Grand Illusion Finished

 Hi all -

I hope everyone had a wonderful 4th of July! I didn't do anything special for the 4th. We're always under high fire danger this time of year and, although people in our neighborhood are generally really responsible, I like to be home on the 4th so I can get the pets out if there's a problem. It was quiet around my house, but I did hear that someone else in the neighborhood heard someone shooting, which is prohibited under the current restrictions. And, of course, it's nice to relax and avoid any crowds!

I spent most of this week finishing my Grand Illusion quilt designed by Bonnie Hunter. This was Bonnie's 2014 mystery quilt. I did the piecing in 2014/15 and started quilting it some time ago, but got frustrated and put it away. I finally pulled it out a couple of weeks ago, determined to finish it. And now it's done!

Grand Illusion

"Grand Illusion" is a good name for this quilt because you can see the pattern from a distance, but up close it just looks like a jumble of shapes.

Grand Illusion - Close-Up of Front

It's so chaotic, it's hard to see the quilting on the front of the finished quilt. As usual, I used left-over units and fabric for the back. I love how it turned out!

Grand Illusion - Back

You can see the quilting on the back. I used what I'm calling "stream of consciousness" quilting. I saw this somewhere a long time ago, but can't remember the artist's name or what she called it so I have to just go with my name for it. I just quilted whatever motifs I felt like doing that I thought would look good. I ended up using a lot of common background fills and sprinkling in every flower shape I could think of. 

Grand Illusion - Quilting Close-Up 1

Grand Illusion - Quilting Close-Up 2

Grand Illusion - Quilting Close-Up 3

Some of the motifs aren't as smooth or pretty as I would have liked, but I think they look good in combination. It was really difficult wrangling the large quilt through my sewing machine, especially with the dense quilting and the puffy wool batting, but I got it done and I love the result! And the added bonus is that I get joy every time I look at all of the different fabrics that I used. 

When I was tired of quilting, I turned on the TV and worked on my La Passacaglia quilt designed by Willyne Hammerstein. I'm trying to finish up my second large rosette for this quilt. I'm on the last round of the rosette, which is a partial round of star units. I picked the fabrics for this round and started preparing the pieces.

La Passacaglia - Second Rosette

I laid out some of the chosen fabrics so you can see how the unit goes together and how the colors look. I didn't get much done on this because I put the binding on Grand Illusion this week. I like to sew the binding to the front using the machine, then turn it to the back and hand stitch it. It takes a long time, but I really like the look and feel of this method. It took my all day Thursday and a couple of hours on Wednesday and Friday to finish the hand sewing. I had to stop before finishing on Thursday because the joint at the base of my thumb hurt too much to continue. I was worried that I wouldn't be able to continue on Friday morning since I haven't found anything that really relieves this type of pain, but I have some DMSO cream that was recommended by an online friend. I hadn't really had luck with this in the past, but I decided to try it again and this time wrap my hand in a microwave heating pad with it on. That really seemed to work for me. It felt pretty good right away and it seemed to be all better the next morning. I don't know if it was a fluke since this is the first time it has worked for me, but I thought I would share it with you guys just in case.

Finally, after putting in the last bits of quilting on Grand Illusion yesterday, I was motivated to work on my Tulips Are Blooming quilt. This quilt is based on the Floral Bouquet pattern in Jelly Roll Quilts by Pam & Nicky Lintott. I used the pattern for the center of the quilt, but changed the borders to something I like better. Last time I worked on the quilt, I had added a squares-on-point border, but was thinking that I might want to add another narrow white border to add some space between the squares-on-point and the binding. This additional border would make it easier to keep the points in the squares from being cut off. And, if I use the flower fabrics for the binding creates a separation between the squares and the binding. I looked at it some more and decided that I did want to add that border.

Tulips Are Blooming

I think this space looks good whether I use a white or colored binding, but I'm leaning towards the colored binding. I think the colored binding will look better and will be more practical since the binding is where you're most likely to get dirt on the quilt since that's where you touch it the most.

