Catching Up

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Catching up on a few things that happened over the holidays:

First, Julie contacted me about an error in a pattern I did for McCall’s Quick Quilts back in 2006.  It was nice to know somebody was still using the pattern!  The magazine probably published a correction in the next issue, but I was out of town so didn’t have access to either my original article or the magazine.  Julie figured it out on her own, however, and I think she did a great job.  She was kind enough to send me pictures of her finished placemats:

Second, I got 3 quilts bound.  Oh yes, I blogged about the first two before the binding was complete, taking care to hide the edges!  Here they are:

Little Jewels, from a pattern by The Quilt Police

Quilt from Pat Sloan’s “Going on a Picnic” quilt along

I finally bound this quilt, which was a practice piece for a pattern I developed last fall

Third, Studio Stitch is now offering the pattern I developed to make this quilt:

The pattern is free with purchase of enough FQs to make the smallest size, but you don’t have to buy the same fabrics I used.  Since I’m always looking for an excuse to buy more FQs, this seems perfect to me 😀

On to 2021!

The Tula Quilt: Better Late Than Never!

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A friend and I decided to work together on Tula Pink’s City Sampler quilt. We liked the variety of the blocks and the tiny pieces in some of them. Since I really prefer not to make the same block twice, 100 different blocks were appealing.

And yes, I know everybody else made this quilt years ago. I’ve seen several beautiful examples.

Anyway, here are a few of my blocks so far. If some of them don’t look right, that’s because I made a substitute for any block I didn’t care for 😀And finally, my favorite block so far:
What have you been up to?

Avoiding Half Square Triangles

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Half square triangles are an important design element in many quilts. The split value and diagonal line allow a variety of dynamic designs.

This is a Half Square Triangle (HST)

One of my quilt groups has been discussing HSTs because some of us love them and some have limited tolerance for them. It matters because we regularly do block exchanges.

One member recently sent a picture of a beautiful depression block quilt, and that got the discussion going again. A depression block quilt is made entirely of HSTs!

This is a typical block from a Depression Quilt

 

This is a traditional Depression Block Quilt made entirely with HSTs

Not being much of a rule-follower, I got to speculating about how we might make this quilt using strips instead of HSTs. (Yes, I get that the original idea was to use up small scraps, but what if you just wanted the overall effect without all those HSTs?) My friend Mary B encouraged me to develop this idea, so here we go.

I did a number of experiments with Electric Quilt 8 (EQ8), which produced all the illustrations for this post.  I learned that the most important element in the success of this quilt is contrast between the values (rather than the colors) of the fabrics. (All the illustrations use Fossil Fern fabrics from the EQ8 fabric library.)

I first tried drawing a block that used strips of lights and darks in place of the rows of triangles. This would simplify construction significantly.

Here’s the block:

Depression block effect without the HSTs

And here’s the quilt:

Then I tried a traditional Courthouse Steps block set on point to mimic the depression block effect.

Here’s the block:

And here’s the quilt:

Finally, I changed up the color arrangement in the traditional Courthouse Steps block to provide more variation.

Here’s the block:

And the quilt:

So! I’m not sure my variations are a good substitute for the traditional Depression Block quilt, but it was fun and I do like the quilts. What do you think, Mary B? 

Christmas 2020

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Our neighborhood was lucky to get a visit from Santa on a warm afternoon.  Everyone wore masks, because we can’t risk Santa getting you-know-what!

I hope your holiday preparations are going equally well!

And it’s back to quilts next week–I just couldn’t resist because this is so 2020.

Designing to Avoid Intersecting Seams

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My friend Chela asked about designing to avoid intersecting seams.  The goal is to make a quilt less “fussy” to construct. Here are 3 ways to do that. Thanks for the idea, Chela!

One of the easiest ways to avoid intersecting seams is to move alternate rows over 1/2 block. This can create interesting designs that you wouldn’t have suspected if you hadn’t tried it!

