Quilt Till You Wilt!

I have spent the last several days working on quilting this quilt for my friend.  If you remember, she asked me to recreate an old quilt she had on her bed for the last 20 years or so.  I drafted out the pattern, made the quilt, hand appliquéd all of the petals and centers on, and then it was ready to quilt!  And that is where I stalled out a bit....

I quilted several baby quilts to get used to my new machine, which I think was a good idea.  Then I printed out pictures of the blocks and did some drawing on them to audition ideas.  Once I thought I had a good plan, I began quilting.  Surprisingly I used very few of the ideas I had drawn out on the pictures!  They just didn't work as well with the actual quilting, so I still have a learning curve on that process :)

I did have to do a little bit of "unquilting" but not too much, and overall I am very pleased with the result!
I definitely quilted until I wilted on some days in a big push to get it finished and hopefully sent off to my friend some time in the next couple of days.


Here is the quilt all quilted, squared up and ready to bind! (I actually sewed the binding on this morning.)

Now for hand sewing the binding down, trimming threads and washing.

I quilted feathers in the white areas and you can't see it, but ribbon candy in the blue areas.  I'll take a picture of the back before I send it off - you can see the quilting better.




Have a wonderful, productive day :)

Odds and Ends

I went to a lecture at Quilt Fest called "Off the Path" which was the best most inspiring class I took there.  I will make a complete post on that soon!  The lecturer recommended this book for inspiration and I have to say it is AMAZING.  500 incredible quilts that are sure to inspire your own creations.  I ordered mine on Amazon.

This is the Adjustable Square ruler I bought from Karen Kay Buckley.  It is adjustable and perfect for squaring up appliqué or wool appliqué blocks.  I always cut my backgrounds larger in case the appliqué pulls up a bit, so I can square them up perfectly later.  This ruler will help with that process.


Here is a video of Karen demonstrating this ruler:

From the vendor mall I bought the 8 inch Curvy Log Cabin Trim Tool.  I have a quilt in mind for this, for OUR bed finally!  Surprisingly we do not have a quilt on our bed.  Probably because it's King sized and I have yet to make a King sized quilt.  But with the new quilting machine, I'm game, and this ruler will get me started.
Have you ever bought a tool though, because you saw a cool demo, then put it on your shelf and forgot how to use it?  Well, look at the QR code at the bottom right of this package.  Use the QR reader on your phone and it will take you right to a video demonstrating how to use this ruler!

We decided to try the daylight bulbs, suggested by Karen Kay Buckley in the class I took from her, in my sewing room and what a HUGE difference!  Now my sewing room is as bright as day any time day or night and the fabric colors read true and are not yellow tinged as with some bulbs.  These are expensive but are supposed to last a long time.  I'll let you know.  So far - loving them!
I cannot find the price on the package but I believe my husband said they were about $15 per bulb.  The package says they have an 82% less energy consumption and the estimated yearly cost per bulb, based on three hours a day of use, is $2.17.

Do you use Frixion Pens??  Megan Legas, the hand quilting teacher told a horror story of a woman who submitted a quilt to a show and during the shipping of the quilt it got cold enough to bring back all the markings, so when it arrived at the show, all the Frixion pen markings were back!

Recently The Quilt Show blog posted a link to this blog:

http://quiltskipper.com/2015/08/13/frixion-pens-all-you-need-to-know/

Jenny K. Lyon, the writer, went right to the manufacturer of the pens for the information she shares.  Definitely worth reading!!

I hope you get to quilt today!

This Makes 25!

Here are three more Patchwork of the Crosses blocks that I recently finished.  I'm piecing these by hand and they go together fairly quickly.  I decided I better count how many I have so I know how many more I need to make.  If I make the quilt like Lucy Boston's, I will need 56 blocks and these three make 25 so I'm almost half way there!

I've been spending many, many hours quilting a queen size quilt.  Hopefully I will have pictures of that finished quilt to share soon!

Have a nice day!

More Quilts!

Quilt Fest quilt show in Layton, Utah

Feathers made and quilted by Marian Murdock
First Place Pieced

Private Pond made and quilted by Kaye Evans
1st Place Art Innovative

Christmas Circles
made and quilted by Margaret Gray

In Full Bloom by Susan Turpin
quilted by Cindy Paulson
1st Place Mixed Technique

This one looked very Sue Spargo-ish to me.  Love it!

Flower Fun by Gloria Hartley
quilted by Carole Lifferth

Best Friends Forever by Linda Williams
quilted by Kim Peterson

Really, really love this one :)

Glowing Candlelight
made and quilted by Crystal North
1st Place Embroidery

Show Quilts

Here are a few pictures from the Quilt Fest quilt show.  They had some fantastic quilts on display!

