Friends

Brick road quilt pattern

Larger scale for the visual


Ok a few weeks back I was watching a Fon's and Porter episode and they showed this one quilt done in flannel sort of masculine looking in the brick road design. And I kept looking at it thinking I could use this look in my bedroom with all of my Klimt art. If I did it in fabric in jewel tones sort of keeping in mind the blanket in the painting of "The Kiss" with gold, black, cobalt blue, and so forth.
Which then got me thinking of this fabric I saw last year but it was only available then in the UK and people were using in a "Klimt artwork challenge" but then I didn't think anymore about it I just kinda wrote if off as a oh well. But with getting my fabric in the mail this week I got a ton of coupons so I thought I'd look around the website today between cookie batches and I found the fabric. Not only did I find it I found it on sale and had a free shipping coupon code and I about flipped out. Now I'm not sure if I would just use this as accent fabric for like pillow cases and so forth or if I would use this to make a throw for in the room to go on the end of the bed. Either way I'm plotting out ideas on this now...

Klimt inspired calico fabrics I ordered





This calico fabric also comes in the same patterns here but in brown instead of blue.

So I'm a terrible procrastinator, and I thought giving myself a huge project like this would push me to finish it in time for Christmas.

Nope.

Lol. Well my understanding boyfriend said he can wait until I finish the top tomorrow, but I wanted to share my progress so far. I started on the evening of the 23rd and stayed up all night, as I will do tonight.


I intended to make 5 paper pieced Bruins symbols, but I screwed myself over for time.


This is my first quilt!

( Pictures, and link to photo album )


Thanks for looking! :) MERRY CHRISTMAS!

The president of our local guild just emailed this, and I thought I'd share:

Twas the night before Christmas,
And the quilts were not made,
The threads were all tangled, the cookies delayed.
The stockings weren't hung, the pantry was bare,
The poor weary Quilter, was tearing her hair.
Stacks of fat quarters, tipped over in streams,
Visions of Log Cabins had turned into dreams.

When what to her wondering eyes should appear,
But a bus full of quilters with all of their gear.
They went straight to work with just a few mutters,
Sorting and stitching and brandishing cutters.
The patterns emerged from all of the clutter,
Like magic the fabrics arranged in a flutter.
Log Cabins, Lone Stars, Flying Geese and Bear Tracks,
Each quilt was a beauty---even the backs!

Her house how it twinkled, her quilts how they glowed,
The cookies were baking, the stockings were sewed.
Their work was all done, so they folded their frames,
And packed up their needles, without giving their names.
They boarded the bus and checked the next address,
More quilts to be made, another quilter in distrss.

She heard one voice echo, as they drove out of sight...
"Happy quilting to all, and to all a good night."
Author Unknown

(Shared by a friend in her Quilters Club of America email)

I am about to embark on my first real, big, adult, humongous, truly real project, but when I was about to post, I realised I never showed my 1000 triangles quilt I made over the summer.

Background: I was at home because I was overworked, and by the time sewing became fun again, I needed to create stuff with an extra meaning. So I chose to dig into my scraps bin and sew some stuff from there. I found two thin cottons: blue and yellow solids I once used to create a banner with.
It was never intended to be a very aesthetically pleasing quilt (spelling?). It was just a project to keep me occupied during my recovery, and a means to get rid of some unwanted scraps. Isn't that just the quintessential truth of quilting?

Here's the progress pictures of the quilt, behind ( this cut )

And soon, I'll be posting here with my next quilt project!

On Sunday it occurred to me that I really, really owe my partner's mother a Christmas present. I don't do anything for Christmas myself, being an atheist of Jewish extraction, but she's always so generous with presents. I decided to make a Christmassy table runner, and completed it in six days. It's not perfect - I really shouldn't have been on the phone when I basted, my quilting is of the "should not be permitted to pick up a needle" variety, and I discovered too late that Insul-Bright is meant to be put the other way up - but hey, no one will notice and I'm sure it will perform fine. Does anyone have recommendations as to what care instructions I should give her? The fabrics involve metallics, everything's made by hand, the batting is one layer of Insul-Bright, and the back is what I think is called muslin in the UK and something else in the US, but anyway was sold as extra-wide backing fabric and is a bit finer than usual quilting fabric. How much is it OK to put on a table runner? I'd imagine that red wine should be kept far from it, but are they OK with general food? I'm wishing I'd made it narrower now, it may well be a bit too wide on the table and interfere with place mats. It's 15" x 42".

( Probably the most traditional quilty thing I've made )

I have absolutely no idea what the blocks are, I found them in a random sampler. Does anyone know their names?

Another quilt in Reggie Sultan Fabrics. I made this last weekend. ( Read more... )

So, taking the day off from work to be home sick and tired, I finished up the Beatles quilt top. Now it's in the washer, then I'll iron and then I'll fold and box and wrap for Christmas. (I'm giving him the top on Christmas Day - he already knows it won't be finished) Then, after Christmas I can make the back, sandwich and start looking for someone to quilt it for me. There's no way it's going through the machine, piecing was hard enough.

Pics Here!

Howdy!

*waves*

I've been working on a landscape quilt for my mom for Christmas, and I'm almost done:



I got the idea from this book I found at my library and ended up purchasing. The house is my grandmother's. She and my grandfather had owned it for 50 years. The landscape part I made up as I went along. The house is in Kansas, but in a city... I suppose maybe this is what it had looked like before the city moved in!

It's almost finished. Just need to get it quilted. I tell ya what though, that piecing really is the hardest part!

I finished a quilt in time for the holidays! ( Pics etc inside... )

WHY THE FRIG HAS THIS NOT BEEN POSTED HERE YET?



THE BEST BEYONCE VIDEO OF ALL TIME. OF ALL TIME!

Today I went to a newly opened quilt shop near our little town. The inventory is very small still, and she's hoping to build it slowly. I went in to help my son (33 ) choose fabric to make sets of napkins with, for Christmas gifts that he'll finish on my serger while visiting. He chose a total of five fabrics, and I figured how much he'd need of each. Of one of the solids to be used as the backings, he needed 2 and 5/8 yards ( which would make the back of 18 napkins). She wouldn't cut any increment of 1/8 ( my guess was because she didn't know how to ring it into the cash register = 2.625 ) - stating that "eights are too little to cut". Needless to say it was annoying, and it happened again when I wanted 7/8 yard of two other prints.
I was dumbstruck. I spent ten years working at a fabric store, a beautiful independent shop, and our smallest cut was a quarter yard. But if someone wanted 1.125 yards or one and one eighth then no problem.
I'm all for seeing this person succeed - we've been without a shop here for a year ( I tried to buy the old shop before the owner retired, but at that point the credit market was locked down ), but with the near non-inventory, few samples, and non customer friendly policy, I'm not sure I'll be returning anytime soon. I've only been there one other time, and driving by it is always totally empty. I'm sure his $70 sale was the highlight of the day for the store. Unfortunately I think my business will continue to go 45 minutes away.
My question is: is this no cutting anything in 1/8 yard increments normal now? Have I been out of the loop too long? Honest, even without a shop nearby, I still seem to find a way to purchase plenty.
Thanks for letting me rant a little.