Quilty Pleasures: Our Lady of Guadalupita

I taught a class at ThreadBear a while back on improvisational medallion quilts. The three session class was designed to give everyone a start on the process, so I haven't seen their finished products.  Nonetheless, it was fun sewing along with the students so they could watch the process and get some ideas, with a few instructional stops along the way.

You may have seen the Lady of Guadalupe quilt I made after taking an epic class on Liberated Quilting hosted by quilting buddies Gwen Marston and Freddy Moran. (Click on the link above to get that story.)

Anyway, I still had some Our Lady panels in my stash (and have started another quilt that I hope to finish this winter), so that's where I started. Since this quilt was improvised, there was no clue what the finished product would look like, just starting in the center, working border by border.

Here's a look at the quilt. I built around the center, got bored with that and decided to add details at the top and the bottom.

Here's a close up of the different layers I added around the center panel. Because I wanted this quilt to be finished quickly, I made strategic use of interesting fabric rather than piecing each border. Freddy Moran, whose quilts have a plethora of fabric and color, likes black and white borders in a busy quilt so our eyes can stop and rest. For reference, the half square triangles are 1.5 inches finished. I'm not sure about the orange and rose fabric touching each other, but it's done and a small matter. At least that's what I'm telling myself.

Look at the quilting Michael at ThreadBear did, the rose and leaf quilting pattern echoing both the roses in the red border and and the general flower motif I repeated throughout the quilt. Oops! Don't look at that stray white thread. Oh, you looked, didn't you?

Towards the top of the quilt is an arch of Gwen Marston's Liberated Stars. I made the stars first and worried they would get lost in the bold colors, but by placing them at the top,  they become a focus motif. Liberated stars are free pieced, no measuring the stars' points, so each one is different.

At the quilt's bottom, I used Gwen's Liberated Basket technique to make flower pots, the flowers from an old Kaffe Fasset fabric. Gwen has used these same pots in one of the Lady of Guadalupe quilts Freddy and Gwen made for their book Collaborative Quilting.

An aside: If you haven't seen Quiltfolk magazine, please do. This issue is about the Michigan quilt community and features an article about Gwen, my quilting hero and a national treasure.

The backing fabric is Alma y Corazon by Alexander Henry. Love his fabrics and am grateful for Ann at ThreadBear, who made a bee line to this exact fabric, knowing it would be perfect.

 As I was making the quilt, I thought about a student I taught in Corona whose mother had gifted me years ago with a beautiful white crocheted sweater and later, after I had retired to the mountains, sent me a cozy hat and scarf to ward off the cold. I've always been so grateful for these gifts because, well, it was a parent who wanted to show me I was valued, and her son Juan went on to become a teacher, too, which is even better. So I sent her the quilt, now named Our Lady of Guadalupita. The name? Guadalupita, NM is the closest village to our place so it makes perfect sense since that's where I made it.

It looks like Mrs. Rosa Salgado likes Our Lady of Guadalupita, so I am glad to have been able to make her just as happy as I was receiving her gifts of love.

Quilty Pleasures: Sometimes Boring Sewing is Good

I've been working on this new Lady of Guadalupe quilt and have moved to the center side panels where there will be trees. I've been "In the Woods" for a couple of weeks now and I am lost. I tried a tidily pieced forest, but don't like it and the going has been slow and my brain hurts. I've a couple ideas swirling around, but decided it was time to cleanse the palate, so to speak.

Almost seven years ago I saw a flannel split rail fence quilt in a book and bought all the yardage for it with the help of my master color helper, Pattie. We bought the fabric, both flannels and homespuns, at Rosie's Calico Cupboard in San Diego. It's a behemoth of a store, taking over the business spaces in a strip mall, one by one, year after year. Once you get in there, it just seems to laterally go and go and I'm glad all the rooms are in a row so I can't get too lost. If you are in the San Diego area, eat at D.Z. Akins deli, which is like the Jewish delis I remember as a kid, with humongous sandwiches and old people who never seem to change sitting in the booths.

The kid I wanted to make the flannel/homespun quilt for wasn't too interested, so I stashed the fabric away and moved on to other quilty projects. A couple of years ago I discovered the fabric in a gigantic tangle in a paper grocery bag, all the strips sewn, and moved them to a nifty work-in-progress plastic box. And it sat some more.

The plastic box has been stacked under the cutting table for a year, and it was time. The Lady quilt was making my head hurt and I wanted to do something that was simple and boring. I wanted to finish something.

