En Provence Top: Finished

En Provence Top Finished
En Provence Top Finished

Nobody died.

I have just been really busy and haven’t taken the time to post. It is that time of year and my evenings have been spent writing Christmas cards.

The En Provence Mystery Quilt top is finished. I finished it last weekend, I think, and I am pleased with the way it turned out.

You can only see part of it as I only had one quilt holder available. I hope to get a better shot before I send it off to its new home.

Various & Sundry 2017 #16

Doing Good

Quilters in Petaluma are seeking blocks 6×6, 9×9 and 12×12 to be made into bed sized quilts. They can be sent to:
Sonoma Strong
C/O NorCal Sew & Vac
909 D Street
San Rafael, CA 94901

The requests I told you about last month are still valid. Check them out at: Various & Sundry 2017 #15

Projects

Tim posted a picture of the pincushion I made for him in use!

I like the Trail Mix pattern, though not the colors, from AllPeopleQuilt.com. I’d like to see it in brighter, fresher colors. I wish they would make a few so people with different tastes can see the variations. It is free, so go download it for use when you have a lot of scraps.

Several clues for Bonnie Hunter’s Holiday Mystery quilt project have already been posted. Part One, all about making 9 patches, came out on Black Friday. Part Two came out recently. In it you make a bunch of Flying Geese. As usual, I am not doing it during the time of the mystery. I may do it later, but I am still working on En Provence, the mystery quilt from last year, so I don’t really see the point of starting a new mystery quilt. I also need to get some of my own projects off my plate.

City Quilter has a good deal on their Grand Central Pillowcase Kit: the kit makes two pillowcases for $28.

Tools, Supplies & Notions

Creative Grids has a full listing of all of its rulers. They suggest printing it and taking it with you when you go ruler shopping. I find this hilarious, but it is an excellent, comprehensive list to keep on your computer.

Techniques

My Self-bordering essay has gotten a lot of traction, about which I am inordinately pleased. Have you read it? What do you think?

I have heard a lot about wall basting. Anything to get me off my knees and the floor. The fabulous Christa Watson has a tutorial. The tutorial includes a link to her free Modern Puzzle quilt pattern,

Donation Block Prep

At the meeting on Saturday, Michelle reported that the guild had donated 175 quilts to various organizations. I can’t tell you how amazing that is. That is about 2 1/3 quilts per member! It is really a great team effort.

Donation Block Prep
Donation Block Prep

After my last post about donation blocks, I had to do some prep to be able to make more. The first thing I did was cut up some charm squares of white. At first, I just cut a few, then on a recent Craft Night, I cut up the entire pack and now have a ton of backgrounds.

I have not yet cut more foreground fabrics. I really want to use the dregs. I know I am not a fan of them, but they are perfectly fine fabrics that need to be used.

ME Check donation block - Nov/Dec n.21
ME Check donation block – Nov/Dec n.21

I made one more block before the meeting, bringing my total since the last meeting to 21.

I also checked out my bin to see what was still left. I have some plaids that I will put into a block together. I also have those sunset kind of fabrics. I cut many, many squares from them and will have to just suck it up and make a bunch of blocks from them. They will look good together and I might have enough for a whole quilt.

Bin of donation patches
Bin of donation patches

My little bin of donation patches is pretty empty. The top fabric is the sunset fabric. We’ll see what I can make from this weird assortment.

Anchor Quilt

BAMaQG Anchor Quilt
BAMaQG Anchor Quilt

Tim and I worked on the Anchor quilt on Saturday. This is a true group project. Gerre organized it. Christina did the piecing. I appliqued on the anchor and Tim will do the quilting. The last time I talked about this quilt was back in June and it has been languishing. Now we are back on track!

Saturday, he did everything and I just stood there and helped him pin and gave my opinion.

BAMaQG Anchor Quilt back
BAMaQG Anchor Quilt back

We had to work on the back a little bit. The back was two large pieces and the big area of white was bugging Tim. We talked about different things we could do and finally decided on adding a piece that Christina had started sort of 1/3 of the way down the quilt. I think it broke up the white enough for comfort.

We also looked at quilting ideas. Tim had some ideas in mind and they were good. We found a couple that we thought would reflect the them and he will do the quilting soon.

