A quiltmaking marathon! A Farmer's Wife meets Jane.

Over the past few weeks, I have been determined to assemble three quilt tops that I wanted *done* for the end of 2010.  There are a few new projects I'm looking forward to starting, and of course more than a few projects still in progress, and I very much wanted to have these three quilts ready to quilt when I wanted.  So here are pictures (not great pictures, as I had an uncooperative helper!) of the three I finished...the third finished just this morning...I feel I've sewn miles of borders!

Here's the one I'm most happy with...I'll share the other two tomorrow.

 The Farmer's Wife meets Jane is 89 x 89.  The final border is actually a medium green...and I wish I had it made it 8" wide instead of 6".  The reason for the change in size is that I put a friendship star block in each border corner, to represent the stars that both Jane and a farmer's wife might have seen in the sky at their time.  I might add yet another narrow dark border to better balance out the quilt.   This is a few years worth of Dear Jane blocks and Farmer's Wife blocks.  64 Dear Jane blocks.  34, I think, are from a group attempt at the quilt, those are red, pink, and white.  The remaining Dear Jane blocks were from a block of the month that I didn't complete.  Quilt math is interesting, as it turned out, there are also 64 Farmer's Wife blocks, that I made from scraps while using the patterns from the book  I designed the quilt using EQ7.

Do you know that if you click on the quilt picture, it will appear in a new tab, and if you click it again while in that new tab, it will get quite a bit larger?  Great idea for all the wonderful quilt pictures out there on blogs!

Happy New Year!

Quilt Tops almost done!

It looks like I'll be heading into the new year with a few quilt tops, ready to assemble!

 This is "The Farmer's Wife meets Jane" - the centre square is a collection of Dear Jane blocks from two different starts on the quilt...the remainder of the blocks are from the Farmer's Wife quilt.  I have the centre and the first border sewn together, and part of the third border.  I just need to make final decisions on the colour and style of the plain border fabrics.

 This is a variation of Honouring Emma, by Lori Smith.  I have all the fabrics, and the applique is done.

And, I'm calling this one Open Window...the blocks were a result of a quilt gone wrong, but I think turned out great with this layout!  All ready to go, all blocks pieced, and I have the border fabric.

Stars for a New Day, month 7

I’ve been keeping up with my plan to work on Stars for a New Day on a monthly basis, but this month – arrggghh…I’m getting awfully tired of those little 1” hsts and all those stars, and all that paper ripping, this month’s set would have ended up in the garbage if I hadn’t been so determined!

All the hsts are sewn by using a paper piecing hst grid - kind of like Thangles but in a rectangle shape to yield the correct number of hst colour combinations.  Then those have to be cut apart, and paper ripped off, and pressed.  Then each of the "fancy stars" are made up of 8 rows of 8 hsts or plain squares.  The little sawtooth stars are kind of fun to sew up, once I'm past the paper pieced hst part!

There are six month's worth of making up these sets - four "fancy stars" and 8 sawtooth stars - I've done four sets, and still have two to go.  I just keep looking at the centre feathered star I had done earlier to make me keep going.

Four Winds (aka just kisses)

I completed this quilt a couple of weeks ago, for my aunt.

The applique are four blocks from Sue Garman's b.o.m. at the Quilt Show.  I had intended to make a quilt using all six of the leaf blocks, but when playing on EQ, came up with this layout.  As is my habit, I don't usually go about making a quilt for a specific person but rather make quilts as I like to, then as I go along a receipient comes to mind.  This one just called for Aunt Pauline. 

I got a Kindle!

My son kept telling me about ebook readers - and I totally rejected the idea because a book is a book - nothing better!  But then I became aware that I  haven't read a book in several months -which for me is more than unusual - because I can't afford or won't pay the high prices for new books; the library is hard for me to get to on a regular basis; and  second hand stores don't seem to have the selection they once had.  An ereader gives me instant books, and after testing out a Kobo, I found that it really was possible to lose myself in the story and forget that I'm reading it on a device instead of from a book.  The page has no glare, no backlit, clear black and white printing, and is very easy on the eyes. 

I so much wanted a Kobo, I guess because it looked like it had the most simplest form, and to me it was Canadian, and it supported epub books which are a bit more readily available than the Kindle format.  But I just couldn't cope with the blue navigation button on the right front of the reader.  It gave my thumb a cramp, as it required a bit of push; and its location made it very difficult to use with another hand or finger.

