Pictures of the Curvy Blocks

In an earlier post, I described working outside my comfort zone and referenced a totally uncharacteristic quilt I'd been working on. It involved curves and bright, vibrant, vivid colors of batik fabrics.

These have not been anywhere near my signature looks for as long as I have been quilting. I am a confirmed traditionalist - old fashioned designs, orderly layouts, and reproduction looks.

To see the quilt blocks for this project, nobody would guess that they came from my hands!

Remembering a Fun Quilt Get-Away

Back in September 2007, just 2 weeks or so after school started, I took 2 days off along with Sharon, and we joined Kay and Sherrie for a trip to Knoxville, Tennessee, to participate in a Ricky Tims Quilt Seminar. Featured along with Ricky was Alex Anderson and Libby Lehman. Oh, my gosh, what an absolutely wonderful time we had!

The type of quilting Ricky Tims is known for is so far removed from any type of quilt I would have ever - ever - made, so I was just a bit unsure of how much I would end up getting out of this seminar, but after all was said and done, I think I learned so much. I think I am more apt to give some of these techniques a try, and I am a lot more willing to risk outlandish colors than I ever used to be. Everyone of us seemed to gravitate to something different. I really liked the process of designing the components of rhapsody-type quilts. I have made several. Sharon has spoken repeatedly of her interest in Convergence Quilts. I fully expect her to attempt one at some point. Sherrie and Kay...well, I couldn't say for certain what they were particularly drawn to, but I know they had parts of the program that they really liked better than others. I will have to ask, and then update this blog with their thoughts.

Rewards of Hand Piecing

I love my sewing room - Adam's old bedroom. I've arranged it to suit me, and I have all my quilting stuff organized and easily accessible. I can only think of one drawback and that is that when I am working in the sewing room, the rest of the family is downstairs doing stuff that I want to be in on!

So after about a hundred episodes of NCIS which we dvr'd, I decided I had absolutely wasted too much time! I enjoy hand piecing and hand quilting, so why wasn't I working on something?

Then I remembered a UFO begun 2 or 3, maybe 4, years ago. It is a 2-color quilt of a very pretty deep red and an off-white. There are just 2 blocks--the star and the stepping stone. The reason I'd quit working on it was that I'd run out of one of the neutrals, and then when I found the neutral, I'd forgotten the measurements.

Well, I dove into the bin where it was stored, figured out the dimensions, cut what I needed and set off to my favorite easy chair to piece, watch NCIS with DH, thus enjoyng 2 of my favorite things - quilting and family.

Above is a picture of the blocks that are pieced. It is 7 blocks by 5 blocks at present. I am not using a particular pattern, so I am unsure just how many more I will make. This covers just the end of my queen size bed, so to have a complete top, I am just halfway there. I have considered, however, piecing these togehter to use in a medallion surrounded by borders of pretty quilting. I could add some applique too, perhaps. I will let it tell me what to do. (Quilts do speak, you know.)

Outside the Box

Breaking old habits is tough sometimes.

In the quilting world, I have been a long-time proponent of traditional quilts. I preferred the old-fashioned designs, and the reproduction fabrics, hand quilting, you get the picture. And, whenever I'd see anything remotely resembling "art" quilts, I was usually only interested insofar as I could like ithem, admire them, but definitely not attempt to make them! Not my cup of tea.

Well, some bug must have attacked me, for lately I have been all agog over Kaffe Fassett's fabrics and designs. Grandma thinks I've gone off the deep end. When I recently bought some of this fabric on an outing with her, she turned up her nose, and muttered "what's gotten into her?" Funny. I knew she would not understand, bless her heart. It is from her that I have learned to appreciate fine quilting and traditional designs.

Case in point:

Back in September, four of us went to Knoxville, TN, for a Ricky Tims seminar. His designs are quite artsy, but over the course of the 4-day event, I became a huge fan of several of his techniques and patterns. Of course, any time there are quilters coming together for anything, there will be vendors peddling their wares. This event was no exception. I did my best to buy fabrics that were traditional, patterns, supplies, books, etc. all that fit my "comfort zone." My friend Kay bought a pattern with bright batik colors and the pattern had curves! Circles! Gracious. I took one look at that and just dismissed it entirely. (Actually, I do not even remember looking at it, but surely I must have for we definitely would have checked out each others' stuff as we hauled it out of there.) Anyway, it was not my "thing," so I just did not think about it! There were so many things that did appeal to me that there was no time to consider the stuff that didn't!

Well, a week ago, when we all got together for a fun-filled day of quilting/sewing, Kay brought this pattern and a stack of Kaffe Fassett fabrics. She was going to work on making the squares for this quilt! I still was not impressed - I had my own work to do (borders on the twins' baby quilts!). Kay just zipped right along making these blocks - machine piecing curves! She was having a blast, and no puckering or undoing stitches! Once I had all my borders on, I thought I really ought to learn how to do those curves, for who knows? Might be a necessary skill someday! Well, to make an already long story short, I made a few and before I knew it, I had enought for a full-size quilt!