My most recent example is a quilt I designed for Studio Stitch:

Lightening. Read about it in last week’s post if you like.

Of course, many traditional patterns depend on the blocks lining up exactly to create visual interest.  They might not benefit from shifting half a block!  Just look at this:

Another favorite way to avoid obvious intersections is to partially frame blocks so that they appear offset. The intersections get lost in the background and the design is much more interesting. One of my favorite examples of this is the BQ2 pattern by Maple Island Quilts. 

I taught a class with this pattern and called it “Easier Than It Looks” because it is! The design looks complex but in reality it is just a matter of framing and rotating blocks. Here’s the quilt I made as a sample for the class:

Another example of partially framed blocks is my recent “Little Jewels” quilt:

And good news!  I tracked down the origin of this design and you can find instructions for it free on this website.

Here is an example of one block.

The “trick” is that each block is framed on two sides, making it asymmetrical.  Then alternate blocks are rotated 180 degrees so that any sense of quilt rows is lost!  Make a couple of scrap blocks and try it–it’s magic!  In truth, there are the usual intersections between blocks but the corners are almost impossible to see 😀

Finally, making blocks of different sizes certainly can be used to avoid intersecting seams. I consider this a design-as-you-go process and it does take both time and confidence, but it works well.  Here is one I made ages ago:

art quilt, gwen marston

Refrigerator quilt inspired by Gwen Marston. Bev Manus came up with the idea for refrigerator quilts.  Finished size 12″ x 12″

And here are some recent blocks up on the design wall to test a potential background fabric:

These blocks are all the same size (will finish 6″) but the sashing will be variable.  I’m setting them in vertical rows with variable distances between the rows, and variable distances between the blocks within each row!  No way will there be anything to line up 😀

Have a good week and share any tricks you have to avoid fussy intersections!

A Few Favorite Christmas Patterns

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If you put up a Christmas tree at your home, the tree skirt probably is part of the fun. Because of that, I thought I’d feature a couple of tree skirts I’ve made in the past few years. The patterns were fun and the only potentially difficult part of the construction was the need for bias binding on the scalloped edges.

Garden Gate Quilts
“Trees All Around”, class sample made from the pattern by Quilted Garden Designs

I love the tree skirt with Christmas trees!. Family members loved it, too, so I had to make more than one 😀 It was also a good way to use some of the Christmas fabrics I’ve been unable to resist! I used fusible applique, so it was pretty quick and easy.

Quilted Christmas tree skirt
Snowmen All Around, my class sample from a pattern by Quilted Garden Designs

A year of so later I found this additional tree skirt pattern by the same designer. I love it too, so of course I had to make it.

Which reminds me of this pattern, by Joni Pike, which I reduced to half size so our daughter could use it as a wall hanging rather than a lap quilt. The pattern is called “Frosty Flakes” #806, but I have been unable to find the publisher on the internet recently.

Frosty Flakes, Sew Special Designs

I loved this one, too. I guess, when it comes to winter holidays, I’m trapped in what my friend Elizabeth calls the “dungeon of cute”. So I’ll quit for now!

What cute stuff have you made for Christmas or other holidays?

10 Fun Items (that aren’t quilt books)

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You probably know that I have loved getting to review quilt books for C&T this past year. What you may not know is that C&T has so much more than quilt books. Here are 10 of my favorites:

10. Diamond Star Quilts by Barbara H. Cline. It may look like a quilt book, but it’s actually a whole method for making those extremely elaborate-looking star quilts that most of us drool over. If you’ve been wanting to make one of those, this may be the tool for you.

9. Zakka Wool Applique by Minki Kim is full of very cute projects including baskets, bags, and home dec.  If you want to craft with “woolies” as my friends call them, this book has a number of cute and useful projects.

8. Kim Schaefer’s Calendar Candle Mats is a packet with full-size patterns for cute little mats made with fusible applique and embroidery.  She calls them candle mats, but I think they would be good mug rugs, too.  Presents for school teachers come to mind, and teachers certainly deserve gifts this year!

