I should not look at the FabricWorm blog. Everytime I go there I want to buy more fabric. I am still washing fabric from my big trip. Sigh.
I love this selection of half yards. Isn’t it gorgeous?
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Tag: Fabric
Weekend Diamonds
My design wall is a mess. It is an even bigger mess than when I showed it before. I have at least four projects on it, which makes it difficult to photograph anything cleanly. As a result, I used the eraser function in Photoshop Elements to erase some of the things surrounding the diamonds in the photo on the left. I wasn’t completely enamoured with the effect, so I left the bits and pieces in the photo on the right. I don’t know how to outline a shape and clear the background completely. I would like to learn that.
I have been intermittently pressing recently washed fabrics and cutting pieces from them, so the diamond accumulation continues. I know I will be needing to cut a lot of the border pieces late in the year, so I want to make sure all the diamonds are cut. I am sure I have said that a thousand times. It is on my mind.
I still haven’t figured out if the Fast2Cut 45 degree half and quarter diamond ruler will work for the side, edge and corner diamonds. I still need to figure that out. I haven’t actually seen it in a store, so it is hard to compare to the Creative Grids ruler that I have. It would be nice if Creative Grids made a ruler to go with their diamond ruler. I did see that they have a Triangles 120 degree ruler. I think it would work for the side pieces, which would be great. It would definitely make an easier time than when I cut the side pieces for the Eye Spy.
I simply do not have enough time to sew. I spent a day and a half over the weekend just sewing. I made a lot of progress on the Zig Zaggy quilt and it was still not enough time. I don’t know how much time would be enough time. I haven’t reached that threshold yet. I simply know that I need more.
Left to My Own Devices…
Left to my own devices, I will buy fabric.
Above is my CrankyPants fabric. There was a weeklong stretch a couple of weeks ago where I was just cranky. I couldn’t think of a reason, but EVERYTHING annoyed me. The boys were smart and just stayed out of my way, did what I told them and just generally were compliant. For the rest of the world, I stayed away and/or kept my door closed. As a small attempt to make myself feel a bit better, I bought the above three fabrics. It would have been nicer, if annoying people at work had just piled up gorgeous half yards outside my door. I think the middle one will go with my red and aqua quilt. Perhaps, the red and turquoise piece on the left as well. We will see.
The ribbon candy fabric is for a Christmas gift bag. No, I don’t need more gift bag fabric, nor do I need more gift bags. Still, this ribbon candy fabric brought back a boatload of memories from my childhood. My grandmother would have covered glass dishes (one was clear and in the shape of Christmas tree) filled with different candies during Christmas. One was filled with these ribbon candies. I didn’t like to eat them, but I loved to look at them and dream about the way they were made. Those curves are so beguiling!
I am still collecting red and aqua fabrics. I couldn’t resist a bit more of Big Plain Jane fabrics, though it isn’t as big as the one I bought before.
I recently found some more of the Martha Negley tossed vegetable fabric on violet. I have been wanting to remake the tote bag I made and then kind of ruined with the front panel. Now I can do it. Now I had better do it.
I bought some more of the taco fabric as well, so I can make something for the Child. Back of a quilt? Not sure yet. Photos to follow!
The print on the top looks just like the print at the top of the second photo. It is, however, a larger scale. That piece as well as the the fabrics in the second row will go into my blue and aqua quilt. I am trying to be ok with having some colors just a bit off from the cherry red and aqua that I am imagining. I may put the grey dot in as well. I kind of like how it looks with the brights.
As I have mentioned, Birch Fabrics/Fabricworm puts out bundles periodically. I mentioned them when I reviewed Birch Fabrics last month, after my trip. I am starting to think of them as Birch Bundles. These bundles are like candy. Expensive candy. The reason they are like candy for me is that the fabrics are from different lines and designers, but still go together and I didn’t have to do the work. I like using full lines, as I have mentioned, because it gets me into the sewing faster. Using Birch Bundles expands my visual horizons.
The above pack may have been a purchasing mistake. I haven’t decided yet. I like the various fabrics, but I would not have bought them all. Still, I want to try to use them together. I am still working on thinking up a project for these bundles. I am thinking about doing the same design for my three bundles just to focus on working with the fabric. Perhaps the Diamond Chain design? Or stars?