One very neat thing about the ereader is that I can put my pattern pdfs on to it, and save printing all those pages.

So, here's my new Kindle (a birthday present from my husband), along with a cover made from a pattern at Moda Bake Shop.  I even used the kindle to read the directions for the cover, while making the cover!

Meet me at the Manor

Quiltmaker magazine has introduced a four part series quilt called Meet Me at the Manor.  I love houses, and samplers, and so I had to give a try to making this quilt from scraps.

I have collected quite a few pieces of what are to me "brights" - as compared to my usual 1800s repros I'm drawn to.  Most of these were precuts of charm squares and eighths from Connecting Threads, some pulled from my stash, many of them already having been used as experiments in other quilts.

For this quilt I took a leap and did not do any sketching or colouring on EQ!  I just went for it - which is really not in my comfort zone...I usually need to have a really good plan of what I'm putting where, especially as I don't have a large design board to arrange pieces.

The first part of this series required quite of a bit of sewing...nine houses, and some fusible applique - here's what I finished with and I'm really very happy with this beginning.  These blocks will be randomly spaced out throughout the top, with smaller pieced blocks and sashings filling out the centre.  I don't think I'll be doing the sawtooth star border that shows in the pattern (I've got enough stars going on with other projects!).  There are lots of options flitting around in imagination that will make up the last border, or more!

Something from something else!

I had an idea to give a quilt to my Aunt...thinking of what was Select Six put together some time ago.  After taking it out of the drawer, I thought I would make it a bit narrower, so I played on EQ and took apart the top a bit, and re-designed it.  Its looking okay, but I don't like the last brown border (unfortunately it doesn't show much on this picture)...so that will eventually come off and be replaced with something a little brighter, maybe a colourful small open design on cream.

Still wanting to give a quilt to my Aunt, I started thinking about the "just kisses" applique blocks I had made so far.  Back to EQ, and after lots of playing, I came up with something I think will be wonderful for Pauline. This quilt is 68" square, all fabrics from the Golden Afternoon collection from Connecting Threads. 

One more top is on its way, from blocks that I had made but didn't like. I made the mini churn dashes that formed the inner part of a block in a pattern called Odds and Ends from American Patchwork and Quilting. After completing a few blocks with those churn dashes, I was just not happy with the look. EQ to the rescue, again, and I came up with this idea, followed by a picture of the blocks made so far. This will eventually be a quilt for a niece, I think.

Show and Tell

August was busy in the sewing room - I thought I'd finally catch up on the blog with some pictures of recent projects finished and on their way -

First is a quilt I made for my niece's first year in university residence.  Its a variation of a quilt called CrossRoads in American Patchwork and Quilting, August 08.  I revised the pattern a bit to accommodate charm squares.  I used to packs of  Rural Jardin charm squares, less the light ones, plus some odd bits from my stash.  Finished size is 62 x 77.


I quilted Starlight Starbright for  my daughter's graduation present

I finished a top to give to my Aunt, then decided another WIP might be more suitable for her, and its almost ready for quilting.  I've re-designed another UFO that may be a quilt for a niece.  I've been working on blocks from the Farmer's Wife book,  and with a goal of 10 blocks a month, I'm up to 40 blocks. 

I've also been very much enjoying the ease of applique from b.o.m. kits!  Its an easy way out, I know, but absolutely no stress over colour choices, which seems to be my nemises for applique.  I'm working on Baltimore & Bali, and a folk version (kansas troubles fabrics) of My Whimsical Garden. ). I'm also keeping up with Honouring Emma. 

More pictures tomorrow,

Penny

P3 Designs block of the month mystery

This series is up to month five - we have a centre, and four each of the blocks I've placed on the design flannel, to the side of the centre.

I find it hard to get enthusiastic about mystery quilts - I love the idea, but ensuring that I pick the fabrics correctly to get a nice quilt is a little intimidating.  This year, for Pearl P. Pereira's mystery quilt, I found fabrics in my stash that have worked pretty well.  The peach check (that make up the large flowers on the sides of the centre block) could be brighter - but it still works.


Pearl writes terrific instructions - which is a very good thing because these are not your usual blocks!  I don't know how she comes up with her designs, but they are the kind where you stitch, cut and flip pieces until you end up with these interesting leaves and flowers.  Very different, and a bit challenging - you  have to follow the directions and work carefully step by step.