I ironed and cut the strip sets into their segments and have been sewing them into rows. Here are some squares ready to chain piece.

This type of sewing calls for some easy television to watch. I recommend The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt now streaming on Netflix because it's more verbal than visual, so I can sew and listen and laugh. Tina Fey is one of the writer/creators, so now you know what kind of verbal it is: Witty, 30 Rock-style repartee with a sunny outlook. Don't try watching The Americans or something where you might miss seeing something that moves the plot while you're beavering away chain piecing. Go for light and verbal.

So the blocks are sewn into twos, which are stacked here, then into fours, then into eights and then add  six to make fourteen blocks per row.

The rows are draped everywhere, with little thought about color placement, which is the total opposite of The Lady quilt. If the same fabric pops up close to each other, who cares? This is just a quilt, a cuddly one that someone will love.

I will make fifteen rows, sew them together, and add a simple border.

In between, maybe I'll piece some trees for The Lady's forest. All this boring sewing is making me excited about The Lady quilt again.

So let's hear it for boring sewing!

Quilty Pleasures Wednesday: Busy City Quilt Top

This is just stinking cute and I wanted to share it with you. The pattern is Busy City by Alex of Teaginny Designs and I've had it stored/lost in the sewing room for quite a while. I like the pattern, but since I bought it, they are now offering downloads, which work better than the cd included with the paper version. If your computer doesn't have a cd slot, I recommend the download.

This is just the top, unquilted, so far.

Sky color is off a bit due to the inside lighting, but you get the idea.

The little vehicles are paper pieced and the instructions include the difficulty levels for the various vehicles, dwellings and trees. I like that.

Here's a closer look at the vehicles. Don't you think the police car's door needs a star?

Me, too.

Now, to quilt it. This is when my paralyzed perfectionist tendencies jump out to get me. I am still nervous about free motion quilting, and that sky needs swirls and clouds!

Like the swimming coach used to say early in the cold morning to his team, "Get in the pool!"

Quilty Pleasures: Finally, A Finished HST Overload Quilt

Last year I was preoccupied by Amish quilts and quilts with triangles, in particular. A triangle quilt (or two) was on my agenda and I couldn't let that idea go.

An Accuquilt Go cutter languished in its bag under the cutting table and I'd been wondering what the first project would be. I bought the 3.5 inch die and stamped out some solid triangles for something Amish-looking, but when I saw the HST Overload quilt by Rita Hodge of Red Pepper Quilts, I knew this was the one. 

Ann, owner of ThreadBear, our local quilt shop, helped me choose the brightest fabrics in the store, focusing on Kaffe Fassett collective fabrics, small checks and florals to calm things down just a bit along with Moda Grunge fabrics and other blenders that read like solids. We went just a little crazy: there are about 30 different fabrics in there, plus or minus.

I took the triangles and my new little 1954 Featherweight to Cali this past July when we visited Trudy and Pat and by the time we went home, I had sewn those triangles together and even started on  a load of half square triangles ready to go. That was the easy part.

Laying it out was fun, and I enjoyed sewing the triangles into patches into squares.

What I hadn't anticipated were all the seams to match when I sewed the long diagonals of on-point blocks together. I measured my progress in Hulu television shows: pinning and sewing took one Elementary (42 minutes) on the longest seams. Layout was somewhat random, kind of like I am.

So here's the rest. The photo below shows HST Overload lying on the snow. You can see that the corners are not square, which is on purpose, really.  There are instructions in the pattern if one wants to square it off, but I wanted the angled corners.

Here's another look at the corners. The binding fabric is a swirly multi-colored stripe I bought at a store in Arizona.

The zigzag print backing was on sale at ThreadBear, so I scored!

Quilting was a loopy paisley done by long arm quilter Beth Glass, who runs On the Mountain quilting retreats.

So I haven't finished with half square triangles just yet. Those Amish bright solids with black are turning into something quite interesting. More about that later!

Quilty Pleasures: HST Overload Quilt Almost Finished!

We are almost to the first finish for the year, with just the handwork on the binding left to do.

It's the HST Overload Quilt by Red Pepper Quilts, and when it's totally done, I will give you a better look. (Get your sunglasses ready.)

Las Vegas (New Mexico) Art Studio Tour

I am excited to have two quilts in this tour, the first time my quilts have attended a real live art show.

Quilts will be in the Bell Gallery at Highlands University.

