Commentary about works in progress, design & creativity
Colleen has been working on the Lozenge quilt on and off for a few weeks. Today she sent me a photo showing that my binding was too short -WAY too short.
duh.
Clearly I have too much on my mind. I knew how big the quilt was. I made the binding what I thought was the right size. Clearly, it wasn’t.
The quilt is coming back to me. I will finish the binding (another thing to add to my to do list) and then I will be able to send it off. From what I can see of the quilting, it looks good.
You must be getting sick of my donation block craze. I really do want to add more blocks and quilt tops to my 2017 list, so I made 5 more blocks on Sunday.
I worked on them while I was piecing the last quarter of En Provence. The blocks seemed to fly out of my machine despite the fact that I was really struggling to find backgrounds.
I have been working through my little bin of donation patches since I started on this binge. After 20 blocks, I have few backgrounds and a lot of fabrics that I am tired of using. Still, I was determined not to cut more backgrounds until I absolutely had to. I decided, after I made the Cal block (blue and yellow) that I needed to see if I had some charm packs.
The blue and yellow block as well as some of the others will be difficult to use with the standard blocks others make. There is some thing about using up as much as you can before you have to cut more background.
Eventually, I went to my tote of charm packs and found two of white fabric. I started cutting up one of them, so my next batch of donation blocks will be pretty standard.
The CQFA meeting was yesterday. It was a great meeting and we met in a new space, which is hopeful for the future of the group.
I used the ATCs that I made for the October meeting. As you might recall, nobody else made them so I had nobody with whom to trade. 🙁
It ended up being ok, because I probably wouldn’t have made them for this time since time has been short and I have been crazily piecing on En Provence.
I was really pleased that only four people were trading. I wanted one of my own and wouldn’t have felt right about taking one if more people had been trading. I could have made another, and that was my plan, but I didn’t get around to it.
From Left to Right (see second photo, above), Bron, Jaye, Diane and Maureen all made cards to trade. Since there were only four of us, we all got one of each.
Now, on to making cards for the next meeting.
All of those year end lists will soon be out, including my year-end summing up. It’s been a few months since I did an inventory of my works in progress, so I thought this was a good time.
Finished 2017 Quilt Projects
Finished 2017 Non-Quilt Projects
While finished quilts are still a bit thin on the ground, I have been sewing. I have finished a lot of small projects, I am working on quilts and I have one more quilt finished this year than I did last time.
This year so far I have used 157 yards of fabric making the above along with donation blocks and tops. I am finally in the black in terms of usage.
Doing Good
In Process
The ‘In Process’ is used to denote projects on which I am actively working or pretending to stitch. I try not to put away projects, because that will ensure I never work on them.
Still WIPs
I still have WIPs. Who doesn’t, after all? A project in the ‘UFO’ category means I am stalled. A nicer way of saying UFO is a WIP. The list is a lot shorter and the projects are newer, for the most part.
Ready for Quilting
In Quilting Process
Binding
Nothing at the moment
Hunting and Gathering
Other
What’s on your list?
Self-Bordering is a technique that I use pretty frequently, though I don’t always know what I am doing. Basically, self-bordering means that you treat the border blocks the same as the blocks in the main part of the quilt. You piece them in as you would regular blocks rather than as a long row.
I don’t know if I made this technique up. I am sure others have done it. If they have, I am not sure what else it would be called.
There are several advantages to using a self-bordering technique for adding borders:
This technique works with Chunking. If you are sewing all your blocks, for the whole quilt, together in rows, then don’t bother with Self-Bordering.
As you have seen recently, I am working on the En Provence quilt by Bonnie Hunter. The border is optional, but I am putting a pieced border on the quilt using self-bordering technique. In the photo, left, you can see the border on the bottom. It is made up of one row of four patches (or 3.5″ squares) all the way around the quilt.
All the blocks in this quilt are, essentially, nine patches. As I sew the blocks together, I work in threes – I sew three blocks in a horizontal row together. Once I have three rows made up of three patches, I sew two rows together, then I sew remaining row to the set of two I have just sewn together.
On the border, there is an extra 3.5″ piece. It is either a 4 patch or a 3.5″ patch. Instead of sewing 3 rows of three blocks together, I sew 3 rows of 4 blocks together and then sew three rows of four patches together.
The corner block ends up looking fatter, because of the extra patches. Once the corner and border blocks are integrated into the quilt, they look like blocks and a pieced border.
You cannot tell which way a border was made, if it was well done.