If you'd like to join in, all the previous month's instructions are still available.  Go to Pearl P. Pereira's website, and click on the forum link in the menu on the left. 

keeping up with Stars for a New Day

Well, no I'm not really keeping up with Stars for a New Day, as this was the Quilt Show b.o.m. for 2009, but I am keeping up my own new schedule of sewing one month's instructions every month!  A variation of this quilt is also offered at a few quilt shoppes as Washington Medallion, with a few less stars!

Sue Garman designed this quilt with excellent instructions...all of the star blocks are made with"paper pieced" half square triangles to make up the flying geese units and points...while this works very well to make up the colours and patterns she's suggested, it is unfamiliar to me.  I almost always make my hsts and flying geese the traditional way, with triangles cut and sewn together without any sew, cut, sew methods.  The hst grid which is provided with the patterns is a different way for me to work, but I'm enjoying the difference, and as Sue's cutting and layout instructions are all based on this grid, it doesn't make sense to try to convert everything to my usual way of doing things.

So here's my work so far...the next few months are more of the sawtooth stars, and what Sue calls border stars, which are sawtooth star variations.

Summertime Variation, quilted

I wrote about this quilt on my blog here.  I got the quilting done, and hung it up in a hallway before taking a picture.  Since then, I've been waiting for the right time to ask for help to take it down, and take its picture.  Well that doesn't seem to be happening, so here's the picture at an interesting angle.

And a close up picture, trying to show the quilting.  Its hard to have a picture show the quilting!  I just did a straight stitch design in the churn dash blocks, and some outline and squiggle free motion quilting on the applique blocks.  If you click on the picture once, it gets bigger, and click on it again, it should get bigger again. 

The big discovery for me was the border.  I started off making a free motion line connecting a kind of flower doodle...but it didn't fill up the space right, and it looked kind of skinny and lonely.  So I made a second squiggle line that overlapped and kind of ran parallel to the first line - I'm really happy that it turned out okay - better than having to rip and re-stitch!  The binding was sewn to the back first, then brought to the front. To sew down the front of the binding,  I decided to a machine blanket stitch to match the applique stitching.

Just Kisses...

Yesterday I wrote a bit about making the crossed leaves blocks of the Hugs and Kisses b.o.m. pattern at the Quilt Show. Here's what I've done to date -

When I first started playing with the crossed leaves design, I thought it might be fun to make the stems curved and casual, rather than straight and formal.  I kept thinking of wind. I started out making some trial leaves and stems prepared for machine applique with turned edge and starch...I quickly realized that that method wasn't going to work too well due to muscle fatigue and pain from the repetitious movements of the iron and tools. 

I then thought I would use glue stick to turn the applique edges, but I didn't want to remove the freezer paper after sewing (I have done that on another project, and never again!).  I decided to try the wash away foundation-applique paper  from C & T (amazon.ca sells it for a good price).  It certainly made preparing the leaves quick and easy - with a little help from Beth Ferrier's book, Hand Applique by Machine.  I think it even made the machine applique a little easier, as there was a definite edge to the leaf to follow with the presser foot.  The only thing I am not sure of, is that the finished applique blocks seems to be a little weight-y...I'm tempted to wash one in the sink and see what happens!

I made a drawing of symmetrical curved stem lines, to fit the block size.  I've used that to lay out each block...I had to lose one leaf on the inner curve of each stem so it wouldn't be too crowded due to the curves. My intent is to make eight of the crossed leaves blocks (repeating two), and one of the wreath blocks, set in a 9 block setting, something like this:

The fabric I'm using is from the Golden Afternoon collection at Connecting Threads, and a salmon colour from my stash instead of the yellow from the collection.

The Fabric Shuffle

Since January, I have been looking at, studying really, the applique b.o.m. from the Quilt Show.  I very much liked the blue and green fabrics - the colour, print, style.  I very much liked the crossed leaves blocks ("kisses") - but I wasn't at all sure about the wreath blocks ("hugs").  In an effort to end some indecision, I order the fabric kit when it went on sale.  But...I didn't want to make the quilt exactly as shown.  Days and days of mucking about on EQ, and playing with paper templates, and wondering what would I do with the kit fabric if I made the quilt with some other fabric?

