Quilt Reflections by QuiltMommy

Trading Scraps

I love my mother-in-law! I didn't think I would have anything to blog about tonight but after talking with Mom D I had to come tell you all what she told me.

First I have to tell you that she is a very sociable woman and will strike up a conversation with anyone. Hal is like this too. I often marvel at the conversations they can get into at the grocery store or wherever. I'm just not that open with strangers. I love watching them as they do this ... The thought of striking up a conversation just never occured to me. Hal got in trouble once when we were sitting in a movie theater and I was just a few months pregnant. We were with some friends but Hal was sitting next to a stranger who wasn't part of our group. He had told me that we shouldn't tell friends or family before 3 months, which was hard for me to do because I am very close to my extended family. After all this he strikes up a conversation with the woman next to him and tells her that I'm pregnant with our first child. She immediately leans over to congratulate me and Hal is trying to shush her so that he can explain that our friends on the other side of me don't know. (That man!) But I've digressed. Back to my mother-in-law. She has decided that she doesn't want to duplicate any of the fabrics in the Cathedral Window quilt. So she has been buying fabric and more fabric. She has gotten a reputation at the local JoAnn's because she threatens the ladies who cut the fabric for her that if they don't watch out they might find their skirt 2 inches shorter because she has her scissors and she needs 2 inch scraps for the quilt. :> I believe all of the fabric retailers now about this Cathedral quilt we are making now. Many people are interested and keep asking to see it. Well this time Mom Darby managed to get into a conversation that turned into a gold mine. Turns out the lady cutting her fabric this time used to sell fabric herself and she has a bunch of 2 inch scraps she'd be willing to give Mom D. Another lady in the store was interested in trading scraps with her. So we are well on our way to achieving Mom D's goal of not repeating any fabric. :>

That reminds me though. I've been telling her about my blog and the group of bloggers I've found online. She wanted to know if you would be interested in trading scraps. She has a lot of the fabric we have already cut 2 inches from and would be willing to trade. If you are interested in swapping scraps send me an email.

Getting into trouble again :>

I've recently joined a quilt related group over at Yahoo.com. I'm very excited about being a part of the group because they seem like a bunch of nice ladies. They are having a "Fall in the Forest" block swap in the middle of September. I'm thinking very seriously about submitting a block. Hal's not going to like hearing that I'm starting another project. But I think I can do it with fabrics I've already got. I already have an idea of making a pine tree with a Robin in it and a set of flying geese in the background. If I machine applique I should have no problem finishing the block on time. Anyone seen any fabric with flying geese in it? I wouldn't mind doing a broderie perse technique on the geese ... I'm afraid my hand drawn geese would be hard to identify as birds and difficult to blanket stitch. :>

Have you seen the new eCatalog for Hancocks of Paducah? It's pretty spiffy, like flipping through their paper catalog. Plus they have a wish list feature! I think I've fallen in love with the Vienna Nights collection and the Luminosity collection. I just love the jacqards, silks, and toiles in Vienna Nights. Not sure which color way is the best. Wish I could import them into EQ5 to play with them and decide what I want to do with them. :> I wonder if I told Hal it was for another quilt he gets to keep, if he'd object to me buying the whole kit and caboodle?

Grandma Day went well today, as usual. I love hanging out with my mother-in-law. She is a marvelous story teller and can recite some of the most wonderful things. Being one who can't remember things for recitation I certainly appreciate the skill in others. Hal inherited the ability, he can do whole skits from Bill Cosby's tapes. I'm afraid we spent more time online searching for books from her childhood than working on the quilt. She grew up with the Elson Readers and they seem to have such marvelous stories in them. Stories with morals and history in them. She also grew up with the "My Book House" book collection which looks wonderful as well. So we spent part of the afternoon shopping for antique books for M-. :> I'm afraid I spent way too much on those books and will have to think three times about buying more fabric. But we had a marvelous time and managed to make a little progress on the cathedral window quilt.
Trouble sure lurks whereever I go; more projects, more fabric, more books ... I can never have enough!

Tomorrow will be another Grandma Day, only M- will get to spend it with his Great Grandma. I'm hoping I will get a chance to work on my block of the month or the Cathedral window quilt while I'm over there visiting. (It would almost seem that I quit work to ferry M- from grandma to grandma :> He is sure one lucky boy to have so many grandmas close by. :> )

Continuous bias -- not my thing

(Sigh) I usually make my bias strips by cutting the pieces and then stitching them all together. Tonight I decided to try the continuous bias from a square method. (It is detailed on the Fons and Porter laminated card on binding a quilt.) First I drew the lines parallel to the wrong edges. Then I had a hard time figuring out how to match the lines up. Then I some how got them off by a bit so my strip just got narrower. I think I made a mistake wanting to make it 1/4 inch thick when finished. (It needed to be thin because the letters I'm using the strip to make are pretty thin. ) Good thing I just bought more of the fabric this afternoon. Looks like I've got to start over again. I'll try this continuous bias thing one more time and then I'm going back to the tried and true of piecing them together individually.

