Project: More fabric

I bought these awesome apples and trees from Alice Kennedy's Timeless Treasures line. Like yesterday's post, these looked great together online but in person, it's way too busy. I can't put Zadie in something with this much print in it. Can you think of something to coordinate? Yesterday I showed prints with solids but I really prefer to mix prints. The owl print is this line is probably too much as well. I have in mind some sort of vintage dress pattern for this one.

This is "Granville" from Alexander Henry. He is absolutely one of my favorite designers. But what the heck do I do with this? As you can see from the type on the selvedge, the pattern is huge. There is an identical print in a smaller pattern but I really like the larger one. I don't really care for the snakeskin-like print in this collection that is supposed to match. So what are you fabric gurus pairing with this one? I'm thinking it would make an awesome skirt.

Help a lady out.

Project: Quilt Top Finished!

I finally pieced together the entire top to my Mod Sampler quilt from the Oh Fransson! Quilt-along. I didn't have any problems adding the sashing between the rows or along the sides. One of the reasons I may have been having problems with the freezer paper was that my pressure was set very low because I usually do a lot of applique. Instead of good control, I was slipping all over the place. You need straight lines for quilting so I moved it up a notch and got much better results.

The fabrics I was choosing from. I got rid of the teal waves and added a light solid in aqua.

After I finished the front, I measured out the larger cuts of fabric I had left over. I have a nice wide panel of the teal linen I used for the sashing, over a yard of the bird fabric (I can't find a link but it's in the "Sweet" collection from Moda), and that awesome embroidered bird that we bought during a trip to Mexico. I plan to map out the back using graph paper so it will have the right proportions. For the binding, I think I'm going to use the fabric with the little red stars. What do you think?

I'm going to take out the finished edges of the bird panel and piece it in to the teal. I'm not really sure how to do that to get the right dimensions so I'll have to do some research.

For more on Project: Project, read this post.

Project: Mod Sampler Quilt

all my rows stacked and pinned

A few months ago I started the quilt-along hosted by Elizabeth of Oh, Fransson! I had discovered the quilt-along because I saw Elizabeth’s quilt patterns for sale on Etsy. Her work was so inspiring that I bought one or two of her patterns and all the fabric to make a quilt for Zadie’s toddler bed (even then I knew it would take me forever to do it so I was thinking way ahead – no crib quilts here, I know me). I followed the links to her blog the day she started the quilt-along – what great timing.

I had only made one other quilt before, the patchwork crib quilt from Amy Butler’s In Stitches. Although that was technically a quilt, I didn’t really feel like I had made a quilt. There was something just not quite patchworky about it. I thought the quilt-along would be better as a beginning project than just jumping in with my precious Heather Ross fabrics that I had bought for the toddler bed quilt project.

I was very excited to get started. As I moved quickly through the first few steps and was able to keep up with the instructional posts, I photographed my fabrics, my stacks of pieces ready to go, and the different blocks along the way. I even posted everything to flickr and put them in the pool. I got all of my blocks pieced together and then I stopped. Cold.

I piled everything up on top of a storage box in the office and left it there. I’ve been looking at it become a fixture for all these months. Then all of a sudden, Elizabeth started posting on her blog more frequently. Then she started another quilt-along. Instead of going absolutely insane and joining in, I decided to finish my Mod Sampler. I got everything out and pinned together my rows. Wednesday night I sewed two of them together and last night I did two more. There are two more left and I’m loving it.

But as I’m learning more about the process, I realize that even though I’m still a beginner at this, I can do things my way. I do not like sewing on the freezer paper so I’m taking it all off and won’t ever use it again (quilters use freezer paper to help add on some width to a cut that is too short). I also don’t like my quarter inch foot so it’s coming off and I’m going to make do with my regular one.

I never thought I would learn so much by simply picking up an old project where I left off. I feel like a better stitcher and am more confident in the decisions that I make with my craft. I’ll post again with pictures when the top is finished. I’ll definitely need some help picking a fabric for the binding.

For more information about Project: Project, read this post.

Quilt Along . Inspiration

I'm a little surprised at how excited I am to do this quilt along (see previous posts) with Oh, Frannson. I decided to postpone Zadie's quilt for a while so that I can focus on this (and I'll get to that cute Spring jacket for her next).

This is my living room. I adore our red cast iron woodstove. It saves us loads of money on our gas bill in the winter and it's pretty cute. I also love this chair we got at the Salvation Army for $7 (or half that -- I think they were having a sale). I've been wanting a throw for my couch so this quilt project will be it.

I went through my meager stash and found this red print that is my favorite and decided to build from there. I'm going with aqua and teal to mix with the red. I will probably also stray a little bit from my plan to do all reproduction fabrics because there's so much out there (and not much at my local quilt shop at all).

So I'm off to a good start. More tomorrow.

Quilt along!

inspiring pin cushion from Oh, Frannson

I am so excited that Elizabeth of Oh, Fransson has decided to host a quilt along. I bought the pattern I plan to use for Zadie's quilt (see ocd post) from her Etsy shop primarily because I love her fabric choices and use of color.

But when I started the process of picking out my own fabrics, I just got overwhelmed. I'm almost there but I still need to buy a few prints before I can make the final decision.

Then I read that she was going to do this quilt along. Unlike other such projects where people just share images of their progress, Elizabeth is actually going to give us tutorials along the way so we can learn how she does it. Since my first quilt (the sock monkey one) was such a challenge, I've had a bit of fear in starting Zadie's new quilt. So this is just a perfect project for me.

I'm going to use all my favorite vintage-inspired and reproduction quilt fabrics (mostly made my Moda and RJR and Marcus). I'm hoping to take a trip to the local quilt shops this weekend to buy stuff in person (no more online for me unless I have to pick up a couple of coordinating prints -- the online buying has been the real issue in my fabric choosing for Zadie's quilt).

It's a sampler style quilt so I'll be able to learn quite a bit about piecing too. So far, I've only done the two types of blocks from the Amy Butler quilt.

I'll be posting my progress here. And wish me luck!