In the end, I played with some red and green fabric to make a variation of the crossed leaves blocks.  I liked that so much, that I knew that the blue and green were going somewhere else.  The background fabric went to the Whimsical Quilt Garden blocks - the white on white dots were just perfect!  In the end, I've used the blue and green for a block from Honouring Emma, by Lori Smith.  I'm going to like making this quilt in these colours...in this picture I have used the yellow from the kit as an accent, but I'm thinking of changing or adding a bit of purple...there is a slight big of purple accent on one of the blue fabrics.  I've done this block as hand applique, tomorrow I hope to finish machine applique on the fourth crossed leaves block and post a picture of the ones sewn to date.

July 23, 2010 - where did the time go?!

I haven't written or posted pictures on the blog for a while...but it wasn't until now that I see that the last blog posting was May 31!  Wow!  I've been gone so long, that I see pop ups all over my blogger page to show off improvements to the service.

June I guess just slipped by...followed quickly by most of July!  Middle daughter graduated from high school, daughter in law won  2nd place in our provincial bowling championships, youngest son continued to struggle with school and finding a place for himself.  My mother has increasing dementia-like symptoms and my sisters and I are coping with how best to give her continued freedom while planning for the future.

I've been working on various quilt blocks and quilted a wall hanging.  EQ7 arrived, which had me mindlessly preoccupied for quite some time!  My favourite new feature is improved drawing tools, which makes it so much easier to trace scanned applique images.

So, here's a picture for today.  It's the first block of Piece O Cake's My Whimsical Quilt Garden pattern - it's a b.o.m. kit from Homestead Hearth - so I can't take much credit other than for the hand applique sewing!  I  don't  do "cute" blocks, and I don't do "bright" fabrics - so this is a real change for me.  I love the birdie!  The bird's tail isn't sewn down, it is meant to be overflow the block and be sewn onto the sashing, so I prepared the edges with starch.  The beak and legs were done with a dmc floss and satin stitch.

I've been sewing like a mad-woman for the past several days... my two teenagers are each at high drama points at this time (one about to be suspended from school for misbehaviour, the other graduating this June with a new boyfriend complicating things...).  So what does a quilter do?  Sew, sew, sew.  All my frustration and worry went into each slam on the foot pedal, each rotary cut, each stab of the pin.  When I wasn't in the sewing room, I was out on the porch, working on a redwork piece so furiously that I have bruised and peeling skin on my needle pushing finger!

I finished the centre portion of Stars for a New Day

 And, I finished the quilt top of Select Six, but I'm still thinking of adding a small narrow border, the same brown fabric as in the sashing.

Eureka!

I have been trying, for weeks I think, to re-design a quilt pattern.  I have so many quilt sketches in my EQ file for this quilt, at one point there were over 28 design variations (despite deleting many), all using the same sampler blocks and nine patch blocks.

Here's the original block of the month quilt, which I fell in love with - the colours, the setting - I just had to have it!  It is called Select Six, designed by Karen Montgomery at The Quilt Company.   The finished quilt size is 76" x 89".  This picture does not give a good idea of the wonderful variety of fabrics in the blocks and nine patches, and the setting triangles for the sampler blocks are actually a variety of golden browns.

As the months went by, though, I realized that the quilt was just a bit too big (we really need a new couch quilt, and I also have a couple of people in mind who would like to receive a quilt that size).  Mostly,  I was awfully afraid of quilting those large open areas - some people would be looking forward to creating some wonderful quilting in those areas, but me?  Nope.

Here, finally, is my redesign.  There are butterflies in the corners, just because I've always wanted a chance to put butterflies on my quilt!  The finished size is 69" square.  The sampler blocks aren't all the actual ones in the quilt, and the colours are just to give me an idea of what's happening on the quilt.

So now this is becoming a habit, joining b.o.m.s and then redesigning the quilt...this makes three this spring.  So why join the b.o.m. in the first place?  I enjoy the pace of receiving the monthly kit; I enjoying sewing it, putting it away, and not having to think about when I'll do the next part, or storing or searching for fabrics.  Second, I do enjoy the process of redesign - its a wonderful challenge!

