My Guild's Challenge

This year the challenge for my guild's quilt show was 'Home'. It is described as "What home means to you. Whether it is a place: your house, a place you have fond memories of, maybe flowers or family."  I decided to make mine based on family.

After a few ideas tossed around in the middle of the night. I know that I am not alone in the late night designing department. I finally settled on a brilliant idea, all my ideas are brilliant at least I think they are. I wanted a heart and family.

A red heart that said home, maybe some flowers as I love flowers and maybe a picture of my family. Everything spiraled from there. The challenge had a mind of it's own. 

First the red fabric. I couldn't find anything I liked and I wanted something that said home. I could have appliqued it, or stitched it or even used fabric markers all would have been fine. But I choose to go another direction I had fabric printed from Spoonflower, that I designed with 'Home where family is sewn into the fabric of my Life' printed on it.

fabric from Spooflower minus a heart shape

Once the fabric arrived I quickly cut into as you can see in the above photo. Next up the flowers, for which I first applied Steam a Seam 2 Lite to the back of the flower fabrics, before cutting the flowers out. I had and still have a lot of flowers cut out.

flowers, flowers and more flowers and this was after finishing the piece

I printed out pictures of my family, sorry no in-laws. I asked my family if they all wanted to be included and my daughter in-laws said no so I decided my son in-law wasn't going to make the cut either. My hubby doesn't want his picture front and center so I coloured him out of the photos.

first layout

One nice thing about the Steam a Seam it allows you to easily move the pieces around as long as they are not pressed down. I put them on a piece of pattern ease (Pattern Ease is a polyester non woven tracing material that can be used to create pattern pieces or sewn into projects as a light weight interfacing or stabilizer.), as the fabric pieces would be fused down to it. I cut the fused piece from the pattern ease along the outer edges, then appliqued the whole piece onto the background fabric latter. I wasn't happy with the first layout and moved the family around a lot until I settled on the final layout. 

I was right into the piece and forgot to take pictures along the way.

thread work

 I used Superiors monopoly for appliqueing the piece to the background. Then I cut loose using my favourite threads, Aurifil for the thread work, there where a lot of colour changes and burying of thread tails. 

a selection of Aurifil threads where used

I should have done more thread work before I started quilting it, but as I said earlier this project had a mind of it's own and decided I should add more thread work.

the back of the piece showing some of the thread work

And now for the big reveal in amongst my hostas.

my home, my happy place

These are the people who hold my love and will always come first. They are the 'Fabric of my Life'.

If you are in the area come and see what our show has to offer. We have quilts aplenty, a boutique and vendors. Some of the vendors are Sue Patten, K&A Quilts, Caroline Quilts. Even if you're not close by come on down. The show is at the Norwich Historical Museum, 89 Stover St. Norwich Ontario. 

Friday June 7th  12PM to 5PM

Saturday June 8th 10AM to 4PM

 

Star Baby Quilt A Finish

Every new baby should have a quilt to call their own. Right? Especially when the baby is a quilters granddaughter. On march 10th our 5th granddaughter Jamie was born she was 6lbs 3 0z. She is just as precious as our first. On to her quilt, I designed it in EQ7, I am slowly getting the hang of it....sometimes.

original  concept designed in EQ7 

On the design wall.

layout progress before a necessary design change

I did the quilty math, measured twice but the sewing gremlins came anyway. The star center went together smoothly but after that it was all downhill. I did change the circle in the center for an appliqued heart.

 

one would think these pieces when sewn together with a 1/4'' would align...nope! 

Aligning the rays that extended out from the star was a big problem that no amount of wine would help. The offset was a 1/4'' but when sewn together they DID not align. I used my seam ripper more times than I ever thought possible.  Sorry no photos as I was totally frustrated by then. Remade a couple pieces. After holding my breath and praying to the quilting god's it worked! A couple of design changes now needed to take place as I no longer had enough of the dark pink to continue as planned. 

star straight line quilting

The quilting I wanted to keep simple as I wanted the quilt to be cuddly and not over quilted. So simple straight lines following the star points and rays. I used Aurifil threads #'s 2021, 2440,5018 and 2730. Matching the threads to the fabric, made for more burying of threads but I'm glad I did it.

more lines and loopy l's

The first border got loopy l's, the dark pink more straight lines, which I repeated in the pink corners. The white corners I did figure 8's in.

