Friday, April 30, 2021

This is 60!

When you celebrate a milestone birthday during a global pandemic, what do you do to celebrate? Well, if you are me, you recruit your friends to help you make a joyful quilt!
This is 60 is my last quilt with the Solid Seven bee. I asked my beemates to make me blocks that included at least one triangle (I love triangles, weird, I know) in my prescribed color palette of bright, bright, bright! As always, they did not disappoint!

I added the black/neon borders on two sides and finished off my quilt with faux piped binding (I wrote a tutorial for it a long time ago! you can find it here). My friend Diann at Happy Quilts longarm quilted it in a terrific modern triangle panto which I love so much. 

A day at the park with my quilting buddies (stay tuned for more about that in my next post) was the perfect photo opportunity. A cloudy day was just right to capture the bright colors of my quilt.

I'm three months into 60 and I have to say, it's agreeing with me so far! 

 








 

Thursday, April 22, 2021

Mod Flower Quilt

 Earth day seems like the perfect day to finish up this quilt and share it with you. Even though it is a small quilt (36"x38") it has been in the works for many months. It all began last September, on National Jelly Roll day. My guild,  McKinney Modern Quilt Guild, was holding a zoom mystery jelly roll sew along day and because I love to "do all the things" I was eager to be a part of it. Mind you, I am not a jelly roll person (not a precut person at all, truth be told) and being on a tight fabric budget I wasn't eager to spend money on a jelly roll. So, I decided to make my own. Due to the generosity of another quilter, I had a large stack of low volume yardage on my shelf. I pulled the needed number of fabrics (20) and cut a 2 1/2" strip from each. 

The day was great fun, with a large number of guild members participating. At the end of the day, I had this finished, and quite boring in my eyes, quilt top. 


Rather than let it go to waste, I decided I wanted to appliqué a large, modern flower to the front. Never mind that hand appliqué was not a skill I had in my current toolbox! I had a vision and was willing to do whatever I needed to do to accomplish it. I set about designing templates for the appliqué I desired, then recruited a friend who is very skilled at needle turn appliqué to teach me. In fact, I also recruited a group of friends to learn alongside me because everything is more fun with friends, right? Martha graciously gave us a free zoom class and I was off and running (with more than a few anxious texts and additional tips and tricks.)
Because I was having fun doing handwork (I usually do), I decided to teach myself big stitch quilting. You Tube to the rescue! I hand stitched the whole quilt using size 8 perle cotton, a neutral variegated in straight rows across and accent stitches on the flower and stem using matching colors.
I even added a few Xs here and there just for fun.
And just for fun, I machine stitched the binding to the back then big stitched it down on the front of the quilt in pink, to match the flower. These stitches don't show on the back of the binding but are firmly stitched through the batting to secure it. Oh, and a few Xs snuck into the binding as well, because, why not?


I'm so happy with this little finish! Very few of my quilts are inspired by nature (weird, I know) and I guess this proves, even when they are, they are modern and not terribly realistic! But it was fun to learn new things.

Monday, April 19, 2021

watercolor journey

 Last year I shared that I had started playing with watercolors just to learn something new. I haven't shared about it in a long time, but I continue to learn and play and I feel like I might be getting better at it! It's funny, while my quilting tends toward solids and graphic design, I really love painting flowers! I thought I'd share a few of my recent entries in my sketchbook. Do you think I'm improving?

Sometimes I layer black sharpie doodles over top of my floral paintings just for fun.



I've almost filled my third sketchbook, in addition to painting many many notecards. I ordered a fourth sketchbook from Amazon and it's ready to go! Have you learned any new skills during quarantine?

Thursday, April 15, 2021

obligatory annual bluebonnet post

 Here we are, spring again! and for a brief time every April the Texas Bluebonnets are in full bloom. Last weekend Hubby and I drove to our favorite Bluebonnet spot for a few photos, as we do. I thought it would be fun to share a little bluebonnet block I made ages ago (and quickly finished into a tiny quilt right before we photographed it).

This is an awesome 6" foundation paper pieced block that is free on Sarah's blog. My original intention was to make a whole field of bluebonnet blocks but, well, you all know how that goes! Maybe someday.


It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon and also a good chance to get some photos of my latest Kalle Shirt by Closet case patterns. This is my go-to summer top (seriously my closet is full of them!)

I just love it in this Alison Glass Tuesday fabric that I picked up at my local quilt shop! This one will be getting lots of wear. I had Hubby take some more photos when we got home in better lighting...


Also I want to point out this is 2 blog posts in one week! Patting myself on the back.... 


Monday, April 12, 2021

baby quilt finish

 Well! I certainly did not intend to take 2 months off from blogging, yet here we are! I have been making making making..... which is not an excuse but it's been fun. 

During Quiltcontogether everyone was sharing the cool things they were creating in their virtual classes. For a couple of reasons I had not signed up for classes, and I found myself feeling a bit of FOMO. A little digging in my WIP pile and I found some blocks I had started at Quiltcon in Austin in 2020. I had forgotten all about these and honestly had not touched the project bag since.


The class I took was called Magic Numbers and the instructor was Katie Pederson (sewkatiedid) from Seattle. I will confess that I completed exactly ONE block during her class (I might be that girl who gets distracted easily and talks too much? maybe). Anyways, several other blocks were partially constructed or the pieces were cut, and all of the fabric were there in the bag so it was easy to get started on it again.

These are improv blocks, right up my alley. I a matter of days I had finished the 12 blocks I needed for a baby quilt, quilted a grid on my domestic machine and shipped it off to a new baby! I don't know why I had put this one off, but it was a pleasure to make now, maybe the timing was just right? who knows, but it is finished and gone.

I am recommitting to blogging at least once a week and I promise to do my very best! Thanks for hanging in there with me....