Quilty Pleasures Saturday: Tula Pink, City Planner

Last year our local modern quilt group, The Chicken River Modern Quilt Guild, decided to make a quilt together that we would sell or raffle. The proceeds would pay a quilt teacher to come to Las Vegas, New Mexico, our headquarters.

So we decided to make blocks from Tula Pink's City Sampler: 100 Modern Quilt Blocks, and went to town on the project. Although there were hiccups with some of the blocks, we ended up with enough to make a double/queen-sized quilt . There were several layout options at the back of the book, and we decided on City Planner because its background would serve to unify the very scrappy blocks. The background and binding make the blocks look like they are floating. Very cool.

In a few days I will post another shot, a little closer and with details so you can see the quilting and binding, which are absolutely perfect choices.

It still needs a hanging sleeve and label and we will be good to go.

Many thanks to all the members of the Chicken River Modern Quilt Guild who sewed blocks, chose the background and binding, and assembled the whole shebang.

Quilty Pleasures: HST Overload Quilt

Man, oh, man! It's been a long time since I've written a quilt post, but I'm seriously stoked about the quilt I'm making right now.

Here's HST Overload on my back-of-a-tablecloth design wall. I've cropped out the blue painters' tape attaching it to the drywall, so it looks much tidier than in real life.

 I've had the blocks completed for about three weeks now, and they sat patiently while I dithered about where to lay it all out. At first I was going to do what I've done in the past, which is lay a tablecloth, flannel side up, on our bed which is upstairs. It's a good workout going up and down the stairs, but I decided not this time. I need a design wall in the sewing room, thus the taped up tablecloth.

In the next couple weeks I hope to have a real design wall, using this neato tutorial from The Quilting Edge blog. Instead of batting, though, I'll use a gray flannel sheet because Kaffe Fassett likes gray instead of white for his design wall. Less glaring, is one of his reasons. If it's good enough for Kaffe, well, you know the rest.

When the quilt is together, I'll update you all.

The Chicken River Modern Quilt Guild's Round Robin Quilts + Tula Pink Blocks

The Gallinas River meanders through Las Vegas, New Mexico, so it was an easy decision to name our quilting group The Chicken River Modern Quilt Guild, since gallinas is Spanish for hens. We meet every month on the first Monday, alternating between day and evening meetings so those with day jobs can join in the fun at least every other month. If you would like to join us, give me a shout out.

Anyway, we had the unveiling of our round robin/circular chicken quilts project the other night and we have some very artistic people in our group who produced some amazing quilts. We took turns adding to each quilt, although we didn't all work on every quilt due to a hitch in our rotation.

This one is mine, the photo thanks to Sophie, who drove up from Santa Fe for the meeting.

If you'd like to see the rest of the quilts, and also the Tula Pink's City Sampler modern blocks we are working on, here's a link to Sophie Junction. Sophie's blog is much more quilty than mine, so I feel like a total slacker when I read hers. But that's okay, because her posts inspire me to Get Going.

And really, that's what we all need to do is Get Going.

Quilty Pleasures-This String Quilt is Hot

It was cold when I started making this string quilt, so I must have been over compensating when I chose its colors. Those are definitely colors to make someone feel nice and warm! If you want to know more about how I picked the colors for this quilt, click this link.

Anyway, it's done and ready to be used as a model for the string quilt block workshop I'll be hosting at ThreadBear in Las Vegas on April 26.

String/strip quilt blocks are fun to make. They are a totally mindless endeavor, perfect when you want to make a quick quilt with little fuss.

I was going to use the sunflower fabric for borders, but when I auditioned it, the quilt looked way too busy, so it's part of the back along with a neato red batik I bought at ThreadBear.

This is the sunniest, warmest quilt I've made in a long time and it makes me happy just looking at it.

If you're interested in learning how to make quilt blocks like these, sign up for the class, because we're going to have some fun!

Quilty Pleasures: Spiderweb Quilt With Snow

Like many grown kids, ours came to visit last weekend toting her laundry, including this spiderweb quilt I made a couple years ago.

She's trying to preserve this quilt because the previous one had so much laundering and drying the border ended up shredded (crummy fabric, methinks).

"Will it dry outside?" she asked. "Sure," Tom said. "It'll freeze dry."

So she draped it over the deck railing for overnight.

It was just a 10 percent chance of snow, which around here usually means it ain't gonna happen, but sure enough, it did. And so the quilt had a quick tumble on low temperature anyway and is none the worse for wear.