Well, that's it for this week....

Nancy

Great Retreat

 Hi all -

I hope everyone is doing well! Things are good here. The weather is nice, but it's really smokey here. I feel really bad for those people dealing with the fires in Utah, New Mexico and western Colorado! I was looking at the map on my fire app (Watch Duty -- I highly recommend this app) and it's amazing and scary how much is burning now! I hope everyone stays safe!!

I attended a really good quilting retreat last week. It was put on by our local sewing center, Twisted Stitches. It's a great center with great lighting, plenty of irons and power outlets on each table. And if I get there early and can get a table where it's not in the way, I can bring my little portable sewing table so I can sew with my machine sunk in the table. I started by working on the baby quilt I'm making for my great nephew who is due in October. I'm making him Night Howler designed by Art East Quilting Co.

Night Howler

I did all of the cutting before the retreat, so was able to dig right in with the piecing and finished the top on the second morning of the retreat. It was made with all stash fabric and I love how it turned out! This is made using the stitch and flip technique like Elizabeth Hartman uses. I created additional half square triangles from every corner that was large enough and will use those on the back of the quilt. I decided to not piece the backing at the retreat because I like to be in my own space when I'm doing improvisational piecing.

When I finished Night Howler, I moved on to Lilah, which I had started piecing at a guild sew day.

Lilah - Progress From Retreat

I had started the star blocks at the sew day. At the retreat, I was able to finish the star blocks and then make a start on the other blocks. These blocks took quite a while to make because all of the flying geese, half square triangle and square in a square units had to be trimmed after sewing. But I made some good progress at the retreat! After the retreat, I decided to finish up the blocks.

Lilah - Finished Blocks

Now I can start assembling the quilt at another sew day.

While I was working on the Lilah blocks, I also pulled out one of my leader/ender projects. I had forgotten to bring this project the first day so didn't make any progress on it while working on Night Howler, but I made some progress while working on Lilah.

Leader/Ender Progress During Retreat

When I got home, I made more progress on these blocks while finishing up the Lilah blocks.

Leader/Ender Finished Blocsk

With this project, I generally try to have all completed blocks before I put it away. These blocks are quick to make and it's easier to organize things in the project box if I don't have to store partial blocks.

The last project I worked on at the retreat was my Wild Women Don't Get the Blues quilt designed by Karen K. Stone. At around 2:00 on the second day of the retreat, we lost power. The area around the retreat center was affected, including all of the traffic lights. Not knowing how long the outage would last, I first ate my lunch and then pulled in my had project from the car. The outage ended up lasting only a little over an hour so I was only able to get one block finished during that time.

Wild Women Don't Get the Blues -- Retreat Block

The power went out again on the third day at about the same time, but that day we were only going until 5:00 so I decided to just make it a short day and head home. The power actually came back while I was putting the sewing machine in the car, but it wasn't worth the effort to bring everything back in and get set up again. I don't know what was going on with the power, but hopefully the power company gets it figured out!!

At home I went back to working on my Grand Illusion quilt designed by Bonnie Hunter. 

Grand Illusion - Some Quilting Designs

Grand Illusion - More Quilting Designs

This is a large quilt so there's a lot of space to fill with quilting!

Finally, I finished the next round of my current rosette for my La Passacaglia quilt designed by Willyne Hammerstein. 

La Passacaglia

This is my second of four large rosettes for this quilt and I just have a partial round of star units to do to finish it. I generally work on this quilt at our English Paper Piecing (EPP) group meetings, but this rosette has gotten too big to fit in my regular project bag without folding, so I want to finish it up at home so I can move on to the next rosette. I hope to get those added next week.

Nancy

Back To Grand Illusion

 Hi all -

I hope everyone is doing well! It's a weekend of holidays (Juneteenth, Father's Day, Summer Solstice) and I hope everyone is having fun celebrating something, or nothing if that is your thing....