Stars for a New Day

The Quilt Show presented a block of the month for 2009-2010, Stars for a New Day, by Sue Garman.  Here's a picture of the quilt -

 
For the past several months, I've been going back and forth on deciding to do this quilt.  The design really appeals to me...but finding all the "right" scraps, plus all those unpieced borders, kept putting me off.  Finally, I decided that I had likely collected enough civil war period scraps to make up little kits for each month's steps, still sort of following the original colour scheme.  The big sticking point was still those borders! Sew Sisters recently had a great sale, and I got very lucky, and found the just the right fabrics.  In the meantime, I pieced "month two" which were the first pieced borders to go around the centre feathered star.  So here's my work so far, along with the selected border fabrics -
 

Soon I'll be sewing the centre feathered star block, which will mean I can put to use some of these border fabrics and see how it all looks!

Summertime quilt - variation

I've finished this quilt top - it is a wallhanging size quilt (about 45" square).  It started out as block of the month hosted by Homestead Hearth, pattern by Primitive Gatherings (the original can be seen here)

I felt that the background fabric chosen for the b.o.m, was a bit dark, so I machine appliqued the pieces with a heavy gold coloured thread, which did lighten them up a bit.  And, because I almost always want to make a pattern "my own", I set the applique blocks with a churn dash block on a slightly lighter background.  The churn dash blocks are slightly stretched - a churn dash block is made with three equal proportions of 2" each for a 6" block, these are 7" blocks so I made the centre section 3".

 
I have the quilt top pinned to my design flannel, and I don't want to take it down to quilt it!  I'm just so enjoying looking at it, I think it will (or has) become my favourite wall hanging.

Garden at Dusk - done and delivered :)

I so much enjoyed quilting this quilt - lots of spaces and places to vary designs, although I did mostly did straight stitching arrangements, and some free motion meandering.  I  finished this quilt about two weeks ago, and my husband delivered to his brother, who will pass it on to Emily when she next comes for a visit. 

The pattern is "Secret Garden" by Cindy Lammon in her book "Gathered from the Garden".  I added the extra triangle border, just to make the quilt a bit bigger.  

I started using the leftover fabrics from this quilt for the Crossed Leaves applique patterns, as written about in the previous post....but that's another story!

Orphan Blocks...or Oops!

I think I'll call myself the Queen of Orphan Applique Blocks.  I have countless applique experiments stuffed and hidden away - I am just too critical of my colour choices in applique, and there doesn't seem to be a darn thing I can do about it! 

Here are three crossed leaves type blocks from Sue Garman's block of the month, called Hugs and Kisses, from the Quilt Show website.  Nothing terribly wrong with them, but I just don't like them.  I think its the choice of the dark stem that is bothering me.

The top left is my favourite - and using Electric Quilt I've drawn and idea of a small quilt to use this block, and some elements from other blocks in the vine.

I am so addicted to using Electric Quilt - and a new version is coming out in just weeks!  I am almost counting the days to see what can be done with the new EQ7!

Evernote software for organizing your quilting works

I use a wonderful - free - program called Evernote to organize all my quilting w.i.p.s, ideas, b.o.m.s, etc.  The program can be used on Windows, and on various portable electronics, synced back to your computer.  I've been using it for several months now and I find myself referring to it daily - here's a screenshot of what mine looks like

The first thing to do is set up notebooks - mine include online b.o.m., subscription b.o.m., ideas, stash (which means to me quilts in some kind of progress), to quilt, possibilities with fabric (different from ideas as I have fabric ready to go).  Then you just list what you like within each notebook, each item can have as many pictures, web links, text, etc. as you want.    (I've marked out the number of items for each notebook, ack!, don't want to have that information public, lol.)

In the screenshot  are the details for Floribunda.  On the left is the list of notebooks, in the centre is a summary of each item in that notebook (here it shows the online b.o.m. notebook) , and on the right is all the details of the highlighted item, complete with picture from EQ which shows what Floribunda might look like when its done.

Eventually I added tags - piecing, hand applique, machine applique, in progress.  Now I can see the number (!) of quilts that I'm currently working on.  And, for example, I can see that I have way too many hand applique projects ready to go!!

For me, Evernote is a quick way to stay organized because I can drag and drop info from places on my computer and from websites - I can refer to it often so I don't forget that great picture, pattern, or drawing.  I also use it to pick and choose something to work on when I'm feeling less than inspired - that's how I ended up finishing these two tops this week.

Time to put together tops...

I've been making up the blocks for the Remembrance quilt and realized it was time to work on the first border - so here is an almost completed top.  The pattern calls for one more 5" border, and I'd

like to find a blue and white large print for that, but right now the quilt is 68" square which is a good size for a lap quilt, so I may end up putting a dark blue narrow final border.