Quilty Pleasures: Hard Times, Splendid Quilts

Just thought I'd share my layout for a BOM my local quilt store ThreadBear offered this past year. The blocks are paper pieced and from a book called Hard Times, Splendid Quilts. I actually kept up this time, which is a feat in itself. If you want to know more about paper piecing these blocks or about the book, click this link to a previous post.

The photo is a tad fuzzy, but I took it to see the layout from a different perspective and also to remember how the blocks were placed when I sewed it together. As you can see, I used large pieces of the black pin dot background to lay everything out before I did any cutting.

I wanted to change it up from the traditional blocks, sashing and rows, so did some research and found a modern looking setting at this site. As you can see, theirs was for 20 blocks, so I had to mess around a lot since my 12 blocks did not match the measurements they had. Nonetheless, Generation X Quilters is a new website favorite!

Since we were at a retreat in a hotel, the hallway became the "design wall," which worked out just fine.

It's at the quilter's now, so very soon we shall see how it all turned out.

Quilty Pleasures: What the Heck Am I Doing?

Today I am off to ThreadBear in Las Vegas, NM, to quilt the string quilt, but in the meantime, in a hyper moment, I took out the Go cutter and made some half square triangles. I've been collecting solids with the idea of a series of  a couple of Amish-style quilts in the back of my mind.

Look at the lint on these blackies.

So the triangles morphed into these:

Which made their way into one of these:

I've been looking through a book called Amish Abstractions, by Faith and Stephen Brown, and have an idea.

Ms. Pearl is not impressed.

Quilty Pleasures-Mi Familia Part 2

There is more progress on the Mi Familia quilt and we are excited! This quilt has been a collaborative effort between Ann (owner of Thread-Bear in Las Vegas, NM) and me and we make quite a team!

Today we added the thin black print border, auditioned about 8 fabrics for the wide floral border, and eventually decided on this greenie one.

Here is a closer look at some of the details:

For the past three years or so that particular green has been my go-to color to make a quilt "pop." Love those half circles? Read the previous post to see how Ann made that inspired choice.

The black batik border is next, with the flying geese in opposite corners. The batik has streaks, some of which echo the colors used in the center panels.

While we are working on this project I just can't stop smiling. It's a friendly picker-upper. Maybe it's those grinning guys in the center, but it's just a happy quilt!

Quilty Pleasures-When Someone With ADHD Takes Up Paper Piecing

At Threadbear, my local quilt shop, we are working on a Block of the Month project from the book, Hard Times, Splendid Quilts by Caroline Cullinan McCormick.

It's paper piecing, something new and kind of daunting especially for me, an early Ritalin junkie.

The term back then was hyperactive, and I was an easily distracted, always needing something to do, smart-mouthed trial to my parents, my brother and my teachers. As I matured, I learned to channel that energy into productive projects, a successful consulting business and a fun job helping teens to get ready for college. And to keep it interesting, I made clothing and quilts in my spare time.

Paper piecing is good for me: It satisfies a need for order. You see, I was the kid who did her algebra homework on graph paper, one digit or symbol per square. It helped to make sense of what was happening and if I made a mistake, it was easier to find in all its linear neatness. It was a successful coping technique for a hyper kid.

Sewing little fabric bits helps to train my mind to focus: One Step at a Time. But it is also maddening, because the opportunities for error are there, right in front of me, if I lose that focus.

Case in point:

The triangle with the pretty 30's fabric should actually be black pindots, plus, it shouldn't be joined to the black pindot square.  I'd been binge-watching Scandal and allowed myself to be distracted. After sewing the units together, I realized, "Hey! This isn't right!"

Since paper piecing requires the stitch length to be shorter, using the seam ripper becomes a Zen experience.

"Be in the moment, Grasshopper," I say to myself, picking away at the teensy stitches.

There. Now they are correct.

Eventually, the tiny pieces of fabric are placed accurately on their paper foundations, the tattered paper underneath repaired with tape, but still falling apart after all that taking apart and putting it back again. The units are sewn into their correct places and they finally look pretty good. You wouldn't know what a wreck it is underneath, would you?

At our paper piecing group yesterday I volunteered that it would be an amazing feat if I could put together at least one block without having to do any unsewing.

And I realized that maybe it wasn't my ADHD causing the mistakes, because almost everyone admitted to making at least one mistep in each of their blocks.

So it's good to know that I am not alone. The paper piecing continues.

Caroline Cullinan McCormick

Quilty Pleasures: Bee Potholder

The Chicken River Modern Quilt Guild had a potholder swap the other day and this was my offering.