This week I pulled out my Grand Illusion quilt designed by Bonnie Hunter.  Bonnie shares a free mystery quilt pattern every year between Thanksgiving and Christmas and this was  her pattern for 2015. Although I save the pattern each year, this is the only one that I've actually worked on. I finished piecing mine quite a while ago. 

Grand Illusion

Then, several years ago, I took it to a place where you can rent a longarm and I basted it by quilting vertical lines using water soluable thread. This quilt pattern ended up being a little chaotic for my taste so I decided I could experiment on it with the basting and the quilting. I decided to try what I call "stream of consciousness" quilting on it. Sorry, I don't remember the artist that I saw using this or what she called it. Basically, you just keep changing quilt motifs, using whatever motif you feel like sewing. Well, unplanned quilting is very uncomfortable for me and this was amplified by the puffy wool batting I used which made it difficult to avoid tucks in the quilting, so I ended up putting this quilt aside. I've been organizing my works-in-progress (WIPs) and decided it was time to resurrect this quilt. I looked it over to see what I was doing and to figure out where I ended, and picked up where I left off. 

Grand Illusion - Front Partially Quilted

Grand Illusion - Back Partially Quilted

Because of the chaotic piecing, you can see the quilting much better on the back than on the front.

Grand Illusion - Front Quilting Close-Up

Grand Illusion - Back Quilting Close-Up

I'll try to muscle through this project until I get it finished. I'll work on it when I have time at home since it's a large quilt and I'd rather quilt it on my home machine. At least I know I'll love it in the end because I love the colors and have really enjoyed looking at the fabrics as I've done the quilting. And I already have a prepared binding using a fun green cat fabric that is one of my favorites.

I've also continued to work on my La Passacaglia quilt designed by Willyne Hammerstein. The is the English paper piecing (EPP) project that I generally work on at our monthly EPP group meeting. In the pattern, there are four large rosettes and then a bunch of small rosettes. I'm starting with the large rosettes to get them out of the way, then will work on the smaller ones. I've finished one large rosette and am working on my second one now. This rosette has gotten too large to fit into my normal project bag that I carry to our group meeting, so I'm trying to finish this rosette at home, then will start the next rosette at our meeting next month. So, this week I finished the round that I had started last week.

La Passacaglia - Second Rosette Finished Round

Then I had to pick fabrics for my next round. This is always the hardest part for me! I decided to go with fussy cut flamingos and a bright pink fabric. Here are the basted pieces set in place to see how they will look:

La Passacaglia - Auditioning Next Round

While I was picking fabric, I also selected some fabrics for starting the next large rosette.

La Passacaglia - Beginning Fabrics for Third Rosette

I'll surround this with the same black fabric I used in the first and second rosettes. After all of the preparation, I was also able to start sewing the next round on the second rosette.

La Passacaglia - Full Progress on Second Rosette

This round is going pretty quickly, then I'll have to pick fabrics for the final round of this rosette. The final round is a partial round of star motifs.

Finally, I did some more preparation for the three-day daytime-only retreat I'm attending next week. We will be sewing 9am-7pm on Monday and Tuesday (although I'll have to leave a little early to pick up Grace from doggie daycare) and 9am-5pm on Wednesday. I decided to do the cutting for my Night Howler quilt designed by Art East Quilting Co ahead of time because there are a lot of small pieces for this quilt and I find it easier to stay organized and cut carefully at home. I was glad I did this because I found out that I really screwed up when choosing my fabrics. I somehow didn't choose all of the fabrics that I needed and I also chose a background fabric that was too small. So, I rectified my choices and got everything cut out, ready for the retreat.

Night Howler - All Pieces Cut and Organized

This is now in a bin, ready to start piecing tomorrow. I also did some more organizing of my WIPs, making sure everything was in separate plastic bins and labeled, and making a list of some of the projects that are good choices for retreats and sew days. I decided that the extra projects I'll take with me tomorrow will be Lilah, which I started at a previous sew day, and Wild Women Don't Get the Blues, which I worked on at our last unfinished object (UFO) group meeting. These projects will definitely be enough to keep me busy all day. At the end of each day, I'll pick more projects to bring along based on my progress that day. That's the advantage of daytime-only retreats -- you can add more projects and pick up other things you might need each evening. Hopefully, I'll have a lot of progress to share next week!