I've also finished the blocks for Starlight, Starbright which I did as b.o.m. through Homestead Hearth.  I've set the centre a bit differently than the pattern, and made it smaller.  I've also changed up the border, and I should have that all done tomorrow.

Mountain Top done

I've been quilting the Mountain Top quilt for the past few weeks - finally got the binding sewn on (all by machine) this weekend.  I straight stitched through the inner block sashings - where the background meets the black squares, and a large meandering stitch up to and through the narrow scrappy border; then just straight line quilting through the outer border.  The original quilt pattern didn't have a border, and it was set 4 x 5 blocks - I had laid many of the blocks on the floor and I felt it was all to overwhelming without somewhere "blank" to look at.  The quilt still finishes at good size, 72"  x 87".

Great stash digging results!

Pearl Pereira is offering a free mystery block of the month - mostly piecing and some applique - just introduced last week.  Mysteries are hard to commit to, and even harder to plan for...the not knowing of what you're going to get makes the fabric selection that much more tricky.  Pearl's fabric choices showed red, 2 blues, 2 pinks, 2 greens.   I decided that I'd participate only if I could find all of the pieces in my stash - after much digging, I got together a wonderful grouping of fabric, and even better, it included some pieces that I had just about given up hope of ever using.  Instead of red I have a predominately peach floral, and the two pinks are peach.

Here's a mock up of the first block on my design flannel, I had a little grin on my face when I stepped back to see that with the fabrics chosen, I could be on my way to a very nice quilt.  Beside it I put the second background and the remaining fabric swatches.  I did have to order a little more of the bright green, and a little more of the second background - but, bonus!  I caught the last day of a sale at the web store.

Anna's Garden

Here are the first three blocks of Anna's Garden, pattern by Lori Smith.   These are 7" blocks, and the background is a dark navy.  Working on these blocks are like working on little applique snacks - just enough challenge to make it interesting, and enough leeway in the design to not worry too much about placement and fine details.  I am happy with the colours, but I do find myself wavering.

After the first two blocks, I brought out some large pieces of mostly civil war era repros.  I almost changed my mind right then and there. Something about those shades and tones that just make me feel like I could crawl right into the pile of fabric! 

But, the style I'm working on now is just fine...nothing wrong with it...just do I want to do the whole quilt like this?  It only takes a few charm packs to make up a quilt like this.. hmmmm.  My goal is to do two to three of these a month; lets hope that in April I'm not showing a whole different set of colours and fabrics!

Stash organization really does help!

I have had a great - fantastic - past couple of days in the studio, resulting in some great decisions on applique and pieced projects that I will keep me busy for at least a year or two! 

A few months ago, I cleaned up my stash.  I don't have a large stash, but I do have enough to keep me inspired, and fabrics that can act as starters for a project.  While organizing, I was astounded at how many yellows and browns I had...about 6 yards of each.  I also discovered a large amount of red and green scraps civil ware repro types  (some large as fqs), that was about 5 yards total.  And enough 30s repro, some cut into 2" squares, to consider a lap sized quilt...didn't realize I collected those!  The strangest discovery was the brights, by sorting them by colour and putting them into bags, I had enough of those to start a quilt.  Brights are not really my thing, and these must have been hatching in the dark.  I also have several smaller "sets" of fabric that will work well into minis and small wallhangings that I used to enjoy doing so much.

So now I have all these baskets and bags of "collections" and colours.  I felt I had to make sure I used them - and I have!  The pink and blues already have been given to the Celebration sampler; the Riveria line of fabrics from Connecting Threads were perfect for the Floribunda project.  The leftover Glace scraps from my neice's quilt is enough to do the Sue Garman machine applique.

There were three quilts I wanted to kit up for myself  - and the last couple of days the ideas kept flowing as I moved fabric and patterns from pile to pile. The red and green scraps that were destined for a sampler by Lori Smith, ended up back in the basket, to maybe turn into a 4 block applique from the A Baltimore Album book.  But that's a simmering idea. The yellow and brown, with white and odd bits of green, will make that sampler into a  lively quilt.   I discovered that the 30s repro could work really well in the Anna's Garden applique pattern by Lori Smith - I even found yards of a navy background to use.  The brights and a few batiks I have can wait for some kind of inspiration.  

