Hawaiian Applique Part 1-More UFO Progress

You guys-  sorry for the momentary lapse into narcissism, but I'm so proud of myself for finishing this project!  I start this quilt in 2007 after getting back from a trip to Hawaii.  It was a challenge from the get-go. My mom has this Hawaiian Applique book by Vicki Fleming and I thought I'd give it a try since I think the intricate designs and blocky color in good Hawaiian quilts are just beautiful.  Did I know how to hand applique?  No I did not.  Did I particularly enjoy hand sewing?  No I did not.  Did I enjoy turning things under? No I did not.  So, of course the logical next step was not to try some small hand applique, or even to try a small Hawaiian applique block.  I decided to make a giant Hawaiian Applique.  Everyone needs a GIANT HAWAIIAN APPLIQUE (cue Jaws music).

I blew the pattern up so that it filled a 36" square (I'd bought a yard of the fabric I wanted to use as a background) and started in.  I encountered so many problems along the way, I cannot even remember them all to catalog them here.  Many were made worse by the fact that at the time I started this project I was such a baby quilter, I didn't even have many basic skills or resources (glue stick anyone?).  I tried pinning the applique: it squirmed around.  I tried doing the actual turn-under hand stitching and made it approximately 6 inches before, ahem, giving up on that.  For some perspective, photoshop has just informed me that the perimeter of my applique block with all its twists and turns is 497 inches.  Yeah.  Finally, I did some weird combination of ironing the whole thing onto fusible while still trying to maintain the turned under edges, adhering it to the background and then blanket stitching around the applique motif with my sewing machine.  The motif was attached but did not look good.  I then added some pink strip-sets cut on the bias to the top and a couple of borders.  I had wanted the strip sets to look like chevrons, but I didn't cut them right, so now they just look like slightly offset slashes.

After all that, I layered for quilting and started in.  I thought originally I would do some echo quilting like on a traditional Hawaiian applique, so started inside the block.  It was disastrous.  I will not even show close up photos of how awful it was.  I had a very hard time moving the largish quilt (38 x 55) under my little sewing machine.  Then the thread broke every two inches, mostly because I was jerky and not smooth.  Being extremely frustrated, I set aside the quilt for oh, a couple of years (!).

When I next picked it up, I thought I was much more advanced, further evolved etc. but when I started trying to quilt largish feathered wreaths (don't ask me why I picked that) in light pink thread on the black background, it was horrendous!  The thread was still constantly breaking, the feathers were jerky and not smooth ACK!  I was so frustrated I was sure there was something wrong with my sewing machine.  I took it in twice, and each time they said it was in great working condition, no problems.  Even I had to admit it sewed fine on everything else.  Of course I had to rip out all the ugly pink stitching, it was horrible, and knotty and really really hard to get out.

In the end, I decided to mark a grid of 4 inch squares on point on the background, and just doodle quilt in them in a dark green blendy thread. I figured that 1) if I was doodle quilting, I would be smoother than if I was trying to follow a pattern, 2) if I was working only in a small 4 inch square, I wouldn't have to move the quilt as much and could be, again, smoother, and 3) if I used a dark thread it wouldn't stand out as much if it was horrible.

This approach actually worked out ok.  My doodle quilting took a long time but filled in the background nicely.  I used varying shades of pink thread to outline the alternating rows (so there's not so much doodling all together) and finally got all the background quilted.  Here are some of my doodles.  Pardon the bad photos, it was really hard to get in focus shots of the dark green on black.

After finishing the background quilting, I had to go back and finish the echo quilting in the green applique block since I had left it unfinished before.  I had hoped that my newly honed skills would make it go more smoothly, but alas no.  In fact, it looks even weirder than before, because I didn't have quite the same shade of green thread.  So all the leaves are quilted poorly, and two of them are a different green than the rest.

I then quilted small feathers in the pink slashes in the top border.  In the bottom border, I used my flexible curve ruler to draw a line of curves.  In each curve I put one of my favorite easy filler patterns.  Is it wrong that this green border is my favorite part of the whole quilt?

Sorry for the long, ranty post.  Stay tuned Friday for the final quilt.

Flamingos!

I found this great block when I was cleaning up yesterday, it was actually one more from Caryl Fallert's class.  This time an exercise in combining paper piecing, curved applipiecing, and the use of contrast gradients.  I used two intersecting gradients; as the pink gets darker, the grey gets lighter.

  I think flamingos are pretty aswesome;  all pink and curvy and incongruous (unless you live in Africa or South America).  I'd been wanting to do something with this flamingo print I'd bought a long time ago, but in spite of their pinkness and coolness, my quilts don't often call for flamingo prints.  Here though, they fit in great.  I love the pink and grey pairing with just a pop of yellow to bring out the flamingo beaks.

I added some pink and black borders to make it a little bigger and then layered it for quilting.  This time I took the spray baste outside, no more sticky overspray in the house.  That stuff is persistent.

