Wave Gap

Well I wasn't sure if I was going to manage an entry for the current Curated Quilts' mini quilt challenge, but space opened up, I had an idea, and I was able to make it happen. The palette - soft lime green, indigo, grape, lotus pink, teal, and aqua - I totally pulled from stash. That was the easy part. It seems lately, there are two separate prompts for the mini challenge, in addition to the palette. This time the overall theme of the issue is Negative Space. But then 'gap' was an additional object of inspiration, so I kept both of those things in mind as I created my mini.

As I often do when I create a mini quilt of a specific size - in this case between 10" and 16" square - I create a square outline on my design wall with masking tape, so I have a rough idea of the space I need to fill. Note that the square was 16" this time, and my mini finished at 13.5" square, so it truly is just a rough estimate, knowing that seam allowances and design decisions will affect the result.

So I began by creating rectangles in three of the palette colors and arranging them with gaps between them and a much larger gap between the groupings. True confession, I had originally intended to quilt some 'ghost' rectangle blocks, but somewhere along the line I forgot about those! Oh well...

But I still had two colors to incorporate in the piecing, and I did that by inserting a skinny aqua line up top, and an even skinnier pink one below. By that time my piece wasn't quite up to size widthwise, so I decided to create another 'gap' by bordering the focal design with side borders. And then it was time for quilting!

I used two coordinating threads, Aurifil 50wt variegated #3320 [Spring Green] and #2784 [Dark Navy]. With the green, I created a 'wave' in the gap between the top and bottom element, and that was really some fun quilting. I'd spent a few minutes gently drawing with my hera marker, until I came up with outer limits for the wave that appealed to me. Then I got to work filling in, basically using my own Organic Straight-Line Quilting method, roughly following and keeping within the boundaries of the wave. It was at this point that I was really happy for the dark blue side borders, as they helped show off the wave in a way that wouldn't have been shown otherwise.

Above and below the wave, I basically did matchstick quilting. Not a huge fan of burying threads, I stopped stitching just shy of the wave, stitched just one stitch over, and then back... over and over again. It definitely created some pretty nice texture.

I'd found a fun stashed print for the backing, and once the quilt was trimmed, I finished it off with a faced binding. 

So this isn't exactly where I expected to end up, but I'm happy enough with it. The time spent working on it was creative joy - especially the quilting for a change - and I'm good with that!

Workaday

Over the last two weeks, I've been working on an entry for the latest Curated Quilts mini challenge, not really knowing if I could make the deadline or not, and I'm here to tell you it was close! But a little window of creative time opened up, and I was able to finish and enter it with a day to spare. 

The theme of this challenge was "Utility," and we were asked to use accessible fabrics for our utilitarian mini quilt design - scraps we had on hand, treasured fabrics, or repurposed fabrics. The color palette was dictated by one fabric - Candlelight Woven in Ocean by Ruby Star Society - though we could use what we had on hand. I chose to do that rather than purchase new fabric, but did find some aqua blue Andover Textured Solids in my stash that felt like a really good match. I don't even think Andover makes this fabric anymore, but I remember liking it - obviously enough to stash a good sized piece!

For some reason, I kept imagining industrial elements, so I started out just creating some pieced components, with just a vague notion of how they might fit together. Besides the textured solid, I incorporated some metallic and natural Essex scraps, a blueish shot cotton and print that seemed to coordinate ok, and a black striped shirt I had rescued from the donate bag a while back.

I began to place the segments up on the design wall, just to envision where I might be headed, plus keeping in mind the size, as my finished quilt needed to be between 10" and 16" square. It was then that I realized I had meant to use more of the darker blue shot cotton on the right side of that curve, so I swapped that out and liked the result much better.

Finally I had a finished top AND randomly rotated it around, deciding I liked a different orientation than I'd been working on all along. Go figure!

For quilting, I used Aurifil 50wt #2805 [Light Turquoise] to quilt a grid - one direction followed a curve in the design, and the other direction was relatively vertical.

And by the way, the 'true' color of the piece is reflected best in the detail photo above, rather than the quilt photo below. Lighting.... always a challenge.

So, the finished quilt measures just 13" x 13" square. It was a bit of refreshment in an otherwise stressful and hectic month, so whether it gets accepted or not, the fabric play was definitely worth it!

Take Away

It feels like it's been a while since I've participated in a Curated Quilts mini quilt challenge, but now definitely felt like the right time. For the upcoming Half-Square Triangle issue, the theme is "quilts that use subtraction as a design feature." To clarify "subtraction," CQ posted Less is More, and in addition to some clarification, it's a nice little quilt show.



