Mom's new purse

For Mom's trip and Mother's Day, she requested a purse to match her new dress and shoes for the wedding they are going to. She had shortened her green dress and gave me those left overs and then found various peach fabrics for the rest of the purse. I think making this purse with lots of different fabrics would also be fun.

I needed to add a little quilting to the sides of the purse but didn't want anything extensive so that the bag would stay supple. I choose a variegated neutral thread so as not to distract from the roses on the fabric. I found a neat corner FMQ pattern in one of my quilting books and enlarged it 25%. I knew there was no way I would be able to do this free hand so I tried a couple of ideas but finally resorted to using my 505 spray basting stuff to attach the paper to the purse side. Genius, even if I say so myself.

Before actually quilting the purse parts, I traced the pattern with my finger several times to get my brain in the groove. The red ring is my Halo - a heavy rubberized iron ring - which is the only way to FMQ as far as I am concerned. The rubber grabs the fabric and the ring keeps the workspace in the center flat. It also provides something to grip while moving the quilt sandwhich.

The photo above shows the quilting a little better - you can see I was not overly concerned about staying on the lines. I was looking more for the gist of the pattern with my own twist.

Then I needed to pull off the paper with the help of these great sideways tweezers that I bought when I was doing more paper piecing. The only downfall to sewing over the paper was that the stitching was a little looser than I liked but I spritzed it with water and some steam and the stitches tightened nicely.

The handles can be pulled thru the grommets evenly to carry the purse by hand ...

or pulled thru the grommets for a shoulder strap.

That completes my deadline items for this month...Now I'm back to hexies :)

WootWoot!!

Night & Day table runner

Mom and Dad are going on a trip and Mom purchased two of my table runners - one as a wedding gift and the other as a hostess gift. I have no idea which is which but, of course, one wasn't quilted when she decided she wanted it, in fact it had been sitting for quite some time while I ruminated about how to quilt it. I had already quilted random straight lines in the border and needed something to match so when I reviewed the pattern book (Night & Day by Eleanor Burns) I found just what I needed: double swirls and more straight lines in the stars.

I know these are pretty washed out but they show the texture pretty well. There isn't a lot of value difference in the green and purple batiks so I would choose different fabrics next time but I still like this runner.

You can see on the "front" pic to the left that I am still working on the binding. I went back to my fav method with 2" strips and sewing it down by hand with an applique type stitch.

Itty Bitty Twistin' Needs Quiltin'

Happy May Day y'all!
This morning I attended the 119th annual May Day Breakfast at the church up the street from my house. I thought about going when I first woke up at 6:15 (it runs from 6 to 9am) but I just couldn't think about looking presentable that early so I waited an hour :)

Today I am looking for an opinion or three...

I finally finished my itty bitty twister quilt and now it needs quilting. The quilt has a lot of seams and it's pretty stiff, heavy and thick for it's size. The quilt will hang in the stand that Dad made for me and will probably be entered in the mini division at the county fair.

It needs pretty quilting but not dense quilting and I need ideas!! I am no good at stippling (go figure) but I am a confident free motion quilter. I could use a stencil to quilt a wreath over the whole quilt or I could go with some kind of overall FMQ design. I could just do some kind of cross hatching or straightline stitching but I am cautious to stitch in ditch because the seams are pressed open.

Oh and just so you have a sense of scale – this quilt is only 12”. Yes, each square is 1”.

TIA

Inspiration

When it's time to quilt something I sometimes get stuck on picking a design and need inspiration.

I have plenty of pattern books that show quilted quilts but rarely look at those design. 

I have about 6 books on this shelf that are just on quilting. There is a book on McTavishing, another book has three increasingly difficult quilt designs for 6 different quilts and the rest of my books show doodles or designs for specific block shapes.

I even have DVDs from Patsy Thomson for design ideas.

I also have a sketchbook of designs. Anytime I see a quilting design that really grabs me, I cut it out of the magazine or sketch it on scratch paper. The ultimate goal is to transfer those ideas into this sunny yellow sketchbook.

When I get ready to quilt a specific quilt I approach the design two different ways. Generally I take out a muslin sandwich and draw out the quilt block and quilting design. I will practice over and over on the sample and then they're saved in a drawer for later inspiration. I can see a lot of improvement from my earlier samples but I think I need to date them...

Last week when I was going to quilt my zigZapp runner, I looked thru the sketchbook for ideas (recognize that design bottom center?). When I had a couple possibilites, I traced the leaf shapes onto paper and drew in the quilt design. I took that paper with me to work and every time I sat back down at my desk I had to retrace it with a pen. By the time I got home I was all "warmed up," had formed the necessary "muscle memory" and decided to forgo my usual muslin sandwich. It worked great!

so...How do you store your quilting ideas? And where do you find inspiration?

Design Wall Monday - 3/7/11

I was all excited this weekend - I had finally designed and free motion stitched my trapunto leaves and flowers and decided the binding would match the red flowers. Then I started quilting the background. I was boogying right along. I really enjoy pebbles and could do them for hours. I figured it would take 2 hours to finish this little runner...until...I ran out of thread. Can you see it there at the far end?