I can hardly believe that I made up all these projects from my little stash.  I really have no reason to shop.  I am still doing some purchased blocks of the month, and will continue to do so, as they provide an opportunity to make a quilt from a pattern that is not readily available, or use fabrics in a way that is too hard for me to organize, or are just plain interesting!  So kits mights still be on the shopping list, but nothing else.  Is there a quilter's oath I can swear....that I promise to use the kits I made up, make no swaps to make new kits, to not even consider yet another I have to have it? Hmmm...

Commitment issues....

I have been obsessed with applique patterns and fabrics.  I haven't been able to make many firm decisions, and my fabric choices go around and around in my head - dancing with different partner patterns.  I used to have many pieced projects on the go, now it seems I'm much more concerned with applique projects.  I also have a problem making a firm decision - is this really how I want to use this pattern or fabric??

I have made so many full and partly finished applique blocks over the past few weeks (and years!)   In the past couple of weeks in particular I have spent hours playing with my stash, reviewing patterns, internet browsing, and colouring quilts on EQ.  Yesterday I finally smacked myself on the head and said, this is not a life changing decision!  just go with something!  you have enough sense to know that you're being overly particular and that really nothing is wrong with anything that you've tried so far - its like an itch that can't be scratched :)  The point is to enjoy the sewing of applique, challenge myself a bit, and maybe at the end have a finished top that I can say, I made that with my own two hands :)

So, I made decisions....any bets if any of these quilt plans will result in that actual quilt?  I think so - I'm done with playing, for now.... I also seem to need a lot of variety - I am not the type of quilter to start one thing and finish it (well, how many of us are like that?) 

After giving up ever being happy with fabric choices for Baltimore n Bali by the Rabbit Factory, and making or prepping blocks one and two, way too many times, I've started another pattern by the Rabbit Factory called Celebration Sampler.  This seems to suit my collection of blues and pinks that I thought would be an applique quilt - the Celebration Sampler will give me a bit of everything, the blocks in this quilt are just pieced, or a combo of piecing and applique, or all applique.

Then comes blocks from Sue Garman's quilt Hugs and Kisses, a b.o.m. from the Quilt Show.  I'll be doing "just kisses", the crossed leaves patterns, by machine applique (applique pieces prepped with edges turned and starched).  I enjoy machine applique, and if I did everything I wanted to by hand, well then I'd have a real problem.  I'm using scraps of Glace fabric leftover from another quilt.

I'm going to continue to follow the Floribunda b.o.m., as I very much like my fabric choices here, and her style of drawing, so similar to Piece O Cake designs.

And, I'm still debating about one more hand applique project that will either be blocks from A Baltimore Album, by Marsha Radtke, or and old favourite of mine that never got started, Anna's Garden by Lori Smith.

So, it looks like I've ended up with a small amount of hand applique in the Celebration Sampler, a monthly hand applique block from Floribunda, machine applique every-other-month from Hugs and Kisses; and one other hand applique to be announced.  That's pretty good decisions, now how about that commitment?

Floribunda

There is a great new applique block of the month being offered by One Piece at a Time quilts - here is her blog link - take a look! I thought about this b.o.m. for a while, then remembered I had put away a collection of fabrics from Connecting Threads called Riveria - I so much liked this line of fabrics that I bought it, but couldn't decide when and how to cut it up :)  This applique pattern I think will work well for the Riveria Fabrics.  I've used needleturn applique for this block.

"Garden at Dusk"

I did get the borders put on the quilt I'm calling Garden at Dusk.  I love playing with border options on Electric Quilt.  The original quilt,  My Secret Garden, from the book Gathered from the Garden by Cindy Lammon, had a plain border...but I wanted more!  This quilt will be going to my college age neice - I just kept thinking about her while making it.

Folk style sampler done and done :)

I was so anxious to get this quilt washed and on the wall...next thing it's up there, but I hadn't taken a picture.  It's place is on the front stair landing, a great spot for large wall quilts, but no place to get a decent picture.  So this is all that I can share.

I use Hobbs Heirloom 80/20 in all my quilts - I love the crinkly effect that happens after a washing, its easy to quilt with on my home machine, and doesn't require a lot of quilting if I want.

I do hate hand sewing binding, so while I told myself that I wasn't allowed to do any other handwork until the binding was done.  So instead I procrastinated by finishing the centre of Garden at Dusk - I hope to put the borders on today -