I like this method because I don’t like putting on borders. I also really like pieced borders. Depending on the design, of course, they really add additional interest to a quilt.
Once I finish a quilt, there is really no way to tell where the blocks end and the border begins from a quick glance.
The top arrow, left, shows the very edge of the border – the seam line between block and border.
The bottom arrow shows the border.
As I have said, they integrate so well that a casual viewer can’t tell where the border is. I really like that.
Although I had a lot of other projects to use as leaders and enders, I really made a lot of donation blocks throughout the weekend as well.
I have used a lot of 2.5″ squares this weekend and I am kind of scraping the bottom of the barrel. It is not a bad thing as I am using up pieces I might not normally use. I’ll have to cut some backgrounds soon, but I hope to work out some piecing so I can use some donation blocks from last year to make a new top.
I added “Piecing” to the hashtags for this post. Immediately my mind revised that as ‘interminable piecing’. I don’t really feel tired of this project, but there are a LOT of seams and I am ready for this top to be finished. Good thing I made significant progress over the weekend.
The upper right hand corner is finished and this means that I have 4 rows of 3 blocks to finish. If I had 4 days free, I could finish the top by the weekend.
I have been sewing the border on as I go along. Using the ‘self-bordering’ technique makes the border much more precise in terms of matching seams. You also don’t have long seams to sew (and match) or borders to add once the center is done. I use this technique as much as possible. It makes my life so much better.
You’ll notice that this post is not about the #OnRingoLake mystery quilt project as you will find on many other sites today as people show their progress on Bonnie Hunter’s new mystery quilt.
Since I am still working on En Provence, I thought it was prudent to finish that before starting another mystery. I am reading and collecting the clues in case I change my mind.
While I was working on En Provence on Friday, I made some more donation blocks. I used the donation blocks as leaders and enders, of course.
I figured out that each donation block has 15 seams. I made about 6 in the course of several hours of sewing, which means I sewed somewhere in the neighborhood of 180 seams total. That is between the En Provence pieces and the donation blocks. I did a couple of other things in between as well, so my total is probably a few more.
Of course, the seams are short, which means they are quick, but I am making progress.
I am feeling like I am running out of 2.5″ pieces in my donation bin from which to choose. I think it is just that I don’t have enough to make blocks from one color. I also think that some of the choices are not my favorites. I have a number of pieces left and will make an effort to use those up before I commit to cutting more.They are not ugly and someone will like them, so I will need to use them.
We had 24 people over for Thanksgiving, so there was no sewing Monday through Thursday while Thanksgiving prep was taking place. I was also working. I did, however, make some good progress over the weekend.
I spent most of the day on Friday sewing. I even declined to watch a movie with the boys in order to sew. They needed some alone time anyway. More than half of En Provence is pieced and I am working on the upper right corner.
I got up and set about sewing pretty soon after that. I usually go for a walk before I sew to get it out of the way, but needed more resting time before I did that. The first thing I worked on was finishing the last/top row of the left hand side.
After coming back from my walk, I laid out the upper right hand side and started piecing. I was able to finish sewing a row and a half of that quarter. I would love to finish this weekend, but doubt that will happen. Bonnie Hunter’s Mystery Quilts require a lot of piecing, which is what makes them such great scrap quilts. Still, I have to sew a lot of short seams and there are a lot more to sew.
I started my contribution to the November Color My Quilt project for Melinda pretty soon after the October meeting. I meant to do more, but I just ran out of time.
Again, I used all scraps and did some Improv piecing. I was a little mean, but I couldn’t cut off that curve. It was part of the scrap that I used and I liked it. I am sure it will get cut off in the final piece, but perhaps Melinda will keep it.
The pieces have a fall-ish look, but are also bright.
The shards made hung together surprisingly well. I think the colors Melinda wanted were clearly defined and easy to use. There were lots of blocks this time, which made me happy. Someone made a block using the method from Sarah Goer‘s class.
In honor of Thanksgiving, I chose a picture of my pumpkin pie filling in process. I make a maple pumpkin pie. I found the recipe in a Bon Appetit magazine when I first contributed to Thanksgiving about a zillion years ago. Nobody has complained so I keep making it that way.
We remodeled our kitchen in about 2007 and it has red accents. We are very strict about what color appliances and accessories come into the kitchen. As a result, I received this food processor as a gift one year. I use it for all holiday food prep and it works really well.
I found out very quickly that the tight composition of the shot made for a very limited palette. The default palette, as we have found over the year, has a lot of neutrals. However, I found this to be a very warm palette.
