Going to Guild - Karla Alexander

Last Monday was guild night, and our guest was Karla Alexander of Saginaw Street Quilt Company. She taught a class on Sunday that I was unable to attend, sadly. The work her students brought for Show and Tell was inspiring.

Karla was last at our guild about five years ago, and she always tells a story about a quilt her mother made for her. Even though I've heard it before, it always makes me tear up. I guess the story reminds me a little bit about the Orange Crush quilt I made for Grace - all those scraps, each with their own memory.

Double Crossed by Karla Alexander

Karla plays with line and color in exciting ways. Her patterns seem to find new ways to arrange and show off the fabrics.  She always brings loads of quilts to demonstrate a point.

Loose Ends by Karla Alexander

I also love how her techniques bring out a luminous quality to the quilts that reminds me more of a painting or stained glass than fabric.

Clam Shells by Karla Alexander

Karla's more recent work dives deep into curved piecing, and this is what I would love to learn from her. The way these clam shells are designed is ingenious!

Lanterns by Karla Alexander

But my favorite quilt of all may be one of the less complex ones. The Lanterns quilt would be such a great way to show off those fabrics that you just can't bear to cut, the ones that need wide open spaces to show off. I love the lines of this quilt, and can think of so many fun ways to free motion quilt each individual lantern.

I've linked to each pattern in case you want to try one for yourself. If your guild is looking for a teacher/lecturer, or if you're trying to decide on a class at a show, you can't go wrong with Karla!

FMQing or the Texas Two Step

So I told you I finished the first Twin Engine quilt, right?  It was a constant battle with my thread fraying and breaking every 4-6 inches.  A nightmare.  I couldn't understand since I duplicated the conditions that had finally let me finish Gracie's Orange Crush quilt.

After some advice on that post, I tried a bunch of different things.  The thread net didn't help, nor did positioning my thread horizontally vs. vertically.  (Thanks, LizA!)  I went to my local JoAnn's to find different needles to see if a topstitch needle would give me any better results than the machine embroidery needles.  I got incredibly lucky to have an actual quilter/employee who asked if I needed help.  I wish I had gotten her name so I could write a letter.  She walked me through exactly what was happening, what I was currently using, and solutions I had already tried. 

She pointed me away from the machine embroidery thread, claiming it is notorious for fraying - this was backed up by the WannaBees on Thursday - and suggested I try the Gutermann all sewing polyester thread.  Like many quilters, I flinched at the word "polyester," but figured I had already started down that slippery slope with the rayon so what the heck?

Imagine my shock when I quilted this entire quilt without the thread breaking a single time!  It was pure joy, and I finished all of the quilting in one day.  The picture above is a little bit of the back where it really shows up.  Now "See Greer Grow" has all but about half of the binding whipped down before it can be called DONE done, and the only quilt I have left to finish is the other Twin Engine quilt. 

Aaaaarrrrrgggghhhh!  I went and bought the identical thread, only in red.  I had taken a picture with my phone of the settings that worked, and made sure they were correct.  I put in a brand new needle out of the same pack as the one that worked, and cleaned my machine.  The fabric from these three quilts was all purchased at the same quilt shop, the batting is from the same piece, and they were all basted at the same time.  How does this happen?

In my search for answers, I did come across this fantastic article from Quilt University.  While the topic is difficult threads, I think there are a lot of different things in here for me to try.  I really want to get back to that bliss of FMQing my quilts.  It takes practice, but the only repetition I'm getting right now is threading my needle! 

One other thing I'm going to try is a Superior Thread.  I'll see a friend at guild on Monday night who's a rep, so I'm hoping she can help.  All the FMQers I envy swear by it, but it's not as easy to find.

Hope you have a beautiful weekend free of frustration. 

Blogger's Quilt Festival - Fall, 2010

I love love love Blogger's Quilt Festival!  Sometimes it takes me several days to look at all of the links, but it is one way I've found a bunch of blogs I want to keep reading.

My entry for this festival has got to be the Orange Crush quilt. For the entire back story and all the mistakes made along the way, you can click "Orange Crush" in the tags for this post and it will take you along the journey.  For the festival, suffice it to say that this was not a quilt in a day kind of project.

