Seeds - Part I

Seeds - Part I

71" x 71"

It started with an inkling of an idea to make tiny pieced circles.  I already know how to applique circles, but I wasn't sure if I could make some tiny pieced ones.  I selected a color palette and got out my compass. I really like a large sampling of colors.

I started with quarter circles drawn on freezer paper, cut out the pieces, and then pressed them to the fabric.  Once they were on the fabric, I used my scissors to cut a 1/4" seam allowance, and then started the stitching.  I actually thought I would be doing this on the sewing machine because I had gotten quite proficient at sewing quarter circle curves on this quilt.

For reference, the A1 section has about a 1" radius.

I also wanted my circles and sets of circles to be lots of different sizes.  So I drew about 8 different sets, some with just 2 rings, and some with 3 rings.  Here is Sharky trying to distract me! 

Quite expectedly, this project required a lot of repetition.  I cut out 4 pieces of each quarter circle template, and then traced the edge of the freezer paper as my stitching line, lightly with a pencil to the back side of the fabric. 

I did try stitching these by machine, but it was an epic fail.  Also, using a 1/4" seam allowance on these small pieces was a fail.  I just could not get the fabric to stretch enough to go around the tiny inner curves.  My solution was to cut a tiny seam allowance for the inside curves only, approximately 1/8".  Well after starting my project, Jen Carlton-Bailly began posting on Instagram about sewing tiny curves like this! Ah ha! Great minds think alike!  Then MQG offered her tutorial on her process.  It involves glue basting the seams and cutting the seams, and then trimming the seams after stitching, ultimately down to tiny seams....which I was already doing.  My methods were not any easier nor harder, so I just buckled down and continued on.  I did like that she offered plastic templates, that could have saved me some work, but I wanted to custom choose my own sizes. The traced pencil lines helped me hand piece more accurately.  And, the hand piecing of the curves went relatively fast.  I mean, the pieces are so small, that they don't require very many stitches. So good!

Ultimately, I used pins, only 3 per seam.  The first pin is pretty easy to pin, right in the center. I folded the pieces in half to find the center. 

Next, I would sometimes hold it up to the light, to overlap the seam line and stick the pin in just the right spot.  These are those tiny little applique pins.  

The pins to line up the ends are a bit tricky to both hold and pin at the same time.  (I think you can also see in the above photo how small the seam allowance is in the orange piece.)  I got better over time, but it definitely took some practice. Also, I don't know why, but these started looking like little fortune cookies to me!

This is one that is stitched, and before it is pressed flat.  I became a bit obsessed with the interesting 3D shapes of these little curves. So fun!

Over time, I became increasingly concerned that the seam was so small, that it would unravel, especially when some of my fabrics were more coarsely woven.  Some of the fabrics were linens, and those were both easier to stretch and sew, but also more likely to become unwoven.  So, I went back and added a line of stay-stitching.  Also, since this is going to be a quilt, the quilting lines will help hold together the seams.

Over time, I began accumulating a set of the little circle quarters and arranging them on my design wall.  I improvised to select the next round of colors and sizes. 

The colors and the shapes were so incredibly satisfying! The power of circles! 

Warm Heart Trapped by Icy Blue

Warm Heart Trapped by Icy Blue
70.5" x 86.5"
(back side of Flow)

This quilt is the reverse side of Flow. It started out as square sections of red that I built up with strips of blue in a log cabin style.

It is an easy and fun way to build a quilt top to use up scraps. Then as I was working on it, the center red reminded me of my heart.  The blue strips were experiences through time.  As time passes, I have more experiences and more pain and build bigger walls around my heart.  It's all about protection and fear.  What does it take to get back to the center?  I am suspecting that the answer is love.  Because as these "wall" are built from emotional pain, they will be pulled down from an emotion just as strong as any other, Love.  If you have ever fallen in love, you know what I mean.  The love just bypasses any thoughts and gets right to the heart of things. 

Here is the completed top, before the quilting.  This is the trapped side.  It is all about being stuck behind the walls.  The other side, Flow, is about movement and flow and getting the heart pumping again, breaking free of constraints, sometimes self imposed constraints.  This is one of the many reasons why I love this quilt so much, because it truly integrates both sides of the quilt.

I am not sure if you have noticed how distorted the full view of the completed quilt is at the top? This is because of the dense machine quilting on the front in long diagonal zig zag lines.  I was really surprised when I looked at the back and noticed just how distorted the quilting made my beautiful and perfectly square shapes.  Maybe a metaphor for memory, or cognitive distortions? I am not sure but I really find it even more beautiful now.

