Back(s) to Quilting!

Hi, all!  Happy National Quilting Month!

I'm baaack!

It's been a long time.  I've been so busy quilting and just haven't made the time to post anything.  But this blog is really my Quilting Journal, the one place where I keep photos of my quilts and the process I went through to make them.  March is National Quilting Month, the perfect time to get back in the saddle and share the journey along A Quilter's Path.  This post is a composite of several unfinished posts from 2018...

What is your favorite part of quilting?

There are those who love the beginning -- discovering an inspiring view or idea or even a captivating pattern, or finding a beautiful fabric that cries, "Take me home!"  Some find relaxation in cutting and piecing.  For others is the quilting process itself, making lovely designs that please the eye in themselves and that add depth and movement to the quilt.  There are even people who enjoy just sitting in front of the TV, sewing on the binding, and feeling the satisfaction of a quilt COMPLETED!

I guess for most of us, it's the whole process.  Otherwise we'd probably never finish our quilts!  I don't much enjoy the actual quilting, probably because I still haven't become skilled at the kinds of quilt designs that I want to make.  Otherwise, I love it all.  But one of my favorite parts is rarely mentioned -- finding the perfect backing.

The back is part of the quilt, too!

We're all familiar with the photos of gorgeous quilts, draped over the corner of a door, over a fence or railing, wrapped around a young child.  Sometimes you get a peek at the back in these photos, or perhaps the quilter has folded back a corner for you to see it.  But think about it -- when you turn down the bed or toss a lap quilt over your knees, you always see the back!

I love finding the perfect backing for my quilts.  I made one quilt -- one very important to me, the one for my son and daughter-in-law for their wedding -- where I used a plain muslin backing.  Lots of people use muslin for the quilt back -- it never detracts from the top, shows the quilting, and is inexpensive.  But in the end I was disappointed.  If the top was so important, why didn't I bother to find a nice fabric for the back?

To me, the right backing material complements the top.  If the back has to be pieced, that's even more opportunity to have what is effectively a two-sided quilt.  Here are some of my favorites.

I made this panel quilt for a niece's baby boy in Ireland.  The African theme suggested warmth, something often lacking in Ireland!  

So I made the backing with a warm flannel in the same colors as the top.  It showed off the quilting nicely, too.  Aligning the back with the top so that the quilting aligned correctly on both the top and the back was something of an effort, but in the end, I was quite happy.

This lap quilt was for my best friend and her husband -- and their dogs!  The photo was taken before the quilting was done.  I stitched the names of all their dogs over the years in the horizontal sashings.

Of course, there was no shortage of dog-themed fabrics that could be used for the back.  The one I chose added a little pop of color that was missing in the brown and dark red top.

Sifting through old posts, you can find my *very* gradual progress on my Otsego quilts -- a pair of twin-sized quilts that in my earliest quilting days I optimistically designed, poorly cut, and struggled to sew.  Over the years I would pick one up to work on, usually during a retreat, when I forced myself to push on by taking only that project along.  But once I got home, back it went in the UFO bin.

This summer I finally finished both tops.  It took a while to find a backing fabric that I loved -- found it at Hobby Lobby in Gaylord, Michigan.  Perfect.

The last back I'll show you today was for another baby quilt.  I've made this one before -- just a couple of charm packs and some yardage.  

I wanted flannel for the backing, but when I saw these little guys, the deal was done.  So sweet!

That's it for now.  We'll be baaaack!  

June's Modern Ombre

A Modern Quilt for June

As I've proceeded along A Quilter's Path, modern quilts have increasingly appealed to me.  When I saw the post on See Kate Sew for the Modern Ombre baby quilt, I knew that this is what I wanted to make for my newest granddaughter, June.  I just wanted to jazz it up a little.  (Click on the link to see the original inspiration).

Wandering around the web, I discovered a fantastic fabric by Laurel Burch.  This became the focus fabric for June's quilt.

I swapped out the black and white print in the original pattern for lavender; I thought a print wouldn't work with the black print.  The color scheme is definitely informed by June's older sister, Greta, who's all about pink and unicorns.  For all I know, June may end up being a girl who wears all black and wears boots in the summer and has pierced I-don't-want-to know.  But for now, pink.

