More Cathedral Windows

My Handwork group met yesterday and I took the opportunity to finish my little Cathedral Windows block.  While I do enjoy handwork, I don't think I'll be making a whole quilt of these!  Sewing back the curved part is great, but I really did not like how long it took to get to that point with the prep work involved in sewing all the white squares together by hand.  If I were planning to do a larger project, I might combine the hand and machine techniques by sewing the background (white) squares together by machine and then doing the curve part by hand.  (You can see my post about the results of my machine-made block here.)

I would also have some practicing to do with folding the background squares as you can see that this block is nowhere near square!

I do love the shapes this blocks make - petal and "star" shapes are some of my favorites.  In fact, the project that I usually work on with my Handwork group includes some of those shapes as well.

(For those of you who went back to read the linked post - I guess 2010 was not the year that quilt got finished :) - maybe 2011?)

Have you tried Cathedral Windows?

Little Projects

I've been working on a few small projects lately. 

At our last Brighton Modern Quilters meeting we all agreed to make nametags for ourselves for future meetings.  I decided to make my nametag about 4" wide and 2 1/2" high and that I wanted to use satin stitch to write my name.  I thought about doing fusible applique, but the size made it impractical.  Since I was using satin stitch, I thought a script font would look nice.  So I used MS Word, found a font I liked (Lucida Handwriting) and printed out my name.  Holding the paper up to a window, I traced it onto the light green fabric, leaving out a few of the flourishes.

Using Stitch N' Tear stabilizer, I satin stitched over the traced script.  It has a few wobbles, but it is still readable and I decided not to aim for perfect.  Next, I added the darker bottom border and a small fold at the top of the back that I can put a pin in to attach the nametag.  I had some really heavy duty fusible I had purchased with the idea of making a sewing machine cover (still on the long list), so I cut this to size and inserted it, pressed and topstitched around the edges.

Next I addressed the machine method of Cathedral Windows that Leanne of the Ann Arbor MQG had shown us at our sew-in last Sunday.  I haven't decided whether I want to add more to this or not, so the edges are unfinished so far.  Ginia showed us a hand sewing method that I am still working on.

I also finished a mug rug for our mug rug swap at our AAMQG meeting on Wednesday.  I can't show you yet since we will be wrapping them up for the swap, but I'll let you see after the meeting and also see which mug rug I end up with.

Oh yeah AND FedEx delivered this luscious set of fat quarters on Friday morning!!

{ Modern } Relief - Japan

Like so many others, I have been stunned by the devastation in Japan.  My older daughter was part of a ten-day exchange student program with Hikone, Japan when she was 14.  She has long loved all things Japanese and returned from the trip wanting to go back.  That hasn't happened yet, but I know it will one day.

As a quilter, my first response to need in others is to make them a quilt.  With that in mind, I have joined the group at { Modern } Relief - Japan.  There are about 90 (!) quilters who will be making quilts and raffling off chances to win them.  For every $10 you donate to MercyCorps, you'll get one ticket for the quilt raffle.  The official kick-off is April 4.  More details on this later.

I haven't decided if I'll make a new quilt or use one I have.  What do you think?  Have you seen a quilt here that would be good for the raffle?  Should I make one from one of my patterns?  Share your opinion and I'll take it all into account as I work out which way to go.

Almost Wordless Wednesday...

Rebekah's block for the Mid Mod Bee.  You can see her request and inspiration post here.

Hope you like it and it works well with the others, Rebekah!

Summer Classes

Sometimes my quilty brain is going in too many different directions.  I was so busy thinking about our get together today with the Ann Arbor Modern Quilt Guild to learn how to do Cathedral Windows that I totally forgot to put this post up this morning.  I'll share my Cathedral Windows project when I get a little more done.

You may remember a couple of sneak peeks I showed you here and here in February.  Well, yesterday was the day the Greater Ann Arbor Quilt Guild unveiled the class offerings for Quilting Unlimited 2011.  (Yes, I belong to three guilds - the other one is the Brighton Modern Quilters).

So, for any of you who live in the area, here is what I'll be teaching.  All day Friday, July 29 will be "Holiday Pillow Trio".  We'll be making these 16" pillows (top picture) and learning about envelope and zipper closures.  All day Saturday, July 30 I'll be teaching Beginning Quilting (middle picture).  The project we will be working on is this sudoku inspired nine-patch.  Sunday afternoon, July 31, we'll be working with free form bias on my Celebration Table Runner (bottom picture). 

You can get more information about Quilting Unlimited from the website.  There are over 50 classes being offered during the three day event, so browse around the website and see what you can find!

Members of the Greater Ann Arbor Quilt Guild have priority to sign up for classes until April 16 when registration opens to the general public.  My understanding is that there is a $20 registration fee for non-guild members.  Guild membership itself is only $35 a year so, if you are interested in attending any other guild lectures or workshops during the rest of the year, it might be worth it to go ahead and join.  Check here for info on upcoming events.

I think this post takes the prize for the most links I have ever included :)

Appropriate St. Patrick's Day quilting

The Brighton Modern Quilters decided several months ago to work on modern sampler quilts.  We chose two blocks for people to do each month for three months.  The original idea was to use modern fabrics.  However, as I was trying to decide what fabric to use, I was reminded by Crazy Mom Quilts scrap quilts series, how much I love monochromatic scrap quilts.  Since I intended this to be a charity quilt and had an overflowing green fabric container, the choice seemed obvious.  The quilt does end up looking more traditional than modern but I'm OK with that.  As you can see, I have another square in a square block to do.  I don't have another green print that has a large enough print to be the focus fabric, so I haven't decided what to do about that yet.