I wanted to try and get more reds, more different reds, so I tried again.
n.2 has more reds, so I succeeded in that way. I am not that fond of Kona Caramel on its own, but with the reds, it does add something – perhaps a place for the eyes to rest?
I was able to get even more red tones in.3. I also changed the Caramel to Kona Latte for a slightly different look. I might like Latte less than Caramel, but I haven’t decided. As with Caramel, it does add something to the heavy red palette.
I kept a red, but tried out a dark neutral palette. The buttons of the food processor are grey, so I was able to add in Kona Mocha, which I think might be off in terms of names, but it is a nice addition to the palette. Kona Ruby comes from my spoon rest (made by the YM) and I kept it in to keep the palette from becoming too neutral.
I tried an even more neutral palette for n.5, building on n.4. I, again, kept some red, but changed the specific red from Ruby to Kona Cotton Wine. I wouldn’t make a quilt from this palette, but can see it being used for a very chic house sale.
Finally, for the last palette, I went for broke with the reds. I was pleased to see a Kona Lipstick show up! I love the name of that fabric. In this palette, the grey (Kona Mushroom) is the only neutral, though the Kona Mahogany could go either way in terms of it being one of the reds or a neutral
I know the differences are subtle between the palettes above, but it is interesting to see the changes one can make by moving the circles around a picture. As I have said before this is a good exercise.
What palettes have you made?
I hope all of you who are celebrating Thanksgiving have a wonderful day and those of you who aren’t have a wonderful day as well! One thing for which I am grateful are you, my dear readers. Thank you!
As I said yesterday, I used donation blocks as leaders and enders. I only finished 2.5. After doing an inventory of the donation blocks I have made this year, I was determined to up my numbers.
I’d love to give Peggy and Michelle a nice little stack at the BAM Winter Extravaganza, but we will see.
I am trying to clear out my little bin of 2.5″ squares. Some have been hanging around for a long time and I am sick of looking at them. The group above are not any of those. I needed some nice fabrics to work with first.
I do worry about using non-white fabrics for backgrounds, though I do it anyway. I don’t want to say beggers can’t be choosers, but I do think it. I do firmly believe that other background fabrics thrown in make the blocks more interesting. Some of the background fabrics in the second image come from the appealing California fabric I bought at the Granary. These fabrics were also not the ones I was eager to move out of my bin.
Some of the red tones in the half made block are those that need to earn their keep in a donation quilt. I bought too much of those Joel Dewberry red-pinks at the top. They keep showing up and I need them out of my life. The two squares on top might be the last two, but I suspect another 1-2 squares are hiding from me, ready to pounce when I am least expecting it.
I’ll have at least three new blocks to give to the Charity Girls in a few weeks and more, with any luck.
I started out late on Sunday with the piece above. I had finished chopping about a million ingredients for various Thanksgiving dishes and was delighted to find that I had some time to sew.
I had sewn most of the last row together, but had a few more seams, so I put those together and found, suddenly that I was able to layout the last row on the left half of this top. Shocking! I thought I had miles together.
I really don’t know why I keep being surprised by this quilt – how much I have sewn, how much I have left, how well it looks. Perhaps I should call it En Provence Surprise?
I had to fold down the piece before I could layout the top row. I could have reached, but why? It would have been a stretch every time I sewed two pieces together or checked the pressing. I wasn’t up for it.
It is extremely gratifying to see the top row even if it is just laid out and not sewn yet.
Triple Star is at a stopping point until I lay it out and decide on a final design, so I used donation blocks as leaders and enders. I finished 2.5, which isn’t shabby.
I know it is all En Provence All the Time on the blog these days. It is what I am working on except for gifts, which I am not working on enough and can’t show at the moment any way. You’ll have to bear with me for the time being.
I counted up blocks and rows and units again and found that I am farther along than I thought. It all started when I noticed that I was getting very short of the quarter triangle units. I carefully counted and found that I only have to piece two more rows on the top to finish one whole half of the quilt.
Or so I thought.
Really, I have to piece two blocks top to bottom for the right side. I was shocked that I had so little left to do. I had been sure that I had an equal number of blocks to piece for the right side as I had on the left. I don’t know how I got so turned around, but this is great news! I thought I would never finish piecing this quilt. Yet, I had already done so much.
As a treat, I decided to see how the piece would look once it was stuck together. Sort of.
I put two images together. There are slight differences in lighting, and the bottom is folded up, but you still get the idea. I am thrilled.
I saw another version of the pattern on Instagram. It is by Sylvia, Sommerschiebe. I love how round this circles ended up.