Since the entire quilt was triangles, I starched the bejeezus out of the fabric before cutting.  I wanted to fussy-cut the Laurel Burch fabric to make an I-Spy quilt.  But the template in the original pattern didn't quite work for the fabric.  After an entire weekend of fiddling around, I finally came up with a shape that allowed me to isolate one animal at a time (mostly).  The giraffe was hard!  Fortunately, I had some template plastic that allowed me to see the animals and still keep a seam allowance.  I marked the black fabric with a chalk pencil and cut it with scissors.  I wanted to preserve every possible inch of fabric.

If you look closely, you'll see that the outlines on 

the animals are metallic gold.  Lovely!

For the solids, I just cut strips the height of the template, then used the template to mark the strips and cut them with a ruler and rotary cutter.

I fiddled around with the layout, playing with the colors, since they didn't match exactly the original pattern.  But it ended up that Kate's layout was the best option (thank you, Kate!).  Once I'd selected the layout, the rest was a piece of cake.

On the design wall.

Other than the agonizing over layout, this was the quickest quit I've ever made.  No seam-matching until I put the rows together!  And no border.  I wanted the quilt to speak for itself.


I quilted straight lines on either side of the seams -- simple, geometric, keeps the modern feel going.

For the back I used a gray print that I've been ogling for weeks at the store.   I had actually talked one woman into buy the fabric for her quilt, so I kinda hoped that the store would give me a discount.  No such luck.

The binding is a flannel zebra stripe that I'd used on another baby quilt about a year ago.

 For the label I used a leftover pink triangle.  I love the way it looks on the back of the quilt.

And for an added touch, I cut out a tiny bird from the animal fabric and appliqued it to the label.

 P.S.  I didn't want Greta to be jealous (her quilt wasn't pink).  So I made her a pillowcase with leftover triangles and backing fabric, a pink stripe (to make it long enough) and some white eyelet trim.

Back with more soon!

Rail Fence Checkers

LEADERS AND ENDERS

I'm not a big fan of the rail fence pattern.  It's just not my style.  But when Bonnie Hunter came up with the added checkerboard units, I decided to make it.

I was getting ready to head to Otsego Lake for 10 days of solo time, so I bagged up the pieces for the fireplace quilt and kitted up what I needed to get a good start on the rail fence.

For the checkerboards, I have plenty of solid black, and both solid and tone-on-tone white fabrics.  i started strip-piecing them and already have a nice bag full of 4-patches.  Each block will require three 4-patches.

For the rails, I emptied my bins of 1-1/2" and 2" strips and squares and started in.  This would be my first totally scrappy quilt, but I did want at least to have some balance among light, medium and dark fabrics, plus a variety of colors.  I cut 6-1/2" lengths of pretty much everything I had in those widths (trimming the 2" strips to 1-1/2"), then dug into the color-sorted stash bins.

Being an OCD-type, I didn't want to waste a thing.  So I had 5 piles going:  strips 1-1/2" x 6-1/2" for the rails; squares of various sizes from strips less than 6-1/2";  selveges for a future project; dog bed filler (pieces narrower than 1-1/2"); and shreds-and-threads that actually had to go into the trash.  Note, that is the smallest pile!

Piles piling up!  (Please overlook the leftover lunch plate). Pieces for the dog-bed bin and shreds on the left.

Fence rails

Squares (5", 2", 1-1/2") and selveges

I sorted the rail strips into color families and took a photo of each group.  Then I made a copy of each photo and converted it into gray-scale to determine whether a fabric was light, medium, or dark.  Some fabrics surprised me, not what I thought they would be.

This is the teal family.  They look mostly pretty much the same to me; the 3rd and 4th from the left in the bottom row are certainly darks, but the others...?











But looking at them in gray-scale, the differences do show up.

I think the dark area on the left is just the hole in the sewing table where the machine goes.  My machine was getting its well-baby checkup when I took these pics.

Do you know that they sell special red glasses for quilters that enable you to see your fabrics in gray scale?  I'm sure there was a reason for them back in the day.  But almost everyone has a cell phone now with a camera.


Since I was sewing these on three different machines, I measured them again before I sewed a light/medium pair to a dark/medium pair.