Orange Crush was a Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt from way back in 2008.  I started it right after Bonnie came to speak at our guild meeting, which was also the spark that got me blogging to begin with.  She's an inspiration, I tell ya!

Every scrap holds a memory

I love how scrappy it is, and how Gracie can amuse herself by pointing out the different fabrics and remembering what quilt it was originally made for. 

I can't tell you what a little thrill it gives me every morning when I wake up Gracie and unearth her from her quilted burrow, or at night when I peek in on her sprawled under its bold colors, with just a few toes peeking out.  

Beaded Curtain by Leah Day

 Love this FMQ design by Leah Day.

Hand dyed back by Ben Hollingsworth

And did I ever even show you the back that Ben hand dyed just for Gracie?   They discussed design and her favorite colors about a year ago...and then one day he just showed up at bee with it.  She loves it so much, she says, that she can hardly decide if she likes the front or the back better!  Thanks, Ben!

Orange Crush - DONE!

So, by now you must be looking at all of these posts and wondering what exactly my contribution to the show was.

I submitted two quilts.  One was my quilt, The Dance, which was also my submission to the Bloggers Quilt Festival.

I also worked right up to the very last minute (I know, you're stunned) to finish Gracie's quilt, my Orange Crush!  Can you believe it?  It was worth every minute to see it hanging in the show.

After all of the mistakes, all my stress with free motion quilting, and two and a half years, it is DONE. Done done...with a label!

In case you haven't been keeping pace with the many, many mistakes on this quilt, here's a retrospective.

•  Re-sewing Step 3 blocks - TWICE
• Running out of lime green and Re-sewing Step 5
• My wonky borders

And some I didn't even tell you about.  I guess I mentioned that Ben was going to hand dye a back for me.  That took awhile in itself because the weather this spring refused to cooperate (can you believe we were complaining about the long, cold winter?).  Once I finally got it, basted the quilt, and quilted the middle, I decided I didn't want to waste an inch of that beautiful fabric and I would bind the quilt with the leftovers.

Silly me...I decided to rip instead of cut so I'd get the straightest strips possible.  Yeah, I didn't count on the fact that I hadn't basted it perfectly straight, so I ended up ripping a slim strip off the edge of the quilt back.  It took me awhile to figure out how to go back and piece that!

Then, when I washed it, two small spots of color ran.  Luckily the quilt is so busy that you'd never even notice...except, of course, I do.

And when I washed it, I noticed one small place where the binding pulled away a little.  I still have to go back and fix that.

I did learn several things from all of my mistakes, and I think I also managed to figure out my free motion quilting issue.  I stalked the blog/website of my latest quilt crush, Leah Day, trying all of her tips, until I stumbled upon the one about thread.  She doesn't use cotton thread!  Whodathunkit?

I didn't use the Isacord that she suggests, because I was running out of time to order something online, but I did have great luck with the Gutermann machine embroidery thread (can't find a link, but it is 100% viscose, which is apparently a euphemism for rayon).  I also took the suggestion of one of the WannaBees to try an embroidery needle.  I did both of these things at once, so I don't know if it was one or the other, or the combination of the two that worked.  All I can say is that I had NO thread breakage for the entire border, and no messy bobbin thread nests on the back.  It was a beautiful thing!

Thanks to Leah, I was able to get my FMQ groove back, and used her Beaded Curtain design for my borders.  Just one more sign that this quilt was meant for my girl, because guess what one of her favorite birthday presents was?

It's a sign, I tell you.

But now it's done and I love it.  Gracie loves it.  And did I mention it's done?  So it's all good!

Bound

I've been steadily binding the last quilt for the show - nothing like a deadline to get a procrastinator to work!  We've been having a few days of spectacular weather here in the ATL, and I've taken my work outside over this long weekend.  Is there any greater bliss than sitting by the pool, quilting and watching your children play?

