Journey 2 Nebula – Artquiltmaker Blog

Gazebo Finished

So, the Journey 2 Nebula is finished. I finished all the projects which were part of the ‘Journey’ and the rulers have been returned to Amy. I am not making the Nebula quilt. If you like hexagons, you should try it. It is an interesting design. I am happy with the small projects I made during this Journey 2 Nebula and am moving on to other designs.

Gazebo, as I mentioned, is the one project about which I was really excited. I did all the projects in order and waited patiently to get to this one.

This project, like all the others, was pretty easy. I was able to start and finish it in less than a day. This is an example of the excellent directions provided by the pattern.

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Gazebo Starts

Last week I decided to finish the last project.

The last Journey 2 Nebula project (except for the bonus project, which I am not doing) is Gazebo. I sort of did the whole project in order to do this one for myself. By the time I finished Candy Dish, I was kind of sick of the whole thing. All of the projects were well received by their recipients, was a relief. I don’t know what my problem was. I enjoyed it until December-ish.

I think life ended up overwhelming me. Big surprise since it was December!

However, I like this design, so I decided just to cut it out and do it. I started after lunch one day. I was able to get the whole thing cut out and pieced by the end of the day. I was also able to make the back and start quilting it.

I worked hard on the fabrics. Since this was for me, I really thought about the look I wanted and am pleased with my choices.

Finished Candy Dish

I finally finished Candy Dish!

It is nice to finally have this done. I am kind of over the Journey2Nebula project. It is sad, because I was eagerly anticipating the Gazebo project.

I still plan to make the Gazebo table topper** soon. I want to complete the whole group of projects.

Jawbreaker in Situ

My niece received her pillow and sent me a photo of it on her couch. She is in the process of rearranging and refreshing her house. She said the pillow goes very well. I am pleased.

It looks like she could stand a few more cushions. I will keep that in mind as I make other items. 😉

I finished Jawbreaker in mid-October. I sent it off fairly quickly, but it took me awhile to send the pillow form (laziness, disorganization). She sent me a thank you note, but we think the thank you note took a beach vacation, because I received it almost 3 weeks later. My niece is very good about thank you notes.

Candy Dish Progresses

I finally made progress on the Journey2Nebula projects. I had started Candy Dish right before the Big Blog Blow-up and then didn’t make much progress. I also haven’t started the last project, Gazebo, which is sad. I really like that project and wanted to do that one most.

I still have to trim Candy Dish and make it into a cushion cover, but I finished the piecing over the weekend in between working on FOTY 2019.

Candy Dish Started

Rock Candy is finished so I am on to Candy Dish. This will be for my youngest niece since the others have gotten their cushion covers.

Candy Dish** has two ‘patterns’ included in the little fold up pamphlet. In reality, it is one pattern with two color arrangements. I believe the goal for the Journey2Nebula project is to make both pillows, but I am only making one.

I pulled out my pink bins and started going through them to find the pinks that would create the vision of the pillow that was in my mind. I found I have a lot of peachy pinks, which I no longer enjoy. 🙁 I’ll have to figure out a use for them. Another lesson in using fabrics up sooner than years later. I seem to be getting a lot of these lessons recently.

Rock Candy Finished

I finished Rock Candy over the weekend, but still needed to do the binding. That is always a good hand task to work on at Craft Night, so I finished the binding on Monday night. This has been a banner week for finishes: Rock Candy plus 3 donation tops and backs.

On to Candy Dish, which is the next Journey to Nebula project

Jawbreaker Finished

After quilting the Jawbreaker pillow top, it didn’t take much time to make it into a pillow. Once again, I used the Spoonflower directions for inserting a zipper. These directions create some flaps to cover the zipper. I haven’t used this tutorial in awhile so there was some ripping and a tiny bit of cursing, but all-in-all, the directions were straightforward and easy to follow.

I actually like this technique. The seam lines don’t take away from the overall effect like they do in half hexagons. I can’t think of what kind of project I would make with these in the future, but it is a future technique I would like to explore a little more. Perhaps a table runner?

I didn’t like cutting off perfectly good pieced elements, but that was the design so I followed it.

Jawbreaker Quilted

I spent some time earlier this week quilting the Jawbreaker. I made good progress on it, but it took me longer than Lucky Charm. Finally, after a second session, I finished it. i swear I have quilted more this year than in a long time. All the projects are small, but I am still quilting them.

Jawbreaker is evenly quilted, but has less quilting than Lucky Charm. I used the Rotary Even Foot and that worked pretty well. I just did straight line quilting – nothing fancy.

Jawbreaker quilted - detail — Jawbreaker quilted – detail

One thing that made me a little crazy is that the light green thread I used shredded periodically.

It didn’t shred all the time, but I noticed it at least twice and I found it strange. I very seldom have this issue with Aurifil. In the photo, you can see that the charcoal was fine, but the light green was shredded.

Jawbreaker Start

I was finally able to start the third Journey2Nebula project last Friday.

I actually like the process even though I had trouble with the rulers again.

My pieces were the right size yet the ruler didn’t line up. 🙁 It doesn’t matter a lot as I can make the piecing work. I just don’t know what is going on and what the problem is and that irritates me

Lucky Charm Finished

I finished the Lucky Charm Pillow on Sunday after finishing the quilting on Saturday evening. I ended up using the directions for a zipper pouch and that worked pretty well. The corners by the zipper ends are a little funky, but it looks good.

I was planning on just giving the cover to my niece, but my mom pointed out that she would probably never buy a pillow form for the cover, so I ordered a pillow form.

I am pretty pleased with the way this turned out. I think I will try the Spoonflower zipper closure directions next time as I think they were more appropriate for a pillow. There is another pillow in Journey2Nebula so I can try the directions when I get there.

Lucky Charm Quilted

I quilted Lucky Charm over the weekend. I was running up against the Journey2Nebula schedule. I knew I needed (and wanted) to get the thing finished before the next assignment came on Tuesday.

Since this is a small project and I did simple straight line quilting, the process didn’t take that long. I had some trouble, but nothing a seam ripper wouldn’t take care of.

Now I need to make it into a pillow. I think I will do a zipper closure.

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