I've made a couple of blocks but I'm still not sure I like this.  Bonnie Hunter says that "if it's still ugly, you didn't cut it small enough."  Well, these strips aren't all that small, I deliberately did not try to pair up strips according to color, and I was using up a lot of fabrics that I didn't like in the first place.  Oh, well, it's all just for fun.  And who knows what it will look like when it's done?  (You will, dear readers.  But it will be a while).

Have a happy Halloween!

Happy National Sewing Month!

Happy September (and goodbye, summer)  😔    Did you know that September is was National Sewing Month?  (Well, I started this post on September 1.  Now the month has flown.)  So let's catch up!


As I mentioned in my last post, I've been finishing up the blocks for the Otsego quilts (original post here).  The blocks are *DONE* but somehow I mis-counted something, and with the blocks that I have, the quilts will be just a bit too short.  I don't have enough fabric to make one more row on each quilt.

So while I ponder the fix, I decided to move on to another UFO, the fireplace quilt, and to dive into Bonnie Hunters's new Leader and Ender Challenge, a rail fence quilt.  More on that one in the next post.

THE FIREPLACE QUILT - Heading into the finish

Last November I made a New Year's Resolution to finish the fireplace quilt by Christmas, 2017.  This was the mosaic quilt that I'd "designed" by uploading a photo to the Victoria and Albert Museum website,  which broke down the image into squares and HSTs.  So this is how it started:

The original image:

The image as a quilt pattern:

Cutting instructions: 

You may remember, I was so excited about this quilt, but ran into a BIG problem of my own making.  I'd tried to save some time, effort, and fabric by making HSTs from already-cut squares.  Of course, the HSTs were too small (duh, I knew better).

Earlier this year,  I had laid out all the pieces and bundled them up by rows.

So now, as I hit the reset button,  all the HSTs still needed to be trimmed and all the squares had to be cut down to the size of the HSTs (1-3/4 inches).  Fun! (not).  I accomplished this while I was on personal retreat at the cabin in Michigan.  Then I finally started to sew.  The the seams needed to be about 1/8" to achieve the size that I had planned.  That has meant seams coming apart and corners of HSTs getting chewed up.

Nevertheless, she persisted.  I've gotten all the rows sewn together and am now embarking on finishing up the quilt top.  It's slow going --  it's hard to get the seams to nest, especially since they were sewed on 3 different machines.  When the top is together, I'll iron it onto interfacing with 2" squares that I'd originally expected to use.  I'm hoping that will minimize additional fraying and stabilize the quilt.

Current status:

The rows lined up and ready!  I expect that the quilting will help to define the main parts of the image -- flames, logs, etc.  I'm still looking forward to the finished product!


Next time I'll show you the Leaders and Enders project.  Until then...

Little Ones (people and quilts)

Little Ones (people and quilts)

It's hard to believe that summer is already winding down!

The Left Coast contingent arrived in early June and are now preparing to head back west.  I guess it will be nice to be back in our own bedroom and to have more space where the toys have been.  But truly, it has been an amazing and wonderful couple of months that I wouldn't trade for anything.  To those of you who have family nearby, count your blessings.  Mine are so far away, we rarely get more than a few days every couple of months with them.  Three-year-old Greta is a gem, so sweet and full of fun.  And to see baby June grow from a bobble-headed 2-month old to a feisty 4-month old who is full of smiles and gurgles and who can roll over and wants to learn to crawl -- such a blessing! 

  My Memphis grandsons started school today, though here in New York it will be another month.  They were here for just a week, but they were HERE!  (refused to allow photos, though).

Of course, with all that's been going on, I haven't had a lot of time to sew at home.  The precious three hours each week at the local quilt shop with our little quilty group have been my little piece of sewing heaven.  Still, much has been accomplished.

Progress on UFOs

The quilt top is done for a sampler block-of-the-month project that I started about 5 years ago.  It still needs to be quilted.  I'll share the finish when it's done.

The 160 blocks for the Otsego quilts (two twin-size quilts), in process for several years, are finally done!  Yahoo!  I had to order more of all but two of the fabrics.  Nonetheless, I realized that I am one row short for each quilt.  And I don't have enough fabric to make two more rows.  ARGGH!  

So near and yet so far.  I'm still trying to figure out how to make this work.  I *really* wanted to get these done this summer.  But I guess one more year won't be tragic.  