7. Who knew there was a puzzle book for quilters?!?  Yep, More Happy Quilter Variety Puzzles, Volume 3, is just such a book.  There are crosswords, logic puzzles, and more.

6. Everyday Embroidery for Modern Stitchers makes me want to take up embroidery again.  The book has iron-on transfer patterns included (I remember those from back in the day!).  The designs are intended to appeal to young people, but some of us “older” folks like them, too!

5.Botanical Embroidery, by Brian Haggard, is a packet with instructions and iron-on transfers for more traditional motifs.  The designs are gorgeous and would go especially well with heirloom projects. 

4. Bags!  C&T makes bags!  There’s everything from pouches to this large tote, all made from recycled water bottles.  They are water resistant and suitable for carrying things like pens and knitting needles that might poke through other bags.  Here’s the large holiday tote:

3.  The perfect hand applique paper, at last!  Oh, yes, it has every feature I want!  It is fusible on one side and, best of all, it is water soluble!  Yes!  Just iron it on, applique as usual, and the paper goes away when you wash your item.  This is some of the best news of the year for those of us who don’t like picking paper out of projects! 

2. The Foolproof Color Workbook is mostly a coloring book for adults with beautiful mandala-like designs to use for experimenting with color combinations.  It’s nice, but my very favorite color tool is the #1 item on this list.

And my #1: The Foolproof Color Wheel Set created by Katie Fowler is the best single tool I’ve seen for working with color.  There are 10 disks demonstrating the various ways in which colors can be combined (analogous, complementary, etc).  I like this because it simply cuts through all the color-related vocabulary that bogs people down (tints, shades, color triad, blah, blah) and provides concrete, visible examples. It is my favorite tool of the year.  If you struggle with choosing colors, I recommend it.

What is your favorite tool of the year?

A Quilt for A Man (or anyone)

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It’s sometimes difficult to think of a quilt design to make for a man, and can be even more difficult to find fabrics that don’t seem too “girly” or cute. Leaving aside the options of fabrics featuring beer labels or half naked women, I thought muted blue and brown would be a good option.

And of course, Studio Stitch had the perfect fabric collection! Here’s the quilt:

And here’s a secret:  I used flannel (the 108″ wide backing flannel) for both the batting and the backing!  As you can see, it drapes beautifully.  An added advantage was that flannel sticks to itself pretty well, so there was no trouble with layers shifting when I quilted it.

Having made it, I wrote up the pattern for Studio Stitch. They will be offering it free with purchase. I don’t know details, so if you’re interested, go to  their website  and sign up for the newsletter and they’ll let you know.  (Newsletter signup is just below the big picture on the front page).

Have a good Thanksgiving and STAY SAFE!

Little Jewels

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I found a quilt like this somewhere online, and you know I love improvised scrap quilts, so I just had to make it!  (Sadly, I have lost the link, so if you know where this came from originally, please let me know.)

It’s always a great idea to offset the intersecting seams!

My quilter was able to use Minky Dot for the backing and quilt it with no batting. That makes the quilt nice and cuddly without being too heavy.

I have been informed that the grandchildren prefer the quilts backed with polyester fleece for cuddling. The lighter weight of the quilt without batting also makes it ideal for dragging around the house or building forts and tents.

Polyester fleece can be a challenge to quilt because it stretches in at least one direction. The quilter told me that a midarm or long arm quilting machine does not have feed dogs, so stretching was not a problem, though the tension was a problem at times.  I suppose I could do free motion quilting with the feed dogs down on my domestic machine, but walking foot quilting might stretch the back.

Minky backing with no batting allows the quilt to drape nicely

Quilt stats:

Name: Quilted Jewels

Pattern source: anonymous picture on internet

Finished size: 46″ x 62″

Quilted by: Julia Madison