Another Country Quilt

Feel in the mood for a country type quilt and have been playing around with my EQ7 program designing all sorts of things...

Settled on the Disappearing Four Patch...quick to construct and interesting to look at and lends itself well to a scrappy type quilt. Country fabric will not be an issue as I have tons of it (and more)...in addition, some time ago I won 20 fat quarters of country fabric in a block competition with one of the magazines over here (Inspiring Country Thread). The fabric is really beautiful but so far I have not used it for anything. Definitely time to cut into it...

The internet is a great resource...did not take me long to find a number of tutorials on how to quickly construct this block.

Here are just a few of the sites that I looked at:

Chock-A-Block Quilt Blocks (ending up with a 12 1/2"block)
SewWonderful (8 1/2"block) and
What comes next? (Disappearing Four Patch with a twist - very cool)




And here is my test block

Perfect...I used 5" squares as my starting point and arrived at a block size of exactly 8 1/2". Went  together pretty quickly...I reckon the best way to go about this is to sew up all of the Four Patch units first and then proceed to cut them to make the Disappearing Four Patch units one by one.

The quilt I am planning will look something like this:

42 blocks in total...with a border of 6" this would come to 61" x 69".  Have not quite decided on the border as yet as this will depend a bit of what I find when I go through my stash, but overall I like the look of this. Yep, can't get away from it...I love those simple, repetitive arrangements.

Linking up to Let's Get Acquainted Blog Hop Week 8 and Link Up over at Plum and June and Anything Goes Linky Party at Stitch by Stitch

Karin

Quilter's Show and Tell



This is my entry to this week's Quilter's Show and Tell over at the Quilting Gallery. The theme for this week is Quilts for the Little Ones.

As you may know I finished this quilt earlier in the year. This is the second time that I have done this quilt. It is the perfect quilt to whip up in a hurry as it comes together very quickly.

 

What I like about this quilt design is that the design is particularly useful in showcasing the feature fabric, in this case,  zebras that are hopping all over the place. There are currently so many bright and colourful conversational type fabrics around and I often look at them and think that they are far too pretty to cut up into really small pieces.

 

 

The quilt measures 36.5 x 48.5 inches and is quilted with an overall loop design.

Watch this space as I am intending to put the pattern up on the blog in the near future (just have to figure out how to upload a PDF).

 

Anyway, voting for the quilts starts on Friday and goes through to Monday morning. There will also be a give-away open to everyone visiting the site during the weekend voting. So, head over to the Quilting Gallery to have a look at all those wonderful quilts (and hopefully give me one of your votes). 

 



Karin

Less May Be More

This is how far I got with my in-lining of the plume shapes

Initially I was going to also outline the plume shapes on the outside as I had done with the feather wreath. However, after I started it and looked at it, I just felt that this was too much...somehow it distracted rather than enhanced the look, so I did not continue with it.

Looking at it now, I think it definitely needs a filler, but given how slow the in-lining is progressing,  this is still a while off. I don't want to rush this along, but take my time and hopefully get it right and enjoy the process.

Linking up to FMQ Friday at the Freemotion Quilting Project.

Karin

Could not help myself

Look what I have found...



Coordinating Contrast fabric

How cute is this fabric. The feature fabric is called 'hide & seek' from JAK Designs Licensed to SSI (Southseaimports)

 

Now carefully fold it up and put it away ...I am actually working on something completely different at the moment.

 

Karin

Feather Frame done

Quite pleased with the finished frame. The design is loosely based on a motif that I found at Forest Quilting by Patrice Trnka Adams (2007). The original design is called the Memories Motif.

Mine turned out a bit different obviously as I  re-drew the design to fit my quilt adjusting the curve as well as the size and shape of the individual plumes. I find it easier to do my own plume shapes than follow a given design as everyone has their own way of drawing (and stitching) feathers. By drawing them myself (and doing about 10 different versions of them) I arrived at a design that had the plume shapes that I am used to and I noticed that when I was stitching them that I followed the same way of stitching them every single time as this was also the way I had drawn them. This made the job a lot easier. The only other challenge was the size of the plumes...some of them were a bit larger than what I usually do and needed some added concentration to not veer off every now and than which is very noticeable on the dark solid fabric.

I will now embellish the feathers with some hyperquilting to make the frame a bit more visible. This should be good fun.

Wondering and would welcome some feedback on whether to stipple the puffy bit in the middle and on the sides down to make the feathers pop out. Had not really considered this before but looking at it now, I think it might need it. Will do the hyperquilting first and then re-look at that.

Linking up to FMQ Friday at the Freemotion Quilting Project with Leah Day

Karin

Playing around with EQ7

I am currently playing around with my EQ7 program...a while ago I got some books on special, one of them 'Pieced Drawing'...Exercises in Pieced block Design by Patti R. Anderson. Quite liked the Offset Shadow blocks that were demonstrated in the book and tried this out yesterday. Here is my block

 

 

I have 2 sets of fabric stacks 61/2 x 61/2" of Robert Kaufman fabric from the Leesa Chandler design range. Have been looking for a while what I can do with them. Have 20 different fabrics with 2 pieces each. The fabric is from the Passage to India and Dutch Cottage range...very beautiful.

 

I think the simple Sawtooth star is perfect for this range as it will show the fabric nicely. I scanned all the fabric pieces into the program and now am looking at different designs to use them up. I quite like this shadow star...mind you, have to think that through a bit further as my two pieces of fabric will just cover this, I think. There would not be a lot of room for error.

 

 

Will continue to play a bit more...

Karin

Perfectionist...Not me!