To get this quilt to lie flat, I tried blocking it.  First I soaked it in a bathtub full of water.  It looks really interesting suspended in folds in the water. 

I flattened it out while it was wet, and pinned down all the edges and then set some fans up to blow it dry.  That worked to flatten it, and then I trimmed it and put the binding on.  All set!  Here are a few details of the back that show the quilting from the front side.  I love how it adds interest and texture to the big red blocks.

This completes the last of the new quilts, and hopefully I will be updating soon with another installation of the Plenty to Go Around quilt.  Cheers!

Pink and Orange

Pink and Orange
91" x 88"

This is one of my stash busters projects, in which I attempt to use up my stash in a bed quilt while exploring different designs ideas.  I wanted to learn to sew circles.  I think this pattern is called Drunkard's Path?  Regardless, it was a lot of hand cutting of pieces, and a lot of curves to sew.  Suffice to say, I'm good with the circle thing now.
What I learned.  All my patterned oranges and pinks look kind of the same next to each other because their color values were so similar.  I needed to buy solids for the backgrounds which kind of went against the spirit of the project.  Oh well!  The larger circles are pink on an orange background and the smaller circles are orange on a pink background.  I thought the difference would be significant to notice it as the first thing about this quilt.  I was wrong.  In fact, it is hard to see that at all unless I mention it to the viewer.  Was it that way for you?  Did you notice?
So, this means that for two similar colors, in a quilt like this, the value plays a more important role, as does the other main factor, the size of the circles.  It is easy to see at a glance that one side has larger circles and the other has smaller circles.  Shape and size are important!

What I love about this quilt.  It is so pretty.  I use minimal machine quilting and some hand quilting so it has a very soft texture.  I also really love the back.  I decided to make BIGGER circles on the back, and a calmer color palette in case I got tired of the POP of bright color in such a large size.  The back is pretty awesome!

I improvisationally pieced large sections of neutral fabrics, and then used giant freezer paper templates to cut the shapes to sew the Drunkard's Path blocks with the white background.  It was so fun to play with so many different patterned neutrals.  My favorites were the large white flower, the white bunnys on black, and the little tiny rows of creatures on a grey background.  Too fun!
The last thing I learned....if your batting is too thin, in this case, mine was, the bright pop from the front shows through to the back.  It makes a warm color cast that I was not particularly looking for.  And you may not notice this effect on these photos because there has been a bit of color correction in Photoshop, but I assure you, in person, it is a bit noticeable.  And, probably more significant because most of the back is white.  I will remember this lesson for the future (I hope!).  If you would like to see this quilt, it will be showing at the Austin Area Quilt Guild's Show, Palmer Auditorium, Sept 16-18, Austin, TX.  I entered it as a two sided quilt, but if it is not showing both sides, as a Quilt Angel (with the white gloves) to show you the back.  :)

Silver Linings Circles

Silver Linings Circles 
59" x 58.5"

This lovely project came to me through a fabric designer I have known for a few years now, Hoodie Crescent. She wanted me to make a quilt with her fabrics to help with marketing, and so she introduced me to STOF fabrics. I was excited about the opportunity because I just love making quilts. We agreed to a few terms and then I waited for the fabric to arrive!

I am very new to this style of working. It seems odd to me to make a quilt from just one collection of fabrics, even though they are all made to go together, I usually like to work in a more "scrappy" mode. In this gesture, they also sent me some fabrics from another line to put in with the Silver Linings. Very cool! I had no idea how much fabric I asked for until it arrived. It was a LOT of fabric!! I set about washing and ironing! The fabric was so soft, I really enjoyed the meditative quality of handling all of it before I got started!

On another note, I must tell you that they wanted me to write a pattern to go with it. I have no experience writing patterns, so I wrote the pattern as I worked. Lots of notes, measurements and photos helped me put it together. Also, because STOF fabrics is in Denmark, they have many customers who use the metric system, so my pattern needed to be in English and Metric measurements. This added to my anxiety, but ultimately was not a problem, just a bit more work. They will be adding it to their website at some point if you want to download it and make this fun quilt!

My idea was to make some improvisational patchwork (like on the back of Pink and Orange), and cut it into drunkard path's blocks. I grouped the fabrics into 4 color patterns, and set to work. The first one was the creams and greens (and a little pop of aqua blue).

It just needs to be big enough to fit under the template I drew. 