Anyway, I was thinking about making a tutorial for how I join the ends of my binding.  I went over to YouTube to see what's already out there, and came across this absolutely great video.  Her camera work is excellent (compared to my jerky shots), her instructions easy to understand, and even after fifteen years I picked up a new tip.  So why do all that work when I can just give you a link?



There are a few very minor differences.  She doesn't show bias binding, which I was taught was the gold standard.  I cut my bindings at 2 1/4"-2 1/2" because I find that the 2" she uses is sometimes a little tight.  She suggests using thread that matching the backing, while I prefer to match the binding - in my experience that's what shows, but YMMV.  She also pins and marks a lot more than me because, as you know, I'm lazy and far from a perfectionist.  But I do love the idea of the little "pocket" so you don't have to join the ends perfectly. 

The other thing I found from looking on YouTube is that there are a million different ways to bind a quilt, some of them way more complicated and tedious than necessary.  How do YOU do it?

better tUesdays - week 3 - Fast Food Fast

Hello!

I'm not doing such a great job at posting about anything else (since I haven't touched my sewing machine in almost a month!) but I would like it noted for the record that this is my third post in a row about goals and health and all that stuff. I think it was just a Monday thing.

I was expecting the no fast food goal to be much harder and whinier, but my kids jumped all over it. I bought 40 calorie no-sugar-added fudgsicles and the makings of several yummy dinners, and they were a huge help. I have still had no diet Coke for over three weeks now.

I also did my 180 minutes on the WiiFit, and now it's turning into the motivational tool that I originally envisioned when I bought the darned thing 9 months ago. I was trying to get my last few minutes in on Sunday evening, and had gathered an audience. By the time I was done they were all clamoring for a turn to beat my now excellent scores (except heading soccer balls - I cannot do that!). Gracie can hula hoop on the 10 minute round like nobody's business, and none of us can even come close to her score. My boys can do the balance games far better than I - why can't they stand up straight without leaning on a wall or chair or me?

The best part of the week, then, was weighing in today and finding out that I lost another 0.7 lbs, for a total of 0.9 lbs. Not a lot, but definitely in the right direction. My WiiFit age was down to 30 at one point, although I bombed the body test this morning and it went back up to 38. I have also - possibly - lost 1/2" in my waist. I'm not 100% sure because of my primitive measurement technique, which consists of embroidery thread and the ruler on my cutting mat.

I will joyfully collect my reward this afternoon at the salon in the form of a much deserved pedicure.

Looking forward to next week:

• Goal 1: I will increase my activity to 210 minutes; however, my addition to this is to get Daisy back in on this. Her walks with me have suffered since my new romance with the WiiFit. I am going to commit to AT LEAST a 10 minute walk every day, in addition to the walks and playtime she gets with the kids.

• Goal 2: I am going to try to extend the "fast food fast" for one more week.
  

My reward is going to be to buy a hand-dyed back for Gracie's Orange Crush quilt instead of piecing it from my stash.

My major obstacle to this goal is that it is hot, and it is sooo much easier to hop on the Wii Balance Board than to put on running shoes and leave the house.

What I can do to overcome this obstacle? I am going to try getting up with my DH when the alarm goes off and get my walk in before the heat gets out of control. The dog will be happier and then I won't feel as guilty if I have a busy day and don't get to the Wii that day.

Have a healthy day!

A Stitch in Time

Remember when Holly Anderson came to our guild and I made a vow to put a little more effort into my quilts?

Yeah, well. What a pain.

You might be wondering why you haven't had an update on Orange Crush recently. I mean, way back in January I had all of the steps done, and the top only lacked borders. What the heck is taking so long?

Truth be told, I put the skinny orange border on right away. Unfortunately (there's that word again!) I took the lazy way out and just cut long border strips, sewed them on, and whacked off the ends. Now, for some quilts that might work. For some quilts you'd never even notice. But for this quilt - this scrappy, triangle-y quilt - it was a disaster in the making. This is what it looked like:

So I went to the Wanna Bees and whined and cried and asked for help. They all agreed that my fatal flaw was failing to measure the quilt and the borders and pin it to death before connecting them. They all agreed that I would have to take the orange border off and start again. You know how I feel about ripping stitches.