I quilted her name in the white space at the bottom of the pinwheels

A look at the finished quilt. Even though I had to make some changes I like how it turned out.

 the design changes happened in the borders and the corners

Of course what baby quilt is complete without a picture of Jamie using using it.

enjoying some tummy time

For the backing I used an adorable print. I picked this up for less than $5/m.

back of quilt

I normally use Hobbs Heirloom Premium 80/20 Batting.  I have a wool allergy so that is about the only batting I haven't tried. What is your favourite batting?

Pattern Release God's Eye

I am excited to be able to release my first full pattern. It is called 'God's Eye' thanks to Sandra of mmm!quilts for suggesting the name.

no leaves but the tree branch still makes a good quilt holder

This pattern started as a block design idea that grew. The initial design a 6'' block became the center of the Mini Round Robin from last year. You can read more about that here.

main block of the pattern

I did some dot to dot straight line quilting and curls in the background. I didn't do any quilting except for in the ditch around the green, orange and grey. I did a spiral in the black centers. and loops in the grey squares.

back of quilt 

God's Eye is a paper piecing pattern. The pattern includes cutting instructions for a Baby size quilt, Lap size quilt and Twin size Quilt. It assumes some basic knowledge of paper piecing. The pattern uses six different fabrics including the background fabric.

It is currently $8 in my Craftsy store.

lap size 

Hurry up Finish

As you read this the wedding quilt has been made and gifted. You can read about it here. The wedding was lovely and we had a great time. The nice thing about small weddings is everyone knows each other and the conversation just flows. I thoroughly enjoyed myself, for a few hours the worries melted away.

finished with time to spare

The designing and making of this quilt was a mad crazy rush. Why oh why did I do this to myself? As I told my friend the bride 'only for a special friend would I have made a quilt in such a short time.' She loved it.

I couldn't find the sun to take better pictures in, it's that overcast time of year. Oh well the pictures must be taken as everyone wants a little eye candy. The four patch blocks went together quickly. 

four patches in a four patch.

The star blocks I made and used a template to cut the points, and wonder of wonders from the first one to the last one everything fit perfectly. This quilt was cooperating, that doesn't happen very often. My seam ripper for once was quit, no rip, rip rip this time around. Not to worry it gets lots of workout on a regular basis.

star blocks fit perfectly

For the quilting I did simple loops and leaves using Aurifil 2605 on top and Superior bottom line in the bobbin. I may have gone a little crazy stitching them, I got in the flow and there was no stopping me. My hubby said I had the peddle to the medal.

flange binding

I made my first flanged binding! What a great way to finish up a quilt that little pop of colour that the flange gives, in my opinion added to the overall effect. I like how this quilt turned out, and may have given myself a little pat on the back for a job well done. I even finished with time to spare.

back

I knew I wouldn't have time to piece a backing so I used a gray mottled wide backing. 

Now it's back to the slower more relaxed type of sewing. I'm working on my 150 Canadian Women blocks in celebration of Canada's 150th birthday. Three blocks are released every week with a story of a Canadian women with every block, week 7 is the latest release. I have week one, 6 and 7 done. I may be playing catchup with these. 

week 7 top row, week 6 second row, week 1 bottom row

I am going to make them using my scrap reds and whites. The blocks are 6'' finished so some of the little pieces of white on whites are getting used up, hopefully I'll get all those little bits and pieces used up on this project. I may have to get a few red FQ's, we'll see how things progress first.

Linking up to 

Needle and Thread Thrusday

Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Sew Fresh Quilts

 

Medallion BOM Finished

This was slow going but at last I have a finish in plenty of time to give as a Christmas gift for my oldest son. You can read about this quilt here.  We have no sun which makes it hard to get good pictures. No snow either!

No snow yet! But also no sun.

The first border I added was simply HST's with a strip of background fabric added to each end to make the border fit. Then a strip of background fabric and a final strip of the same fabric as the sashing and inner border. It finished up at 70'' but after tossing it in the washer and dryer it finishes at 67 1/2''s square. I love a quilt fresh out of the dryer showing all the texture of the quilting. 

I did try out some ruler work with the ruler foot toe, you can read more about the foot here. Amy from Amy's Free Motion Quilting Adventures has a Craftsy class which I have already taken,this is an affiliate link. I only have one ruler but I know I will be buying more soon. 

