Design Walls Monday

     Yes, it's not a typo, I do mean design walls. And, once again, I am coming in under the wire. In some parts of the country, it's not even still Monday, but in my part of the country it is.

     I taught a class at a nearby quilt shop, so I spent a good bit of my sewing time preparing for the class, making sample blocks, etc. I really enjoyed teaching the class, but I need to work on remembering to bring out my camera, while the class is in progress. This class covered 5 different blocks, that kept me too busy to take pictures. Sorry, I know that sounds like a lame excuse, I will have to work on that.

     So here is what is on my design wall(s). A few more pieced hexagons. I am up to 10 finished, and an 11th one, almost finished. I did a layout on EQ, and found out I need 50 blocks, so I am 1/5th of the way there.

    

     I am still working on this quilt, although there is not much change on the design wall to prove it. All of my strip sets are pinned, and I have been using them for leaders, and enders. I have lots of strip sets sewn together, but I want to wait until they are all sewn together before I start pairing them together, to make my blocks.

     This next quilt is one I collaborated on with a shop owner who's shop is near my house. I did the design, and Karen Daniel from honeybegood.com chose the fabrics. Aren't they beautiful? And they are all organic too. This will be offered as a kit on her web site soon. I am almost finished sewing the blocks together.

     That is what is on my design wall(s) this week. Go to patchworktimes.com  to see lots of other interesting design walls.  

     Thanks for stopping by!

Neglect

     Time always passes so quickly, so often, I look up, and I can't believe so much time has gone by since the last time I wrote anything! Since my goal is to write twice a week, I have been pretty neglectful. Is that even a word? I hope so.

     I say that I haven't been writing.
That is not entirely true. I haven't
 written on my blog, but, I have
 been writing all day. Next Saturday,
I am teaching my Let's Polka quilt at
A Scarlet Thread in McDonough. I have
 spent a good bit of today writing the
instructions for this pattern, and
gathering my thoughts on just what
 I can tell people to help them make
this quilt. 










    Last Thursday, I did our last demonstration at my guild quilt show. I didn't want to do the whole sewing machine thing again, so I thought it would be fun to try a few blocks for another quilt that has been tugging on my sleeve. Especially since it would be easy to work on while I was talking to people. I had already cut all of the strips for it, and I figured I could demonstrate rotary cutting the strips into squares and triangles, and get a few blocks ready to sew. The quilt was inspired by this painting by Vincent Van Gogh.

    
      I mostly, want to just explore using this color scheme in a very simple quilt with small blocks and an overall design. Here are the blocks that I cut, then I sewed them the next time I was at the sewing machine just to see how they would look together. I think I need a lot more to tell if I will like it. I may or may not add a thin sashing. This will be another good chain piecing, and work on away from home quilt.
 

  

     Yes, I am still working on my pieced hexagons-slow going, and my strip quilt. I have been carrying those strips everywhere, and I have all but 9 strip sets cut and ready to sew. There are about 250 of them. I have been sewing them between the other things, using them as leaders and enders, Right now I have 35 sewn, but they are not trimmed yet.

     One more thing. A couple of posts ago I mentioned meeting Karen from Honey Be Good.com. We have gotten together and done some brainstorming. She liked this drawing and chose some fabrics to make into a lap size to sell as a kit. I am trying to get it together for her ASAP .

      

     This is what I have done so far. I am writing a pattern for it too, as I make it. Sorry about the wonky perspective. My largest, best design wall is behind my loom, which makes photography difficult.

     So really I haven't been just sitting around and eating bon bons. Also, spring is almost here, so spring activities are starting up. The community garden, lending library, and my tennis team are all in need of attention. I am working on getting a newsletter started in my town. And now that the quilt show is down, there are all of those quilts to return to their rightful owners. Hope your life is full of fun too. Thanks for stopping by!






    

Design Wall Monday

     My large hexagon quilt is slowly growing. I got one and a half more sewn together, and 2 more laid out.

     Sorry, this photo is not as clear as it could be. I was racing against my camera battery when I took this. Now the battery is dead for awhile. They will look better when I get them sewn, and on the downstairs design wall with the others.















