Commentary about works in progress, design & creativity
I have cut more pieces for the Fabric of the Year 2013 quilt. Many of the fabrics in this group turned out to be more greyed… or not as bright perhaps as I thought. That is the problem with buying fabric online. The colors just don’t reproduce as well our eyes see them.
Still I am pleased with Texture Basics pieces (dots, stripes, diamonds & houndstooth). They are not ugly and the red and teal are particularly nice.
I am already cutting them up for a project, which is great as well.
I am still plowing through the piles of fabric to iron. I iron fabric when I need to think and when I am under stress and it it calms me. I suppose the tactile nature of the fabric helps, but, as I probably don’t need to say, the color and design help, too.
This year’s shape is a 3.5″ square and I have an idea to do a kind of waterfall effect. Stay tuned to see what actually happens!
I had two fabri-lanches in the past few days, so I finally started pressing fabrics and cutting the squares for Fabric of the Year 2013.
There are fabrics for projects in process and also fabrics that just came up on the ‘to press’ pile. I might need to take a day off work that I dedicate to pressing fabric.
I have finally finished the back of FOTY 2012.
I decided to show the front again, one more time, as I don’t know how long it will be before I have it back from the quilter finished.
I have used another Philip Jacobs prints for the back. It turns out I had two pieces that worked well for opposite corners. I was surprised, though, to find the yardage in two pieces as I usually don’t cut up large pieces until I need it. Still, I may have bought it on sale and was only able to get to large pieces rather than one. Alternatively, I could have bought a piece and then decided to buy more. I don’t remember.
I was pleased to take the parts for the back off the design wall. I like the front of this quilt so much and it was great to see it one more time.
My only concern with the front is the border. I didn’t put one on and I am pretty sure it doesn’t need one, but still, I wonder.
Fabric of the Year 2011 is finally finished!
It took a little more time than the quilts in this series normally would take, but I am thrilled that it is done, not only from a finished point of view, but also from the point of view that I really like this quilt.
I have to say that I wasn’t really thrilled with the result when I finished the top. Colleen did a great job quilting it and really made the whole piece.
I am trying to decide whether or not to hang it in my office or in my hallway.
One thing that I have been trying to do with the pieces I have been finishing lately is making beautiful backs. I am pretty pleased with the back of this one. It feels light and airy to me.
As you know, I have been using larger prints or prints that don’t look good cut up into small pieces to make the backs. This one uses some prints I bought with lettering on them.
In my heart of hearts I would love to have a show with all of these quilts.
I had a nice surprise yesterday: FOTY 2011 returned to me ready for binding! I didn’t know Colleen was working on it, but here it is. It was perfect timing, too, since I just finished the binding on the Stepping Stones on Thursday.
I also didn’t think I like this quilt that much, but the quilt really made the quilt. This photo isn’t that great, but the boys weren’t home to hold it and I wanted a photo RIGHT NOW!!, so I just took this one. Do click on the image to make it larger, so you can see the quilting.
I already started working on the binding and I am sure I will be done with it this week. As mentioned, I have a cold, so there is a lot of laying on the couch happening.
The last time I wrote about this project was almost a year ago: 2/21/2012.
One of the things I love about this quilt is that I get to visit with my fabrics again as I sew the top together. I get to say hello and they get to tell me not to forget them and how they can be used.
I also love the anticipation of finishing this piece and hanging it on my wall and looking at it more often, walking by it every day and remembering the fabrics.
I finished the top yesterday and am very pleased with it.
I probably could have finished the back as well, but finishing this top is some kind of miracle, because of how slow I was moving. Working on it, I think it helped to keep my joints a bit more limber. It could just be a perception, though.
You can see the whole series on the FOTY Gallery Page.
I have been a bit unwell and not up to a lot of contemplation about the meaning of this quilt. I thought that a slideshow of the progress might be just the thing to satisfy you. Enjoy!
Early last week I posted the final patches I was planning on using for FOTY 2012. The CQFA retreat was this past weekend and I worked on the quilt top all weekend. This is the final layout, or nearly the final layout, of Fabric of the Year 2012. I think of this as a butterfly emerging from a cocoon, in some ways. Perhaps I will call this piece Chrysallis?
In this picture, all the pieces are sewn into groups of 2. By the time I left the retreat center, I had started to sew larger chunks together and the upper right hand corner was nearly all sewn.