Jodi said to iron the hell out of it. With starch. Ben wondered if blocking it would work. Lynn mentioned something about interfacing (I stopped listening after that word), and Lene said I needed to stitch around the edge of the quilt before trying to reattach the borders. Jackie confessed that she'd be tempted to do what I wanted to do - stick it in the UFO pile and forget about it.

But no! I remembered my vow to Holly. I carefully ripped out all of the orange border. I pressed the hell out of it. I stitched around the border. I measured the quilt in about 10 places and took the average and measured the binding and cut it carefully. I pinned it to death before starting to sew again. I whispered a little prayer and asked Rene to use the IDT to help me.

You know what? It worked! Even my fellow Wanna Bees were impressed with how flat the quilt lays and that there are no puckers. When I think of the time I could have saved if I had just taken the time to do it right the first time it is embarrassing, but what a lesson learned.

This is what the finished top looks like now:

I am so happy I took the time to fix it. What a feeling of accomplishment! Now I'm off to piece the back and, hopefully, give some of those orphan blocks a home there.

I wish you a sense of accomplishment today too!

Update: Apparently none of my orphan blocks are suitable even for the back of this wild quilt. The Wanna Bees gave them a resounding thumbs down. All of them. I guess they are orphans for a reason. Is there any point when you just throw them away?

A Wonderful Weekend

I'm a southern girl at heart, so when the weather turns nasty I do what generations of strong women have done over the centuries: I stayed in my pajamas all day sewing and refusing to leave the house.

It was worth it, though, don't you think? I got the top of Orange Crush pieced. It is still busy, but beautiful. My daughter loves it, which is a good thing since it is going on her bed! Now I am auditioning borders, and I think I'm going to go with one of these:


I think I prefer the one on the right. What do you think? Let me know!

On a patriotic note, there are some great ideas for commemorating the Inauguration tomorrow with kids at The Crafty Crow.

Enjoy the rest of your 3-day weekend. I hope everyone is staying warm.

Step 5 Crushed!

From Step 5 Blocks

The temperature's dive turned out to be a winning situation for everyone in my family: my husband went off to his poker game without a twinge of guilt, the kids wrapped in blankets and watched a movie on the couch by the fire, and I fired up my sewing machine for a marathon of Orange Crush.

Thursday the Wanna Bees helped me choose which greens to use for the center of my album blocks, and Lene even added a perfect piece from her own stash (see the center of the block on the bottom right, the swirly lime green? Thanks Lene!) After getting the Step 5 pieces cut out at bee, I was ready to sew these last blocks.

So I tuned in to my boyfriend, Chris (Meloni...Law & Order: SVU...are you paying attention?). My friend, TiVo, had taped a marathon, so I was good for a few hours. Not only did I get all of Step 5 done, including those &%^$ half and quarter album blocks (I had to go back and rip out 4 of those half split four patches AGAIN!!!), but I also got a nice bit of sewing the blocks together done. I cannot wait to post the pictures of that and show you when I'm done.

It does look a bit...busy. To put it gently. It is starting to calm down now that the blocks are going together, but when I first laid out the whole quilt I almost cried. It was so loud. I really wondered if Gracie would ever be able to sleep under it. Hopefully some solid borders will give the eye a place to rest, because right now it looks like it could be used in a double blind study on epilepsy. Seriously, MarioKart for the Wii poses less danger to people with seizure disorders than this quilt! I am VERY concerned.

I am starting to think of names. I'm not sure I want to just call it Orange Crush, partly because my orange isn't really reading that way. I'd like to incorporate some of the mystery and/or something significant to my daughter in the title. The orange is reading very much like flames and she was actually due on July 4, so I had considered something like "Firecracker". Let me know if you come up with any brilliant ideas.

Please consider spending at least some of your time on Monday working on those charity projects as part of the National Day of Service. I thought this was a great suggestion by Cheri Sullivan. And if you have a blog, help spread the word!

So I'm going to get back to sewing, but I hope you all have a great long weekend and stay warm.

Friday Fill-Ins

Friday Fill-In for January 16, 2009 ~ My answers are in bold.

