days, off and on, pawing through my stash to find something that worked. This red batik is dark enough to sit well with the purples and some of the dots on it actually look purple now (they looked black before I put them next to the blocks). I like the introduction of orange in the red too. This puts me in mind of the clowns Fredi used to make.

Before I found the sashing fabric I made one more block, thinking that I might want/need more hearts. This one is smaller than most of the others because it was made from the offcuts of the other blocks. I tried to fit it into the top but it just wouldn't work. So I have a starter block for something else :- )

I've made yet another heart block, this time out of silk, for my monthly journal quilt project. I'll be posting that on my personal blog soon.

I've thought about adding letters to this one per suggestions y'all have made. Still undecided on that point though.

House Building 2

Just about to go to bed, but just had to share this.

I think I'm going to take out the original block and the one bottom left and create mad houses. Alex chose the colours for the one on the right. My favourite is the one top left which took me an age to do as I was going through one of my 'can't see the angle' phases and I kept on just cutting and sewing strips to get it square.

Playing with my blocks

I'm enjoying looking at all the blocks and and quilts in progress. Mine is far enough along that I'm beginning to thing about how they're going to go together. The last tree was pretty twisted looking and I thought I'd toss it out but after thinking more about it I'll probably use it anyway.

First I just laid the trees out in rows but decided they were were too orderly.

So I spaced them out some so they weren't all lined up and I like that better. I think I'll start in the top left corner and add background fabric to them one at a time and then try to fit them together as I go. Actually, looking at this photo - I think if I pull the bottom tree into the bottom right corner I'll have enough trees.

House Building

I'm creating a small village. The big centre block was one of the first houses I made and its been crying out for its own quilt ever since.

I started using the colours that are in the first house and alternating them. The one top right has probably got to have its roof cut off (no contrast) and perhaps replaced with a purple one.



I pulled from the scrap box a bit of the border from Les Bleus, cut it into strips and this was the result.


Photo not brilliant - light was crap - but I like it. It doesn't fit in with what I originally intended so I'm going to have a rethink.

Dragonfly - 3 are enough :-)

Ok, so far for the repetition theme... I decided after 3 dragonflys I'd have enough of them. Besides I ran out of scraps for the wings.
The words are German and mean 'Dragonfly summer' , Libellensommer is the title of a book, DD got as a present and it was me who read it :-)
I'm not sure how to proceed, I think I like the version with greens better, what do you think ?
Heidi ( traveling to Boston and Cape Cod at the end of May and hope to stock up my stash )

House-o-rama

I saw that some of you visited when I posted my neighborhood on my blog the other day--Thanks for the nice wishes. I am making more houses and having a great time. The repetition theme has been really helpful in getting me to feel more in control of what I am creating, but also feeling like I can let more of the "un-known" in because it is just a "study" for me. I am so excited about assembling more and more together and then attaching them all together to make something big, the middle part is probably 2ft by 3.5ft and it is so fun to see all the different pieces of fabric working together and playing off each other and sometimes just quarreling. I love it. I love seeing what everyone else is doing too. Keep posting!

Hearts, Finally!

I went with the purple and gold color scheme after all. The multi-color idea just wasn't going anywhere. This two color scheme had me a little worried because of what I perceived as limited options. I was also uncertain about how to place the light and dark values. Light background with dark hearts or vice versa? I had a nice big piece of a lighter value of the gold that would have floated purple hearts nicely. As you can see, I chose the opposite: gold hearts on a purple ground. This way I can have some variety in the background as well as in the hearts without the background becoming too busy. So far I've only used two purples and three gold prints. Since I don't anticipate this being a large piece I may not expand beyond those 5 fabrics. Or maybe I will. That's the fun of working this way; you never know what will happen next!

So far I've made only these six hearts. I kind of like the vertical format that I have them in for this picture but there's no guarantee they'll stay this way. There's one heart I think looks more dorky than wonky but whatever. The question I'm facing now is whether to make more hearts using the same fabrics I've already used or whether to stretch the palette a bit. Or I could just stop here and set them together as is. Hmmm....

Juliann - completed top

There we go.

All sewn together - just need to find a free evening to get it basted and I cannot wait to begin quilting this one. I don't think I will do another border, just a black binding.

Thanks again for the nudge Tonya - this was really great fun! By the time I got to the words on the top border, I was really flying with my free piecing.

Hope everyone else can find the inspiration to continue their pieces. Enjoy.

Juliann's teacup update

I sewed the teacups together for the center. Now I need to work on more words. I am not thrilled with the pink cup - second down on the left - but I love the fabric up close so it stays. I think the words all need to be framed by light colors. I had sewn the word white a while ago but I don't think it will work. The cup in the border is just hold a place although I may make some more little blocks to space out the words.

Off to make a cup of tea and get back to sewing.

comforter quilts

Result!

One finished top.



It's a lot bigger than I meant it to be - covers the entire design wall!

It's joined the list of tops to be quilted and I'm continuing with the repetition theme by doing some wonky houses. I love wonky houses!

Haven't Started Yet, but Some Free-Piecing Action

Hi all. I haven't started to work on my main projects for this class (place names and fish), but I have done a little free-piecing lately that I thought I'd show here. I think I've gone a bit overboard with the swaps! I think a larger butterfly quilt quilt could be in my future, though, too!

I Would Love to Get Started...

But I can't even decide on a palette at this point!

I want to make a wall hanging for a friend of mine who moved away a couple of years ago. I'm planning to do hearts, at least to begin with. When I think of her I think of the dolls she used to make (clowns were her particular favorite) and the house she used to live in. Now she's into altered books and I have no idea how she has decorated her current home. I thought of reds at first because of the heart theme and because I know she is a fan of strong colors. Or a polychromatic scheme using pure hues. I really enjoy very scrappy quilts. But I also have these luscious batiks in purples and... I don't even know what to call that other color! Suffice to say it's a sort of golden neutral. (I'm too lazy to go take a picture for you.) I guess I'm afraid I don't have enough variety of prints in the neutral. I'll get bored using the same thing over and over again. Shopping is a bit of an issue for me or I'd simply go out and buy more! My favorite LQS is having a sale this week so I will probably venture out eventually anyway. I'm just not sure what direction to pursue. I know it will be an effort to stay on task when I'm in the quilt shop. But having a purpose makes it easier.

It sounds like I want to go with the purple color scheme in my heart of hearts. Any suggestions or input would be appreciated however :- )