ARGHGHGHGHGH!

No one carries Superior brand threads around here so now I have to place an emergency order** so that I can have the thing done by next weekened.





** We changed the class date so it no longer has to be an emergency order but still...I hadn't planned on buying thread and I might as well buy a bunch if I am buying any, right?! Now I have to decide what other colors I want...

UFO Thursday

For this month's UFO Project, Judy chose #1. For me, this means I need to finish quilting and bind Michele's table runner. I really like this runner and it was super easy to make - I'd even like to make another. But when Michele said she wanted to buy it when I only had part of the quilting done, I kinda froze. What if I chose a free motion design and then she didn't like it any more? There are lots of designs I would like to do but I was having trouble narrowing down the options. (Please don't ask me to make descisions, EVER, on anything.) Then I found Leah's 365 days of free motion designs. Loved it but PURE overload.



You can see that I did tiny pebbles in the pink border. That outside border really is more green - I wanted to quilt that and the center, leaving the neutral blocks without any quilting.  I think I even already made the binding for this. Just need to decide on the quilting pattern. That is 9/10ths of the problem, actually quilting and binding will be a breeze.

I've got a busy weekend ahead so I don't know when I'll get to this. Will let you know ASAP...

Design Wall Monday - 8/9/10

We are making progress here at Casa Grande...

Quilting on the cats is progressing. The cross-hatching takes forever but looks great and since the cats won't receive much quilting they really pop out. The borders will have freemotion "orange peel" quilting so that will go much faster. (NOTE: the green mat in the foreground is actually a slide out tray that Dad added at my request when he built the table. It makes for a nice local place to slice and dice while sewing but it also supports a quilt as I swing it around for quilting various parts. I can also pull out the drawers on the left if I need more support but he made sure the tray was pretty sturdy.)

And here is Smokey in the window and Pepper watching over her. I asked my brother to leave Smokey a little longer to see if they would continue to play nice since they even smelled noses Saturday. This morning both were cranky so now we are going backwards... (NOTE: I better explain these floors. When I bought the house, there were no carpets, tile or anything, just subflooring. We could stand in the living room and look between the floor boards to the basement. The previous owner had just never gotten past painting the subfloor. Each room has been covered with carpets we got at yard sales and as a room is redecorated, we lay down oak laminate floors and remove the carpets. That pink carpet will not be gone soon enough!)

Design Wall Monday on Tuesday 6/1/10

Sunday was a good day for staying inside in the shade and quilting all day - yeh, I said ALL day. I quilted three table runners, have the bindings machine sewn on all three and handstitched down one. I'll show you the other two another day.

You might remember seeing this tablerunner here and here. I free motion quilted it to echo the snail trails with red, white and black threads. The only red I had was Masterpiece so I was also going to use the black Masterpiece thread. It was breaking sooooo many times I actually threw it out because this is the second quilting session that has happened. I love Masterpiece for piecing and I had no problems with the red but that black was just too much to deal with when it breaks every couple inches, even with a new needle and freshly oiled machine.

It was a busy weekend with three rescue calls, marching in the Memorial Day Parade, a family picnic, long bike ride, trip with Mom to the not-so-LQS and baking for Yard Sale Days this coming weekend. I figured if I don't have a lot of "stuff" to sell, I can sell baked goods along with my tablerunners and other homemade crafts. Three other people will have "stuff" in my yard so we should get a lot of lookers.

Another table runner

Here's another table runner for the Christmas Bazaar. I free motion quilted my version of "McTavishing" in the center area - a nice fairly quick filler - and one of my machine's programmed stitches in the inner border. Truth be told I picked the border stitch a month ago since it clearly echoed the border fabric but then it just sat there while I decided on the rest of the quilting. Last night I pored over the designs from http://freemotionquilting.blogspot.com/ and looked through my quilting warm ups from previous projects and finally jumped on this design. The binding is nearly half done.

Seven days left how many more can I finish???

keep it or sell it?

This is my fav table runner so far for the Christmas Bazaar. The colors/fabrics are bright and likeable but my fav part is the quilting. I've really been debating whether to keep it for myself. Mom says why not but I already have two people interested in buying it. Of course, neither has asked the price so I guess I need to start pricing runners and ask them if they really want it. Otherwise I will finish one that is cheaper and more likely to sell. I have never been confident in pricing my art. Can't the Pricing Fairy just pop over this weekend and tell me what to do??!!

In the background you will see my little helper. Pepper rarely "sews" with me so I was thrilled when he spent several evenings on a roll of batting while I was working in my studio. If I keep the house chilly enough do you think he might continue to help?

The next picture is Tula. There's nothing better than a fresh bag of cat food - she wouldn't even let me get it into the bowl.

Happy Valentines Day!!!

This is the mini quilt I made while learning paper foundation piecing. I was also practicing free motion quilting while I finished this pink beauty so you might be able to see the hearts stitched into the border. OK - I'll admit it, I'm still working on my free motion but I can do ivy leaves very well!




I just started the Pineapples Plus class at QuiltUniversity.com. This is my homework for week 1. I plan to make at least 3 more for a wall hanging or pillow.