The Many Worlds of Sue by Kaye Evans
quilted by Ranae Haddadin

Nine Patch Chain by Kaye Evans
quilted by Ranae Haddadin

(Kaye had a special exhibit so had several quilts in the show.)

Ranae's quilting is amazing!

Bali Bed Runner
made and quilted by Adeline Parkin

Sheltering on the Forest Floor
made and quilted by Florence A. Evans
Received Judge's Choice Award

Oh My Neutral Stars! by Dianne B. Wittusen
quilted by Kathy Carter
Best Machine Quilting Award

I don't know how I missed the name tag on this one - sorry!  It's beautiful though, isn't it?  It is inspiring me to do something with my 30's fabrics!

Bali Wedding Star by Barbara Walsh
quilted by Virginia Gore








I have been quilting a quilt for a friend - it's keeping me very busy!!  I hope to finish it up and get it in the mail this next week - then work on finishing Dear Jane :)

Hand Quilting

I took a hand quilting class at Quilt Fest from Megan Legas.  She does beautiful work.  I had taken a quilting design class from her a couple of years ago so I know she is a great teacher.
It seems funny that I took a hand quilting class when I just bought a machine quilting machine, but for some reason I keep getting drawn to hand quilting!  I think it's beautiful and actually very relaxing - well sort of relaxing....

This is at least the 3rd or 4th hand quilting class I've taken and they all start out the same, how to mark, how to baste, then you put a muslin square in a hoop and practice.  Everyone has different little tidbits though that I find helpful, so even though a lot of the class is a bit repetitive, I always learn something new.

Here is my attempt this time.

I learned a fabulous tip from Megan that immediately made my stitches smaller!  Look at this heart - the stitches on the right side of the heart are where I started.  After I learned her tip, look at the stitches on the left side - they are noticeably smaller!  Hurray!

Now I need to practice, practice, practice.  I have a smallish quilt in mind that I think I am going to hand quilt.  I need to graduate from a muslin square to an actual quilt and just go for it.  Wish me luck!

Inspiration

A couple of years ago I entered this quilt in the Utah Quilt Guild's Quilt Fest show.  This is my Japanese Quilt Blocks quilt based on blocks from the book (Japanese Quilt Blocks) by Susan Briscoe.

This year, this quilt was in the show!
It is called "Happy Spirit" and was made and quilted by Kathy Young.  Her artist's statement says:
"I saw a quilt similar to this....loved the taupe colors, Sashiko stitching and beautiful Japanese blocks.  I designed the hummingbird block .... we love these birds!  The hand-stitched quote from President Hinckley was included as a reminder to me to face life's challenges with a 'happy spirit'!

So I don't know for sure if my quilt was an inspiration to her or not, but I like to think it was since it was at the same show two years ago.  It makes my spirit happy to think that something I made may have inspired someone else!

I love the idea of putting this wonderful quote in the center.  Her Sashiko stitching and hand appliqué are beautifully done and her quilting is fantastic too.  I voted for her quilt for Viewer's Choice.  If I hadn't already made a quilt similar to it, I would be inspired to do so.  Actually I still have a lot of taupe fabric left and I love the quote idea.... Hmm....

Celtic Applique

Michelle and I took a Celtic Appliqué class from Sharon Aposhian Wright at Quilt Fest last week.

Sharon lectured and taught a workshop here in Grand Junction several years ago.  I think it's time she come again!  Her work is AMAZING and she is a fantastic teacher.

I learned a LOT in this Celtic Appliqué class - it is unlike anything I've done before.  It was hard too!  I think with practice I could get better though :)

These quilts were all made by Sharon - like I said - stunning work....

This quilt won Best of Show at Quilt Fest last year.  She said after the quilt was quilted, she decided that the Celtic appliquéd center was a bit crooked, so she unpicked all of the quilting (in the center area), removed the center piece and RE-DID all of that Celtic appliqué, put the center piece back in the quilt and re-quilted it (it's all hand quilted too.)  That is dedication - no wonder it won Best of Show!




I love the design of the whole quilt, with the borders crossing over and wrapping around the center, with subtle color changes.  I'm still trying to figure out how she did that.

Here is another one of her beautiful Celtic Appliqué quilts.  She does this with bias strips, made with bias bars and these strips go over and under where they are supposed to and are all appliquéd down by hand. Is your jaw dropping yet?

All hand quilted....

And do you see the face of Christ in the center appliquéd part??  I at first thought it was a map of the world or something, after she pointed out his face, that's all I see now :)

(If you're having trouble seeing him, try squinting your eyes.)

This was her first attempt at Celtic Appliqué .....

And this is my first attempt....

This is a difficult process, but fun too - very challenging!  You can see by my examples that it can be hard to get the design straight and not "crooked".

Oh, and in the quilt at the top - the center "crooked" piece she removed from the quilt is now her quilt label on the back :)

Celtic Appliqué anyone??