Planning Period 

I’ve been challenged by a commission to do a t-shirt quilt. The shirts are from Irish dance competitions. I’m trying to branch out of a grid. I thought Celtic knots. I’m putting lots of sketching time into this. I thought I had it till I took a closer look at my husband’s bookmarker. Now, I’m thinking a twist on the Double Wedding Ring. 

   

White Wedding

WhiteQuilt
Quilt Top

I almost cut up this quilt top, and started over. I wanted to add more color. I was only half way through, and wasn’t used to working without color. Because of the encouragement of a friend, I decided to keep going. I like it so much more now. There are touches of light colors, but I live in a bright world. It’s still feels strange to me, but I’m happy with it. I need to shop for a back fabric. I’m going to do some kind of floral quilting on it. I want to take my time figuring out how exactly I want the quilting stitches to go. I know I want to approach it in a way I haven’t tried before. I’m going to save this one for a wedding present.

I was just commissioned to do another quilt. It might take me awhile to finish this one.

Finished

I started this quilt with the idea of large irregular rectangle shapes. That idea morphed into large red circles with a white background. That morphed into using what I had to make something between the two ideas. I can’t remember how I ended up with stripes, but I got into it. I’m not the quilter who collects fabric without know how it’s going to be used. I have a limited space to work. I try to only purchase fabric for future ideas. However, sometimes you just can’t help yourself. I do have a small fabric collection from leftovers, or from all the quilts I haven’t made yet. This quilt gave me a way to use up a lot of my leftovers.

My intention was to make this quilt guy appropriate. I feel like the back fabric helps to keep it that way. The back fabric I had to purchase. I did not have enough of anything to do the back. I think the black edging frames it up nicely. Now, to give it to that special someone.

I’ve got a beginning, but no end.

I’ve started using Instagram. I’m following several quilters. Others seem to make so many things so quickly. I have three quilts in progress. All three will take me a good while to finish. I feel like my blog works best when I reach milestones. When I have long patches of time without reaching an interesting progress point, I feel like I don’t have much to offer a blog, and a blog doesn’t work for me. I still think it’s an interesting process, and will keep up my blog. I do wish I could finish projects faster.

I should be able to finish my striped quilt within the next month. My white quilt shouldn’t take to long. I predict a finish date of February. My hexy quilt will take forever.

My mom just gave me her serger machine. I’m looking forward to sewing clothes. I used to sew my clothes. It’s been a long while. I would love to get to a point where I am sewing all my clothes. Not sure if that will really work out for me, but I’m going to try.

White

Shades of White

Whitewashed Farmhouse
Whitewashed Farmhouse

My husband and I were driving from Nashville to Chicago a couple of weeks ago. The colors of the open farmlands against the sky inspired me. I wished I could get closer to the whitewashed farmhouses. I took pictures from the car window knowing that somehow I would use the colors in a quilt.

Today, I started to pin together the striped quilt that I just finished. This evening I started another quilt top. I’m working again with stripes. This time using the influence from the whitewashed farmhouses from Illinois, I’m working with varying whites. This is a challenge for me. I love color. I have wanted to work more with white space, but all white would have never entered my mind before. I have barely started. I’m not all the way convinced. I may end up add the color of the farmland and the sky.

Quilt Top

strippedquilttop

Feels like fall is officially here. Although the sun was out, it was a bit chilly. It was the perfect day to sew. I finished this quilt top. It’s made up of approximately 1” strips of my scrap quilting fabrics. It will fit over a queen size bed, but won’t hang over the sides very much, maybe about 6″ inches. This seems to be the size I’m most comfortable making. Compared to my last quilt top, it came together pretty quick. I need to pick out a back fabric, and commit to a quilting design. I think it will be vertical, irregular rows following the stripes. I also see maybe a vertical loop-to-loop pattern. I’m interested in pursuing some of the floral traditional quilt stitching patterns. I haven’t tried any of those yet. As much as I want to try something traditional, I don’t think that would work for this quilt. I’m already thinking about my next quilt, and how I can incorporate a tradition floral quilt stitch into a more modern quilt top.

Pretty Much Done

It's good enough for now.
It’s good enough for now.
The messy before shot.
The messy before shot.

I have one more of my mom’s paintings to hang. The metal cabinets are too heavy to hang on the wall. I need to find something else to put them on. That might take a few weekends of antique/thrift shopping to find the perfect thing. For now, a broken chair will work. I think it’s time to get back to sewing in my improved sewing corner.