Does every girl have a pink and purple bedroom? I did. My parents and their friends worked hard on that bedroom. My bedroom was different from the colors above, painted much more of a sweet pink and lavender. Still the bundle above reminds me of it. The bundle is one that I love. I LOVE the violet. I also love the scale differences of the motifs.
I probably would not have bought the Tufted Tweets fabrics alone, because of the strong pattern. Still, they fit really well into this group. Those flowers also would not have been first in my basket at the fabric store. Cynthia and her team have helped me imagine a new and different fabric combination. Let’s see how it works when I actually put something together. You can buy one, too and show me what you make.
I resisted the Good Morning Sunshine Birch Bundle. You should definitely buy it! 😉
And More Diamonds
If you thought I was kidding when I said that I had cut a lot of fabric on Monday, you were mistaken. I think that is the way I shed those Crankypants I had been wearing for a week or more.
This group looks a little more light and airy than the last batch. The next group of fabrics I have to press are for the Frosted Stars, so I won’t be cutting diamonds from those until I have used all the fabric I need. I don’t think it will be long. I am almost done cutting fabric for those stars and then I can cut diamonds.
I am getting scared about how big this quilt will be.
More Diamonds
Here is another batch of FOTY Diamonds. I diligently pressed and cut for a good portion of the weekend. This isn’t a very lively batch. I am working my way through the stack that TFQ pressed and for some reason this is not a cheerful batch.
I have to admit that cutting the patches makes me think about sewing the project together and that prospect makes me a little bit anxiety ridden. I am thinking about using the P&B Fizz as the anchor colors. I still want to do a colorwash with the diamonds, but thought that if I lined them up in color order across the quilt, I could use them to start laying out the piece.
My other idea was to arrange them like a Lone Star and radiate the other fabric diamonds off of them from the center.
For the moment, however, I need to cut diamonds out of my fabric.
FOTY Diamonds – August/2010
Here are a few more diamonds that I have cut from new fabrics. There are many more coming!
GAQF Visit Part#2
It was hard to get to the Great American Quilt Factory. It is in Denver, but pretty far away from downtown. Unlike my last trip, I didn’t have a car or a navigator. Thus, I didn’t think I would make it out there on this trip.
On a whim, I asked a librarian who used to live in Denver about transportation. He and his wife had driven to Denver. We mapped out a plan for getting there on public transportation and I was set to go, but not convinced that I could make it out and back in time for my flight. Later that day I received an email from my librarian friend’s wife and she wanted to go to GAQF! Score! Wednesday, before I left, we drove out there and had a blast.
Above are the dots I bought! I can’t really say fabrics, because they are almost all dots! The food fabrics are for my mom‘s quilt. The black and white large dots are for a bag and everything else is on spec. The dots in the upper left hand corner are really nice Ellen Medlock dots. I didn’t think I had ever heard of her before, but when I looked at her site I think that Kathy from Finishing Lines mentioned Medlock’s bag patterns to me.
I saw two books that spurred my imagination and my recent scary Christmas mania. One was Christmas with Possibilities. I liked some of the motifs. One was especially appealing: a star with a spiral inside. The other book was called More Joy to the World, which had a really nice Noel pillow pattern. I didn’t buy either as they were mostly pattern books and I would rather get them out of the library or used. Sadly, they are not available at the library and used the books are about $13. We’ll see.
Flesh colored Aurifil had been on my mind since TFQ mentioned it to me after she used it for one of her projects. I also found that I needed some white thread. I saw them at the shop, so I picked them up.
The Lazy Girl pattern was an impulse buy. It might make a good gift for my Grama. Being really poor at reading patterns, I didn’t look at the materials list. I always assume that, since I mostly make quilts, I have everything on hand. That isn’t the case with this pattern. I need a bottom and some fusible batting. When I saw that it scared me because of the Amy Butler experience from last November. I put the additional supplies on the list to buy.
One of the best parts was that Beth (yes, another Beth in my life!), who does embroidery and is interested in quilting, but hasn’t taken a class or ever made a quilt, left with three patterns! One was for a flannel quilt using a panel. The two others were for Christmas decorations. One was for wool ornaments and one was for an arty wool Christmas tree.
New Beth and I plan to get together so I can look at 60 year old quilt that has some damage.
Zig Zaggy Start
This past weekend I mostly worked on the Blue Janus Quilt, which I called the Blue Quilt in a previous post. Those squares required a lot of chain piecing and I needed something to piece in between so that I wouldn’t have to cut threads each time I wanted to press as I moved farther along in the process.