Details of the stash

I realized last night after visiting Arlee's site again that I hadn't really shown you my stash, just where it was kept. So today I brought out most of it to share with you.

Keep in mind that there are two ways I buy fabric. One is to go hunting for fabric with a specific quilt in mind. The other is to grab something that is so tantalizing I can't leave it on the shelf even though I don't have any idea of what I'm going to do with it. I'm sorry if the page is slow loading. I bumped the compression rate down on the pictures so that they would be clearer. I had to keep their size down so they would fit in the space allowed by the blog template.

I'll start with my most prized possessions. :>

The Vest

As I mentioned before my sister-in-law and I tend to collect wearable art projects at the MAQF every year in hopes of finishing it for next year's festival. This is one of the projects that didn't make it. We bought lots of kimono silk scraps with the intent of making vests. We even bought silk batting to use in the vests for when we quilted it with silk thread. I still can't wait to try hand quilting silk batting. (sighs at the pure luxury of the thought). This project got put on hold because the silk was very hard to cut for the beginner that I am. I was "crazy patching" the inside out of the green and teal silks and assembling the outside using designs inspired from Janet Haigh's book Japanese Inspirations, a very beautiful book.
Here are a few more detailed pictures of the fabrics and part of the back that has been pieced.

Another find at the MAQF was this cotton fabric that looks and feels like silk. It is made by a Japanese fabric manufacturer.

These are more prized possessions won off of eBay. They are Celtic inspired fabrics made by Woodrow studios. I can't find them anywhere but on eBay. They seem to be no longer produced. I hope to make a quilt for Mom D out of these some day, assuming I can bring myself to give it away. :>

Now for the jump off the shelf collections: my Japanese motif fabrics.
I thought I had more of these than I actually do. I'm thinking I'll make a drunkards path quilt out of them someday.

Here are some fabric medleys that I bought earlier this year. Muted colors seemed to be appealing to me at the time, just prior to VA Reel. (Which was probably a color rebellion ;>)

I didn't take pictures of the other jump off the shelf collection of batiks. Most of those are blues.

Then I have the collection of fabrics left over from other quilts.

We have some pretty little florals from an applique teapot quilt that got raffled off at my church. .
And more of the teapot fabric with fabric from a wedding quilt for Hal's co-workers and a baby quilt with dragonfly for one of my coworkers. (all crib size or wall hanging size quilts)
Scraps from my brother's wedding quilt.
And scraps from a class project and a quilted jacket I made for my Mom earlier this year.
I'm learning to love batiks. They do make up nice projects.

Let's see what is next ...

Here are the fabrics for Hal's Kings Highway quilt.

I intend to play with the stripes to make some Jinny Beyer inspired blocks. :>

Then there is another Beyer inspired quilt, the Biblical block quilt. I have a book with this quilt pattern but I think I leant it to my sister-in law. I can't find it right now. It uses very similar fabrics in it. It has a tree in the center and it is surrounded by blocks with biblical names. Many of the blocks have kaleidoscopic looks to them because they have been cut much the same way Jinny Beyer does in her quilts. Don't think the book was by Beyer though. I can't seem to find it on Amazon right now. I'll let you know when I find it. ;>

Well those are the highlights of my stash. Phew, that took some time telling. :> But I enjoyed remembering some of the quilts. :>

Hal wanted me to close with this little story about his Mom and M-. Yesterday, when Hal was on the phone leaving a message for his Mom I told him to tell her that we had a certain little boy for sale. It's one of those things you wonder why you even said it and I was a bit upset that he actually told her on the machine. (I just expected him to ignore me.) I figured she must think I'm a horrible mommy because there really was no reason for me to say something like that. M- had been a gem all day. I had just been super distracted with my web research and blogging. Today we came home to find my boxes of fabric at our front door. Mom D had dropped by and left them with this little note.
"To whom it may concern-
I am currently making arrangements for robbing Fort Knox, the Louvre, and the Bank of England. If all the above go well, I will contact you about the negotiations for the purchase of "a certain little man" which you recently informed me may be available for purchase--
Signed-
The Poquoson
Grandma"

I love my mother-in-law, she really is a hoot and a joy to be around. :>
No wonder I love her son so much. ;>

How big is my stash?