Gift Post #1 – 2017

One of the reasons I didn’t make more progress on En Provence over the Thanksgiving Weekend was that I needed to make a gift. The BAM Winter Extravaganza Palooza Party and Swap was yesterday. I had decided to participate, but sewing time was short, so I picked a pattern I knew well and devoted a day to it.

Jane Market Tote for Mary
Jane Market Tote for Mary

Mary C wanted a grocery bag, so I got out the Jane Market Tote pattern and made it using some Carrie Bloomston fabrics that I have had for awhile. Her request was that the bag be made in green. The fabric is green, but tending towards teal/turquoise so I hoped it would be ok. I made an effort to do a  really nice job sewing. For once, I paid attention to the top stitching and did all that the pattern suggests.

I sew my straps on differently than the pattern suggests, so I also did some top stitching with a decorative stitch at the top of the bag. I made a note to myself on the pattern to leave a little more of the strap in the seam allowance next time. I hope that the decorative stitching will keep the handles from pulling out.

Jane Market Tote: Amazing Piecing!
Jane Market Tote: Amazing Piecing!

When I looked at the outside, I was shocked to see some of the amazing piecing. I can’t take much credit, though, because I couldn’t really have lined up the fabric any better, if I had tried. And I didn’t try!

I don’t know how I did it, but was very pleased when I saw the way the joins had come together.

Jane Market Tote: Amazing piecing by pocket
Jane Market Tote: Amazing piecing by pocket

This amazing piecing happened in a couple of places. I knew that Mary would notice eventually so I showed her after she opened the gift and she was pleased. She appreciates stuff like that.

The inside is plain. No pockets. I have to figure out where would be appropriate to add an inside pocket sometime. I didn’t do it for this iteration.

CQFA December 2017 Meeting

Works displayed at A Work of Heart
Works displayed at A Work of Heart

CQFA was last Saturday, as I mentioned in the ATC post, and was held in our new space. Andrea at A Work of Heart is allowing us to use the space on Saturdays when the shop is closed. Marie and Maureen worked really hard to arrange for us to use the space. It is a gorgeous space and I HAVE to look at the calendar and pick out a class to take soon. The artwork in the space really reflects Andrea’s style. It is bright and cheerful and I would want it all in my house.

Some of us exchanged ATCs. We each presented some work and our thoughts about our work of the year. I talked about how few quilts I had made and how they were really complicated and had a lot of piecing. I brought part of En Provence, the scarves I have knitted, my Triple Star blocks and a few other things.

Dolores' Galaxy
Dolores’ Galaxy

Dolores brought her 3D pieces and also her fabulous galaxy project. The Galaxy has bits of Cherrywood lint needle-felted into the background. There are also little sparkles. This is a wonderful project.

She also brought her 3D cube and we discussed that awhile.

Gladys' book
Gladys’ book

Gladys, a potential new member, brought a book she made. I like the book aspects, but I also really like the botanical drawings (?not sure about this). Every time I go to CQFA, I want to make the book Maureen and I discussed. After seeing this one, I know I have to make it soon.

Sonja showed her fabulous sketchbooks and talked about her new and fancy Brother machine. Diane showed her silk paintings and talked about working smaller. Maureen showed her finished hashtag quilt. We worked on it with her at the October meeting and she was able to move forward after our discussion. The piece is great.

The meeting was great and I enjoyed it.

En Provence Almost the end

I made a lot of progress on the En Provence quilt and it is nearing the conclusion.

En Provence -December 2017
En Provence -December 2017

I started out Saturday afternoon sewing the two halves of the top together. Then I laid out the quilt to see where I was. It was really great to see almost the whole quilt laid out. I think it looks really great.

After seeing the quilt so close to completion, I was on fire to sew the last 4 rows. I took everything back upstairs and laid on that bottom corner on my design wall.  I didn’t have much more time to do that on Saturday and no time to sew.

En Provence Beginning - Dec. 3, 2017
En Provence Beginning – Dec. 3, 2017

Laying out the last corner was huge, though. I found I was missing a couple of Peaky & Spike blocks, so I had to cut some fabric to finish those. It was good, though, because I could switch out some of the Peaky & Spike blocks that I hadn’t yet sewn.