     Lest you think that is all I accomplished, I also cut a bunch of strip sets for this quilt.

    
     I am getting a surprising number of strip sets sewn together by using them for leaders when I sew the large hexagons together.

     That is what I have been up to in a nutshell. Don't forget to go to patchworktimes.com
for lots more inspiration! Thanks for stopping by!

A Big Surprise

     I have made a decision in writing this blog, so far, not to write much about the non quilting areas of my like. One big reason is that I regularly read a couple of blogs that include more non quilting aspects of life. While I really enjoy these blogs, I guess I worry a bit about feeling like I am copying them.

     That said, sometimes your non quilting life runs into your quilting life when you least expect it. I live in a very small town, and I am very active in the local community garden. The other day I was to meet a new person who was interested in joining. In the course of conversing with this person in an effort to get to know her; she mentioned that she works with her mother in a family run business in town. When I asked her what business they were in I was amazed when her answer was a quilting business! There is a quilting business in my town; and I know nothing about it!? Are you kidding? How could this have happened?

     It turns out that this is an online business called honeybegood.com  Their focus on organic, and sustainably produced fabric got me thinking. Although I had thought about these kinds of things in relation to food, I never thought about them in relation to fabric. The whole idea rather caught me by surprise at first. Of course, there is not the depth of variety available in organic fabrics, like there is in the fabric I have been using. Anyone who knows anything about my quilting knows that variety plays a major role in it. Also, organic fabric is a bit more expensive, and I am already struggling to afford fabric as it is. Still, I do feel that it is important to think about these kinds of things; and I do care about how what I am doing is effecting the world that I live in; so I have decided that it is worth working in some organic fabric when, and where I can. That way, hopefully, this will give better practices an opportunity to become more prevalent. They did have some really beautiful fabrics, including a nice selection of solids, which you know I love.

      I am still working away on this quilt:

      I have gotten 15 strip set sewn together just by using them as leaders and enders while sewing on my batik hexagon blocks.  Also, by carrying the strip bins everywhere with me, I have put together 47 strip sets. I like to plan them out in advance, so they are next to the sewing machine, and ready to go when I need something to sew on.

     As stated above, I have sewn 1 and a half hexagons together. I figured out that I need 40 hexagons to make a quilt. So far I have 7 1/2. Almost 1/4 of the way there!

     So, that is what I have been up to lately. Thanks for stopping by!

Design Wall Monday

     Most of the sewing I have done this week has been on sample blocks for my next quilt. I don't know what to call it yet. It uses the same technique as my Sonja's Windows pattern, but the color is distributed in a totally different way. Here is my drawing:

 

      Here are the blocks that I made to try out the idea:

 

      I was interested is seeing  how far I could push the color to keep the quilt lively, but still be able to see the pattern well. I also finished cutting and gathering all of my strips for this project.

     I did manage to get one more big hexagon sewn together, and 2 planned out , and ready for sewing. The one in the lower right hand corner is the new one.

      Through all of this, my solid quilt languished on my design all with no attention paid to it.

      Sorry, the bottom portion is cut off because I have a big weaving loom in front of my design wall. It's just something I have to live with for now, since this is the largest blank wall in the house. Now that all of my strips are cut for the new quilt,  and I have a plan in place for this next nameless (for now) quilt, I hope to get it put together in the next week or 2.

     Don't forget to check out all the yummy things to see at patchworktimes.com for design wall Monday. Thanks for stopping by!

Busy Week

    It has been such a busy week, that I am trying to decide if I should put it all in one post, or break it into a couple of posts.

     On Monday of this week, I spoke at the lunchtime program at our quilt show at Art Station in Stone Mountain Village.  I had been debating how much of my audience would be quilters, and how much would be nonquilters. Since it was at an Art Gallery, I decided to gear my remarks mostly, to nonquilters. Wrong answer! I got up in front of about 40 people, and asked if there were any quilters in the audience. All but 3 people raised their hand. I immediately decided to dispense with the rotary cutting demonstration I had been planning. Thank God I had a trunk show planned. I just spoke about each quilt in more depth than I had originally planned. Fortunately, they did seem to enjoy it, and I even sold a pattern.