As usual, I went through my process of hand wringing and chest beating on Friday followed by sewing and intense rearranging on Saturday.
One of the things I really like about working on this at the retreat (remember last year’s retreat?) is that everyone helps. They don’t help by rearranging, though that goes on a bit, but they come by and give me an opinion, there is always someone around to help with tricky placement and they appreciate my process. By appreciate, I meant they let me engage in my process, which, for this project, involves a fair bit of angst. It was all worth it. I am pleased with the way this is coming out.
I think that I may be over the colorwash technique for these pieces. I like the idea of cutting a piece of fabric from each fabric I use or buy during the year, but I think I have done enough of the colorwash exercise for the time being. I am trying to think of something else for 2013. I have some fragments of ideas, but they haven’t coalesced yet.
I may cut a few more, but these are probably the last patches for FOTY 2012 you will see until I sew. I made an effort to press and cut some more pieces. With TFQ’s help I made a little progress.
I sorted all of the patches I cut into color groups, so I am pseudo ready to place the patches and then sew. I may not get to sewing this weekend, though I do hope to do enough placement to make some progress sewing.
I had a good amount of time off over the holidays. I was able to spend some time pressing fabric and cutting pieces for this project. It is a meditative process and was a good way to transition from the difficult last quarter at work to vacation.
The end is drawing near, so I need to speed up the process or work with what I have.
One thing I like about this is that looking at the fabric patches and thinking about the projects on which I am working as well as the new fabrics.
I haven’t taken any kind of inventory of pieces that I have. If I do I can fix any problems, if I don’t it will be a design challenge.
While I am making progress on preparing to sew the FOTY 2012, I still have a pile of fabric to press, not to mention the other pile I have to wash AND press. There is no way for me to get it all done, but I will get as much done as possible before I start sewing at the CQFA Retreat in January.
I do enjoy this process, however. I like seeing these photos and thinking about what I made from the fabrics.
I have FOTY 201o hanging in my hallway and I keep walking by thinking “I need to find that fabric; it would be perfect with X project.” That is really fun.
And now back to your regularly scheduled programming.
Yesterday was fun, but I am ready to get back to normal blogging. It was exhausting trying to keep up with the questions and the comments. Look for winners and more tomorrow.
I have been cutting and pressing fabric a little at a time. I realized that I needed to get my act together if I am going to work on this quilt at Retreat at the end of January. I do enjoy looking at the patches on my design wall and thinking about where I bought the fabric, what project I was working on when I cut the smaller squares and future projects I am planning.
I did find that this process was good for putting fabrics together that I might not thought of putting together. I got a Chicopee solids pack (Thanks, Temptress Adrianne!). While those fabrics were waiting to be pressed, they were on top of a large floral by Philip Jacobs and I noticed they all went really well together. There was another dot fabric that was perfect, too. Not sure what I will make, but something.
I have a big stack of fabric to press and cut and another big stack to wash, press and cut. Not my favorite tasks, but not horrible either. Great for calming me down in stressful situations. Too bad they won’t give me the space to set up an ironing board, iron and cutting mat at work. 😉
The time is really flying by. I was thinking about ordering my turkey next week (maybe the week after). I bought some pumpkin for Thanksgiving and Christmas pies last week in my attempt to get ahead of the major shopping in the next few weeks. I am behind. Behind in blogging, my house feels like a wreck, behind in cutting new and used fabric. Everything.
Case in point: it has been almost two months since I last posted FOTY fabrics. The last blog post was in late August! Gracious!
Still I was able to get some new fabrics cut up. I was also able to scrounge some squares from fabrics I have been using. Are you able to see the projects I was working on in this group?
I see some blocks I made, a journal cover I made and a few fabrics slated for journal covers I will make. One reason I love this project is that it is like a memory book in fabric.
I noodled around enough so I didn’t have time to write a book review, so here is an update the cutting for the Fabric of the Year 2012 quilt. It has been nearly a month since the last update.
For those of you have forgotten or were never in the loop, the rectangles are new fabrics – lots of these are from Quiltology – and the squares are fabrics that were in my stash that I have just recently used.
You can see the pink donation quilt in this edition as well as the Yellow donation quilt and pieces from the A-B-C Challenge.
I am having fun cutting into fabrics that have been around for awhile. That is another good aspect of the donation tops – fabrics get their day in the sun and I get some space in my fabric bins.
I’ll get my act together over the weekend and get you some meaty posts to sink your teeth into. Stay tuned.