Naughty Me

I’ve been very, very naughty….

A lot of fabric has been purchased lately….

I swore that I was going to go on a “fabric diet”…. But… well…..

First, I got a small bonus – cash – from my contract firm and I’ve also been feeling a little down about a lot of things and retail therapy helps. 

Earlier this month, a friend and I hiked out west to couple good, but not often visited due to drive fabric stores as well as hitting standbys that are close by.  The end result:  Blue Bamboo for metallics and some batiks that I cannot find elsewhere, SR Harris for 108 wide batiks, an embroidered piece and many, many, cottons, three large chunks of 108 backing fabric at Joann’s and on TWO days – fabrics from Twin City Quilting.  There was also a trip in there to Glad Creations for the fabrics I needed for the “Jo’s Little Women” club (ANOTHER block of the month)

And, honestly, none of them are really for any current projects.

I also went a little crazy online.  I bought three patterns from Keepsake quilting AND signed up for their bits and pieces club.  I pay monthly (credit card) and get a pack of mystery fabrics each month.  I like the idea and hoping that it will stimulate some creativity.  The first month arrived with the patterns a couple days ago.  It is a layer cake of some very feminine small florals.  Anyone have an idea what I should do with them?

Connecting Threads also got a chunk of money from me.  I have a very fussy Juki.  I’ve written about it before.  It’s one factor in my decision to only buy good quality cotton thread from now on.  I first decided to go with Gutterman because I can get deals at Joann, and Aurfil for a smaller thickness (quilting mostly).  Gutterman is a great thread, but I don’t like the spools.  They are what most people know as the standard spool of thread with “discs” on either end and the thread on the narrower part in the center.  While this is fine for standard sewing – especially when the spool gets spun around to use – it doesn’t work for quilting.  The spool is usually stood up, and the thread needs to wind off quickly.  With the standard spool, thread can often get caught on the ends and break.  I really needed to find another thread type with a different spool configuration.

I love thethreadexchange.com for my embroidery thread, but I haven’t been 100% satisfied with cottons from there.  I bought several large cones – 40 and 60 wt – that are just beautiful and sew very well.  They are high quality, strong, etc., but one cone just will NOT work on the Juki.  It’s the same brand as the others, but it breaks non-stop.  I tried it on several quilts.  I can piece with it, but it won’t work for the quilt sandwich.  A big shame, because it’s a variegated green/purple that I haven’t found elsewhere.

I buy quite a bit of fabric from Connecting Threads.  I really like the charm packs and other collections she puts together (her own selections and collections; not things that everyone carries) and her prices are the best.  I decided to try a small color collection of her threads – brights – just to see.  They are the same weight as Gutterman – 40 – but come wound on straight spools (cardboard cylinders).  The thread is also even cheaper than Gutterman at 50% off. 

Well, suffice to say, the thread is fantastic!  The Juki likes it!  I am also very pleased with her colors.  She doesn’t have as many shades as Gutterman displays in Joann’s, but a large color range is covered and her brights are simply vibrant.  I’ve even quilted a piece with Minkee for the back and it turned out very well.  So, along with my quilt shop shopping, and online fabric purchases, I also got a big box of thread…. And a couple more pieces of fabric….

The Project Box Status

While I’m still putting the “must get dones” on the project list, I’m not listing all the smaller things that I pull out of it and get done.  I’ve actually been really good on that front.  I am ONLY pulling things out of that box to do, and I’m using scraps as much as I can in conjunction with those projects. 

For the last two weeks, most of what I’ve been doing from there is small projects:  (note:  “decorative piece” means a smaller than baby quilt size that can be a wall hanging, table topper, etc.)

