Sunday, September 23, 2012

Craft Book Month

Craft Book Month at Craft Buds

The last few weeks, it's been fun to hear fellow bloggers talk about their favorite craft books and share project from them. There's been quite the expansive blog hop as part of the celebration of "all things craft book". In all honestly, there are about 10 stacked at the foot of my ironing board, 3 or 4 of which I've gone back to repeatedly over the last year for inspiration. One of my favorites is Quilting Modern by Jacquie Gering and Katie Pedersen.

I love that though this book has projects you can do, it strongly encourages you to let the techniques inspire you to create your own unique designs. So it's very conducive to newcomers to improv as well as those that want to move in their own direction.

Though I'd dabbled in improv quilting a few times before, it was a whole different thing to actually take a class with one of the Quilting Modern authors. To put it simply, we practiced every technique in the book, ending the day with an odd little assortment of pieced blocks, and a wad of Katie's scraps to finish whatever.

I decided to make a sampler quilt of sorts with my blocks, and felt full license to put them together however I felt moved. And I started by taping a grid up on the wall of my sewing room, and 'building' each panel, as described in the book. 
Here's my finished quilt, loosed based on the book's "mod tv quilt".
I used the same panel technique as I pieced the remaining class blocks into a backing.
This quilt was a fun foray deeper into improv, with a book that I know will continue to inspire me.

Linking up with Craft Buds.

14 comments:

  1. I agree it is a great book, and I love your quilt too.

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  2. it is such an amazing book. i love it!

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  3. I like that you have 2in1, both sides looks good.

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  4. This is one of my favorite books too! I love the colors you chose for this quilt - pink and orange make a great combo. What design did you use to quilt it?

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  5. Amazon is holding out on delivering that to me right now, I'm not amused! Still, your mini looks great :o)

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  6. A great looking book. The quilt is amazing, the two in one is always a fun design =D

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  7. Again Debbie, this quilt is just great. The back and the front!

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  8. Hi Debbie. I just finished my first improv quilt inspired by that book and another book. Great job on your improv quilt.

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  9. Debbie, this is great! I'm so glad you were inspired by the blog hop--I love your improv quilt! (And I need to get my hands on this book... sounds perfect.) Thanks for linking up to Craft Book Month!

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  10. I love your improv.quilt and this book is definitely on my wish list as I love Katie's work.

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  11. I am planning to quilt my son's Stained Glass quilt with the help of this book.
    I still have the quilt hidden as an excuse not to have to start ...

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  12. I must confess, I think I like the back the best! So awesome, oh and I love the quilting that you did on this one!

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