Freemotion Quilting on the Buckeye

Today I did some more quilting on the Buckeye Beauty Quilt. I really wanted to set off the flowers by echoing around them, but with the top of the quilt light and the back of it dark I was very torn with what color thread to use for this part of the quilting. After staring at the quilt for at least a week I took it over to my thread collection and it dawned on me. Tan! Why hadn't I thought about it before? As there is no tan on the quilt it seems like a bit of a leap, but the tan is a neutral so on the front it blends and accents to the light color and on the back it blends to the dark. It was just the answer I was looking for.

This quilt is my first attempts at freemotion quilting and clearly thereby my this is my first six practice runs at offset freemotion quilting. I pulled the quilting line from the tip of the flower and brought it around that way it spiraled out getting bigger with each go round.

I love this little trapezoidal border, but I was concerned about how to quilt it, stitch in the ditch would have yielded all together to many stars and stops and more thread build up than I was willing to have. As I was quilting the echoes it came to me a bit of a whirl on each color would do the trick and then I stitched in the ditch on both sides. That just leaves the outer most border to be quilted (and to pick up the black thread to finish off the bursts on the Windmills).

We are all indeed still sick with me having a mild fever all day. At this point I long to be better. Hopefully you are well and will enjoy a happy holiday.  Best Wishes from our home to yours!

As always if you would like to see an image closer up, feel free to click on it.

2010 Lady Bird Cardinal Pictures

My beloved Lady Bird Cardinal is back and letting me take her picture again!  This is her second visit this year and the new camera we got for Christmas let me zoom really close and in focus for these.  This first photo clearly shows Lady Bird's one foot sticking out.

Of course we're not certain if this is the same male Cardinal Lady Bird selected last year, but he did dart up to her and share a bit of seed with her this morning.  This was taken right after that, as I didn't know what he was up to until it was over.

So if your day feels a bit heavy and difficult just think a moment on dear little Lady Bird here, if her daughter has grow up well it's quite possible Lady Bird will even be a grandmother this summer, we'll never know of course. 

Hard Core Quilter? Or Lazy...

Today I made the binding for the Buckeye Beauty Quilt.  While I was cutting my finger got in the way, but I kept at it.  In this house anytime I get up it might be a long while before I get back to what I was doing.  Would you believe I finished making the binding and wrapped it up for later before doing anything about this?

The best news is that Lady Bird Cardinal is back this Spring, it was such a thrill to see her one footed self yesterday morning.  She was a little tippy as she alighted the bird feeder which is how I reconized her right away.  A Gackle was there as well which was bigger than her and made her a bit leary of staying to long, and of course I dug out my camera, that was to much for her.  Hopefully she will be back soon.  I went back through my old posts so you can feel free to follow the link above and read all about her visits last year as well as any new viewings this year.  I first sighted her as an adult on May 4th, 2009.

A Bit of Sparkle

As the first Turtle block I made is not destined to be in the Hawaiian Ocean Appliqué quilt (for reasons I blogged about previously) I decided to embellish it up as a matching pillow. Keep in mind that I'm not finished yet. So far I've only run low on beads and ideas, but hopefully time will fix that.

We're all still sick, so any little thing that I can do like this feels worth mentioning.

National Quilting Day Follow Up

I was blogging around when I first read the word, National Quilting Day? A day to celebrate every thing about quilting that I hold dear? Besides it's a holiday so anyone wanting to tune me out or say "uh hu, yes..." while I rave about fabrics will just have to listen.

What would you do on such a great day? Rather than annoy those close to me with my deepest fabric fantasies, I headed for my sewing machine and settled down with my turtles from my Hawaiian Ocean Appliqué Quilt. I've been having a problem seeing my appliqué through the clear plastic of my "open toed foot". Open toed, my toilet! So I broke it, completely and totally on purpose. It was wonderful. I have never broken a sewing machine foot before, so this was something new.

I did increase the pressure on the presser foot to compensate for the missing plastic, but other than that I was good to go.  I thought for a moment it might be harder to line up without that little bit of plastic, but it took no more time getting used to than when I'd first switched to that foot in the first place, and I could see again! Did anything wonderful happen to you yesterday? I'd love to hear about it.

