Face It!

I find that I try new things when I least plan for them or expect to.  That is my experimental nature shining through.  While I was quilting all the Pond Island house blocks, I knew that I was going to finish them individually, rather than sew them into one large quilt.  I had thought about binding each in a strip of black, as though it were "framed". Once I got home, I stalled.   What is wrong with that picture???  It is way too formal was my gut reaction.  I don't think I can look at a wall with 15 stark black frames, regardless of what is inside.

Then,  I remembered that Jean Wells discussed various finishing techniques in her book, Intuitive Color and Design.

Ah hah!  Among other techniques, she suggested a facing finish.  This was the answer!  I started  right in following her excellent directions and made facing using both mitered corners and triangle corners, just to see which one I liked better.  The triangle corners system is a bit more fiddly to make, but it does solve the problem of having a lot of seams and fabric at each of the four corners.  I ended up choosing to make most of my facings with the mitered corners anyway.  Easier and faster wins.

facing with mitered corners and hanging tabs

facing with triangle corners

two faced blocks,  one framed block.

I had no choice but to frame that one block shown above.  The fabric I  put along the top and the bottom is corded (woven) such that once its threads are cut, the cord quickly unravels.  It is also thick, so I cannot turn it to the back as facing requires.  

A facing, like the facing in a jacket or dress, isn't seen from the front.  It is only visible on the back of the quilt (or on the inside, if we are talking about garments.)  When I began cutting the strips, I was thinking of using only one fabric to make all the facings.  WAIT A MINUTE!  I have lots of fabric languishing in my stash.  Why not a little unexpected variety?  Out came some florals on dark backgrounds.  Now the process became more fun.  The fabric I chose doesn't make the process any different, but it provides the boost of making it more interesting.  I cannot wait to sew these  facings to the blocks that are piled on the table!

SOMETHING NEW!

I am one of those quilters who cannot complete one project before beginning something new.  Once an idea starts brewing, I gotta go with it.  I recently saw a similar quilt made by  Ashley in Film in the Fridge . That was my inspiration.  Thanks, Ashley!

This is the start of a baby quilt.  I need to sew all the blocks together.  Once I do that, it will shrink quite a bit, but that is as big as it will be.  I make "little" baby quilts.  Why?  The parents can use the little quilt right away, while the baby is tiny.  It would fit in a pram or stroller, or car seat without getting bunched up in the wheels or straps, etc.  Once the baby gets too big for the quilt, it can be "graduated" to be their own little quilt used to tuck in their dollies or teddy bears.

Summer Highlights

I am just back from Maine, where we spent five weeks on Pond Island (Narraguagus Bay, near Milbridge) and 10 days at Alamoosook Lake in Orland.  Both of these places are dear to my heart.

Pond Island is truly rustic. We hire a lobsterman to get us there, as we have no boat. We bring as much dried and canned food with us as we can.

our "stuff" at arrival  - 90% food, the rest is clothing, quilting, tools,

We replenish the larder with a list given to relatives who have boats and are going into town, or by accepting left overs from departing groups, as many come to the Island for a long weekend bringing way more than they can consume.

We have a small cottage with no electricity, no plumbing,  an outhouse and outdoor shower. We carry drinking water from  a well and we catch rain water in a 100 gallon tank which serves for washing purposes.

The Barnacle.  Original house was the little building which is now the bedroom.

While we have propane to run a refrigerator and two gas lamps, we find we don't use the lamps.  We prefer to go to bed soon after sunset, when we can no longer see well enough to read.  It is great.  It is easy to get in 10 hour sleeps this way!   We get up when the lobster boats begin streaming out of the harbor to tend their traps, usually just after sunrise, but sometimes before.  Early in the morning, the sea is usually calm and the boats look like little dark bugs skimming along the water.  The lobster men refer to the lobsters they catch as "bugs", so I have begun calling their boats "bug boats".
Sunrises and sunsets are often spectacular....

Sunrise

Sunset

Also there is the fog... which often is seen creeping onto the other islands around us while we have full sun.

