quilt block – Entropy Always Wins

This last month has been surprisingly productive given the craziness of my work and family life. I think my creative life feeds on it a little bit though. The less time I have, the more ideas I come up with and the more I need to make. Can anyone relate?

I started and ended the month with blocks finished for Debbie in our Bee Sewcial group. She gave us the mission of making Midcentury Modern blocks. Find her block post about it here: A Quilter's Table: Bee Sewcial Goes Mid-Century. What a fun endeavor this has been once again. I did some improv curves with inset ovals. I made up a paper piecing pattern for a MCM star, experimented with a boomerang shape utilizing the 6 minute circle technique (It worked!) and lastly made up some very geometric appetizers to finish up this fun buffet. It’s all I can to keep from sharing my month’s mission which begins in September. Can’t wait!

Of course, I have been bag making too. I am really inspired by the new book out by Anna of Noodlehead, “Handmade Style” (Handmade Style: 23 Must-Have Basics to Stitch, Use, and Wear: Anna Graham: 9781940655062: Amazon.com: Books). I channeled her Tablet Case pattern and modified it (as I tend to do) and made three bags, the last being one for my dad for Father’s Day. I used my stitched toaster for one, recycled a french knot project for another and did some more stitch sketching/free motion quilting on left over painter’s drop cloth in the shape of a camera for the third. To add interest, I used unfinished leather for the binding and tiny pockets in all of them.

My friend Sondra and I are collaborating on some bags together too so I combined vinyl and paper reproductions of her works with leather and took them back to her today as she plans to add paint, mica and other ornamentation. I can’t wait to see them finished.

In the selfish sewing department, as we are headed to some cold weather soon I combined some organic fleece I had previously hand dyed with linen and left over Malabrigo Rasta Wool for a scarf. It was picked as a Craft/Make Magazine online weekly favorite this last week (CRAFT Flickr Pool Weekly Roundup | Make: DIY Projects, How-Tos, Electronics, Crafts and Ideas for Makers | MAKE: Craft)-so fun.

Lastly, I finished up a quilt top I started in December. I call it “Stars and Stripes” though there really aren’t either to be found on this modern American Flag variation. I am excited to have a quilt that I can take out on future 4th of Julys. It’s fun to see it mixed in with my other quilts-geometric lover anyone?

Happy 4th friends.

Hillary

It is feeling like Spring here in Northern California. I am appreciating my bulbs that have already bloomed and the warmer weather which seems in stark contrast to the rest of the country. (We would gladly take some of that snow and rain however given the multiple year drought we are in the midst of. Yikes!)

In any case, the March Bee Sewcial block challenge matches in palette and mood our current weather. For details on this month’s challenge, check out Melissa’s instructional post on Flickr (Flickr: Discussing March is for Melissa! 🙂 in Bee Sewcial). I must reiterate how fun this Bee has been. It is forcing me to step out of my creative comfort zones and I have learned so much.

When planning my blocks for the month, I searched high and low on Pinterest and in Flickr for “transparency” inspiration. Nothing seemed quite right so I finally settled on images that came out of the blue. Translating those images to fabric was the big challenge and after considering several options, I decided to simply convert the scale pictures I had drawn directly into paper pieced patterns.

Making the points line up perfectly was the only real challenge of it all (along with picking the left over paper pieces off the back of the fabric.) I can imagine glue basting would work well for this (another new method to try out). I am now completely hooked on making paper piecing patterns.

And I think I can now call myself an official quilter after making two ginormous design walls. That’s right, I will no longer be doing design layouts on the floor. What a concept! Now I just have to find a better fabric cutting spot as the floor is still my go to. Kneeling, bending and squatting are good for you right?

Though I enjoyed playing with the new colors in Melissa’s palette I needed to nurture my creative rebel side a tad and made up the block above. This design has been in my head for awhile. I can imagine a quilt made of several similar equilateral triangles. Unfortunately my darn new ideas keep competing with old plans for time on my sewing machine. I have so many plans lined up I’m going to have to farm out some tops for quilting by others I think.

My mailbox and heart have been bursting with love from the huge hearted quilting community I now feel a part of. Anne de Waxholm (Holland) (https://www.flickr.com/photos/anne_de_waxholm) and Berene (Canada) (@happysewlucky on Instagram) sent me their contributions to the “Nude is Not a Dresscolor” project. Don’t they play well together?

I also got some similar blocks from Krista (Poppyprint) while at Quiltcon along with other special goodies and a signed copy of her new book (Martingale – Make It, Take It (Print version + eBook bundle)). I can’t wait to make a couple of projects highlighted in it.

Chawne Kimber (completely cauchy.) was super sweet and sent me some of her Quilting business cards, some fabric and a pin of one of her gorgeous Quiltcon quilts. I was bummed to miss her at the event but appreciate our ongoing dialogue online and look forward to a face to face meet up sometime in the future.

Lastly, along with her gorgeous Shirt Blocks, Berene sent me some hand printed linen tags that make reference to my day job. They read “Quilts are the best medicine” , “Inject a little creativity into life”, “flesh and fabric are my canvas” and “give me sutures or thread and I will stitch beauty”. Crazy amazing and generous right?! These are going on some of my quilts for sure.