Item	Status
Baby quilt using a small jelly roll	Completely done and actually given to Ana to claim she made and give as a baby shower gift (it was planned unexpectedly)
Decorative piece using two charm packs	Completely done
Decorative pieces using leftover 4 ½ inch blocks from the circle dance quilt AND scraps from the scrap bin AND using one of the Scrap Tamer’s monthly patterns (Picture shown last posting)	Completely done
Decorative pieces using left over 7 inch  from the circle dance quilt	Completely done
Decorative piece using six embroidered blocks (originally done to use up ends of spools of embroidery thread) AND  many small bits from the scrap bin	Top pieced, needs to be quilted and bound
Decorative piece using two (slightly different) embroidered blocks AND the leftover QSTs made for the line above ( J )	Top pieced, needs to be quilted and bound
Mariner’s compass quilt (picture to be in a post soon, I promise).  This is a LARGE piece that I’ve been working on since later October (not solidly).  Yay!  One of the major things knocked off!	Top pieced, needs to be quilted and bound.
Decorative piece using the three extra Mariner’s Compass blocks.  How I made three extra when I so carefully cut and labeled, I do not know….	Top pieced and quilted, needs to be bound
Decorative piece using the single block that I made from the Fat Quarter Quilt Shop’s paper piecing block of the month.  This was the shop that I had such bad experiences with and decided not to continue with the program	Top pieced and quilted, needs to be bound

Block of the Month projects

·         Scrap Tamer’s Mystery (x2, remember?) – Not overdue, will be working on at Sewing day tomorrow.

·         Twin City Quilting – Not overdue, will be working on at Sewing day tomorrow.

·         Ranae Merrill – Behind….almost…  I did block one, block two came out 3/1, and block three will come out 4/1.  If I do block two in Sewing day tomorrow, I’ll be golden!

·         Jo’s Little Women: club project – just started this group three days ago and got the first project.  I have all the fabrics for it.

·         Jo’s Little Women:  extra project – again, the group just started.  I’m going to use a charm pack from the project box for this.

I really enjoy block of the month projects.  However, a lot of it is the solidarity with other quilters in the monthly meeting.  I like the presentation of new products, and seeing what other people are doing.  The online BOM with Ranae Merrill’s Spiral designs doesn’t have any of that, but I am really interested in the project as a whole. 

Contest Entry

*sigh*

I have to get going on this. 

Since I discovered that my project was too large, I finished the top, but have neither quilted that piece nor determined what to do instead.  I’m pretty sure that I’m going to do a spiral design, but I’m not yet inspired.  I have to submit the entry form by April 30, so I still have time.

Calendars, Photo Books and Blank Books

I’ve mentioned “The Picture Project”…. I bought a ton of groupons for Mixbook.com, PrinterPix.com, Vistaprint.com and MyPublisher.com with the intention of making calendars for my family, photo books of the children AND annotated books of my quilts.  I’ve also sent all the snapshots I could find to ScanMyPhotos.com and spent several hours hanging quilts on my front fence and taking pictures of them.  I’m at a stage where I’ve got a lot to work with, and a couple of the coupons are expiring early in April. 

Instead of doing a lot of writing here, I’ve been spending a lot of my computer time putting together quilt books in the online editors for the various programs.  I’ve developed some favorites and will gladly share!

·         VistaPrint.com – this site offers far more photo products than the other sites.  Most of the sites have books and calendars and maybe one or two other things.  VistaPrint has EVERYTHING.  You can make post it note pads, t-shirts, mugs, etc.  I use them mostly for 4 x 6 soft cover spiral bound books.  I have found that size at other sites, but not spiral bound.  These “flip” books make great little brag books that fit nicely in my purse.

·         PrinterPix.com – I got a good deal with this site on paper.  It was $9, plus shipping, for a hard cover book.  I haven’t gotten the first book yet and I will post when I do.  Since buying the coupons (2), I’ve read not so great reviews about them and the editor SUCKS.  It’s awful.

·         Mixbook.com – so far, this is the BEST for editors for full books.  I am really having a lot of fun putting the books together.

