What Are Quilters Blogging About Today?

 When my friend Jayne, over at Twiggy and Opal started sharing her Geo Pop pattern in different variations, I decided to see how small I could make one! I pulled out some of my solid scraps and made this citrussy version...

Each block is 1 1/2" finished so the mini finished at 9"x12". pretty small but, of course, Jayne made a smaller one hahaha, which you can check out on her instagram.

Our Improv small group is doing a placemat swap. In August I needed to make a placemat for my friend Anne who had chosen pink and ...

There’s been a lot of sunshine here but with that has been intense heat and humidity. Many hours of sewing and quilting was becoming somewhat unjoyful for me so I went down a different path.  I had ordered some large art paper and the first happy thought I had was a sunflower and I drew a very simple drawing

The center of the flower is strip pieced, cut and sewn again to give the illusion of a woven center.  Beading in the center gave it more dimension and made it look more like a seed center.

The leaf is ...

My quilting journey began somewhere around 2006 to 2007.  I purchased a magazine, “Quilt It, Two Block Quilts” and immediately loved two of the quilts.  The first is in the back of my quilting closet, partially quilted.  Each time I take it out thinking I’ll finish it, I’m reminded that I don’t care for it very much.  I also remind myself that a fair amount of work went into it, especially as a beginner, and that I should finish it so I can donate it.

The second pattern was for “Baby Love.”  In 2018 I finally got ...

Scraps, scraps, scraps. A container full of one and one half inch scrap strips! There is also a bin of polka dots that has been waiting to be used. The blocks are quarter log cabins with the centers made up of four patches of polka dots.

This option for arranging the blocks just didn’t work for me.

I’ve arranged the quarter log cabins several ways and putting four together for one full log cabin block was most pleasing to me.

For now, this is my layout choice.

There’s a long way to go. I’m now piecing ...

We are at the end of the quilt challenge. It was supposed to be a 10 day challenge, but has taken me close to a month to complete. Talk about technical difficulties, family issues, and life challenges, including a bout of CoVid 19. Believe me, when you're sick from that, you don't care about your blog, your social media, or even your people. 

But this post is about these quilts, which really deserve to be together. They are sister quilts made for two granddaughters who really know how to be sisters. They wanted the quilts to be different ...

For day nine, I'm showing this quilt that I made for a granddaughter. Marley chose the colors and asked for "something zigzag." I think she must have seen another chevron quilt. I needed to play a little, so the compromise became two sizes of chevrons in three colors. They lost their home to mold several years ago and all of their quilts were lost, so this one is in a landfill somewhere. But that does not take away from the fact that it once existed as a silly quilt for a little girl who loved zigzags just because she ...

This happy cross quilt is one that I pieced on a trip to the Great Lakes. I always take a couple of easy kits that are cut and ready for sewing. When we return home they are quilted (or put into a basket where they may wait a bit too long.) I sold this one at a guild show a few years ago. It became a gift to a priest who was leaving one parish and going to another. Don't you think happy is a good description for this one?

When I was working as a contributing editor at Elle Magazine, the Fashion Director called me out loudly in front of the entire staff. She asked me if I was color blind, not in a concerned way, but as an accusation meant to humiliate, and demonstrate just how awful she thought my sense of color… Continue reading Color and Design

Precision piecing has never been my strong suit, but I am — like Michaelangelo at age 80 — still learning. One of the things I’ve learned is that ...

Oh the opportunity I saw when the Great Corona Lockdown began.  I was going to sew, sew, sew, and I did just that! I completed several quilts, made progress on several Works in Progress and best yet – I emptied many project bins! And then it happened – SLAM! I began to feel like going into my studio and sewing was a J-O-B.  So I stopped.  This is supposed to be a joy, not a chore, so…

I immediately ordered a large pad of drawing paper, some Tyvek sheets and checked on my supply of Lumeire paints.  The plan is to do ...

The beauty of doing the Zoom presentations is that I can usually get a picture from everyone, and they are edited for the class, so obviously, they are edited for posting after the class.

One of the quilts we're working on at The Hobby Horse is Celebration by Quilted Moments (Marilyn Foreman). It's a block of the month pattern, but I wasn't that thrilled with it. Let me rephrase that - I like the quilt, but the coloring on the cover is not my favorite.

Celebration pattern

Such a joy to see a box on the front porch that wasn’t an Amazon box! It was a box full of quilt goodness from Elaine in Missouri. She sent a full quilt top for Hospice.  This is such a happy quilt. I especially love the green that peeks out among the cheerful oranges.  This donation could very well go to a male patient. Most quilt tops seem to be more appropriate for female patients so this is a total win. This flimsy is now hanging with four other Hospice flimsies. I’m guessing this will be the first ...

I had high hopes of knocking out a few of the easier blocks for Anders' Beware the Ishmaelites sampler quilt over the weekend, but I was stymied by a color glitch.  My plan was to make all four of the predominantly yellow blocks, and I printed up my foundation paper piecing templates and my rotary cutting charts and headed upstairs to the studio...  But when I pulled out the two yellow shades of Kona Solid fabric that I'd used in my EQ8 design, I had serious misgivings about using them together in my quilt.  I decided to trust my ...

Instead of just posting about my finishes, I thought I would go into more detail on a few quilts. This first post I have touched on before but wanted to talk more about the steps, techniques and process of building these quilts from design to binding.

I am starting with a color play study I did, that was inspired by Stanley Whitney’s work.  As Josef Albers explores color with his work Interaction of color, I love how Stanley Whitney does the same (at least for me) in the placement of the colors in the grid.  Here are a couple ...

So many cut off corners from my Tula Strings quilt just begging to be used for their own quilt. I have been wanting to do a quilt of all flying geese for some time – perfect opportunity! First, there was all the trimming of the triangles. The adding of the solids was done while at a sew-in with friends – it took forever! The final trimming of the blocks seemed to take more than forever.  There was a lot of arranging on the design wall, rearranging, and yes, rearranging some more. The blocks occupied the design wall for at least a couple ...

There have been questions regarding how I made the Tula Strings blocks and border. Unfortunately, I’m not very good at keeping notes and drawings, so I will do my best to recreate the pattern. First, I laid out the various colors of shot cottons from my stash, then pulled out coordinating Tula prints. One and one half inch strips were cut – solids and prints.

The strips were paper pieced onto a 10 1/2″ square of paper, beginning with a solid strip in the center. Was the paper necessary?  For me it was because the shot cottons definitely lend ...

At last! This quilt was a fair amount of prep, much sewing and now it’s done! What’s even better – I love it! The solids are all shot cottons and the prints are various Tula Pink prints, all of which are now out of print and many considered rare. I was originally inspired to do this quilt by one done by Quilt Diva Julie that she calls Optic Strings. I posted about this quilts beginning here.

There are playful blocks!  See the racoon’s eyes peeking out?

And one of my favorites – Prince Charming!

Tula Pink fans could play ...

In my last post I shared the Clam Up bag from byAnnie.com, and earlier I shared my AWESOME Running With Scissors bag made for her patterns. I love bags and baskets and boxes and things to organize. One of my favorite classes to teach is my Easy-Peasy Inside-Out Bag, which makes a great 3 hours quickie class for a bag (or two if you are fast) or full day class where you can learn more details and extras. I decided to try Annie’s Soft ‘n Stable stabilizer instead of batting to see how it would work in MY ...