I decided to start the Zig Zaggy quilt and use the pieces to help with my chain piecing.
First, I looked at the Happy Zombie site again and confirmed the sizes. then I cut some samples. Happy Zombie used a special ruler and cut 5″ long wedges. Elizabeth Hartman from Oh Fransson! blog originally used templates and cut the wedges longer. I decided to use Happy Zombie’s method and trim later.
I cut and sewed a few together, think I would do another colorwash look.
Blech!
I am not doing the colorwash. With just the purples it is too boring. the purples are all the same value and just don’t look like the colors are gradating. I am going to mix up the colors. I just didn’t get very far.
Tempting Fabrics
Aren’t these colors wonderful? This group from the FabricWorm is very tempting…
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I would love to see them in real life. I am glad they gave the names of the fabrics so I can look them up. I can’t think of what I would use them for. They would be gorgeous together.
Frosted Stars Possibility?
I didn’t buy the Frosted Stars kit that I talked about recently. I already have a lot of projects going, I have several projects to start, there were some things I didn’t like about it, it was lots of money, etc. You know all the reasoning.
Still I couldn’t get the thing out of my mind, so I went to look at it again today. In addition to p.s. i quilt shop‘s offerings, the Fat Quarter Shop has the pattern as well. I decided to do my due diligence.
Above is an image of all the Fruitcake prints from the Fat quarter shop. I looked there. I also went to the Moda site to look at the all of the fabrics from the Basic Grey Fruitcake collection. Fruitcake is the fabric collection Charlie Scott uses for the Frosted Stars quilt. It turns out, sadly, that I don’t really like most of the fabrics included in the Fruitcake collection. I still liked the pattern, however, and thought perhaps that I would make it anyway.
I looked around to see if the pattern was available. Charlie Scott, the designer, has a website and has a link to the pattern on the Moda Bake Shop site. YAY! This revelation expanded my options. I could make the quilt with other fabrics. I was thinking aqua/turquoise and red with a little green thrown in.
In the midst of all this I emailed my mom with the various links and she said not to buy the kit, but just to get the pattern and use my own fabrics or other fabrics. Sometimes it is nice to have someone agree with me.
Somehow, I ran across the Kate Spain Christmas fabrics. They are bright and cheerful and a definite possibility. I printed out the PDF so I could look at the individual fabrics. I am not fond of the motifs on a couple of them and I couldn’t use the panels, which are part of the collection. I don’t know if they come with the Jelly Rolls and Layer cakes.
I saw this Lumiere de Noel group as I was perusing the Fat Quarter Shop site. I thought that perhaps it might be a nice choice for the Frosted Stars pattern. It has a little bit of a grey tinge in this picture, but looks much brighter in the example quilt on the site. Take a look at the individual fabrics and let me know what you think.
More thinking required, I think.
Blue Quilt
This is the first part of a quilt I am making as a gift. I will tell you for whom it is intended once it is delivered.
I have been cutting blue 6.5″ squares, in a delusatory way, for the past year. I was sure I would get it done. Suddenly, it was April and I didn’t have nearly enough squares. I really wanted the quilt done by the beginning of June and was, thus, in a pickle. My deadline isn’t going to happen.
TFQ helped with my dilemna by cutting about 100 squares for me. That really, REALLY helped. I cut the rest and began sewing. I hope to have this top and back done in time to quilt it at my longarm appointment on July 30.
Patches I Cut
You all know that I cut a patch from each piece of fabric I buy in a given year. You also know that I do this in order to decide if I like the fabric so I can buy more before it goes out of style. These are my Fabric of the Year (FOTY) patches and this year I am cutting diamonds. In addition to my FOTY patches, there are other patches I cut from other pieces of fabric. Lately I have been cutting from both new and old, but it depends on the project.
First, in the upper left hand corner are the 6.5″ blue squares. Some blue green snuck in as well. These are for a quilt I am making for someone who reads this blog, so I can’t tell you any more until I get it done.
Next, upper right, are the 4×4″ squares. These are for TFQ, because she cheerfully cuts many, many patches of almost any size and shape I ask. I am cutting these from any fabric that I get out of my fabric closet and all new ones.
Third, lower left corner, are the Tumblers for Julie. Her quilt is king-sized, so until I see her put the thing together and get it quilted, I keep cutting. Mostly these are from new fabrics, but I hauled out a bunch of blues lately, so this stack happens to be blue.
