Word Quilt Progress

My Word Quilt is coming together slowly but surely. I got the first three blocks made over the summer and then took an unintentional extended hiatus. There was a trip back to California (which I apparently never posted about! Yikes!), other projects to be sewn and a presentation to prep for. But today I was able to make my guild's Sewing Saturday and add to that tally. I got a late start and left a bit early, because it was a mosey-ing kind of day. But it felt good to be sewing again!

Here they are all together:

Iron Caddy

You may remember awhile back when I made a drawstring bag to carry my handstitching supplies. And those of you with really good memories may recall that I wanted to make an iron caddy. Well part of what was holding me up on the iron caddy was choosing a fabric. Because you can use it as a pressing pad, it's important to use a single piece of fabric (no seams to cause wrinkles and bumps). And I was suffering from perfectionism. Especially once I completed the drawstring bag and realized that I would really prefer it if they matched.

Free Motion Freedom

Last weekend my guild hosted a free motion quilting workshop. I'd bought a free motion foot back in December and used it exactly...oh, never...so this seemed like a good opportunity to learn. I have a tough time dedicating materials and time to practice pieces (I'm not sure why it feels wasteful, since it's the only way to learn, but it does) but this gave me an excuse. The class also gave me motivation to keep going instead of tinkering for a few moments and then jumping into an actual project. In other words? It was exactly what I needed.

Our fearless leader had us start by doodling sprials, patterns, and shapes on a whiteboard to get a feel for the travel and connecting shapes.

Then we jumped onto a small practice piece.

Josh's Quilt

A couple of weeks ago, my mom called with some news. And an idea. One of her close friends' son in law has apparently been in the hospital for almost two months. As a complication of childhood cancer, he'd needed a heart valve replacement. He had that surgery and apparently almost everything that could go wrong has and he's had multiple open heart surgeries, pneumonia, fluid in his lungs, etc, etc.

His wife has been trying to keep things together for their small children and my heart aches for her. I can't even imagine what she is going through. Josh's doctors had asked for people to send cards, as keeping his spirits up is an important part of the recovery process.

Which lead my mom to her idea: she knew my guild was making charity quilts, would we be interested in making one for Josh? I ran the idea by my guild and was awed by the positive response. In less than two weeks we had gone from my inital post on the facebook group to the finished quilt being delivered to my mom's friend, for delivery to Josh.

Charity Quilt #3

In my last post, I mentioned that our final quilt top would be red/pink and auqua/blue. I need to make one more blue block to round this out, and this isn't the final layout, but here are the blocks. This has been a good exercise for me in "things do not need to be closely matched to look good together". I never would have thought peach, fuschia, orange-red, and true red could work together in a quilt and all read as "red". But they do! : )

Project Number Next

My next quilt is a word quilt, done in shades of blue, gray, and orange and filled with happy thoughts. For the back, I'm planning on enlarging a single block. This one to be exact. It's going to be lovely (and large, I'm thinking 100" x 100").

Space Baby Quilt Completed!

Life has exploded these last two months and I've fallen behind on my blogging. Consider this my first offering in catching up. The space baby quilt is happily ensconced in its new home!

In my last post, it was quilted. After that it was just a matter of burying threads, making up a pretty rainbow binding, attaching it, and tossing the quilt in the wash.

And I love it so much. I'm thrilled that it's off to meet its new owner and proud of how it turned out.

This photo shows the front.

Space Baby Quilt--Quilted!

Despite being a "Quilter", I find the part of the process that intimidates me the most is the...quilting. Especially on things that I just adore the piecing on. As my piecing gets better, the intimidation ratchets up. So, I had gotten stuck with this quilt. Loving it too much to "ruin" it. Unsure if my planned quilting would work. Fretting.

And I had excuses. I was sick. And then we were busy. And the baby was already born, so since I'd missed that deadline, what could a little longer hurt?

Thankfully, my friend who helped us paint, also provided a healthy does of inspiration and staying on task. We had planned a craft day and by the end of it? I had quilted the quilt! And it had turned out better than I had hoped and WAY better than I had feared. And the back looked great! And I had had no reason to fret at all. True friendship in action folks, believing in you even when you doubt.