Nancy

Pink and Gray Quilt Finished

 Hi all -

I hope everyone is doing well! We're having a nice, somewhat rainy day here. It's nice when Mother Nature waters my flower pots for me!

This week I was able to finish the quilting on my pink and gray quilt. Since I'd already applied the binding, this quilt is now finished!

Pink and Gray Quilt - Front

Pink and Gray Quilt - Back

For quilting, I first did stitch-in-the-ditch (SID) between each of the blocks. I was able to do this with my walking foot, so that was quick and easy. Then I did SID quilting inside the frame of each block using dark gray thread for the dark gray frames and light gray thread for the light gray frames. I started doing this using a ruler to keep my lines straight, but I had a lot of trouble keeping the stitching on the seam so I switched to doing that stitching free motion and was much happier with that result. Finally, I stitched a motif inside each square using a curved ruler and pink thread.

Pink and Gray Quilt - Quilting Motif

Pink and Gray Quilt - Curved Ruler

The length of this ruler made it very difficult to align things under the sewing machine and then to maneuver the quilt, but I got it done. It's not perfect, but I think it still looks good!

We had our monthly UFO small group meeting this week. A lot of people were able to make it so I decided to do handwork there to leave more room for others using sewing machines. This was a good opportunity to start doing the hand embroidery on my Wild Women Don't Get the Blues blocks designed by Karen K. Stone.

Wild Women Don't Get the Blues - Hand Applique

I'm randomly chosing the colors and the stitches. Originally, I was going to have some blocks with circles and some without (so with grids or scattered stitches), but after embroidering these four blocks I think I will have a circle motif in each block. I think it adds a nice coherence. But I will be varying the size of the circle in the blocks. I'm going to lightly embroider all of the blocks, then decide if more embroidery is needed. I'm guessing I'll want to keep the embroidery light, but we'll see....

We also had our monthly English Paper Piecing (EPP) small group meeting this week. It was a fun meeting, as usual, but a little more fun this month because we celebrated the birthday of one of the group members. She has celiac disease so our host's husband made a gluten-free chocolate cake. He used a King Arthur cake mix and I wanted to share it because it was incredible. Nobody, myself included, would have guessed that it was gluten-free! It was moist and tasty -- the perfect chocolate cake. I'm guessing it was the mix here, but only know that it was King Arthur and was gluten-free. I highly recommend this cake mix! Anyway, I continued to work on my La Passacaglia quilt designed by Willyne Hammerstein.  Since I usually just work on this quilt at the monthly meeting, the progress is slow but I'm loving the results! This week I finished the yellow round and started the blue and gray round.

La Passacaglia

This is the second large rosette in the quilt. I haven't started any of the small rosettes yet. This one is now too big to fit in my project bag without folding, so I think I'll try to finish it at home and then start the next large rosette at our next meeting. That way I don't have to carry around my huge project bag that I made large enough to hold the large rosettes without folding. It's a nice bag for storing the project, but not very convenient for travel.

I also pulled fabric for my great nephew's quilt this week. He is due in September or October so I have plenty of time. I found a pattern I liked at the quilt shop when we met there for our cross-stitch group a couple of weeks ago. (I'm going to try to buy something from the shop every time we meet to thank them for letting us meet there for free.) So I went through my stash this week and pulled fabrics for the top. I'll be making Night Howler designed by Art East Quilting Co. 

Night Howler

I like the color scheme that they used in the pattern, but decided to use patterned fabrics rather than solids. I looked through my stash and found fabrics that I think will work well. Week after next I'll be attending a three-day daytime-only retreat. I'll probably piece this quilt there. Then I'll have plenty of time to think about the quilting.

