New Project

Having a hard time to decide what to do. So many choices... but never the right fabric. How is this possible?

 

This is only the really good fabric. Then there are the bigger cut offs, naturally sorted by colour, and then there is the box with the cut offs that accummulate during quilting which I use  to make blocks for a string quilt.

We are moving house in a few weeks, so I don't want to start something too intensive just something that keeps me busy. Last year I won some fabric (courtesy of Leutenegger) in a competition that was run by the Australian Patchwork and Quilting magazine. Over 20 fat quarters of country fabric...I love country quilts, so I was over the moon. Very nice fabric from different designers however I have been hesitant to cut into it. Not sure what I am saving it for.

How about this lot?

Gorgeous fabric. The cat fabric is 'Tale of 2Kitties' by Jacqueline Paton for Red Rooster fabrics and the checkered fabric is 'Honeymoon Cottage' by Gloria Parsons for Blue Hill fabrics. The rest I found in my stash and it matches perfectly. Whether I have enough is another question. I am thinking of a baby quilt, something soft and cuddly but not too difficult so that I can put it together relatively quickly. I am planning to use this as a practice piece for my FMQ. As I have stippled two large single bed quilts I am keen to practice new designs.

Found an excellent book at the last Quilt Show I went to: 'Machine Quilting Solutions' by Christine Maraccini. My type of designs -  lots of leafs, spirals and hooks but still easy enough for the beginning free motion quilter. The book is very well structured with easy to follow instructions and illustrations, taking one design and showing a variety of ways that it can be used. Well worth its money. I found a design in there that would be ideal.

The quilt I am thinking of will look something like this and will measure about 30 x 36in.

A bit random, but I quite like it. This should be fun.

What I am seriously working on is a block I have come across on the internet. It is called 'An Arrangement of Small Pieces'. I think its odd name attracted me. It is not particularly special but somehow I got hooked on it and now I am torn whether to make this a scrap type quilt or to produce a two tone quilt. ...

Well, I shall continue to ponder on this...

Until next time...Karin

Quilt Along #3

Playing around with the scale of the stippling. My normal quilting is about half an inch apart so I concentrated on the smaller and larger stippling. The smallish stipple was ok. The larger stipple however was not quite that easy...found that I had to really concentrate on stippling larger and then could only produce wiggly lines which lacked considerable variety.

Large stippling worked better for me on an actual block that was bigger where I could make sweeping type movements.

However, I do find that I then get a bit lost at times and can't always see where I am going and how close I am to the line above. 

Question:
When I did a workshop on FMQ we were advised to start the stippling from the bottom up so that you could see how far apart from the preceding lines you were. Is there a right way of doing this or is it a matter of personal preference.

Now back to thinking about quilting. Currently in between projects and having a hard time to decide what to do. Too many ideas, not the right fabric and nothing really grabs my attention. This, in itself, is becoming stressful.
Karin

On Blogging

Obviously new to blogging. Took me ages to set this up to participate in the Quilt Along. Finally discovered the 'pages' section today and will have to think about some categories I might like to set up.

?Gallery
?UFOs (who hasn't got them)
?Ideas for 2012
FMQ - designs that I have tried on quilts

Also need some photos and maybe change the background. References that I use could also be useful, however not sure where this would go.

While I basically set this up to follow the Quilt Along I also would like to have something like a jounal of my progress. Currently I take photos of my quilts as they are progressing on the mobile phone. Needless to say my phone is getting full. I have got about 15 different quilts on there with pictures of the varying stages of progress.

Hmm...lots to learn. But now back to quilting

Quilt Along with Leah Day #2

Hi. My name is Karin and I have been following Leah Day's Free Motion Quilting Project over the last year. I have been quilting since 2006 and have been free motion quilting for about 4 years. Here are my samples for this week's Quilt Along

Random Sample

I found random stippling actually quite challenging and found that it was hard to stipple in a consistent manner, a problem that I encountered before when I did stipple over a whole quilt. I think I have instinctively followed more of a row approach. It feels more natural and comes together more easily as a clear direction is followed.

Row Stippling

Close up

As you can see my stippling resembles 'Mickey Mouse' ears. When I first started to stipple that was the only way I could do wiggly shapes without getting completely lost.