WIP Wednesday

 I'm packing for a weekend retreat, so my house is turned upside down! I want to bring everything, but that is just silly. How do you decide which projects to bring with you to retreats and sew-in days? To complicate things, this is the retreat that I organize. And. Julia is meeting me there, so I need to bring projects and supplies for her, too. Yup. My car will be FULL!

I did finish a quilt this week- last year's retreat project. I wanted to have it done for show & tell. It looks a little odd, but it makes more sense with Julia's quilt next to it (which is not done yet). Read more about them here.

Holy crap! I just found a 24 year old UFO! I made this wall hanging top with leftovers from the first quilt I made by myself after I took a beginner class in 1990. So this is probably from 1991 or 1992. My points are bad, and the fabric screams 1990's, but it's a good design. Maybe I'll reproduce it this weekend with modern scraps. You know, because I don't have enough projects packed already.

I'm going to pack some more. I'll be surfing the linkup when I need a break.

The One Year Quilt

You've all seen the meme: How long does it take to finish a quilt you're not working on? For this quilt, the answer is one year!  Actual working time? Three or four days. It was a coincidence, really, that I completed it exactly one year after it was started.

At our retreat last year, Julia and I made these jelly roll race tops.

The workshop included instruction on adding piece-lique circles. It was Julia's idea that our circles should make a heart when our quilts are together. Since we wanted to work on this project together, and last summer flew by, we buckled down and applied the circles during Christmas break. OK, I may have leaned on her pretty hard to carve out the time for this.

Not wanting to wait any longer, I quilted mine yesterday. Just before midnight, I took the final stitches on the binding. I'm happy that I'll have it for show & tell this weekend.

 

My quilting plan revolves around my dislike for marking and burying threads. I quilted organic wavy lines across the rows with my walking foot. When I ran into a circle, I just wrapped around it and continued on.

 

I did want to do something fun in the circles, which required burying threads. It couldn't be avoided. To make the flower shape, I divided the circle in 8ths with a hera marker. No pen or pencil lines to wash out is almost as good as no marking at all.

For the back, I wanted to use more batiks, but I had previously chopped up my entire batik stash into 9" squares for future Anita's Arrowhead blocks.  I pulled all the colors that coordinated with my top and started piecing. In no time at all, I had a pieced back that really made this a two-sided quilt. I used the same blues and greens from the circles to piece together the binding.

 I'm happy it is done, but it needs its mate! Half of a heart is not very exciting. Maybe I can get Julia to quilt hers this weekend.

 Jelly Roll Heart

Started 3/8/14

Completed 3/8/15

Workshop with Pat Harrison at Great Escape Weekend

Empty Nest Quilting

 Our nest is empty again. Bill and I helped Julia move into a new dorm room yesterday. There are perks to being an upperclassman, and she loves her larger room with private bath.

I've got a lot of projects to keep me busy. Last week was all about piecing. I love piecing! I love the process of cutting up fabric and sewing it back together. If the process involves some clever recutting and resewing, that makes me even happier!

Two examples from my recent sewing sessions:

Anita's Arrowheads for the back of my jelly roll quilt...

and Scrappy Mountain Majesties. 

This is my new stash project. As I come across smaller pieces of fabric, I'll be cutting 8.5" squares for this project.

 I pulled out this Philip Jacobs' geranium print for my New Year post. I couldn't resist getting right to work on this One Block Wonder. I'm sure I bought the book, but I couldn't find it anywhere. I had to wing it! It was a blast cutting and piecing this top. Now I need to figure out what to use on the back.

 I'll be focusing on quilting this week, starting with this mini for the schnitzel and boo swap. I'll tell you more about it when it is done.

 When I cleaned out my storage area, I found a basket full of Orca Bay parts from 2011. There were lots of HSTs and hourglass blocks. As I was piecing other projects, I pieced together pinwheels from the HSTs as leaders/enders. In no time, I had a new project to assemble. I put the last 2 borders on this morning making this a 40" square wall hanging. Now this needs backing fabric, too.

 And one more to quilt. My friend Ellie was working on this table runner and lost interest. I'll quilt it up and donate it to our guild auction in October.

 Let's sum up...

Ready for quilting:

Jelly roll/Arrowhead

One block wonder

schnitzel and boo mini

Scrappy blues

pink/yellow runner

Setting In Circles

 Last weekend, Julia and I worked on our retreat projects from last March. During the retreat, we made the jelly roll race tops. Pat Harrison's design had a lovely swirl of circles that were set in using Sharon Schamber's piece-lique method. Julia and I thought we could arrange our circles so the quilts would work together. I first thought of a yin-yang type deisgn. The heart was Julia's brilliant idea.