The image up top shows the quilted and trimmed top. I know it's hard to see the quilting on, so here is a shot of my layout (marked with yarn borrowed from aforementioned friend).

Sewing for a Cause: The Blocks are (mostly) In!

You may recall that a couple of months ago I kicked off a charity sewing project with my guild. Well, at our meeting last week we officially closed accepting blocks. (There are a few more already done that are en route to me, but for the most part, I have them all.

And aren't they a glorious sight? All said and done, we've had 25 blocks contributed. I'm going to make a couple more to get us to the nice round number of 27--enough for 3 lap quilts, each with 9 blocks. I'm so thrilled at how my guild mates embraced the concept and I love seeing how blocks made by so many different people all come together. Fabulous. : )

Space Baby Quilt Update

The quilt is basted! I finished the solar system side by embroidering the small planets (Earth and everything closer) and appliqueing the larger planets. I glued them in place and then hand stitched them down.

To Boldly Go...Progress on the Space Baby Quilt

Last we spoke, I had my layout for the back figured out. Since then, I finished the back and started the front.

The photo up top is cropped to give an idea of what the finished back will look like. Right now, it still has all the extra fabric attached from having set everything on point.

Sew Baby Sew

One of my friends is pregnant with baby #2, so naturally, that means a quilt was in order! I decided to do a space themed quilt. I found a wonderful batik, navy blue with gold stars and decided to make that the foundation of the quilt. For the front, I'm using this quilt (scroll to the bottom) as my inspiration. I've even found a site that will allow me to scale the planets and sun accurately!

For the back, I wanted to try out paper piecing. Each of the four large blocks you see is paper pieced. The smaller stars are all improv pieced. The colors I am using here are the same colors I will use on the front.

As you can see "front" and "back" will mean almost nothing on this quilt, as both will be very open and free form. : ) I started with the back first, because I wasn't sure how long the paper piecing would take (answer: very much longer than normal piecing, but egads I love those results!). My next step is to fill in between the stars with the background material in order to finish the back. Then I'll start making planets for the front. My plan is to applique those down, with the smaller ones being freezer paper applique, by hand, and the larger being backed with muslin, then cutting the muslin and turning them right side out. Those shapes will get sewn on by machine.

I'd like to hand embroider a label, we'll see if I have time....the goal is to get this quilt done and out the door before the end of April.

Sewing for a Cause

Each of the officers of my my quilt guild is also in charge of heading up a committee. As Treasurer, that means me. I opted to head the challenges committee and kicked off my first two challenges at our March meeting. The first is a simple color challenge, I picked paint chips and everyone has to make something, anything they like, that uses those colors. I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone else comes up with but, so far, I haven't done anything on it myself.

The second challenge is to sew blocks for a charity quilt (or quilts depending on how many blocks we get). For inspiration, I turned to Do Good Stitches as it is a modern bee which also makes quilts for charitable causes. I fell in love with this quilt. I adore the use of negative space and the bold scrappiness.

Our group decided that instead of going monochromatic, we would go rainbow! I've made the three blocks shown at the top of the post and have fabrics picked out for an orange one as well.

Detailed pictures and a link to the instructions under the cut.

Curves Class Progress

I've written before about the Curves class that I signed up for. Well, it's over and done and I have just three things to show for it.

1. A bib

2. A half complete wall hanging

3. A pdf e-book of all the projects

There were LOTS of fabulous projects covered in the class and I've learned a lot just reading the instructions. That said, I fully intend to continue working the projects. The problem is with the amount of time I spend sewing, plus the non class projects I'm working on, I just couldn't keep up. But, I knew that going in, so I'm not disappointed. I figured I would do what I could and have the ebook for later. Zen quilting. ; )

And what I have done, I am pleased with. I spent hours deciding what fabrics/layout to use for the sky in that half done Christmas tree wall-hanging. Now that I have that figured out, I am probably 1-2 good sewing days away from done.

Upgrade! A Pieced Drawstring Bag

When I took my Handstitched class last year, I needed something to carry my supplies around in. You know, needlebook, thread, scissors, etc. So I grabbed what was handy, a ziploc bag and ran with that. Which works...unless you leave it our near a cat who enjoys eating plastic. Or want to put scissors in it. You know, crazy stuff.