·         MyPublisher – I haven’t tried this one out yet

In addition to the books that I’m creating to showcase my quilts (and books of my children), I’ve also created a couple books that lead up to the ability to create more art – blank books.  I’ve created two of them – one with lined pages and one with unlined pages – that are my “working books”.  Each features a picture of one of my quilts on the front.  Granted, at $10 approximately apiece (and adjusted downwards as the groupon used was basically 70% off), they are expensive.  However, it’s really cool to carry a half sized lined notebook to quilt class that has your quilt on the front!  I frequent cut pictures out of quilt magazines and catalogues for inspiration.  They sit in piles on my end tables and I lose track of what I thought of when I cut it out.  I tried once to put them onto index cards and write on them.  That resulted in piles of unorganized index cards.  Now, I’m pasting them all into the blank book and writing in there!

Just a short post today.

I’ve written many times about using up scraps.  I don’t like to waste.

One of the quilts that I’ve made recently used quarter circle blocks – like drunkard’s path blocks – in two sizes.  When I was done, I had eight of the smaller size and six of the larger size left over.   Adding to that, one of my monthly patterns from Scrap Tamers group used drunkard’s path blocks – four per block.

Ok, since I already had eight – there’s the right number for a two block table runner.

Here it is:

·         Scrap Tamer’s monthly project knocked off Project List – Check

·         Used up scraps and left over blocks from other projects – Check

Overall – WIN/WIN

Accomplishments, Color Theory and Glass Fusion

Accomplishment of the week!!!

I have sorted my scrap bin – the one I spoke about last week – and cut all the scraps into 1½, 2, 2½ and 3 strips and a variety of squares.  One of the Scrap Tamers projects on my project list requires a lot of pink and brown squares.  I pulled out a bunch of pieces from my “fat quarters and other small yardage” section of my stash and started cutting.  At one point, I thought to myself that I knew there were some pieces I could use in the scrap bin – the bin that I’ve been tossing pieces into for weeks (months?) now and haven’t sorted….

All of the cut pieces are currently sorted into piles of size; tomorrow I’m going to further sort them by color and roll them onto the existing rolls.  I will also sort out the squares I cut and file them into the “squares” box.

Here is a picture of what my living room currently looks like. 

Clockwise starting at “noon”: 

·         Pile of squares I started cutting for the project

·         pile of fat quarters and other small yardage

·         (on the coffee table) pile of small scraps for the “Terry” bin (the person who does paper piecing testing)

·         (3 o’clock) Leg of the ironing board – have to press things before you can cut well!

·         The scrap bin – now emptied of the pieces piled on top and what remains is the rolls to which I will be adding scraps

·         The bin is resting on a newly finished baby quilt – something made off the project list!!

·         A few strips and squares that I have to put into the right pile

·         A stack of squares

·         The pattern from Scrap Tamers (white booklet with quilt pictures laying open)

·         Four piles of strips (they are separated)

·         Cutting board and tools

I was sitting on the floor watching Netflix with hubby for several hours whilst cutting… probably not the best for me, but I needed something to relieve the tedium!

Don’t judge me by the messiness of the room – it will all come together!

Here’s a close-up of the crate.  I “sub bin” the space with smaller storage bins so I can lift them out.  The crate itself stacks nicely with others that I use for other scraps.

Three Blocks

Accomplishment number two – Apparently I write good patterns off the top of my head!

We will be following Michelle’s latest quilt here too… (yes, we WILL, Michelle!)

Last week, I wrote up a pattern (see this post) for blocks that look like these:

I wrote up the pattern for my friend Michelle.  Little did I know that she would jump right in and create some beautiful blocks within the week!  She has texted me the pictures of them but I’m not sure how to get the pictures from texts on my phone to my computer.  I can probably figure it out, but tonight is not when I want to start playing with the phone – it’s late and I’d rather write!  Perhaps she’ll email me the pictures and I can post them yet this weekend.

It really gives me a sense of accomplishment on the highest level to teach hobby related classes and to see people create things based on MY directions!  I can’t begin to explain the sense of pride and satisfaction.  I wish I had time to teach full classes at quilt shops and to do more pattern writing. 