Fourth, in the lower middle, are Eye Spy hexagons for my SIL’s Eye Spy project. I buy very few conversationals, so I don’t cut many of them yet. I don’t know if she has started cutting from her own stash yet. These are fun to fussy cut. The exercise makes me look at my fabrics differently.
Last are the blue rectangles (2.5″x4.5″). I am in deep love with that rectangle shape I used for FOTY 2008. I look at the quilt every day at work and adore it, so I decided I wanted to make another out of blues. It takes a lot of cutting, so it will be here for awhile. After starting to sew the Blue Quilt together I am thinking that a blue rectangle quilt might not have been such a great idea.
Not pictured are the food fabric squares, 6.5″, I am cutting for my mom. She is making a replacement quilt for her step grandson, whose quilt was burned up in a fire. I will probably help her with it. We are seriously considering the Corner Store pattern from Pretty Little Mini Quilts, which is like M Dugan’s version on Flickr. I may try this quilt out myself, too. Back to my mom, though. I hope we do get to work on it together. I think it would be fun.
I also cut 2×2″ squares and make four patches as warm-ups.
I often press and cut fabric while I am on the phone. I am not much of a phone person, so there are only a few people to whom I speak on the phone for extended periods of time. On a recent conversation with TFQ, I was amazed to see how much I cut. I am not a fast presser or cutter, so I was pleased.
I hope this preparation doesn’t seem terribly schizophrenic. Sometimes it does feel that way, but I am so glad when I have enough of one patch and can just start sewing. I don’t like to do all my cutting at once and this is a good way for me to do it incrementally.
Sandy talked about scraps and what she cuts for scrap quilts on a recent podcast, so I don’t feel quite as crazy. It was interesting to hear what she said about the pieces she cut.
Creative Prompt #74: Celebration
Post the direct URL (link) where your drawing, doodle, artwork is posted (e.g. your blog, Flickr) in the comments area of this post. I would really like to keep all the artwork together and provide a way for others to see your work and/or your blog.
The Creative Prompt Project, also, has a Flickr group, which you can join to post your responses. I created this spot so those of you without blogs and websites would have a place to post your responses.
The US celebration, the 4th of July, is coming this weekend. I thought I would take the opportunity to post this word.
Definition: 1 : to perform (a sacrament or solemn ceremony) publicly and with appropriate rites
2 a : to honor (as a holiday) especially by solemn ceremonies or by refraining from ordinary business b : to mark (as an anniversary) by festivities or other deviation from routine
3 : to hold up or play up for public notice <her poetry celebrates the glory of nature>intransitive verb 1 : to observe a holiday, perform a religious ceremony, or take part in a festival
2 : to observe a notable occasion with festivities
to take note of something extraordinary
party
Kool & the Gang Celebration song
ceremony
Food Fabrics
The food fabrics above are for the quilt my mom is making for her step grandson. I talked about it last week. Maureen saw my post and offered me some squares of food fabric. She even cut them. The first 3 rows above are the fabrics she gave me. The last row are fabrics I bought and have cut for mom. I don’t know how many blocks she has, but it must be nearing 100. That should be a good sized quilt.
Late June Diamonds
I have been cutting and pressing fabrics like a demon lately and here is another group. I have found that this number of diamonds is the right number to photograph, so I have a few more on the wall that will be in the next photo.
One of the things about this group is that there are a lot of the Fizz by P&B fabrics and I am really loving those fabrics. I would love it if they would come out with another dozen colors in between the colors they already have. There are a lot of colors in the group already so that would mean that their colorists would really have to work over time. I would love it if these became a staple background fabric. Fabrics go so quickly out of fashion that I doubt that will happen. I plan to use these fabrics in another Interlocking Triangle quilt.
An idea that occurred to me with these Fizz fabrics is that I could arrange them in a color wheel and then radiate the other diamonds out from them. I think that would make the piecing a challenge, but all ideas are worth considering. It might be a problem with the colors which I don’t buy very often.
I haven’t decided if I am cutting diamonds from the food fabrics for my mom. I am intermittently, so some show up as diamonds and some don’t.
The other thing I am doing is cutting pieces from a few fabrics I have pulled out of the stash. An example is the red at the tip of the diamond. These fabrics have never had a piece cut from them. My project, my rules.