The quilt was roughly designed to include twelve 12" blocks with three inch sashing to finish at about 48" x 63".  My plan is to make another twelve blocks to add to these to make a quilt that is approximately 63" x 81" (which is the size the charity requests).  I just love those Dutchman's Puzzle blocks!  There is something about all those flying geese going round in a "circle" that just makes me smile :)

Hourglass blocks for Trudi

This week I'm trying to catch up on bee blocks.  The first two are for Trudi of The Bee's Knees VQB.  Trudi lives in England and it took about six weeks for her fabric to get to most of us.  Just when I was about to conclude it had been lost, it arrived!  Trudi's fabric choices will make a nice, summery quilt.

We are nearing the end of this bee and I still haven't quilted my Bee's Knees quilt.  It is all pinned and ready to go.  (The picture was when it was still on the design wall.)  Part of the problem is I had a very elaborate quilting plan in mind that had paths connecting the houses.  I think I might revise the plan to something much simpler as I'm worried that the busyness of the fabric won't support the complicated quilting very well, especially on the darker background parts.  What do you think?

Craving neutrals

I love neutral quilts and have wanted to make another one for a while.  Yoshiko Jinjenzi (see this post) uses a lot of neutrals in her quilts and reading her book added to my neutral desire.  But it was this Etsy shop that pushed me into action.  This art made of wood is so amazing I can't even tell you how much I love it.

So I got out my creams, beiges and taupes and many of my fabrics with text on them and put this little pillow together.  I am very pleased with how it turned out.  I think it is interesting without being too busy.

The only drawback to this pillow is how long it took me to put it together!  I don't usually work with so many small pieces.  Most of the strips on this pillow were cut at between 1" and 1 1/2" and about 6" long.  You lose a lot of fabric in the seams when you work that small.  Still, it was worth it for a pillow, but I am not likely to do a whole quilt this way!

I have made two other neutral quilts, one of which was a Christmas gift that was so last-minute I never took a photo of it.  Creme Francaise is the other one.  Early readers of my blog may remember it from this post.  I know there is a bed-sized neutral quilt in my future sometime!

Modern Day Quilts!

My LinesSpring quilt was featured on Modern Day Quilts yesterday!  I just found this blog myself fairly recently and love the daily eye candy.  Click on over and have a look :)

A sweet little quilt

My Cherry House Quilts Quilt Along quilt is finished!  This was such a fun project to do.  I love the simplicity of the design and it was great to know that a lot of other people were working on the same project at the same time.  Cherri is planning to develop this quilt into a pattern for a larger quilt so keep an eye on her blog for when that is available.

The only departure I really made from Cherri's design was to use the darker binding.  I was literally sitting down to sew the matching binding on when I stopped and decided to use a darker one.  Looking at it now, I'm not sure that was the best decision.

For the quilting, I quilted along each side of the columns of squares, every two inches in between the columns and, in one of the two inch sections, I quilted another line to make two one inch sections.  In addition, I added three horizontal quilting lines near the top of the quilt and five near the bottom.  I washed and dried the quilt as I often do.  It seems a little more wrinkled than usual to me.  I used a different batting than usual in either this quilt or LinesSpring.  I know I wrote down which one it was somewhere, but I can't find it in the pile of bits of paper on which I have written too many notes to myself!  Another possibility for the extra wrinkling might be that, since it is such as small quilt (about 34" x 38"), it didn't tumble much in the dryer - I think it stayed pretty much in the same position.

My next project has lots of small pieces of fabric and is taking me much longer to piece than I expected.  Stay tuned...

LinesSpring

It has been quite warm here for the past few days (above freezing), so the snow has been melting, but there is still plenty on the ground.  I'm looking forward to seeing the crocuses, snowdrops and grape hyacinths coming up.  I was thinking about the carpet of these little flowers you sometimes see in early spring when I chose the colors for this quilt. 

You may remember that I made a Fall version of this quilt so I wasn't sure if I should make another one.  But, I love the way this design distills things down to the basics.  For the Fall version, I used one variegated thread and quilted many horizontal lines.  For the Spring version, I used the same horizontal lines, but chose three different threads.  Following the idea of the naturalized bunches of flowers in the woods, I made "puddles" of variegated thread around the (mostly) matching colored pieces in the quilt.

I had originally intended to use a green variegated thread too, but I stitched one line and decided the greens did not cooperate with each other.  I opted to leave it out rather than interrupt myself with a trip to the store.

Inspiration!

I went to the Brighton Modern Quilters meeting on Monday night.   We had scheduled a sit and stitch, but I forgot about that until I was walking out the door.  I went anyway and had a great time.  We all had lots of fun projects and ideas to share. 

One of the members brought this book.  As soon as she held it up, I blurted out "Oh, I want that book so much."  Of course, I didn't mean HER book, but since it is not really her style, she offered to swap me a pattern or two for it and I jumped at the chance.  The cover quilt is a good indication of much of the content that I have browsed so far.  Spare design - right up my alley!  I can't wait until I have a chance to sit down and actually read it :)  The title is "Quilting Line + Color:  Techniques and Designs for Abstract Quilts" by Yoshiko Jinzenji (published by Interweave Press).

There are so many great quilt books coming out, I could go nuts buying them.  I try to limit my buying to ones I think I absolutely MUST have.  That doesn't always eliminate many of them.

Do you have a favorite new quilt book?