So when Rachel linked to this drawstring bag tutorial, I knew I needed to make one. But with the holidays and trying to finish up my quilts which had deadlines, I just didn't get a chance.

2013 Quilty To Dos

I already told you about some of my quilty plans for this year, but for my sanity and your enjoyment, here is a list of all the things I want to make this year. (I'm sure this list will grow, they have a way of doing that...)

Learn
Stitched in Color's Curves Class
Pile o' Fabric's BOM Skillbuilder

Give
Jewelry Roll
Spacey Baby Quilt--This is to be paper pieced for a little one due in June. Time to get moving. ^_^
Wordy Wedding Quilt

Play
Mood Quilt
QR quilt (?)

Enjoy
Jewelry Roll (Yes, a second one. I desperately need one!)
Iron Caddy
Pressing pad/cutting mat transporter
Wall hangings for bedroom
Fabric "buckets" for my sewing room
Art quilt for my office (?)
Gift bags
Holiday garland

Progress
Mother's Love
Handstitched
I Spy Polaroids
Wonky Rainbow Squares
Turtle Quilt

Quilty Plans

Lots of good things happening over here at the Dragon household. I promise fuller updates in the next few days. In the meantime though, I wanted to share a couple of quilty things I have signed up for, in case any one else would like to jump in too.

The first is a Curves Class through Stitched in Color. Rachael taught the Handstitched class I loved so much this summer, so I couldn't resist signing up for another class. She is actually running both the Curves and the Handstitched courses in January/February. Registration opened for both today and, if you are interested, I would hurry on over as she sold out of spots for the last go-round.

The second is with a new-to-me blogger that I "met" through Flickr. Alyssa of Pile O Fabric is running a monthly block of the month (BOM) skill builder.

I'm intrigued by the blocks but what really caused me to sign up was the fact that this is a quilt as you go (QAG) project. This will serve the dual purpose of (a) giving me something to practice free motion quilting on each month and (b) walking me through a QAG method, which I am curious about. This quilt along is absolutely free, which is perfect for the wallet weary.

Both of these will have me nosing through my stash this weekend to see what I can pull out. I suspect I can mostly do Rachael's class from my stash, but I may need to get fabric for the BOM in order to get all the value/color combinations she is calling for.

Are you tackling any new projects this year? Any skills you are especially excited to learn?

Quiet Time Complete

I finished Quiet Time at approximately 11pm the night before we left for the wedding (end result: 3 hours sleep; moral of the story: don't do that!). So, talk about squeaking by! Still, it was done and I got on the plane with a tote bag full of quilt and a happy heart.


I ended up being about a 1/2 yard shy of the fabric I needed, so I ruffled around and found some more solid Kona in a neutral color. It's the putty colored strips along the top and bottom of the back. I have no idea what the fabric was intended for so...hopefully nothing important? It looks good here though, so it worked out well. : )

I quilted it in a squared off spiral from the center of the quilt. You can sort of see it in this picture.

I ended up having a bit of an emergency when, while laying the quilt out to show my in-laws (pre-gifting) I discovered that a couple of my seams had popped when I washed it. (Ack!). Thankfully our hotel offered complimentary sewing kits.


I little bit of handstitching later and everything is (hopefully, cross your fingers!) secure and ready to go.

Talk About the 11th Hour

We fly out tomorrow morning to attend a family wedding. I'm looking forward to seeing the family, playing florist's assistant, taking too many pictures, and generally having a blast.

This also happens to be the wedding that Quiet Time is being made for. After a feverish weekend of borders! and quilting! and two evenings of binding! and thread tail burying! it is finally d.o.n.e. and in the wash. Which is excellent as I still need to pack...

Quiet Time Update

Last weekend, I completed the main section of the backing for Quiet Time. I need to add borders to the top and bottom (to get my total length) but this photo should give you an idea of the general size.

This weekend is mission Get Ready to Leave for the Wedding. Which means we have some shopping to do, some cleaning to do, and a quilt to finish! It's going to be busy, but my hope is that by the end of this weekend I will not only be in possession of some shiny new shoes but will also have added borders to the front and back (including a label for the back), basted, quilted, and at least started the binding. (I prefer to finish binding my quilts by hand, but I may have to machine bind to save time. We'll see how long the other steps take.) Then it's in the washer and off to Texas!