Since bright pink seems to be my color scheme lately, and the curvy bit reminded me of a flamingo neck, I thought I would quilt a flamingo into the background.  I lightly drew the outline with washable pencil and then quilted over it in bright pink thread (highlights from Superior).  I went over it several times so the flamingo would stand out nicely.  I then quilted him a little grey pond with pebbles and added some straight lines contrasting in the background.  Ta-da, mini flamingo quilt!  The block is about 8 inches square; with the border the finished wall hanging is about 15 inches or so.  I used more of the flamingo print for the binding.  I tried really hard to have smooth quilting with no birds nests or ugly starts and stops.  I'm slowly getting better!

Hope you enjoy!

Easy Friday Project-Phototransfers

Since it's Friday I thought I'd show a quick-easy-do-it-in-an-evening project.  I've made quite a few of these photo-transfer projects over the years.  These were all made with the inkjet printer fabric you buy at JoAnn's although recently I've been experimenting with the products that enable you to make your own printable fabric.

Usually I just print a picture, add some borders and then either quickly quilt it up into a wall hanging or make it into a pillow cover.  Easy-peasy personalized present! Here are some of them;

These are Mike's adorable grandkids Raegan and Walker, I made them these pillows for Christmas last year. Walker loved Thomas the Train.

I made this one for my grandmother using photos that were left over from making a memory quilt for my grandpa.  It's been well sat on I think.  

Here's one I made into a wall hanging and kept after my sister and I had our cousin out to visit a couple of years ago.

And here are three more pillows I made for my mom and some good friends commemorating a great ski trip.

The phototransfers make great wall hangings and birth commemorations and quick memory projects.  There are all kinds of cool digital manipulations you can do with photos and fabric, but even just printing them out and sewing them into blocks like this makes a fun project.

Pouches-Round 2

I decided to try another pouch, hopefully with better results than the last time.  I took the same basic assembly steps, but because this one is to be a birthday present for a good friend, I used a slightly simpler block in the hopes that it would go together better.  I chose to do a cream/purple color scheme and instead of patchwork I did a sort of window-motif-applique thing.  I know this technique has an actual name, I just have no idea what it is.  Basically, the base of both pouch sides is the cream tone-on-tone print while one side has the flower pattern appliqued on and the other side has the "window" leftover from cutting out the flower pattern appliqued on.  I just drew half the flower pattern freehand onto folded paper-backed fusible web.  Folded so that I would get matching halves, and fusible so that I could tightly affix the appliques before stitching.

Here's what the basic sides looked like after fusing the pieces. Each piece is about 7 1/2 inches square.

After fusing, I blanket stitched around the motifs with a matching purple thread then assembled the pouch.  Like the other, it does have a lining, I just didn't take a picture of the lining fabric.

It definitely came out better than the last one, I'm really pleased with the purple and cream and hope my friend likes it.  Without all the tucks adding bulk, the zipper went in much better, but the top corners are still a little weird.  I have to work that out next time, but I think I know what the problem is so it shouldn't be too hard.  These really are fun, and not too hard to make.  I've really enjoyed trying some different types of piecing for these so far without committing to something big and complicated.

Pinterest Challenge!

Sherry from Young House Love (seriously my favorite blog ever people, you should check it out at once), issued a Pinterest Challenge along with her friends Katie, Lana, and Emily.  The basic idea was that all of us who had been madly pinning inspiring things to our pinterest boards should actually make something inspired by those pins.  For anyone who doesn't know, pinterest is a great website where you can catalog and pin up anything on the internet that inspires you.

The challenge ended Tuesday, and while I finished my projects last weekend, I didn't get them hung/moved/photographed until last night.  Funnily enough, both the projects I decided to undertake were inspired originally by YHL.  

The first thing I wanted to try was re-painting a bookcase.  I had this wretched useless craft storage cabinet in my quilting room which was taking up space without providing any useful storage.  It was one of those pieces of furniture that looks like it will be so very useful, but then you realize it has been systematically designed not to efficiently store anything.  At any rate, I put it out on the curb and found a sturdy wooden bookcase from a used furniture store.  Inspired by Sherry and John's fabulous dining room bookcases which had been on my pinboard forever, I decided to paint the bookcase light grey with a deep rich pink back.  I'd never painted before so it was an interesting task.  After letting it dry for a few days, I moved it into my quilt room and it fit in the space perfectly!

I forgot to take any before photos, but it was basically a medium oak sort of tone.  I didn't sand it, just wiped it down thoroughly and painted with a primer-and-paint in one from home depot.

 A couple in progress shots inside the extremely hot garage.  Can you say painting in a central Oklahoma heat wave?  Yuck!