Continued working on my feather arrangement. I had in mind to put a frame around the feather wreath. Obviously I over-estimated my skill level. When I drew the frame in with my flexible curve ruler, I came to the realisation that there was no way that I was going to get a match on either side, in fact I had not even figured out what exactly I wanted this to look like...did I want more free flowing feather, different sizes, different shapes or did I want a more uniform arrangement...and how big?

Inititally I tried to lightly draw some feathers in but soon realised that I would not be able to re-create that on the other side, not freehand anyway. Out came the paper...pity, I should have photographed the many attempts that I produced on paper yesterday. This was quite hilarious as I got to a point of perfectionist delirium, I reckon...not uncommon for me so I had to take a break to get back to reality.

After a bit of a break I made some decisions first, i.e. I went for a more uniform approach and also decided on a proximate height and size, then did my drawing...and presto, that worked.

After this I did what I had done the other day (see the post HERE for how I marked the feather wreath) and drew the design on my Golden thread paper and stitched through it with a bigger needle on my unthreaded machine. Then I used the Quilt Pounce and lightly transferred the design onto the quilt.

Very pleased with the result. The first photo is a bit touched up...the colour  does not photograph well

Half of the corner arrangement

Matching Middle Section

While I could have tried to do this freehand there is no way I would have achieved this level of mirroring and given that this is going to frame the wreath all around I think it is important to look more uniform than not.

Also, next time I might try to spray baste my quilt. The pins are continually in the way and for the marking of course I had to take whole sections out...not ideal. My batting is NuWool Batting, an Australian product...a bit of loft, but very nice and soft, easy to work with and no bearding!

Anyway, six more to go...

Linking up to FMQ Friday over at the Freemotion Quilting Project.

Karin

FMQ progress

Update from yesterday...progress on the blank canvas. This is the continuation of my exploration of Patsy Thompson's Feather DVDs. For inspiration or if you have not seen some of her feather work go to Patsy Thompson Designs ...and be amazed.

Endless possibilities

Finished Wreath

 

Some close ups of my handiwork



Like the centre of this

Hyperquilting a pointy heart feature

I am using Aurifil 50/2 and just used the colours I had (I can only get the thread at a particular shop in the city). A more contrasting colour would have obviously stood out more but I also like it in this softer tone.

My pointy heart in-lining is a tad too pointy, I reckon. However, must say, I quite like it...it makes for an interesting texture. I got this little nip going all around the wreath. This was a lot of fun to do. Also did some pearls in the spine...there were other designs I could have tried but this stencil provided a fairly narrow spine of 1/4" and in the end I thought the pearls would look best.

Now need to figure out what to do next in terms of surrounding the wreath.

Linking up to Anything Goes Linky Party at Stitch by Stitch

Karin

Can't Help Myself - Another Project

Started another project as I was missing FMQ. This rate I am not going to get a a pieced quilt done any time soon.

As I have been posting before in March of this year , I am still watching my Patsy Thompson DVDs and learning heaps. I cannot recommend those DVDs highly enough. Check out Patsy Thompson's website for tons of inspiration. Actually just looking at her blog now...creating a feathered frame for her quilt block (a wreath). This is actually what I am thinking of doing, although I am not so sure I can pull this off as there is a fair bit of mirroring involved.

While I have been playing and trying out different things, I thought that I might as well do a simple wall-hanging similar to some of the ones I have seen on those DVDs. I absolutely love the repetitive rhythm of feather quilting and having a couple of borders will allow for some wavy feather arrangement. Picked out my favourite solid, a type of maroon colour and just did a simple inner border in a greyish colour and presto, I had a blank canvas. Initially I was going to use my trusted Golden Threads Quilting Paper again to stitch out the design (i.e. stitching over the paper), however decided to do the marking a bit differently this time (mainly because the motif was over 10" and I thought that this might become a bit tricky with the paper trying to get that to sit neatly in the middle of my square.

So, I traced the design onto the Golden Threads Paper and then stitched over the paper (with a bigger needle) following the lines without a thread in the machine. Here is a close up of the perforated paper. This is fairly neat as you can also use this to make multiple copies of the same motif...just make yourself a stack of squares, pin them together with your drawn motif on top of them and stitch through all of them at the same time.

Paper Stencil

Anyway, I then positioned my motif in the middle of the quilt top (bumpy side up) and used my Quilt Pounce. You are supposed to just gently glide the Quilt Pounce over the whole stencil.

 

As you can see I overdid the chalk component a little bit...I reckon just going over it once would have been sufficient and definitely no patting the Quilt Pounce (mine was too saturated). Nevertheless I was impressed with this and stitched out my motif . This worked very well. I was not overly concerned re the chalk...had used it before and knew that this would just disappear with a bit of steam.

Stitched out Motif

Oh, glorious fun...doesn't this just beckon for some jazzing up! I am planning to do some hyperquilting in the outside plumes and to also try myself at putting something in the spine. I am using Aurifil 50/2 as always...I love that thread and so does my machine...in terms of colours I am limited to what I have at the moment. Probably will use a type of gold colour and some musty pink.

Linking up to FMQ Friday with Leah Day at the Freemotion Quilting Project

Until next time

Karin

WIP Spiderweb Update

Quick update...

Have been working away on the Spiderweb quilt in a bit of an assembly line fashion. Cut out a stack of interfacing and drew my template on. Then sew the calico star wedge on with a stripe attached to each side. Did about 14 of them in one hit and then came the relaxing part...just sewing on strips. I felt that I made heaps of headway but then realised it only gave me another 3 blocks. Never mind...slowly but surely

Could not help myself...also sewn together another quilt top of solid fabric measuring about 38" square. Am missing the calming rhythm of FMQ. Will continue with my practice of feather quilting starting with a huge feather wreath in the middle. So, hopefully I will have something else to show very soon.

Popping in to Anything Goes Linky Party at Stitch by Stitch

Until next time

Karin