Arlee asked how big my stash was in a comment to my previous post. I'm afraid to say it isn't very large. I had to go run and take pictures to prove it. Please forgive the mess. My craft closet is a bit over stuffed and has overflowed into the guest room. Here is some of the overflow, mixed with my Creative Memories albums. The clear box has the fabrics for Hal's quilt. The basket on top has the fabric for a Quillow I was making for my aunt, but I'm waiting for a cross stitch piece from my Mom. So I'm blaming her for that unfinished project (UFO) ;>. It also has more fabric for the next vest I intend to make for the Mid-Atlantic Quilt Festival. (My sister-in-law and I try to make new wearable art pieces each year to wear to the festival. We usually buy the supplies and patterns one year and if we are lucky we will have it finished for the next year.) The basket behind the albums has some fibers for a neat scarf I was making (on my sewing machine, not knitting) and some other little odd projects that would only take a few minutes or hours to finish ...If I actually worked on them.

Here is the inside of my closet. You have to be careful when opening it or a box of fabric or batting might fall out on you. I'm actually missing a medium and small size box of fabric because I sent them home with my mother-in-law earlier this week so that she could use some of it for the cathedral window quilt. Each box has a UFO in it. The crate in the back has a box full of oriental fat quarters from when I first started collecting fabric and was into anything inspired by the orient. Since then I've come to the conclusion I need to start collecting half yards. :>

I know it is not recommended to store your fabrics in plastic containers. But I don't really like the look of the wire mesh baskets and they always seem to catch on things. I like these because I can see what is inside them and I can stack them easily when they have their lids on. And should they topple over, which they do, I won't lose or misplace any of the project pieces.

The rest of the stash is scattered around the house. One basket has the latest additions of my stash waiting to be washed. The other basket has 30's reproduction fabrics that I've been using in the Wanna Buy a Bunny quilt.

Here is a picture of VA Reel with out the borders.

This is the Wanna Buy a Bunny quilt. I'm making it for my niece. Grandma Darby has sung the Spike Jones "Wanna Buy a Bunny" song to me on several occasions. She does it wonderfully. When I saw the Grandma's Bunnies pattern by Darcy Ashton I knew I had to make a bunny quilt.
I intend to put the lyrics for the song on the back of the quilt. Since it is a 30's song the 30's reproduction fabrics are appropriate. My local quilt store had some really cute nursery motifs in their selection. I have machine appliqued 9 of the bunnies and am in the process of adding the sashing and borders. I intend to applique the title of the song on the top border and to put a double scallop edge on it. It's the first time I've tried to do a scalloped edge quilt but I think it will make it look more feminine. Note that I am not doing the snowball block as shown in darcy's pattern.

I'll finally close with a picture of Hal and I on our anniversary trip last weekend. Here's to 5 years and going strong. Isn't he cute and sweet. :> (she sighs with a dreamy look in her eyes...)

Too much blogging, very little progress.

Ok I've got M- stuck in front of the "boob tube" ( a phrase I learned from my Grandmother for the television) so that I can work on the labels for Wanna buy a Bunny and VA Reel quilts (not that the tops are done yet but looking for appropriate pieces of scripture and playing with MS Publisher sounded like more fun than cutting the last sashing strip I need for Wanna Buy a Bunny :/) But instead I got caught up with my blog again. (sigh) This blogging stuff is too much fun. However, if I don't get to making my quilts I wont have anything to blog about. What a conundrum.

I've been updating my blog roll list. In case you haven't noticed, when you rollover the links under "Favorite Quilt Resources" and "Other Quilt Blogs" you'll see my brief "review" of the site.

I went to all my favorite blog sites to see if there was anything new and Sarah, at HipToPieceSquares pointed me to Albedo Design. I just love the site's introduction. Every time I read it I just want to run to my fabric stash and toss it in the air yelling "mine mine all mine" in pure delight. :>

Well enough blogging, off to my searches. Hope to see you all again soon. :>

Ahhh the power of fabric ...

Nothing can motivate me like fabric. :> I walked 2 miles to my local quilt store this morning. I pushed M- the whole way in his stroller. I went to see if they had the Flutter Bye fabric I saw at keepsakequilting.com (see Jim Shore entry made yesterday). They didn't have it so I contented myself with picking up a few notions I needed and a couple of half yards that jumped off the shelf into M-'s stroller. ;> Then I walked 2 miles home to buy the fabric from keepsakequilting.com. :> While I was there I saw issue number 74 of Down Under Quilts and had to buy it. It has a gorgeus Cathedral Window on the Cover. Unfortunately it doesn't have instructions for making it.