1. Enough with the cold weather!

2. Parenting causes me to be conflicted.

3. I've been craving chocolate cake.

4. The Big Bang Theory makes me laugh.

5. I wish I could go to Quilt Retreat next week.

6. My friend, Lisa, who is thisclose to finishing chemo, has been on my mind lately.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I'm looking forward to working on Orange Crush, tomorrow my plans include the Gladiators game and Sunday, I want to see snow!

Have a great weekend!

Back to Work

From Last Import

I dusted off my sewing machine today and got back to work, thanks to the urging of my bee group, the Wanna Bees. Almost the whole crowd was able to make it today, and it was good to see what everyone was working on. The bad news is that, while everyone else has moved on, I am STILL plugging away at these Orange Crush blocks. The good news is that I was able to find all of the pieces I had assembled for Orange Crush to bring to the bee, and that I finally finished all 30 blocks of step 4. Wahoo!

I thought I had lost a piece, and finally realized that I was just being thick and was miscounting. I guess that's what happens when you take a months-long break and have to get back into the swing of things.

Anyway, I hope you are all enjoying some sewing time as well. Send me a link to what you're working on, even if it's the same old, same old like me. That just means we are persistent!

Orange Crush Step 3

Wow, am I spatially challenged!

I do not know how someone with such poor spatial abilities and terrible math skills got involved in quilting, but it just goes to show that you should pay attention in Geometry even if you don't want to be an engineer.

These very simple blocks took me forever because we needed 22 going each direction. I got the first batch right, and then sewed the second batch wrong and had to "un-sew" them...TWICE! I even did a test block, wrote down how to do it, and did it wrong the second time. Honestly, it's amazing the kaleidoscope quilt ever got put together.

But they are done, and I can move on to step 4. I might actually get this quilt done before Bonnie moves on to a new mystery - at least if her publisher keeps her busy with the book tour and teaching!

I hope you feel some sense of accomplishment today!

Friday Fill-Ins

My answers are in bold:

1. I believe whatever doesn't kill you teaches you something about yourself.

2. If you're good at something, do it!

3. Why so tired? The girls had a sleepover again and kept me up til 2 with their giggling!

4. Something is out there, it's God.

5. If my life were a sitcom, it would be titled Trouble in Suburbia. [I wonder if anyone will get that.]

6. Sitting on my back porch I see green. Emerald grass, lush trees, and a jungle of kudzu. It's my little slice of heaven right here in the heart of the 'burbs.

7. And as for the weekend, tonight I’m looking forward to reading by the pool, tomorrow my plans include celebrating Mom's birthday, and Sunday, I want to work on Orange Crush!

Have a great weekend!

Orange Crush Step 2

So I'm a little behind the times on Orange Crush. What can I say? I've had a lot going on in my life, and a lot going on on my design wall. But I finally finished step 2, a process that seemed eternal!

Part of the reason it took so long is that I was doing it as a leader/ender project with the Kaleidoscope Dreams blocks. It turns out that the kaleidoscope pattern practically screams for another quilt to be made at the same time with this method due to the need for the design wall and the extreme care required to make sure that each piece is in exactly the right spot. The down side is that the leader/ender quilt (in this case, Orange Crush) doesn't really get your full attention or sewing time.


Both quilts are chugging along at a glacier pace. If it weren't for the changing photos of my design wall it would feel like I wasn't making any progress at all! I really like the red border on Kaleidoscope Dreams, and I am thrilled to be moving on to step 3 (of 6) of the mystery. It's not much of a mystery to me anymore since I have been unable to help seeing photos of the finished pattern on other blogs, but I am curiously anticipating my own finished product since no two of us chose the same fabrics.


I have to add that making this quilt for Grace is perfect. The other day she sat on my bed looking through the step 1 blocks and reminiscing about all of the quilts they represented. She remembers - maybe more than I - which fabric went into whose quilt and sometimes even when we bought it. I imagine her lying in bed, covered in memories of all those cousins and friends and times sewing together, like a cozy memory lane. I have discovered a new fondness for scrap quilts that I never appreciated in the first ten years of my art. Bonnie awakened this in me, and for that I am so grateful.