I kind of struggled with a plan for a while, then a glimmer of an idea came to me, which led me to create a single block....



It only made sense to make more blocks (which I did). and then play with them till a firmer plan materialized (which it eventually did). 



I actually had the top all pieced when the thought of a ghost block came to me, and that was really kinda fun to execute. For the first time, I used Aurifil 28wt for machine-quilting, and loved the result. I'll be trying that again. 



The spool I had happened to be the same color as I was using on the mini [#2600. light gray], so that was handy. I did go ahead and use 50wt for the quilting, hoping that would help the ghost block stand out, and I think it did. Rather than do strictly matchstick quilting, as was my original plan, I did a dense organic straight-line, which is one of my favorites to execute.



A faced binding became the way to go when I realized I didn't have enough of the light gray solid left, which would have been my choice for a regular binding. I tried Cotton & Bourbon's method for a change, as I'd noticed it was single-fold, and I thought that might be a good option for a mini. And I think it was!



Oh, and for the backing, I used a favorite print from the deep stash with some bits left on my cutting board. Maybe not the most profound use of fabric ever, but it gave me alot of pleasure.



So, this little quilt finished at 16" square, the maximum size for the challenge. I really debated on whether to crop close to the HSTs or give them room to float, and I obviously settled on the latter.

So I'll get this baby submitted, but no matter what, that was just what I needed. This is exactly why sometimes, it's really fun and freeing to work small.

confluence

Well that was fun! When Curated Quilts announced January 2 as the deadline for their next Mini Quilt challenge, I knew it would be tight. I mean with my frenetic holiday sewing and the actual holiday activities and all, I got a really late start. But that's the great thing about mini quilts.... just a few hours does the trick.

The theme was Curves, and the color palette white, spring green, moss green, burgundy, fuchsia and teal. It had been a while since playing with improv wavy curves, and they were calling me, so that's the direction I headed.

When it came time for quilting, I was in a real quandary about what color of thread to use and finally opted for Aurifil Monofilament, which I'd used with success earlier in the year. At first, I was regretting my decision, not really liking the look. But the farther and denser I quilted, the more I liked it, and crazy enough, it kind of sparkles in the light. My only real frustration was that almost every time I used my automatic thread cutter and lifted the presser foot, the filament unthreaded from the needle! With my old eyes, this isn't at all helpful! I finally got into the routine of grabbing the top thread immediately after cutting, before lifting the pressure foot, and that little trick saved the day.

It's not an exaggeration to say that this little bit of sewing over the weekend was seriously refreshing, and a great way to close out the year. A faced binding seemed a good finish for it, and in the end, my entry, confluence, measures just over 12" square.

Remembering that my smallest quilt of the year will be hanging at QuiltCon, I just want to remind you that everything we make doesn't have to be huge. In fact, making small - impulsive yet focused - can be really, really good.

House

When I first saw it announced, I wasn't going to make time for Curated Quilts' House Mini Quilt Challenge. But I guess I needed a little play time in the studio, pulled some fabrics and went for it.

I had perused the prompt 'house' online for a while for a little inspiration, and kept coming back to a photo of House on Krokholmen in Värmdö, Sweden. It was the roof that so captivated me, and for better or worse, my version using all the colors called for in the prompt, apparently looks like a circus roof. Not my intent.

In fact, nothing about this piece quite 'fits' for me. I think one reason I'm not 100% happy with it is that it isn't easily recognizable as fitting its theme, "house". Not that that was even necessary, but I guess I thought it would reflect that in some way.

That said, I had alot of fun messing around with improv stripes, the palette intrigued me to no end (SO not being anything I would have chosen on my own), and unexpectedly, the piece became sort of a sampler of walking foot quilting designs done in coordinating threads all around. And that was very fun.

So even though I don't love it, I'm happy enough to have explored the theme, I enjoyed the bit of improv, and I'm ready to move on. So there you go.

House measures 12" square.

Hewn

Remember me telling you about Curated Quilts, the new quarterly quilting journal coming out soon? Well one of the features in each issue is a mini quilt challenge. For the second issue, the call for log cabin quilts has been announced. In fact, the deadline is coming soon - October 1!

I can't honestly say that what I'm submitting is quite the result I may have gone after if it hadn't been for the traveling I've done the last several days. Ie. I knew I'd be away from my machine for a while, and the week waiting for me when I returned didn't guarantee much sewing time either. So when I managed to get a quilt top done before I left, I knew the only logical way to proceed was with hand-quilting.