Color Theory

I’ve stated many times that the one of the reasons I quilt is that I love color and love putting together fabrics to create new designs.  That love of color is the basic core of my being and extends into my daily life.  Just today, one of my co-workers commented on how I can pull off just about any color scheme. 

Bear with me through a too in-depth description of my clothing/jewelry/makeup.  There is a point…..

I don’t just wear a particular color/colors – I weave that color into me for that day.  Example – today I wore a light purple top – that was the piece of clothing that I wanted to wrap the rest of my outfit around.  I added a different color purple sweater, and jeans with embroidery (it’s Friday, jeans day even in corporate America!) that had two other shades of purple.  The top had a little bit of a clear/white sparkle on it.  That meant silver jewelry.  I added a silver necklace with clear rhinestones and earrings with both clear and purple rhinestones.  The earrings are little grape clusters.  I topped it with purple eye shadow, liner and even purple mascara. 

At that point – it was not an outfit, but a collection of colors and textures.  It’s important to me to “feel” the colors and experience the whole effect.

My hobbies and interests are the same way.  I like to immerse in color and texture.  I like to experiment and see how things go together.

Last Saturday, Brandie (didn’t give birth to her, but she really is my third daughter in many, many ways) and I took a glass pendant class.  The technique used is called “fusing”.  There are many different types of glass; the glass used for fusing has a different co-efficient than glass for stained glass projects. 

Side note:  I am a more technical quilter/embroiderer than many – being able to use the word “co-efficient” when talking about an art hobby is just cool.

Anyway, the theory behind fusing is that you layer bits and pieces of glass:  clear and colored, opaque and translucent, flat, square, round, and then the piece is melted together in a kiln.  The starting layout and the end result are similar, but different.  Different sizes, thicknesses, etc, of glass will melt differently and create a unique look.  I suppose that with time, one can learn what to expect and take it into account.

For example, here are some pieces as we laid them out prior to fusing:

See if you can match them to the finished pictures a bit later in this post.....

Not what I expected in all the cases!

The other unexpected result was where both Brandie and I went with our pieces.  Brandie is a free hand artist in many ways that I can never be.  She can take a photograph and create a painted picture from it, she can draw faces and shade, and all sorts of things like that.  I am organized, methodical, and base everything on straight lines. 

Over the years, Brandie and I have had many discussions on color.  We both eschew the “color wheel” that is used to teach color theory and are quite snobbish about knowledge of color.  Either you have color theory instinctively inside you or you don’t.  I made Brandie a quilt with all oranges, and a turquoise blue border.  She was the person who supported my decision when I put orange down the center of my beige/pink/brown color progression French Braid quilt.  Everyone else just sort of  hemmed and hawed when I showed them the BRIGHT orange fabric.  For the record – the quilt is stunning and the orange totally worked.

Color is the center of an Artist’s world.  It is the uniting factor.

When Brandie and I were both done with our pieces, and laid them out on the tray for the kiln – this all became obvious.  Despite our vastly different approaches and mediums in the art world – we made VERY similar pieces!  In fact, when I showed Ana them tonight, she had a little trouble picking out which were mine and which were Brandie’s. 

Here is a picture of all the pieces we made.  (the tape on some of them is holding the bail onto the back until the glue completely dries).  The top row of three is Brandie’s and the bottom row of four is mine.

And all the individual pieces:

Ana’s Quilt – Chocolate Covered Cherries

I spoke about Ana’s quilt in this post.  Well, I got off my tush and quilted it for her.  The back of the quilt is a solid fabric in a color best described as “hot pink”.  The main impetus for that particular back was that Joann’s had a pink in 108 wide fabric – otherwise the back was going to be beige/light brown.  I do NOT like to piece backs.  Hate, hate, hate it….

My machine is fussy about thread.  Often times, what is good, cotton thread for pieceing just doesn’t work on the machine.  It only likes Guterman, Aurifil and the cotton thread from Connecting Threads. All others – even good brands – break way too often when used as a top thread.  I have a great collection of variegates that I have gotten from odd sources over the years – thrift stores, estate sales, etc. – which I can tell by feel are good, and hold up well for piecing, but just aren’t usable on the Juki.  I’ve talked about the machine before (this post) and often refer to it as haunted.  I put up with it because I can do beautiful quilting on it with nice, even stitches.

