and my fave, the poppy.
14 February 2006
A bunch of flowers for Valentine's
I am contemplating joining a quilting circle but thus far, none have really convinced me ... so I have to plow on solo. But at one of the groups, a lady was showing her floral appliqués that I found quite impressive.
and my fave, the poppy.
and my fave, the poppy.
13 February 2006
My first question ;-)
A few days ago, I received this eMail:
"I recently discovered your blog online and was thrilled to see the most recent post - the burgundy quilt with the contrasting quilting thread. The pattern is beautiful so far - I hope you keep posting pictures as the project progresses!
I'm new to quilting. I'm working on my first quilt top, a simple block design that I'm hand stitching (my sewing machine is about 5000 kms away at the moment!). I haven't started any actual quilting yet, and for this project I'll probably do very simple quilting following the lines of my blocks to learn to stitch evenly - but I have a question! I hope to do more elaborate quilting patterns in the future, like yours, and wonder how you plan your quilting design? Do you draw the lines you'll follow on the fabric with chalk, or what?
How do you make sure it's centred and even on all sides? I'm learning on my own so there's no one here to ask for advice (I'm living temporarily in Halifax, Canada, and can't find any local quilters, alas)."
First of all, thanks for asking little old me! As for your questions: I didn't really "plan" this quilt anywhere beyond this stage:
This is a shot of all the little images cut from two or three returns of the Monsoon fabric placed onto the backgroud fabric with the border fabric laid to the side.
Looking back I've been quite speedy in applying all these little quadrangles because this following shot is dated July 1:
and this was taken on July 26
In the meantime, I had chosen a design from a book on (traditional) Indian designs:
As you can see, the design is not square. I managed to find a way around that by copying an eighth of the whole design to make myself a quarter. Huh? Imagine a clock: I took the part from noon to 1:30 o'clock and copied it, traced those line on the reverse side of my copy, cut out that new "piece of cake" and attached it to my first part so that it became 1:30 o'clock to 3 o'clock. This quarter I copied four times on a copying machine, taped it together and had my "master plan".
Out of this I cut the centre piece:
traced this using a quilting pencil - but I've been told that regular coloured pencils work just as well. Some use slivers of soap which wash away, obviously. But the pencil fades too, so no worries there.
The outer part of my design gave me a heart-ache when I started making the stencils for tracing. So I gave up on accuracy and just "went with the flow". It is reasonably crooked but, hey, this is hand-made. It doesn't need to be exact and square. It won't be anyway.
This was the most difficult part: giving up on exact lines and succumbing to the hand-made look.
So far, it's coming along nicely, I'll just have to finish the centre piece and then do a bit more free hand swirly loopy machine quilting. I hope to have it completed by February 23 but I'm not holding my breath.
To go back to your original question, I don't really plan my quilts so far. I have a faint idea of what I want to have and just plow ahead. To me, quilting is a lot about the process itself. I have two small children and a very busy life, quilting to me is luxury, unwinding on the sofa and relaxing while still seeing a result. Also, some quilts need wonkiness, such as these:
- a quilt made by Tonya - or this one:
- the Stargazey Cuppaz quilt by Jan.
If you click on those photos, the link will take you to Tonya's and Jan's blog to check out their other works, too. I can only recommend that ;-)
"I recently discovered your blog online and was thrilled to see the most recent post - the burgundy quilt with the contrasting quilting thread. The pattern is beautiful so far - I hope you keep posting pictures as the project progresses!
I'm new to quilting. I'm working on my first quilt top, a simple block design that I'm hand stitching (my sewing machine is about 5000 kms away at the moment!). I haven't started any actual quilting yet, and for this project I'll probably do very simple quilting following the lines of my blocks to learn to stitch evenly - but I have a question! I hope to do more elaborate quilting patterns in the future, like yours, and wonder how you plan your quilting design? Do you draw the lines you'll follow on the fabric with chalk, or what?