Sis-in-law Pattie found this cute paper pieced bee pattern for FREE, compliments of Badskirt. Thanks, Badskirt, this little guy came together easily and quickly, which was good, since I waited until the last minute to get my potholder made.

Here is a closeup. I used fused applique to place the bee on the potholder. Whoops! He needs antennae.

And the back:

Both the back and wings fabric are from the Noteworthy line by Moda.  The lime green leaf stripe is from Simply Color by Moda.

I don't have a photo yet of the potholder I received, but it is cute and you will see it soon, really!

Quilty Pleasures-Chicken River Modern Quilt Guild

We are excited to announce the Chicken River Modern Quilt Guild in Las Vegas, New Mexico. The Gallinas River flows through this, the original Las Vegas, and gallinas means chickens, so that's where the name came from.

We even have a blog with our introductory story: http://chickenrivermodernquiltguild.blogspot.com/

We hope if you live in the area you can come play with us!

Here are a few things we have been working on:

This is a challenge where we each had three fat quarters and could add two other fabrics to make a modern style block. Our goal is to use up all the fat quarters and they seem like they go on and on. After that, we will make a quilt. That's all we know about that so far.

We have been messing around with hexagons and below is the beginning of a project Ann is working on. Go hexagons!

 I started playing with a charm pack of Zen Chic fabrics:

And Linda brought her finished Las Cruces quilt. It's not totally modern, but it's a stunner nonetheless. More about this quilt later.

And don't forget there's a giveaway of Locally Grown fat quarters. Cute! Deadline is tonight.

Quilty Pleasures-Pattie's Easy Street Quilt

Back before Christmas, sis-in-law Pattie and I decided to make Bonnie Hunter's Mystery Quilt, called Easy Street.

Pattie finished her quilt and last month sent me a photo of the completed top. She went with a different colorway than Bonnie's and was at first concerned because she went very scrappy in choosing the fabrics. Because of this, the center design didn't show up as clearly as she would have liked. Once together, though, I must say that the design shines through just fine and the scrappiness makes me think of a church's stained glass windows.

Check out the flying geese border and how the geese get smaller as they are closer to the corners. Smart move!

My quilt top is still partially together in a bag somewhere in the sewing room, waiting for me to unsew a couple blocks so I can recommence assembly. There's nothing like messing up to create a big old stop sign in your mind.

Pattie, your quilt has shamed me into getting mine done. Soon, very soon.

Quilty Pleasures Monday: Depression Era Blocks, Paper Pieced

Back during The Great Depression, readers could find patterns for clothing or quilt blocks in their local newspapers. The Kansas City Star was one of those newspapers, and they didn't even charge for their complete patterns. Caroline Cullinan McCormick decided to write a book about some of these blocks from the newspaper and adapted many of the designs for paper piecing.

ThreadBear, my local quilt store, decided to offer a Block of the Month program based on this book. So we have bought the book and just finished our first block.

What I like about ThreadBear's BOM is we may choose whatever fabrics we want. I decided to go with a black pindot background and for this month I chose Denyse Schmidt's fabrics from her Shelburne Falls collection.

This fabric looks so pretty and fresh and this block came together nicely.

How do we get such precise results? For my friends who are not quilters, it's called paper piecing, kind of like painting by the numbers. Here is how it looks on the back. Each number shows the order in which the fabric is placed on the paper pattern. Et, voila! It looks perfectly perfect! Just what this ADHD person needs to keep her head on straight.

No, ThreadBear didn't pay me to write about their BOM. I just like their store.

Now I am on my way to meet up with our Modern Quilt Group. We are going to muddle through my presentation on sewing giant hexies by machine, the class I took from Jacquie Gering at QuiltCon.

International Quilting Day: My Favorite Quilt

In the 12 or so years since I began quilting in our daughter's bedroom after she went off to college, I've made and given away more quilts than I can remember. Note to new quilters: take a photo of each quilt you make and put it in a safe place so when you are old and senile, you have it right there.

My favorite quilt, though, is one I kept and hangs on the living room wall. Why do I love it?

1. It's the first quilt I made where I didn't have a clue how it would look at the end.
2. My brain was so engaged in making this quilt that I even dreamed about it.
3. Looking at it is always a new experience. And not because I am old and senile, but because there are surprises, like that fabric in the bottom right,  different from the rest of the border.

 Thanks, Pattie Prothero, for inspiring me to start this most rewarding occupation.