Fog over Trafton Island

Sewing, in such a setting,  means 100% hand work.    Over the past 5 years or so, I have pieced together small quilts representing each of the 15 buildings on the island.  This year my goal was to quilt them all.  I've completed quilting 13 of the 15 and should have the last two done within the month.  I will show all of them when they are bound... (soon, I hope)  but here is a sneak peek of a one of them.

Rockledge

These blocks were all free pieced.  No templates nor paper piecing or patterns were used.  I learned liberated free piecing from Gwen Marston's book LIBERATED QUILTING, and then used the technique to create my blocks.  I worked from photographs and sketches, but often once I got going,  I did not refer much to these, either. The blocks were made independently, so they are all different sizes.  I found that making the windows first allowed me to keep the scale for that block.

I didn't do any quilting at Alamoosook.  We were there to catch up with our son and to close up the cottage for the winter.  But, I did squeeze in a quick trip to Marden's in Ellsworth and took a look at their fabric section. One must search carefully to find treasures there.  I didn't have the time for that, so a return trip for next year is on the list of things to do.  I did go to Fiddlehead Artisans Supply in Belfast and found a nice selection of FQ to bring home. (Of course, like the majority of us, I need more fabric like a hole in the head.)

I did have one wonderful quilt-related time, however.  I had the opportunity to contact and visit Lynne of Patchery Menagerie.  I had to drive my son from the Lake to Portsmouth, NH, and realized that I would be pretty near where Lynne lives.  

What a wonderful visit!  Lynne is a terrific host,  She was so excited to meet me, as I was her, that she did a happy dance in the parking lot.  I have never had a personal parking place, but she made sure I knew where to go!

 Lynne is a fantastic cook and treated me to an awesome pasta salad and chocolate cake and ice cream for supper.  Yum.  (We don't get cake and ice cream on Pond Island.)

Lynne is a wonderful quilter... her specialty is word quilts and they are fantastic.  She inserts subtle surprises in her work.  At first glance,  the words look like they are made from the same fabric... But, on a closer inspection, one discovers that while each word may be of a single color, the letters are made from different fabrics of that one color.   Such fun to look at.  And in many cases, the background she uses holds surprises too.  Take a look at the NO RULES FOR JULIE quilt on Lynne's blog  and see if you can find the "fun" hidden there.

  Lynne is currently working on an OUT OF THE BOX quilt and it was fun to see all of that set up.


We talked about quilts and the magic of quilts well into the night. The next morning we went to Quilted Threads, a wonderful shop in Henniker, NH.  If you are ever in the vicinity of Concord, NH, or even Manchester, NH  be sure to make a detour to Henniker.  You won't be disappointed.

 Here is Lynne giving scritches to her cat, Millie.  Millie tolerated me from a distance.  I am glad she didn't totally go into hiding.   Millie has her own blog... darlingmillie.blogspot.com.



(Lynne has featured me on her blog.  As she said, we are looking forward to repeating the experience next year.)

Thank you, Lynne.  Getting to meet you and know you was truly the highlight of the summer.

Seattle and back

I've been away from blogging -  12 days in Seattle and then recovery time back home catching up on all the little things that were left hanging.  So here is a quick run down of some highlights of the trip:

SEATTLE!

Our son's graduation: Master of Architecture, UWashington.

Wedding quilt reveal to my nephew and niece.  I felt like a sleazy trader because I gave it to them and took it back.  It came home with me to be quilted, etc.  But they were good about it and very excited. They even slept under it one night.

"Hurricane" by Carol Taylor

The Quilt and Textile Museum in La Conner had an exhibit by Carol Taylor, which was beautiful and very inspiring. There was another art quilt exhibit 














Meeting LeeAnn of NiftyQuilts for lunch. The waiter had to "wait" for our order.  We were so busy talking quilts that we didn't look at the menu for a long while.  LeeAnn took me to her office and showed me a few of her quilts she had hanging there.  Beautiful!  Darn... I forgot my camera that day.