How do you make sure it's centred and even on all sides? I'm learning on my own so there's no one here to ask for advice (I'm living temporarily in Halifax, Canada, and can't find any local quilters, alas)."
First of all, thanks for asking little old me! As for your questions: I didn't really "plan" this quilt anywhere beyond this stage:
This is a shot of all the little images cut from two or three returns of the Monsoon fabric placed onto the backgroud fabric with the border fabric laid to the side.
Looking back I've been quite speedy in applying all these little quadrangles because this following shot is dated July 1:
and this was taken on July 26
In the meantime, I had chosen a design from a book on (traditional) Indian designs:
As you can see, the design is not square. I managed to find a way around that by copying an eighth of the whole design to make myself a quarter. Huh? Imagine a clock: I took the part from noon to 1:30 o'clock and copied it, traced those line on the reverse side of my copy, cut out that new "piece of cake" and attached it to my first part so that it became 1:30 o'clock to 3 o'clock. This quarter I copied four times on a copying machine, taped it together and had my "master plan".
Out of this I cut the centre piece:
traced this using a quilting pencil - but I've been told that regular coloured pencils work just as well. Some use slivers of soap which wash away, obviously. But the pencil fades too, so no worries there.
The outer part of my design gave me a heart-ache when I started making the stencils for tracing. So I gave up on accuracy and just "went with the flow". It is reasonably crooked but, hey, this is hand-made. It doesn't need to be exact and square. It won't be anyway.
This was the most difficult part: giving up on exact lines and succumbing to the hand-made look.
So far, it's coming along nicely, I'll just have to finish the centre piece and then do a bit more free hand swirly loopy machine quilting. I hope to have it completed by February 23 but I'm not holding my breath.
To go back to your original question, I don't really plan my quilts so far. I have a faint idea of what I want to have and just plow ahead. To me, quilting is a lot about the process itself. I have two small children and a very busy life, quilting to me is luxury, unwinding on the sofa and relaxing while still seeing a result. Also, some quilts need wonkiness, such as these:
- a quilt made by Tonya - or this one:
- the Stargazey Cuppaz quilt by Jan.
If you click on those photos, the link will take you to Tonya's and Jan's blog to check out their other works, too. I can only recommend that ;-)
9 February 2006
Because my progress shots ...
didn't turn out well at all, I thought I'd at least post this:
It's a snippet of a Klimt portrait and I love the different patterns that seem to almost interlock.
It's a snippet of a Klimt portrait and I love the different patterns that seem to almost interlock.
18 January 2006
Progress
is being made:
I will finish the central quilting soon, I hope. In the meantime, I need to make up my mind what to do the the rest. Currently, I'm debating quilting around every appliquéd image in that same bronzey gold and then machine quilting the rest in swirly loops in burgundy.
I'm also proud to report that I am joining a quilting group in a nearby town. They are pretty difficult to come by in my homecountry but the US military presence helps a lot. Some groups currently can't even take new non-military members on board because of US quilt guild rules.
I will finish the central quilting soon, I hope. In the meantime, I need to make up my mind what to do the the rest. Currently, I'm debating quilting around every appliquéd image in that same bronzey gold and then machine quilting the rest in swirly loops in burgundy.
I'm also proud to report that I am joining a quilting group in a nearby town. They are pretty difficult to come by in my homecountry but the US military presence helps a lot. Some groups currently can't even take new non-military members on board because of US quilt guild rules.
15 January 2006
Simple designs
Tristan, our godson, drew this for me. I like the simplicity of the design and use of limited colour.
12 January 2006
All Geri's fault!
Charles Baudelaire: The Flowers of Evil. You are
one of the most loved and hated poetic works.
Death and decadence are important themes for
you, but none should overlook your impressive
aesthetics, either. Deep down youre not evil at
all, you just like to play the tough guy on the
block.
Which literature classic are you?
brought to you by Quizilla
4 January 2006
Food for thought
I've been intrigued by (visual) [art] journals for some time now and have just stumbled onto an interesting post over at In a minute ago.
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