And here's the final thing, in place with my crafty goodness.  The very top are my special stuffed animals, especially the abnormal knitted sheep I got from my mom, on the next shelf- quilt magazines and my fabric-box-of-buttons-snaps-and-other-miscellany.  Under that are three baskets full of fat quarters, while the next three baskets contain notions and ribbon.  I'm excited to finally have a place to show the cute heart pillow (made a long time ago as part of a lesson in curved piecing), since I can't have it the living room due to dog-consumption.  The baskets I already had; they were part of another relatively useless storage system, but once painted grey and put on the bookcase, they're a great storage solution for corralling all kinds of stuff.  I'm so happy with the way this turned out- I love the pop of bright pink and it coordinates very well with the curtains in that room.

The second project I did for the Pinterest challenge was to make a ribbon shade for my laundry room.  It was also inspired by Sherry over at YHL, she made a cute ribbon chandelier for her adorable beanette's reading nook. I made mine the same way she did, basically ribbons and hot glue, only I put a ring on both the top and bottom of mine for some extra structure.  I hung it in my laundry room to cheer things up there.  While it looks really cute, it was very hard to get good pictures.  The laundry room has no windows, so with the light off, there's hardly enough light to take a picture and with the light on, there's tons of glare and you can't really see the chandelier part.  The colors are definitely more fun in person.

So there you have it, my summer pinterest challenge projects.  Hooray!

Wedding Kaleidoscope

There have been a bunch of fun kaleidoscope quilts up lately, so even though I've never made a true kaleidoscope quilt,  I thought I'd post this quilted wall hanging I made for my sister and her husband after they got married.   They got married in 2004, but I probably made the quilt in 2005 or 2006.  I can't believe how long it's been!  The instructions came from an old Quilter's Newsletter, but I couldn't find which issue.

Basically, you print out 4 copies of a photograph of interest (on the inkjet printer fabric) and 4 copies of the same photograph reversed.  Then make a triangular template the size of 1/8 of an octagon and line it up on the same spot on each photograph.  Cut, sew, add borders, quilt, bind as always.  It makes for a really fun twist on the traditional photo quilt. My sister says many people don't even realize it's their wedding picture, most just think it's a cool kaleidoscope-type hanging.

Wasn't she a beautiful bride!

Hope you enjoy!

Tackling the UFOs-Caryl Fallert Small Blocks

Earlier this summer I vowed to tackle the many unfinished quilts/projects sitting in my sewing room, and promised not to start any more big projects until these were done.  So far, I'm making progress.  Number 5, the Visions of God quilt, is finished.  I've been working hard on number 2, the Hawaiian applique (more on that soon I hope), and over the past weekend I finished number 7, the small blocks from Caryl Fallert's class.

I talked a little bit about her class before, it was really a fabulous workshop all around.  The blocks I pieced as part of the design exercises in the early part of her class.  The blocks are all potholder or place mat size, and just this weekend I finished adding borders and quilting/finishing them.

The first one was string pieced, and the purpose of the exercise was to put together a contrast gradient (light/dark) using a single colorway.  We had a giant table of solid strips contributed by everyone in the class, and used those as the source to put together our gradients.  One of the great tips Caryl gave us was to use the black and white setting on your camera to look at your gradient.  Often it's hard to tell which fabric is darker when color is in the way, so using the black and white view removes that factor.  I'm really a fan of having contrast variations, the lights and the darks really make a design pop in a way that all medium tones can't achieve.  I'm not always good at that though,  many of my quilts have lots of bright colors in medium tones without much light and dark.  Another thing to work on!

Anyway, here's the basic string pieced yellow-brown gradient block I made.  You can easily see the contrast changes in the black and white photo.  I added the pink-orange border after the fact and quilted practice feathers on it.  My grandma really liked this one, so I gave it to her.

The next block we made was not a contrast gradient, but was just an exercise in appli-piecing.  This is Caryl's method for combination curved piecing/applique that avoids the stress of regular curved piecing.  The edges are turned under (around a template) and then a very small zigzag stitch is made over the edge using invisible monofilament thread.  This one was potholder size and then I added the purple border and tried to practice some quilting designs.

The contrasting quilting emphasizes how much I still need to work on being smooth when doing free motion work!  I'm probably going to donate this one to the Dallas Quilt Guild mini-quilt auction at their quilt show next year.  It was good practice and I love the colors (especially that print in the bottom section), but you only need so many little quilted blocks hanging around the house.

This last one was an exercise in combining at least two gradients and the appli-piecing technique.  I got a little too complicated and decided to try intersecting gradients in two different colors (green and pink) as well as plain gradients in those colors and a brown gradient.  It looks a little chaotic but kind of reminds me of strawberry fields.  Instead of putting on a regular binding, I thought I would try doing a faced binding in case I ever want to try that technique on a big quilt.  It worked out fine, but the corners are a little more rounded off than I would have liked.  This one is 8.5 x 11, and since it is small enough I might donate it do the Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative.  They sell small donated quilts to raise money for Alzheimer's research.  They also have a collection of gorgeous large art quilts that they periodically auction off as well.

These were all fun to make and I was glad to have some good opportunities to practice my machine quilting since I have a couple nice tops waiting to be quilted.