That was the case here – I found a nice variegate that was more pink/red/white, but in the right tones.  I just couldn’t pass up using it, so I used it on the back.  It shows up very nicely on the pink.  I then found a Guterman variegate that was red and a deep plum/almost back color.  Not quite the brown I was looking for, but it went nicely.  You can often get away with colors on a busy front of the quilt that won’t work as well on the back.  Most of the front has a lot going on – blocks with smaller pieces, patterned fabrics, etc, but there is a wide border of white, so I did have to make sure it fit in.  I used a simple meandering pattern in what I refer to as a “medium/large” size. 

Here are some pictures:  Didn’t she do a wonderful job?  Yay Ana!!!!

My Picture Project and Taking Good Pictures

Speaking of pictures, I am learning a lot about my camera and lighting as I go through my “Picture Project”.  None of the concepts are new to me; for example, I’ve known for a while that my house interior is dark (woodwork) and most pictures – even with flash – have a yellow base when I take them at night.  However, I’m learning more tricks with getting things lit better and have pretty much decided that ALL quilt pictures from now on will be taken with natural light only.   I’ve also learned that using one of my smaller OTT lights when taking quick pictures of things to post here.  For example – the picture on the left was taken without additional lighting.  I then grabbed a small OTT light and took the picture on the right mere minutes later.  Neither have been adjusted in software – notice a difference?  Just one small natural light light bulb…

This, of course, puts a lot of cramp into my photo taking project.  It’s Winter in Minnesota.  I have to wait for two things before I can take pictures – sunlight and decent enough of a temperature that I can be outside for a couple of hours.  I can’t bundle up too much when taking pictures; a heavy coat will restrict my movement and anything but light gloves will impact my dexterity with the binder clips that I use to hold the quilts to the fence.

Perhaps this weekend will be decent enough t allow me to finish the last couple hours of picture taking I need to do……

Trials and Tribulations of Making a Picture Book

And still on the subject of pictures…..

So, I mentioned last week about the various groupons that I have bought for various online sites for creating books.  I have already created calendars and some small “flip books” at Vistaprint.com.  For the books – 4 x 6 inches approximately with a spiral bind – I simply threw in a bunch of quilt pictures and called it a day.  I really like the little book and it’s a good “brag book” to keep in my purse.

Mixbook.com is another site and I have several coupons for there.  They are each $15 for $50 worth of product.  Their offerings are different that Vistaprint.  Rather than having the boatload of photo products that Vistaprint has, Mixbook is really only about basic photo books and special occasion stationery (wedding invites, birth announcements, etc.).

So, my plan is to create several volumes of my quilts.  I initially figured that I would throw the pictures of my better pieces onto the site, randomly throw them into a book, and that would be that.

Nope….

I’ve got several hours into editing the first book and many more to go.

Instead of just a picture per page, fill up the page, etc., I’ve been playing around with layouts, adding embellishments, writing text – generally creating a “history” of my quilts.  I’ve found myself rearranging pages to “group” the quilts according to some similarity and adding pictures of basic, simple and sometimes poorly done pieces to illustrate the story and create a pathway of how something developed.  I’ve also decided that ONLY pictures of completely finished quilts go into the books.  The flip books that I did had pictures of unfinished quilt tops (I basically am using those as an inventory versus the complete history/story).

It’s really a lot of fun, VERY time consuming and has become a journey.

I have three $50 coupons to Mixbook.  Two expire in mid April and one is good until September.  My plan is to use the two current coupons for Volume One of the Mary Quilt world, a small picture book for my purse (kid/family pictures) and next year’s calendars for the family.  The third coupon will be the Volume Two of the Mary Quilt world as it will probably take me well into the summer to finish taking photos and to compile the picture layouts and annotations for the rest of the quilts!