     Friday afternoon, I demonstrated at the show, and taught the second half of a class at A Scarlet Thread in the evening. It was great to see the work that the students got done during the week. Everyone had a fun time with this quilt; which is pictured in my most recent blog post. I took photos of what they had so far with my phone. I am a bit spotty with using this phone for a camera. 2 of the photos turned out fine, but the third was terribly blurry. I am so sorry Sherry, that I didn't get a better photo of your beautiful quilt.
 

      Barb use beautiful, bold colors. She is planning to use the blue fabric is all of the centers.

     Lyn chose a gorgeous Asian fabric, and got tons of fabulous variety.

     Unfortunately, my hand must have moved when I took the photo of Sherry's quilt. It was delicate and whimsical. I know I have a tendency to do this, and I usually try to remember to take a couple of shots of each thing, but on this occasion my battery was about to die any minute. I was so disappointed when I saw this photo.














     I will be teaching at A Scarlet Thread again on March 23. I will be teaching my Let's Polka pattern.

     Then, I demonstrated again Saturday afternoon, and evening at Art Station.

     In between I got all of the strips that I needed cut, and made practice blocks for a quilt I wanted to start. I don't have a name for it yet, but it uses the same technique as my Sonja's Windows pattern. I have wanted to do something else with that technique for a long time now. Here is my drawing:

    
     I made a set of test blocks in every color combination needed. I was trying to see how far I could push the boundaries of color variation. I think more variation makes he quilt more lively and interesting, but I don't want to cross the line into confusion, and being unable to see the pattern clearly. I think I am doing OK so far. Do you agree?

      One thing I like about working with this technique is that it goes very fast. Dare I say that I will have this quilt put together in no time?!

     So that it what I have been up to. Thanks for stopping by!

New Projects

     Whew this week went by fast!

     Have you ever had this experience? You have a plan for what you want to accomplish, then all of a sudden, some other project comes to the forefront and just demands attention. You can't get it out of your head-you just have to start it right now! That is what happened to me this week. I was planning to work on a couple of quilt backs, finish my solid quilt, and continue working on my pieced hexagons. Then I suddenly just HAD to start this other quilt. I think part of the problem was I was thinking that right now I don't really have a good project for chain piecing, and I don't have a project that lends itself well to portability, and carrying to the houses of friends. The solid quilt used to be good for that, but it is past that stage.

     So, I spent most of my sewing time this week cutting and sorting strips.

     I went through all of the strips I sorted last year, and pulled out ones I thought would be the colors that I needed. Then in the middle of this process I realized that I was pulling together colors that I wanted to use for another quilt, so I thought I should cut some strips for both quilts, since the other quilt needs the some of the same colors, but different size strips.

     I took this photo early last year. These units all went into the Missing Monkeys quilt that I recently finished. When I had all of these on the design wall, I thought I would like to make a quilt where these Economy Patch units played a more important role. When I played with it a bit on EQ, I used blues and greens. I want the blocks to be just a bit larger though.

     Here is my test block. I don't yet have a test block to show you my other idea. That will have to wait a few more days.
     

















      Also this week, I took a class from Flavin Glover on Innovative Court House Steps. I had always wanted to make a Court House Step quilt using solid fabrics, Here are a few blocks I got done in class. I don't know when I will start working on this quilt in earnest; there are a few ahead of it.

     I also taught a class at A Scarlet Thread this week. It is a 2 session class, and we had the 1st session Friday night. This is the quilt we are working on. It is so much fun to see all the variations that students bring to an idea. I can't wait to see what they bring to class next Friday!

    
     I am doing a lunchtime program at my guild's quilt show at Art Station in Stone Mountain, this Monday, so I have been gathering quilts, and other items to show for that today.

     I still have a couple of other colors of strips to cut, so back to the cutting table I go!
Hope your week went well. Thanks for stopping by!