Fabraholism...Hi, My Name is Jenny!

The first step towards beating any addiction (and who's to say I even want to?) is to admit that I am powerless over it. I'm so there! I haven't posted all week because I've been having way too much fun sewing and fondling fabric and even playing with heating elements of all sorts to distort and mutilate textiles to satisfy my illness. It was wicked fun!

First I had a conversation with my wonderful MIL about a cousin whose baby is due next month. I realized that, while each of my cousins' babies have received a quilt from either mom or me, none of DH's cousins have. Oops! The timing has always been a little hairy and we just aren't as closely entwined with their lives. Sooo...I felt it was high time to remedy the situation. In honor of my new fascination with Bonnie Hunter, my introduction to the Easy Angle ruler, and Andi's love of lime green, I decided to make a scrappy Jacob's Ladder with a green focus. Here's the block so far:

On Tuesday I finished whipping down the binding for the Team Tomato prize quilt. Last year for Mother's Day I gave my mom, MIL, and cousin one of those Topsy Turvy Tomato Growers. They had a contest, and Cousin Judy won by a landslide. This Mother's Day her gift will be this cute little tomato quilt and basket (by Dawn, of course) to

gather her harvest. Shhh...don't tell her! Thanks to the Stashbuster poster who suggested the "Just Leaf It" technique of free motion quilting. You can't really see it that well, but it worked perfectly for this little quilt.

On Thursday, Mom and I went back to our Kaleidoscope class. We learned how to make the alternate blocks that really make the design pop. Check out "My Design Wall" on the right to see how this quilt is coming along.

Then on Saturday (yes, my house is a wreck - don't call DFCS on me) I went to an awesome class with Jan Girod from Fiber on a Whim. It was incredible! Calling it a quilting class would be a bit of a stretch - it is definitely in the Art with a Capital A category. We worked with foiling and bone ash, Tyvek, cellophane, organza, metallic mesh, buttons, beads, and all kinds of pretty threads. We had irons, heat guns, and soldering tools generating some serious creative energy. It's not ready for photos yet, but I hope to have it up soon.

Plus Step 2 for Orange Crush has been posted! I'd better get back to work! Have a great week.

Orange Crush Step One Done!

I had a very quilty day today. I was invited to join a new bee group that has spun off my guild, and we had such a fun and productive morning. I worked on step one of Bonnie Hunter's new mystery, Orange Crush. As you can see, I took the instructions to make it scrappy very seriously!

It was so inspiring to see what everyone was working on. One person is doing beautiful handwork, another is designing on the computer, another was auditioning border fabrics for a stunning quilt top, and a few of us were machine piecing. I could just feel the ideas exploding for future quilts, and it reminded me of a great story about teaching:

"If I have a pencil and you have a pencil, and we share our pencils, what do we have? We still each have one pencil. But if you have an idea and I have an idea and we share our ideas, then what do we have? Now we each have two ideas...at least!"

Don't forget to vote for your favorite kaleidoscope blocks. Only a few more days before I'm going to make my decision on the final three, and the voting is close for 3rd place!

Have a great weekend,

Kaleidoscope Dreams

I have been having the best time with my kaleidoscope blocks from the class Mom and I took on Thursday. So far I have made 15 blocks. I need 3 more, but I have 6 possibilities. For those of you who haven't made a kaleidoscope quilt yet, I need to cut enough wedges for 38 blocks but only use 18 as the center stars. The rest of the wedges get used elsewhere in the quilt, and I need to decide on my favorites. Some were very similar, some were WAY too busy, and some just didn't speak to me. Now I need your help: please vote for your favorite blocks out of the six left (multiple votes allowed). At left are the finished 15 and the focus fabric to give you an idea of what I am already working with.

I'll give you the week to vote while I cut the rest of the blocks, work on my denim and flannel quilt, and maybe even start on Orange Crush.

It's one of those rainy, perfect-for-sewing days here in the 'burbs. If only the laundry would do itself! Have a wonderful week!