Meeting Sharon K. of Indigo Threads.  I spent the morning with her at the Bellevue Art  Museum looking at the exhibit of African-American Quilts - Bold Expressions -  that had just opened.  The quilts were so intriguing and bold in color, style, fabric. We were commenting so much that the docents  came over and asked us questions about quilting, as they didn't really know much about the craft.    In many ways the quilts resembled some of the Gee's Bend quilts, but they came from all over the South... including Indiana!  Sharon and I and my husband had lunch together and then went to the Quilt shop in Bellevue before making our way back to our son's house.  Pictures not allowed at the museum, but Sharon posted about the visit and included some pictures from the exhibit catalogue.

Visited the Quilting Loft in Ballard and found some 108" gray with dark gray polka dotted fabric that will back the wedding quilt. Score!  I wasn't looking forward to having to piece the backing for this one.... way too big.

 We did a bit of sight seeing, too, but I won't bore you with all that.

and BACK!

Since I've been home it seems as though I've been living in the sewing room.  Lots of boring stuff... like piecing batting for the wedding quilt, cutting the binding strips, etc.

I have had a chance to play, too.   I saw a posting by Kathy Loomis on andthenwesetitonfire. She provided a tutorial on piecing really thin strips of fabric into background fabric.   I had to try.  I don't know where I am going with this, but I like it.












Now I am packing - I'll be away from the computer for a long while.  Going to Maine to our island off the coast near Milbridge.  No electricity - no computer - no sewing machine.  I will be hand quilting, as I have lots of projects waiting for that, so I will be busy but just a bit out of touch.  See you all in September!

Happy 4th and Happy Summer and may you take many stitches too.

Roses for Rosita - the wedding quilt reveal

Hooray!  I finished the wedding quilt last night. It took a bit of figuring as I needed to fill in gaps to make everything fit together.  The various gray fabrics are the gap fillers.  I had to sew a couple of Y seams, otherwise it was pretty much straight stitching.  I am amazed at how well it came together, given the variation in sizes of the blocks.

Here's the story:
My nephew, Luis Miguel,  born and raised in Madrid (Spain) now works in Seattle. There, in 2008, he met Rosa, a Mexican lass, just before she returned to Mexico as her visa expired.  She was unable to return to the USA - something to do with the immigration laws.  They barely knew each other, but LM persisted and managed to visit Rosa wherever and whenever he could. They were engaged in 2010. In August, 2011, they obtained a fiancee visa allowing Rosa to return to the USA.  The stipulation was that they had to be married within a certain time frame, something like three months. They wasted no time.  Three weeks after Rosa arrived, they were married at our family cottage on Douglas Lake (northern Michigan).

I had promised them a quilt when they announced their engagement (Barcelona - there is a diamond in that block). I had asked for direction in terms of the type of quilt they would like to have and colors.  Soon after their wedding they told me that they wanted something that tells their story. To help me they sent me photos of the refrigerator magnets that they had collected as well as some photos they had taken. I used photos from the net and my imagination as well.

This quilt commemorates their courtship and the places they visited over the 2-1/2 years until their wedding.   The roses were given for every Valentines day and, of course, the wedding.

Here it is:

Roses for Rosita

Roses for Rosita  (96 inches  x 100 inches)


The color is a bit washed out - sorry.  I took the photo in full shade, but the sun still set a glare on things.  Next project for me is to learn to take good quilt photos!

5, 4, 3, 2, 1!

Ah, the count down for the blocks for the wedding quilt I've been working on and posting all winter/spring.  I almost made my self imposed deadline .  I'm currently working on putting the top together.  I raided a friend's stash - thank  you, Ann R. - for some good neutral fabrics to fill the gaps that result from having blocks of many different sizes.  I hope to have it all done in a few days and will show the completed top and  tell its story as soon as I'm done.


For now, here are the last five blocks!

Edited to add a very special thanks to Teresa of Fabric Therapy who helped me by making the sketch of the bride and groom and then helped me put all the applique pieces together so that I could stitch them all as a unit.  She has a wonderful applique tutorial on her blog.  I raided her stash, too. You gotta love those quilting friends who are so giving of their time, talents, and materials!  Couldn't do it without them.