Windmill Quilting

So I researched Windmill arms and what I discovered is that I didn't want the traditional tiny squares of a real windmill quilted all over the arms of my quilted Windmill blocks, nor would they have fit very well anyway as real windmill arms are very long and rectangular whereas in a typical Windmill Quilt block you're working with triangles.  So I altered the Bright Star quilting pattern by Day Style Designs to only run over the teal part of the blocks.  This worked out great for 3+ blocks when I ran out of the thread I was using. 

We're all quite sick here so catching Tiny keeping my sewing area company was to sweet to resist.  I'm not even certain how she has found the time as it seems every time I look up she's right there with me.

Spinning Flowers - Raw Edge

I've been struggling with how I'd like to quilt the offsetting blocks on the Buckeye Beauty Quilt ever since the trouble with my attempts to freemotion quilt through the paper resulted in broken threads. Well yesterday I stumbled on the answer. Appliqué. Could I truly happily appliqué on a quilt that is already being quilted? Shock of shock it’s not a problem at all, in fact it has worked beautifully. I used a glue stick to hold the pieces in place and then touched the iron to the appliqué pieces setting them while trying the glue, and then I quilted right over them through the quilt with a dark purple thread. This resulted in the entire flower including the veins of the petals showing on the reverse.  

I really like how this gentle touch of the fabrics from the front really brought the colors of the quilt together, uniting both sides. What do you think? As I still have a bit more quilting left to do, I'm really looking forward to discovering what other whispers this quilt will give me.

The free applique pattern can be found here.  I increased the size when I printed out the pieces by 150% to ensure the flower would fill my 10" offset block and I smoothed out the interior curve to allow the spin to appear more natural.  Last but not least I made my own circle templates, as by the time I'd scaled up the originals they needed reformed.  Wink--> The lid to my glue stick was perfect.

Hawaiian Ocean Appliqué - A Bed Quilt

I can hardly believe this will be my first post about my Hawaiian Ocean Appliqué Quilt as I have collected fabrics and planned this since I believe September. That's nine months!  I even made a practice charity quilt which you can read all about here.

I have nearly completed the first 20" block.  Above is the front and below is the back.  I'm concerned about the green thread on the back, it's showing over the dolphins on the back rather than blending in and allowing the dolphins to play.  I think perhaps the thread I placed in the photo might look better.  Of course if I change the color on the bottom I will have to be 10x more careful about my thread tension.  Who knows maybe it would just change the problem to the lighter end of the spectrum.

The fabrics I collected are South Sea Imports Zinnia's in Green, Michael Miller Dolphins at Play, and Moda's Atlantis in blue. I have done a mock up of the layout below for you to see; the 20" turtle blocks all around and one 42" dolphin and turtle block in the center. You can see the original pattern here, by Pacific Rim Appliqué, which was given to me by my friend Vicki.  I am using a method of quilt as you go machine hawaiian appliqué with a blanket stitch that I altered to suit my own quilting abilities.  I used fusible interfacing which Rob cut carefully enough that I will have the reverse image to use in a future quilt so there will be no leftover scraps, how about that?

The background of the center dolphins will match the water background behind the turtles when completed.

The Process of Quilting

For me quilting is the process of quilting together my top my back and my batting.  Often I plan while I'm piecing how I will quilt the finished piece.  Just like building a house sometimes the knowledge comes quickly and it's something I know right away without hesitation and other times it comes more slowly.  With the Buckeye Beauty Quilt it's been a slow revelation.  I've been quilting from the back which I suppose makes it the front now with the Windmills taking first thread (that wasn't ripped out).

Above is what I have so far, with the echoes over the purple quilted over all of the windmill blocks. I'm thinking I might like to make diagonal quilting now over the teal fabric to give it the appearance of the blades of a windmill; perhaps I should Google Windmills for more insight. No thoughts on those offset blocks yet; I think when I've settled on the Windmills the offsets will come to me.

The more I look at the trapezoid border the more I love it. The texture is just amazing - well worth the effort to strip piece then cut and sew again.