Totally out of my comfort zone - totally not in any colors that I generally lean to - totally uncharacteristic, yet totally fun and satisfying!

I highly recommend stepping outside the box.

Unplanned Fabric Shopping

What a wonderful opportunity! I took a negative and turned it into a positive yesterday after school. Because of the accident which totalled Erin's car, she was to get her new car from Smitty's this morning. This meant that she could turn in her loaner car to Enterprise after work yesterday, thus earning her extra $$ from the insurance company. This required, though, a willing parent to drive up to Columbus to get her. So the bad ( Erin's car being wrecked) resulted in a good! Because I just left from school at around 3pm, I would be getting to Columbus way earlier than I needed to, so I decided to drive out East Broad Street to Quilt Beginnings. I didn't even decide to do this until I was several miles up Route 104.

Totally spur of the moment!

I was excited to do this as I equate Quilt Beginnings as a shop that specializes in very bright fabrics as opposed to the darker reproduction fabrics that I normally buy. Since I have been in a Kaffe Fassett mood lately, I knew they would have some of his that I'd been unable to find on my other fabric outings.

And I was not disappointed! They had the loveliest array of larger prints - those bold flowery, viney and leafy prints in amazing colors. Scrumptious. Absolutely scrumptious! The cost was a bit on the high side, but I just pretended not to care. I bought 1/2 yards of about 10 or 12 different fabrics. What a delightful treat. I also bought a new cutting mat and an 18-6 (or thereabouts) cutting ruler. My grand total was not as high as I expected, so even though I really probably didn't need to shop for any of this stuff right now, I was pleased to have had the opportunity to shop to my heart's content. Very, very satisfying.

Curvy Blocks

On Monday, when I sewed with Sharon and Kay, Kay worked on a project that involved curves. The pattern is probably better known as Drunkard's Path. She had purchased a pattern and templates for the project and brought her Kaffe Fassett fabrics to cut into for it. Well, I finished the borders for the baby quilts that I was working on, and I thought it would be smart to learn how to sew curves, so I got my little stash of ultra-bright batiks and dedicated them to this project. The very first block I made was nearly perfect. It was so easy and it requires no pins! Since I had such good luck with my trial block, I plunged in and cut all the batiks. That was Monday.

By Thursday night, I had sewn them all together! I have them on my design wall and they look fabulous! Here is a picture when about half of the large blocks were finished and placed on the design wall.

I have considered what I will do with this quilt. I will make it into a quilt, by the way. But it is so not me! I am a traditionalist! I am neat and order (at least with the quilts I make), so this is way out of my comfort range.

I decided that I would make it and then donate it to the Tigerettes for a fund raiser. They could display it in their booth at Wheels of Progress Festival. There could be other places where it could be seen and sell chances on it as a raffle. I think it would bring in a good bit of money for the squad. If nothing else, it's motivation for working hard on it to finish. I would take it to Wilma to have it quilted.

I've taken a picture of the complete set of blocks laid out on my design wall. I need to get it into the computer, though. My next step is to "square up" all the blocks. There were 36 larger blocks and 18 smaller blocks. All need to be squared up. I still have a clean kitchen counter, so I will do it down here.

I am actually motivated!

Ta-da!

A blog about one of my favorite things. Quilting. Yesterday Erin showed me some things on the internet about blogging. It looked very interesting, and I can add links to those on this one, so I am going to see how I do with this. It ought to be fun. Since I teach English in my real life, I think I can find plenty to write about. I do a pretty fair amount of that at school every day!

So, recent news for me is my very growing interest in quilts and fabrics by Kaffe Fassett. It all began with an ad in the quilting magazines lately of a gorgeous quilt pictured in front of some landmark in Malta. I paid only marginal attention to it at first, but gradually I began to study it and grow more and more enamored by it. I actually woke one Saturday a month or so ago from dreaming about it!

No stores in my immediate area sell Kaffe Fassett's fabrics, so I did a bit of shopping online and bought about 18 or 20 fat quarters. They arrived very quickly and oh! my gosh! How gorgeous they are! At the same time, I bought 2 of his books - Victoria Museum Quilts and Kaleidescope of Quilts. They certainly are different from the kinds of quilts I am known for liking - traditional.

Then just yesterday I took a little field trip to Waynesville's Fabric Shack. I took Grandma, who likes that store a lot. After I helped her find the fabric she wanted, I made my way to the KF fabrics and bought 1/2 yard cuts of about 8. Then I zipped over to the bins where they keep their fat quarters and found about 6 or so that go with fabrics that I have been collecting.

Happy, happy times! Time with Grandma and time in a quilt shop add up to a really great day. A bonus was that Erin wanted to go along. I really had a great time with her. She's become such a wonderful person. I enjoyed her company.