It did take a bit to get used to moving the ruler with the fabric and I have, as my one granddaughter said a couple 'hills' where the I didn't move everything together as a unit. But overall I was impressed hills and all. As you can tell it doesn't take much to get me excited.

ruler work complete with 'hills'

harder to see the ruler work in this one mainly the background.

On top of that I have hardly any scraps from this project I made a scrappy binding, by sewing 1 1/2'' strips of all the red fabrics, together then cutting them at a 45 degree angle at 2 1/4'' for my binding width, then I sewed the cut strips together to make over 320'' of binding. I like the effect of the scrappy binding.

scrappy binding

By the way I fixed the block with the corners going the wrong way read about that here. I appliqued a  new piece over each corner and quilted them.  

all fixed

The colours in the quilt would have shown up better if Mr. Sun would have made an appearance.

hanging in a tree

I was going to make a table runner and a couple other things I had in mind for Christmas, maybe next year. I don't have a single thing wrapped and Christmas is next week....

Are you ready for Christmas?

'Spring is Sprung'

I have a hard time naming my quilts. The colours in this one said spring and after the winter we had I am so glad to see spring, although the last few days have felt like summer.

I did the FMQing on my domestic sewing machine. This is a picture heavy post today. There are 6 pieced block in two different colour settings and 8 white blocks diagonally through the center. The pattern was a BOM from my guild. I am more of a traditional quilter but this looks more modern. 

The negative space through the center I had fun with. I sketched out an idea on paper first with leaves and dragonflies I didn't do the flowers when I quilted it.

I should have quilted it a little less as it is denser than I like. 

I hope this shows the diagonal movement created by the vines.

I tried out different ideas in each of the 6 blocks and repeated them in their counterparts. 

Some feathers in the outer border and a small scroll in the green border.

the first picture is before washing.

After washing. 

Catch up

If you are here from Vicki at 2 Bags Full Grow Your Blog party. Thank you for stopping by. My post for the party is here.

I hate to admit it but I am not a very good blogger. Maybe I'll get better with more practice.  

I've been busy finishing up my Grand Illusion Mystery by Bonnie Hunter. This will probably be my first and last mystery quilt I do. I am glad I didn't make all 25 blocks as I really don't like it very much, too many things going on with it and no place for the eyes to rest. Maybe I shouldn't admit that as I do like scrappy quilts. Just not this one. 

I made 16 blocks added the 2 inch border all around then the pieced border on the top and bottom.

I made blocks from the border pieces I didn't use for the back. I pieced the rest of the back from my stash I have one shelf of stuff I've had it seems like forever. So I am trying to use as much as of it possible. This back eliminated 3 pieces, but lots more to go. 

My daughter likes the back better than the front. A friend suggested I use her long arm to quilt it, and I may take her up on it. I just want it done.

Ugly Fabric Challenge

We had an ugly fabric challenge in our guild. We each brought  a one yard piece of ugly fabric. The way it worked was the first piece, is cut in half you keep half and pass the other half to the person next to you. Then cut the new piece in half again keeping half and passing the other half on  continue until the smallest piece is about 2 and 1/2 inches. We ended up with 8 pieces from 1/2 yard to a 2 1/2 inch square. We could add two other fabrics of our own. 

It was fun and interesting to see what everyone made. The challenge results were varied. There was a vest, table runners, wall hangings, table topper and doll quilts.

I made a doll quilt. The inspiration of the butterfly was from Pinterest. I practiced some free motion feathers. 

Justin's Path

Finally finished I have been busy doing the quilting on this quilt for my youngest son's Christmas gift this past week. His favorite colour is red. There are 5 different reds in the goosey blocks. I didn't have a pattern but saw the block when surfing on Pinterest. The Rolling Star Pattern are paper pieced from Wombat Quilts. I used three, one each to represent his family, my DIL and their two daughters.
I Free motion quilted it on my domestic machine. I should have taken a few close ups of the FMQing. The larger negative spaces I used wavy lines to help make it soft and flighty like. I stippled around the stars after stitching in the ditch around them first to make them have a little pop. Overall I like how it turned out.
Since I have been doing more free motion work I can see the difference in my stitches I'm not saying I'm anywhere near expert but I am most certainly improving.   
I took this outside today trying to get some good light to take it in. Red and blacks are hard to get good pictures of.  You will notice no snow, which is fine by me..LOL

Linking up to Sew Fresh Quilts and Pat Sloan and Freemotion by the River and Quiltville's A Very Merry Happy Holiday Linky Party