After we came back from a NSGW event on Sunday afternoon, I put the pedal to the metal on my sewing machine and sewed 3 rows. I know there are only 3 blocks left in each row, but there is still a lot of piecing. I also have to add the border and that makes some of the blocks larger, thus more time consuming to sew.

En Provence - 3 good rows
En Provence – 3 good rows

I ended up with what I thought was 3 good rows.

Standing back really helps and I found a mistake. I stopped after the mistake block. It was really too late for me to be sewing anyway and I’d already had to rip out two sections of that block.

En Provence Ooops
En Provence Ooops

Except for the two pieces, I am pleased with how this quilt came out. It is not insane like Grand Illusion, but it was complex enough to keep me interested and interesting enough to want to continue to look at it.

I’ll fix it next time….whenever that is.

Mostly Manor Lozenge Quilt

Mostly Manor Lozenge Quilt after quilting
Mostly Manor Lozenge Quilt after quilting

Colleen has been working on the Lozenge quilt on and off for a few weeks. Today she sent me a photo showing that my binding was too short -WAY too short.

duh.

Clearly I have too much on my mind. I knew how big the quilt was. I made the binding what I thought was the right size. Clearly, it wasn’t.

The quilt is coming back to me. I will finish the binding (another thing to add to my to do list) and then I will be able to send it off. From what I can see of the quilting, it looks good.

Even More Donation Blocks

You must be getting sick of my donation block craze. I really do want to add more blocks and quilt tops to my 2017 list, so I made 5 more blocks on Sunday.

I worked on them while I was piecing the last quarter of En Provence. The blocks seemed to fly out of my machine despite the fact that I was really struggling to find backgrounds.

I have been working through my  little bin of donation patches since I started on this binge. After 20 blocks, I have few backgrounds and a lot of fabrics that I am tired of using. Still, I was determined not to cut more backgrounds until I absolutely had to. I decided, after I made the Cal block (blue and yellow) that I needed to see if I had some charm packs.

The blue and yellow block as well as some of the others will be difficult to use with the standard blocks others make. There is some thing about using up as much as you can before you have to cut more background.

Eventually, I went to my tote of charm packs and found two of white fabric. I started cutting up one of them, so my next batch of donation blocks will be pretty standard.

ATCs – December 2017

October 2017 ATCs for CQFA
October 2017 ATCs for CQFA

The CQFA meeting was yesterday. It was a great meeting and we met in a new space, which is hopeful for the future of the group.

I used the ATCs that I made for the October meeting. As you might recall, nobody else made them so I had nobody with whom to trade. 🙁

It ended up being ok, because I probably wouldn’t have made them for this time since time has been short and I have been crazily piecing on En Provence.

CQFA December 2017 Meeting ATCs
CQFA December 2017 Meeting ATCs

I was really pleased that only four people were trading. I wanted one of my own and wouldn’t have felt right about taking one if more people had been trading. I could have made another, and that was my plan, but I didn’t get around to it.

My December ATCs
My December ATCs

From Left to Right (see second photo, above), Bron, Jaye, Diane and Maureen all made cards to trade. Since there were only four of us, we all got one of each.

Now, on to making cards for the next meeting.

26 Projects – December 2017 Edition

All of those year end lists will soon be out, including my year-end summing up. It’s been a few months since I did an inventory of my works in progress, so I thought this was a good time.

Finished 2017 Quilt Projects

Finished 2017 Non-Quilt Projects
While finished quilts are still a bit thin on the ground, I have been sewing. I have finished a lot of small projects, I am working on quilts and I have one more quilt finished this year than I did last time.

This year so far I have used 157 yards of fabric making the above along with donation blocks and tops. I am finally in the black in terms of usage.

Doing Good

In Process
The  ‘In Process’ is used to denote projects on which I am actively working or pretending to stitch. I try not to put away projects, because that will ensure I never work on them.