Finally, I also made more progress on my Kallara shawl designed by Ambah O'Brien. 

Kallara

I've made it past the widest part of the shawl and am now starting the decreases. It decreases more slowly than it increased so I'm probably about a third finished with this shawl.

Nancy

Wild Women Blocks Assembled

 Hi all -

I hope everyone is doing well! Summer is definitely here! It's been warmer than usual, but we have had some of the thunderstorms that are common this time of year. As usual, I appreciate any rain we can get! I bought a bunch of flowers that I put in pots on the deck. Probably too many, but I love them! And the hummingbirds love them, too! It's nice to have something that I can put out for the hummingbirds without worrying about attracting bears!

After putting the binding on my pink and gray quilt, I decided to assemble the blocks for my Wild Women Don't Get the Blues quilt designed by Karen K. Stone. I'd been wanting to get these block put together so I decided to do it before setting my sewing machine back up for ruler work.

Wild Women Don't Get the Blues

Wild Women Don't Get the Blues - Close-Up

I used regular copy paper for the paper foundations, rather than something easier to remove like newsprint or vellum, because I started this in one of Karen's classes and that's what she gave us. Paper piecing leaves you with lots of bias edges so they usually suggest that you don't remove the papers until everything is sewn together, but I wanted to get those papers out now when it would be easier. So I did a couple of things to be gentle with the bias edges. First, I removed the papers immediately before sewing each block together so I wouldn't take the chance of stretching a bias edge during normal handling of the units. Then, when sewing the units together, I reduced the presser foot pressure from the default 50 to around 25. This still allowed the feed dogs to control the stitch length, but reduced the pulling on the fabric especially when sewing over thick seams. For this pattern, I was sewing over six layers of fabric at the intersections. I also used a stiletto to help guide the fabric under the needle so I wasn't pulling on the fabric with my fingers. After sewing a seam, I was very careful when pressing it over. I first folded over the seam and carefully creased it with my thumbnail. For me, this works well to get a crisp seam without stretching the fabric. Then, I carefully pressed the seam, moving the iron up and down rather than sliding it around, and used a lot of steam. I feel like the steam helps correct any small stretching of the fabric. Finally, once the block was sewn together, I stay stitched around the outside of the block to help prevent stretching until I get the blocks sewn together. I plan to do some hand embroidery in the center of each block before assembling the quilt, so there will be a lot of handling of these blocks. The stay stitching should help keep them from stretching.

I also decided to make a quick bag before going back to my pink and gray quilt. I made the Sew Essential bag designed by Cheryl Von Ruden and Rosemary Wissink. I wanted to make a bag for the host of one of my sewing groups as a thank you. I looked through my patterns and chose the Sew Essential bag.

Sew Essential Bag

Sew Essential Bag - Large Pocket

Sew Essential Bag - Smaller Pockets

For the main fabric, I used a really cool batik that I bought in her little quilt shop. I never would have guessed this was a batik if it wasn't in the batik section of the shop! I know she really likes this fabric because we talked about it and she showed me where she used it in one of her quilts. I picked this bag pattern because I liked the way it would highlight the fabric. This pattern is well-written and easy to follow. I decided to make the inside pockets as suggested in the pattern. They say the large pocket is good for scissors and rotary cutters; the upper small pocket for bobbins and needle packets; and the lower small "pocket" (this pocket is open on the bottom) for spools of thread. If I make this bag again, I'll probably use lightweight stabilizer instead of Shape-Flex. I think the Shape-Flex made the pockets a bit too stiff. I might also try it with regular batting rather than the Soft and Stable suggested in the pattern. The Soft and Stable makes these smaller bags a bit stiff, although the regular batting might leave the bag too floppy. I think it's worth a try.

Finally, I started a new knitting project. I decided to start working on my Kallara shawl designed by Ambah O'Brien. 

Kallara

This is a good project for knitting group because it's mostly just garter stitch, so not much thought is involved. You just have to wrangle two balls of yarn, which is easy for me sitting on the couch at home but is a bit more difficult sitting at a table at knit group. I like the dramatic shape of this shawl along with the subtle striping.