I was so excited yesterday. I received the first block for the BOM "Charlie Kissed Me" that I saw at StoryQuilts.com (see Mystery Quilt-Charlie Kissed Me entry) I love reading fiction almost as much as quilting. I've definitely been doing it longer. I was so ecstatic I went out and finished piecing the inner part of VA Reel. I'll post a picture of it this weekend. Now I need to hurry up and make up my mind about the borders. Meanwhile I'm pulling out Wanna Buy A Bunny so I can finish piecing that top. My goals are to finish the Wanna Buy a Bunny quilt top this weekend and to start my BOM block. I hope to have the Wanna Buy a Bunny and VA Reel tops done before the month ends. It would be great if I could get their backs pieced as well (Have I mentioned I like to put a lot of labels on the backs of my quilts?) but that is looking a little to ambitious. My husband is always having to remind me about setting realistic goals. I'm still waiting for science to produce the transporter technology we see on Enterprise. ;>

Here's a bit of trivia about me: I think I posted that I've been quilting for about 7 years ...Well my husband corrected me, I have only been doing it actively for 3, we wont count the collecting of fabric in college. In that time I have finished 9 quilts. And yet I still have a reputation of not finishing quilts (I guess its because of the 7+ quilt projects sitting in my craft closet waiting for me to return to them ...;>)

I hope to have more to report later this weekend. Until then, have a great weekend. :>

More on Jim Shore

If you have been reading through my blog then you've probably seen my entry on Jim Shore, Sleeping Infants and Jim Shore. He makes statues that have quilt motifs in them. I loved his manger scene set. Well, last time I went into Hallmark I saw that they had a miniature (i.e. smaller) version made as ornaments for the tree. I bought all three sets (the wisemen, the holy family, and the shepherd with animals). I was so happy to find the smaller set. I figure I could put them on a tree, wreath, or just set them out somewhere. (Since I already have the one manger set I bought in Germany.)

Well I was flipping through the Keepsake Quilting catalog yesterday and noticed they were selling some of his ornaments and statues. The thing that made me laugh was that they also had a fabric medley based on his designs. So they are now making quilting fabric inspired by Jim Shore, who's work seems to be inspired by quilts. As much as I love his ornaments and statues I wasn't that tempted by the fabric medley. I'd rather make a quilt with one of the motifs in his statues then use the fabric. Maybe the picture didn't do the fabric justice because it didn't look as bright as his statues do.

The flutterby medley was gorgeous ...I'm very tempted. Oh and the Sedona Sands medley too! I can get into the worst sort of trouble with those medleys at keepsake! (she sighs ... Wondering if her husband would even notice a few more yards coming in the door....)

Responding to Comments

Today's posts have been responses to comments. You can find them at :

• Few of My Favorite Things
• Grandma Days
• "Another Quilter Takes up Knitting" over at HipToPieceSquares
• "inspiration" and "B Block Bound" over at All To Quilty

Back to Basics - pinning, pressing, and templates

Well I have succumbed to pinning! When I first started quilting I wasn't thrilled with the idea of pressing fabric and pinning pieces together. I also didn't like the idea of using templates because it all seemed more like work than fun. I loved rotary cutting because it seemed to make short work of the cutting process, one of my least favorite parts. My favorite parts of quilting are selecting and buying fabrics, hand quilting, and fingering large, completed portions of a project.

On my Storm at Sea quilt I learned the importance of paying attention to bias edges with triangles and pressing through out the project. I later applied those lessons to a quilt I made for my Mom this Mother's day. (I still haven't gotten pictures of that one yet.) I found that using starch when pressing helped ensure nice results as well.

I would pin when I needed to match seams put other then that I matched edges as I sewed on the machine. With VA Reel I'm finding I need to pin even on edges that don't have seams that need matching. I would sew halfway across a side and find that my bias edged triangle would be shifting on me. Pinning helps reduce the shifting and I am having to do less tugging at the machine.

I mentioned that I would try paper piecing the remainder of the blocks but I forgot that my EQ block was different from the block I'm actually making, which sort of rules out that idea. (See I did it but I might be going nuts )

I've been reading through Jenny Beyer's book on hand piecing, . She's been discussing whether to include seam allowances in templates or not. She votes for including the allowance. Her discussion and Sarah's preference for using scissors (see HipToPieceSquares entry Let the Sewing Begin) is beginning to make me rethink rotary cutting and the use of templates. I might have to try that on another quilt and see if I get better results.

I probably have about 2/3 of VA Reel blocks done. Once I get the inner portion done I'll probably set it aside while I try to make my mind up on what to do with the borders. While I waffle on that I'll work on the Wanna Buy A Bunny Quilt. (I'll try to put pictures up soon so that you can help me decide on a border and see how the bunny quilt is coming along.)

Well I gotta run because Mom wants to go shopping. Oh, but before I go I have to tell you about the card my husband gave me for our anniversary. We celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary this weekend. Mom was sweet enough to sit M- while we spent a night at a hotel on the beach. Hal was very pleased with the card he had found, it had thread stitched onto the front to form wine glasses. (I'll have to post a picture of it too.) He was so sweet to find a card that incorporated something I liked into it ... Mainly sewing and thread. :>

Well off to the store with me, talk with you again soon ;>