This is a photo of it on my glass door.  Once I pressed the freezer paper template in place, I could easily see that my patchwork had "grown" large enough.  It was time to cut!  Then sew it to the plain cream background piece:

This part is really easy, even though it looks rather lumpy.  It turns out that the bigger the curve, the easier it is to sew!  I simply folded the patchwork in half, twice, to make folds, and then did the same thing to the background piece.  Match the folds, with right sides together, and pin, and then slowly sew easing in the fullness.  You can see more (including videos!) about this simple technique on my blog post with a tutorial for making One Earth.

I used a different patchwork for each quadrant of the circle.  It was easy to make these fabrics sing!

Next up?  How to quilt it!  I decided to keep it simple and modern, long parallel lines, 1/4" spaced.  I think it worked perfectly!  And it leads me to another wonderful Quilt Market story!  I met Becky Richards from Hobbs Batting (which I mentioned on the post regarding my 2nd place win at the Houston Quilt Show for Two Deer, or Too Dear!).  She had sent me some sample battings to play with!  I choose the Cotton (80%)/Wool (20%) blend for this project, and just LOVED it.  It was so easy to work with, easy to quilt, and the quilt looks fantastic after all this quilting!  It hangs so nicely!

This may become my new favorite batting, but I have another Hobbs sample to try, a Silk batt! 

The Making of One Earth - Tutorial

The Making of One Earth - Tutorial

I had been playing with improvisational curves.  Unfortunately, I like my curves too curvy.  And, the improv curves work better with less curvy curves.  Ultimately, this technique failed for me for this project because my pieces got increasingly distorted as the shape got larger.  So, I opted for the more traditional approach for curved pieces.  This is a method that works!

Draw your curves on a piece of freezer paper.
Cut out the paper shapes.
Press them to the RIGHT side of the fabric.
DO NOT cut along the edge of the freezer paper, DO cut 1/4" from the edge of the freezer paper, thus adding your seam allowance.
Then sew the pieces together (right sides together).

Bonus: The freezer paper templates can be reused many times!
I started by drawing some curves.  


If you would like to see this is action, here's a short video of drawing the curves:

Also, I wanted my biggest and last curve to be a perfect circle, like a Drunkard's path pattern.  So, I started with it first, and used a tape measure with holes punched in it (I punched the holes myself!).

Also, I mentioned in the video that you can make one big circle if you make 4 templates like this.  Too silly!  You don't need to make 4 templates, that's the beauty of having a template.  Draw it once, and then use it 4 times to make a circle!

Next I cut the paper shapes apart with a rotary cutter.  I did not hit the lines exactly, but that is really not too important, as long as you add the 1/4" as you cut your fabric to the actual edge of the freezer paper template.  Press them to the right sides of the fabric, and cut them all out.
Here is another video showing using scissors to cut the seam allowance:

Here are all the pieces for one quadrant of the earth. You can see the seam allowances peaking out from the paper templates.

Next, gently peel off the freezer paper and then stitch the pieces together.
Fold each piece in half with the two sides touching and crease the middle, then fold again.  You will have pieces that look like this.  The creased folds will help you pin the pieces together.


When opened, it should look like this:

Here is a photo of how to match the creases:













Place one pin at each side, and a pin for each fold:

I like to sew with the larger piece on the top.  Even though the folds look unwieldy, it is not too hard if you sew slowly.  Here is a video with a few tips:

After sewing fabrics for all four quadrants, I selected a background, in this case white fabric.
 
Then a made a template for the background from the unused outer corner of the arcs I drew and cut earlier.  Sorry, but I didn't take a picture of that one!  You can get an idea of the shape by looking at the shape of the white corner pieces in the photo above.

Next up, the little i's.  I used Mistyfuse on the back of all my fabrics.  It is super easy and quick and fun!  Cut out a piece of the Mistyfuse and press it to the back of the fabric using a teflon sheet to protect your iron.  When it cools, peel it up and cut out your shape.  I used varying widths and heights to make the i's and then decided their placement on the quilt top before any of them were pressed into place.












Last up, layering with batting and a backing (which is another post!), and quilting with my favorite grey Masterpiece from Superior Threads:

I had a LOT of fun with the quilting!  It was fun to pick a different pattern for each of the layers.  I did not have fun quilting the 1/2" concentric spiral of the background.  I love the way it looks, but it is not fun too do it.  I should also mention that I quilted the background BEFORE fusing the "i" shapes on.  It made it much easier to get the effect I wanted.  Then I went back and quilted the i's too!