Nancy

Added Binding to Pink and Gray Quilt

 Hi all -

I hope everyone is doing well and had a wonderful Memorial Day holiday! Life here is good. I made it to the nursery last week to pick up some flowers for the deck. I got them potted and am enjoying them. I plan to pick up some more tomorrow. I like to keep adding to my collection as we move into summer!

This week I mainly worked on my pink and gray quilt. I continued to work on the quilting. I decided to do some simple ruler work in the centers of the blocks. I decided to quilt curved lines around the edges of the center block and also across the middle of the block 

Pink and Gray Quilt - Center Block Quilting Design

This should be simple to do and also provide the needed stability. The curves around the outside of the block allowed me to do this quilting without any extra starts and stops. I have a bunch of arc-shaped rulers to choose from. To figure out which curve would work best for this, I drew a 6" square on a piece of paper in pen, then drew the quilting in pencil using the different rulers and a 1/4" spacer that I got years ago. I can put my pencil tip inside the center hole on this spacer and run it along the edge of a ruler to get the stitching line that I would get when using that ruler.

Pink and Gray Quilt - Quilting Ruler Spacer

With my chosen ruler, I concentrated on quilting all of the blocks on the outside edges of the quilt. I wanted to get these done so that I could bind the quilt because the gloves I use for quilting really pick up the batting fluff and that drives me crazy so I like to get the binding on the quilt as soon as possible. Once I got the outside blocks quilted, I could concentrate on the binding. I had thought that the fabric that I have with the pink and gray stripes would be the perfect binding for this quilt.

Pink and Gray Quilt - Auditioning Striped Binding

Pink and Gray Quilt - Auditioning Striped Binding

I tried the striped fabric both with the stripes at a diagonal (which I thought would be perfect) and with the stripes straight up and down, but didn't like either. I felt like this fabric was too light and bright and would draw attention away from the center of the quilt. Next I auditioned one of the polka dot fabrics.

Pink and Gray Quilt - Auditioning Polka Dot Fabric

I thought this was better, but was still too much for the binding, so I tried a more subdued polka dot fabric.

Pink and Gray Quilt - Auditioning Subdued Polka Dots

I liked this a lot better and decided to go for it. I then spent this weekend applying the binding. I like to sew the binding to the front of the quilt with the sewing machine, then fold it to the back and hand stitch it. It's a lot of work, but looks the cleanest to me.

Pink and Gray Quilt - Finished Binding on Front

Pink and Gray Quilt - Finished Binding on Back

Pink and Gray Quilt - Quilting Close-Up

Now I can go back and finish the quilting in the rest of the blocks.

This week we also had the first meeting of a new cross stitch group in one of my quilt guilds. The organizers didn't know if there would be much interest in the group, but we had thirteen ladies show up for the first meeting! I did some work on my Flying Beauties cross stitch.

Flying Beauties

It was a really great group and a lot of fun to have others to share my cross stitch with! The only down side was that I found out about a Web site that has some really cute downloadable cross stitch patterns, so I did end up spending some money! 😁 I look forward to our next monthly meeting!

Finally, i was able to get a little bit more done on my sampler from the big stitch class.

Big Stitch Sampler - Left Side

Big Stitch Sampler - Right Side

I would like to finish the sampler to get more practice at getting even stitches, but I'm getting annoyed with the pleats in the sandwich. I didn't have any painter's tape when we did the sandwiching, so I wasn't able to stabilize the back and get everything flat. One helpful thing I learned this week is that I probably don't want to use Valdani thread for big stitching a quilt. I used Valdani thread for the grid at the bottom of the right side of the sampler and had a lot of problem with the thread fraying. It just didn't stand up to all of the fabric and batting layers like the other brands of perl cotton I tried. It's still a lovely thread for embroidery, but doesn't work for me for this application. A great thing to learn from a sampler!

Nancy