Table-top Mini Quilts

Meanwhile, two more mini-quilts made it onto the 12" hanging rack in the front hall.  For July, I just cut a panel from some patriotic fabric and framed it in red, white and blue with a gold binding.  Uninspired, but sometimes you make do.  I plan to replace it with something more interesting next year.

Much more fun was a very small quilt (9" x 12") that is almost like being on the beach.  I was inspired by a similar quilt that I saw on the web, although it was a wall hanging, about 24" x 36".  I changed the color palette a bit and used some clouds-on-blue for the sky, quilting around some of the whitest areas of the clouds.  The quilt looks wobbly in the photos -- I don't normally wash these little quilts, but this one needed a bath before it was fit to be shown!

For the water and sand I just did slightly wavy lines, but I did a little free-motion bubble shapes for the foam along the beach.  It came out sort of uneven, but considering that the widest point is only one inch, I didn't stress too much about it.

I had to satin-stitch around the sun, which I really don't like very much.  But it was ravelling around the edges.

The sun's rays are in a gold polyester thread with a lot of shine, using a built-in serpentine stitch in various stitch lengths.  This was the way the rays were done on the quilt I'd seen on the web.  I may go back and add some stitching around the rest of the sun, though not so dense.  The jellyfish thing doesn't really do it for me.  The reflection on the water is the same gold thread, just vaguely wavy lines.

For the border I used a lovely striped summer fabric that I'd bought to make pillow covers.  It turned out to be not quite right for that project, but it was perfect for the binding and one width of the fabric was just the right size.  Now to figure out what to do with the remainder of the two yards.

While I am sad that my summer of grandchildren is nearly gone, I am looking forward to spending more time on sewing projects old and new.   There are still a couple of UFOs that I really want to finish, and so many new quilts to make!  There are 2,715 items in the "Quilt Patterns" folder on my computer, and that doesn't count all the books and magazines on the shelf.  If I could put time in a bottle...

A Lovely Old Girl

I grew up sewing on my mother's (formerly my grandma's) White machine, sturdy and never complaining.  Later, my freshman year in college, I won Riccar in a cabinet at a drawing at the Ohio State Fair, thanks to my step-sister, who had entered me in the drawing.  I used that for years, then replaced it with a brand-new Kenmore in 1978.  She sewed beautifully, made more children's clothes and doll clothes than I can remember (and sewed over pins!).  When I embarked on my quilting journey, I decided that I wanted a "better" machine.  I now sew on a Brother NX 650 Q, which is fine.  But it doesn't have the horsepower of the Kenmore and doesn't like bulky seams at all.  I do wish I'd kept my Kenmore, more that's water under the bridge.  And now, a chance to rewind...

My wonderful quilting friend, Deb, offered me this gorgeous old machine, as long as I was willing to take care of it.  Well, yes!  How could I resist?  A friend of hers had found it, but wasn't able to keep it, so gave it to her.  I'm sure she'd like to have it still, but she needed space and gave it to me.

The cabinet is in fairly good shape and has a heavy glass plate on top.

Sadly, the wood top had some scratches, but that's what happens to all of us over the years.

The front of the cabinet has a nice size shelf to hold important machine supplies.

Inside the cabinet door was a small bag filled with bobbins (some filled), presser feet, and other attachments.  Clearly, someone had been using it.

Deb and I both think that this was originally a treadle machine.  At some point it was converted, with a foot pedal installed sideways to act as a knee controller.  The wiring doesn't look too bad, but no telling how old it is.  Much of it is cloth-wrapped.  My plan is to have my husband take a look, and if she doesn't look like a total fire hazard, I'll plug her in and see if she works.

She's a Singer, with a motor manufactured by Delco/General Motors in Rochester, NY in 1906 or 1907.  She's so pretty, with elegant multi-colored decals.  Some are worn away, but others just glow.

Aren't they gorgeous?!

Next stop will be the local sew-and-vac, to have her cleaned up and have the wiring re-checked and replaced as necessary.  I'd love to return her to a treadle, but that's beyond my ability.  I'll have to see what it would take and how much it would cost.

Meanwhile, she remains an object of affection rather than use.  And she's had to stay all closed up in the cabinet while four of my grandchildren are in town.  Maybe a good rainy fall day project?