Which is all fine and good. I've had plenty of experience at it back in the day, but lately not so much. And with the use of both Art Gallery denim and Essex linen in the piece, the thickness varied quite alot, and my stitches were kind of wobbly and uneven. You know - a very handmade look. The best part, though, was the thread I used - Aurifil 28wt #2625 (Arctic Ice). It was a first for me, as far as hand-quilting goes, and it stitched oh-so-smooth.

By the way, the backing I'd found in my stash was pretty perfect, I thought. In person, the colors really mesh with those of the required palette. Which reminds me - there was a required palette! What I saw in the photo posted was gray, tan, coral, gold, and pink. I read somewhere that the gray was really 'a soft navy', which is why I chose the denim. At any rate, it was a really captivating palette for me, and very enjoyable to work with.

One other little issue, though, was that I took the opportunity to use a machine I was quite unfamiliar with to sew on the binding. Don't get me wrong - it was a delight having a brief sewing spell in a borrowed (with permission!) sewing room, but it was kind of like sewing in Greek - none of the buttons were familiar, and I wasn't about to switch out the walking foot, thus my seam allowances weren't as precise as normal, and that resulted in a bit of bunching in the finished binding. In an odd sort of way, maybe that just adds to the wonky log cabin and the imperfect quilting, eh?



Whatever, it was a very enjoyable sew and gave me some hand-stitching for the car ride. Finishing at 15" square, it's the smallest quilt I've made in a while, and I confess, that was a bonus. Perfect it's not, but who ever said it all had to be? ....Exactly.

Linking up with Curated Quilts' Call for Entries - Log Cabin Mini Quilt.

Ruby X

I fell in love on flickr . . .

1. Mini Cross Quilt for Kerry

1. Pillow Talk Swap, R.6 _Finished

. . . so much so, that I was compelled to make a mini x-quilt for myself. Not finding a pattern or tutorial, I had to figure it out. So I grabbed a charm pack, did the math, then went to work cutting and piecing.

I'm not sure why, but I'm loving these little 'x's!

For her mini quilt challenge, amylouwho had encouraged us to "try something new and break out of our comfort zones". I had already done that by working without a pattern, and decided to really go for it, and try a new free-motion quilting pattern. {Considering I had only ever done free motion here and here, this was a pretty big deal.} But I decided to go for it and did a swirly-ish meander. Perfect? No way. Did my friend the seam ripper help me out occasionally? Yup. But I kept repeating to myself, "I'm supposed to try something new! I can do this!"

And so, here is "Ruby X", 16 X 20" of darling, quilted up with determination rather than mastery. And I'm smitten again.

block fabric-Ruby by thimble blossoms; background-by basicgray;

sashing-KONA coal; binding-stash dots; blocks are 4"

Watch for a tutorial in the next few days! See Mini 'X' Quilt Top tutorial here! Meanwhile, linking up with the mini quilt challenge, {sew} Modern Monday, and Fabric Tuesday!



And adding to the new Modern Mini Quilts group on flickr!

W.i.P. Wednesday

I've had a good quilty week since last W.i.P. Wednesday, but don't feel like I have alot to show you {yet}. But here's the rundown!

Completed projects

Swoon quilt - Finishing this quilt felt like a major accomplishment! 80" square, it tested my machine-quilting skills, but all came out fine in the wash, if you get my drift! If you didn't see my reveal post, it's here, along with more pics. Truly a pleasure every step of the way, this one.

do.Good Stitches November blocks plus a couple of charity blocks provided great fun and a nice distraction from Swoon {pics and links to tutorials here}. 

Ongoing projects
Mini quilt challenge quilt - A work in progress that I'll be entering in the mini quilt challenge hosted by amy lou who sews this Friday. So hope you don't mind if I just give you a sneak peek.

Scrappy Autumn Lap quilt - Sorry, but another project I'm not quite ready to show. Here's a little preview of my palette. The top is done, just what I was after, so now it's on to piecing the backing and quilting.

Wrenly HST quilt - no progress here . . . guess I got distracted!

Upcoming projects  
* 4th quarter 4x5 Quilt Bee blocks 

* Flannel Christmas star quilt - found the pattern!
* Hometown "Wild Thing" 
* Pattern for Mango
* Stash zig zag quilt - debating whether or not to put this idea to rest for now

* Quilts for siblings #2 and #3

Be sure and check in at Freshly Pieced! It's Lee's one-year anniversary of W.i.P. Wednesday, and she has a great post up about the original eight W.i.P. Wednesday linky ladies plus a great giveaway! I must say, W.i.P. Wednesday has been a super source of inspiration and motivation for me this year!