Arcs, Curves & Points With Rulers Preparation

 Hi all -

I hope everyone is doing well! Things are good here. The new year has started and we continue to have unseasonable warm, dry weather. We need to get some moisture, but it sure is pleasant!

This year I've decided to participate in Angela Walters' Arcs, Curves & Points With Rulers quilt along. To participate, you purchase one of the panels she designed for this quilt along and her rulers, and then she'll provide videos and handouts showing how to use the rulers to quilt the panels. (You can participate for free without the panels, but it would be difficult to come up with a quilt top that would provide appropriate spaces for the quilting designs. Or you could just decide to practice the quilt designs on throw-away quilt sandwiches. I like to have a finished project even when practicing.) I went ahead and purchased the entire package -- the large panel, border strips for the large panel, backing/binding fabric and the rulers. If you bought the large panel, you could also get the small panel for a discount, so I went ahead and got that, too. When I started putting everything together, I decided that I didn't want to put the borders on the large panel. I have to pin baste my quilts on my kitchen floor and the borders were going to make the top too large for me to pin baste it. So I just prepared the large panel without the borders.

Large Panel Pin Basted

Since I didn't use the borders on the large panel, I decided to put them on the small panel. Because the top and bottom borders have the printed design turning the corners, I had to cut out some of the middle of the borders to make them fit the small panel. It's noticeable if you look closely, but it isn't glaring.

Small Panel With Borders

Since I only purchased the backing/binding fabric for the large panel, I need to piece a backing for the small panel using some of my own fabrics. I want to use up as much of the quilt along fabric as possible, so I started by preparing the binding for both quilts so I knew I would have enough for the binding.

Prepared Binding

To get enough for both quilts, I had to prepare 550 inches of binding! I made it as one long strip to make the most efficient use of the fabric I could. With all of that done, I could start piecing the backing for the small panel. I thought the panel fabrics looked the most like my batiks, so I looked in my batiks for some fabrics that looked good with the blues and reds in the panel, Then, I just started sewing pieces together without much thought. I got as much of the backing pieced as I could before I had to stop for the Broncos game. (We are hopefully going to win home field advantage for the playoffs today!)

Small Panel Backing So Far

I have one more piece of the backing fabric (the light blue fabric that makes up most of the backing so far) to include, but the rest of the backing will probably be the dark blue fabric used for the small squares you see. I hope to get the backing for the small panel finished and the panel pin basted this week. The first video drops January 13. Since I have the large panel basted, I'm ready to follow along even if I don't get the small panel finished. A couple of ladies in my Englis Paper Piecing (EPP) group are also participating, although they both quilt on longarms while I'll be quilting on my domestic sewing machine.

This week also marked the start of Laura Nelkin's annual first quarter knit-along (KAL). For the first quarter of every year, Laura has a KAL where if you work on any of her patterns and you post pictures of your progress, you are put in a weekly drawing for a prize. I started this year's KAL by finishing my Boublay scarf designed, of course, by Laura Nelkin. 

Boublay

Boublay - Close-Up

Boublay is a simple boomerang scarf with large bobbles (she calls them Boublay stitches) on one side and the bottom border.  You can't see it in the picture, but the Boublay stitches on the bottom border have a beads on them. After the Broncos game, I'll decide which project to work on next.

Nancy