A little coloring helps a lot

As many of you know, I've been playing with the triangle galore block for ages. Sometimes I find that what appears distinctive up close can get lost from the distance,  even something "big" like a 4.5 inch triangle. The problem is that the values of adjacent fabric are too similar and swallow the one that is supposed to stand out.  This time I didn't scrutinize the color combo from a distance, or even squint at it. Consequently, I fell into that trap.

Normally, I would resort to the seam ripper and remove the weak triangle and insert one of a stronger color.  But. sometimes I'm lazy.  I certainly didn't want to deal with the "right way" this time.  The lost triangle was one of the two first to be sewn in the sequence, which meant the whole block would have to be torn apart.

Crayons to the rescue!  Years ago, I took part in an informal lesson where we colored quilt blocks with good ol' Crayola crayons.  (Not the washable kind) .  The crayon color can be set with heat and it works especially well with light fabrics.  So I dug out my box of crayons, found a color I liked and colored.  I placed a piece of sand paper under the triangle to stabilize it and also to help the crayon rub more strongly.

Then I placed paper towel over the triangles and pressed it with a hot iron.  The wax is absorbed by the towel and the color is left on the fabric.

Ahh.  Much better,  This is not my favorite block in the series, but it will work.

P is for...

Progress # 1

The wedding quilt top is coming along.  I've made three more "blocks" since my last post.  Five more to go and I should be able to start cobbling this baby together.  As I begin to see the end of the project, I have to remind myself that no matter what... it will take time.  The last laps seem to take the longest;  I've never run track, but I imagine that it sometimes feels that way.

(Teotihuacan- Pyramid of the Sun)

mosaics - note the diamond

Progress #2


The triangles galore quilt now numbers 21 bocks.  I'm shooting for 35! I'm gonna run out of room on the design wall.

Parts


Quilt "parts" are one of the ideas that Gwen Marston and Freddy Moran have advocated in their books, Collaborative Quilting and Freddy and Gwen Collaborate Again.  They found that making basic pieces such as HST's or nine patches, or piano keys, or spikes, in advance of their meetings made the designing process a lot more efficient. Each of them put together a stash of parts using their scraps and with no set quilt pattern in mind.

I've been making parts, too. I have no set plans for them, but I know I'll use them somehow, someday.    I always sew together HST's of the cut off triangles from the corners of flying geese or snowballs (even if they are tiny).  I sew together elongated triangles left over from the Triangle Galore project which will make skinny spikes or divided rectangles. I sew these pieces together in the Leader and Ender style of Bonnie Hunter... I have a stash of pieces by my sewing machine.  As I start a series of sewing, I will begin the process with one set of the parts and then when I come to the end of the project, I'll sew another together.  These leaders and enders take the place of the bit of scrap that is often used at the start of a seam so that fabric and thread don't make an annoying birds nest or jam into the "hole" in the machine.  (Sometimes I forget which project I am really working on and end up sewing several parts in a row before I remember they are supposed to be the leader and ender.  LOL)   Here's just a wee handful of my parts.  Those HST's measure 1.75 inches square.

Play


The Bloggers BOM for this month was designed by Amy of Mrs. Schmenkman Quilts.
These are my four blocks.

The New'Bee made-fabric bee over on 15minutes play.com... Beebee asked for this star of made fabric and a bright solid around it.  The solid fabric is really a lot brighter than it appears here.  My made fabric was made from tiny scraps, so there is lots of variety.

Parcel


Look what arrived in the mail all of 40 minutes ago!  Gwen's newest book!  Published by AQS.

It is FABULOUS.  No matter what your quilting style is -  modern, traditional, scrappy, applique, wonky, liberated, amish solids- there is something of interest in this book.   It holds lots of fun and inspiration and how-to hints!  Gwen shares the spotlight with a number of BIQR students.   I highly recommend this book.  I'm looking forward to taking a really good look at all the quilts.  I'm going to Gwen's retreat in October and Liberated Medallions is the focus.  So excited!