  • City Sampler – blocks all made. Need to sash the blocks and finish putting the top together. Due to some issues I had with my seam allowance, some of the blocks are smaller than others, so I will have to adjust them in some way – either adding a piece or two to the block or with sashing. This is sort of a sticking point and while I consider this quilt ‘in process’ I haven’t worked on it.
  • Dots & Stripes HST Quilt (or Something) – half square triangle blocks are made. I laid them out and see what is what with them. These blocks did not turn out as planned. I will put them together and donate the top to Charity.
  • English Paper Piecing Project– half hexies – I haven’t worked on this in awhile since I have been knitting while I watch TV. I’ll get back to it.
  • En Provence – I have three quarters of the quilt put together and am nearing the end.
  • FOTY 2016 – I didn’t capitalize on my excitement after seeing the Ellsworth Kelly exhibit and now I have lost that rush. I still need to get on it. I’d like to get the top finished by the end of the year, if nothing els.
  • Lobster – I still have more stitching to do and then I need to quilt it.
  • Triple Star: The blocks are all made and I have an idea of how to lay it out.
  • Under the Sea: class project; like the design and am happier with the colors. I had an idea for it and would like to finish it by the end of the year.

Still WIPs
I still have WIPs. Who doesn’t, after all? A project in the ‘UFO’ category means I am stalled. A nicer way of saying UFO is a WIP. The list is a lot shorter and the projects are newer, for the most part.

  1. Aqua-Red Sampler – I need to lay the blocks out and put the piece together.
  2. BAMaQG IRR – I have decided to quilt it and donate it to charity.
  3. BAMaQG Color Round Robin – no progress.
  4. Octagon 9 Patch: It is ready to put together. I could have used it as leaders and enders for a number of different projects I have going. I didn’t, mostly because I have a lot I can use as leaders and enders. Not sure what I am waiting for. Do I want to lay out the blocks more carefully? I actually have a plan for it, so I should get on it. I should do a lot of things.
  5. The Tarts Come to Tea: I still haven’t worked on this since April 2011, though, I did bring it to the 2017 CQFA Retreat as a potential project. It is still in a prominent location so I have easy access. I plan to bring it to the BAMaQG retreat.
  6. Pointillist Palette #4: Fourth is a series of 6 quilts; needs tiny square patches sewn together. No progress.
  7. Pies and Points from Victoria Findlay Wolfe class. No further progress. I did wash the background fabric I found when I went to Portland, so I am ready to cut. I need to focus on this and it is not up high enough on the list yet.
  8. Self Portrait: started in 2006 at a class at Quilting Adventures in Richmond, Virginia. I am stalled on this again. Again, I didn’t capitalize on the excitement I got from my career counselor and now the feeling is lost.
  9. Serendipity Lady Quilt: no progress.
  10. Stepping Stones #2 – I am still ready to make the border blocks , but haven’t gone beyond designing them yet.
  11. Stripes & Dots HST quilt – need to sew blocks together.

Ready for Quilting

  • Nothing at the moment

In Quilting Process

  • Mostly Manor Lozenge quilt – Colleen is quilting it and I sent her the bindinga  few days ago.
  • Thanksgiving tablemat – I started quilting this piece at the 2017 CQFA Retreat. I made good progress, but it isn’t finished yet. It will be another BAMaQG retreat project.
  • Theoretically, the Tarts Come to Tea is in the quilting process, though I haven’t worked on it in a while.  See above.

Binding

Nothing at the moment

Hunting and Gathering

  • 30 Something: I am still cutting 1.5 inch squares. I am pretty sure I have the 800 I need, but I am not ready to sew them together yet, so whenever I have a chance I cut more. It will give me choice when the time comes. I’ll have to think up a new name, too.
  • Blue Gradation Quilt: cutting 2.5 inch x 4.5 inch blue rectangles. It has to end sometime. I am just not sure I am ready.
  • Blue Lemonade: cutting blue, green, purple 2 inch squares. I used a lot of these squares for En Provence, so I will need to cut more.
  • Pink Gradation Quilt: cutting 2.5 inch x 4.5 inch pink rectangles
  • Spin Wheel: really not started, but supplies gathered. I probably have enough fabrics and just need to decide to start.
  • Windmill quilt: Still hunting and gathering. I am supposed to be cutting a variety of greys for the background. I bought a new template, so I should be able to get going again

Other

  • Stepping Stones #3 using the Macaron pre-cuts from Hoffman. I have all the fabric in pre-cuts and am just waiting for space (and desire) in my schedule.

What’s on your list?