The original method requires cutting holes in the background first, then piecing in the circle. We reversed that and prepared the circles first by pressing under the seam allowance. Then we glue basted them to the background and cut away the inside of the circle from the background. Finally, we machine stitched the seam. If you've done any piece-lique, this might make sense. It's hard to describe, but it worked for us. Anyway, don't our finished tops look cool together?

When I went to my stash to look for a backing, I found my bin full of Anita's Arrowhead blocks and batik squares waiting to be pieced. About a year ago, I cut up my entire batik stash into squares for these blocks. I pulled all the yellow, orange, pink and green and went to town piecing blocks. I absolutely love making these blocks! Anita's process makes me happy! Now I have a pieced backing that will make this a two-sided quilt.

The binding is pieced from scraps leftover from my circles.

My top, backing, and binding are ready and waiting for me to buy some batting.

I set aside all the blues for Julia, but she won't be able to work on hers again until Spring break.

Tuesday Archives - Jelly Rolls

Val's Tuesday Archive theme today is Jelly Roll Quilts. I've got two completed quilts and a couple of WIPs made from jelly rolls.

This is Olivia's quilt, made for my 4th great niece in February 2013. A sweet quilt for a sweet little girl!

 

This batik quilt was quick to piece and fun to quilt.

Julia and I participated in a jelly roll race at a retreat last March. They are still in the WIP pile because the project calls for some set-in circles to add interest. We planned out a layout design for our circles, but haven't made this a priority yet.

Head on over to Val's for more jelly roll inspiration!

WIP Wednesday- Quilt Retreat Edition

After a wonderful weekend away at a quilting retreat, I have lots to show you!

Start & Finish: I made a little quilt to enter in the weekend quilt challenge. The theme this year was "Things we Bring to Quilt Camp." My first year at the retreat, I didn't bring enough thread. I won't make that mistake again!

I got to use some tiny scraps and my favorite Kate Spain print for the border. I used some silly fabric on the back.  The triangles are pockets for a hanging rod.

Of course, it was pieced and quilted with Aurifil thread.  I like the way the tiny quilting in the background and no quilting in the spools makes the spools pop. My little quilt is called "Going, Going, Gone."

New: The Saturday workshop started with a jelly roll race. Here are our yummy supplies.

I was so excited to sew on my Featherweight all weekend. She did great, with just a minor bobbin winding issue.

Here we are with our latest WIPs. The first time I attended this retreat, I was pregnant with Julia. Twenty years later, she was there with me again!

Someday, we will be inserting circles into these tops using the Piec-lique technique. Our fabric and design have been chosen, we just need to find some courage and time.

Ongoing: I finished 12 more blocks in the past week for my Farmer's Engineer's Wife quilt.

This is what happens when you try to sew after midnight!

Enjoy the rest of your week!

New Batik Project

 I've been itching to start something new. While surfing Pinterest last night, I came across a Fons and Porter pattern that attracted me. I knew immediately that I could use this package of batik strips that I've been hoarding. Actually, I gave them to Julia for Christmas two or three years ago.

I paired up the strips and started chopping them up.

Ooh, that lime and raspberry combo is so yummy.

 

The best part about this pattern is that it uses virtually the entire strip with minimal waste. I think the scraps will be perfect for a Ticker Tape canvas.

 

This is what I have after about two hours of work! Fun, right?!

 

If you are interested, here's the link to Kristine Peterson's pattern, Color Study. Or you can jump to Kristine's inspiration, Gemini by Blue Underground Studios.

Welcome, Olivia!

 My fourth grand-niece was born last week. Isn't Olivia so sweet?

Olivia's baby quilt is now ready to go. I used a really sweet jelly roll (Birdie by Me and My Sister Designs for Moda), Kona white and the Whirlygig pattern by Amelie Scott Designs. The quilt measured 48" x 60" before washing, about 45" x 57" after.

I've seen a quilting pattern similar to this a bunch of times online, so I drew it out on paper before I started. I wanted a loose design, so I started out really big. As you can see, I tightened up significantly as I made my way around the quilt.

See the tiny flowers in the center and giant flowers at the edge?

I used one extra block and some extra strips to make the back wide enough.

 More jelly roll strips became the binding.  I bordered the label with some leftover binding.

I had saved all the lighter strips for the binding, and I thought they needed some help. I think the bright pink ric rac did the trick.

This week was big sister Abby's 2nd birthday. She loves playing in her toy kitchen, so I made her a cute new apron.

Giant dots on the front, tiny dots on the back. I followed this tutorial by Yards and Yards.

I'll be linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts' Finish it up Friday and Pat Sloan's Show & Tell.