Quilts

Good Heart Quilters • Quilt Retreat 2016

July 16, 2016July 12, 2016 Elizabeth E.9 Comments

The 5th Annual Good Heart Quilters Retreat began last Friday morning (7/8/16). For those of you who don’t know yet about this small quilting group I participate in, The Good Heart Quilters began meeting about 20 years ago, and have been meeting about once a month, taking summers off. Five years ago, Lisa decided she wanted to do a retreat, so she clears out all the furniture, brings in tables and chairs and we come and sew (or mostly sing and talk, it seems like) for two days in July.

She also invites her relatives to join us, so they all schlep down from Utah/Washington, which is really fun. Above is Elly, our newest member. In the background are Nycole and Brittany.

I always believe I will get something done, which is a complete fantasy. On Friday, I made four log cabin bee blocks, all the wrong size, and put this Chuck Nohara square together, then had to rip it apart when it didn’t fit. I did make it over to Costco at dinner time and brought back an “All-American Chocolate Cake” (aka, “Death by Chocolate”) so the day wasn’t a total loss.

Lori just puts her head down and goes. This is the culmination of her LQS Sampler Saturdays.

Jean is another who quilts and quilts and gets her blocks sewn together at retreat. She’s amazing.

Coming back from dinner. I think we had about 12 sewers on machines, and one doing handwork.

We had two more join us on Saturday, which is when I pulled out all my words from the Spelling Bee I’m in, and tried to make some to fill in where I didn’t have. Again, a total illusion that I’ll actually get something done.

We do Show and Tell at Saturday lunch. This is Brittany’s.

Charlotte did a quilt with Monopoly Fabrics.

Nycole made a quilt in her husband’s favorite soccer team’s colors, and played us the RSL song that is sung at the games.

Laurel finished her exquisite Millefiore Hexie Quilt-A-Long, and even has it backed to a border. I love this one! (Mine sits in pieces on the guest room bed–six months down, six to go.)

Simone’s been working on a baby quilt: free-form hexies will be appliquéd to a very creative front.

And YES! I finished something: Simone’s word for this month’s Spelling Bee. She’s playing with all our minds and asking us to make the names of colors in a color other than is indicated.

Lisa sent us home with lots of goodies, all in a Daiso Japan zipper case — thank you, Lisa!! See you all next year!

Hallowe’en 1904 QAL–Step Six • Final Post

July 13, 2016January 12, 2017 Elizabeth E.6 Comments

First up, some business to take care of.

I recently had a post about creativity/uniqueness/Uppercase/Collaboration, where I had a giveaway with two Uppercase magazines and a charm pack of Uppercase Fabric. So many of your comments were incredibly thoughtful about the process of creativity and the quality of being unique. Several were very encouraging to me, which was quite appreciated and touched my heart. Of course, I’ve pasted them in my journal for those less-than-stellar creative days. Thank you all so very much.

I used the True Random Number Generator (I like to spread the love around the random number generators), and it picked Mary, of NeedledMom. Email is on it’s way to you, Mary, and I’ll get the treats mailed off to you this week!

Okay, back to Halloween 1904. This was our schedule:

Step 1 (Preparation): February 13, 2016–buy all the fabrics and find the pattern. Patterns are available from Primitive Gatherings. The quilt measures 90 by 90, which is too large for me, so I’m only doing nine blocks. Each block is 20″ square, and with the outer borders, that should come to roughly 65″ square. I may change my mind, but this looks good from here.

Step 2: March 13, 2016–Cut out the quilt: the tan backgrounds of the squares, the border triangles, the smaller half-square triangles, strips for the wonky stars, but save the piano key border for later.

Step 3: April 13, 2016–Assemble four blocks and add large appliques; use Thelma’s method (of Cupcakes and Daisies) for adding the curlicue stem. Make and add half-square triangeles (HSTs) around these blocks, using the 8-at-a-time method of HSTs.

Step 4: May 13, 2016–Cut and make the wonky star blocks from templates and strips. I’m doing five blocks, so will need to make twenty wonky stars and true them up. Add on the large outside triangles.

Step 5: June 13, 2016–Assemble the rest of the star blocks, by adding their HST borders. In the pattern, they are mixed up and varied, but also harmonized (some have a mix of orange and black, some have just black, some have just orange.) Make your own rules and go with it.

AND NOW! WE ARE AT Step 6: July 13, 2016–Arrange the blocks on your design wall and stitch together. Cut the pieces for your borders. Make the four corner pinwheels. Sew borders together and attach them to the quilt. Ta-Done!!

AND THERE IS AN UPDATE AT THE END OF THIS POST, added December 2016

We finished up here last time, with the center of the quilt put together, the blocks placed and sewn together (and yes, I fixed the lower sawtooth edge on the right). Leisa and I are making a 9-block quilt; the pattern calls for 12 blocks.

Make more HST blocks: there are four blocks per pinwheel, so this time I didn’t use the eight-at-a-time method, but instead, followed the pattern’s recipe for two-at-a-time (check there for dimensions).

Trim each HST to 3″ using your favorite method, then stitch four together to make a pinwheel.

Press, as shown, with all seams to the dark, popping a few stitches in the middle to allow the seam allowances to make their own tiny pinwheel. Halloween6_1

True the corner pinwheel square to 5 1/2.”

You’ll be making four corner pinwheels.

Cut your pieces for your borders, following the pattern directions. For the smaller nine-block quilt, adjust down to 24 total per side. I tried to randomize the sewing of the oranges in between the black pieces, as I had many more different types of orange. Just do your best.

Press the seams going one way. You’ll notice that you begin with a black and end with an orange piece (or visa versa). I chose to press my seams toward the orange, from the black, doing the same on all four border strips.

Matching all the seams, pin and stitch on the borders: I sewed on the top border and the bottom border and pressed the seam away from the quilt top (towards the border). Then I sewed the sides on, but I left one inch free on the beginning of that seam and on the end of that seam, which would allow me to stitch on the pinwheel blocks later. You can kind of see where it’s not sewn down, above.

Now, audition your pinwheels–you’ll like them going one way or the other, or swap them out to get the look that pleases you. But please don’t overthink this step. When you get them how you like them, stitch them on the side borders at both ends. Press. Then finish stitching the side seams.

Halloween6_5 Now press those seams away from the quilt top, towards the border. You are done!

I went outside in the sunset and took pictures of the completed quilt top.

I know when you were deep in wonky stars and then deeper in making millions of half-square triangles, you wanted to quit; however, this last part is easy-peasy, so you should come roaring into the finish line.

All Hallows Eve
Quilt #174
68″ square

Update (December 2016): I finished the quilt, taking it over to my quilter. She got it back to me by the end of November and by December, the binding and sleeve were on.

Here’s the back!
(Now back to the original post)

Congratulations on finishing your Halloween Quilt, and so early! Thanks for following along our QAL. Hope you enjoy your quilt this Halloween!

When you finish, send me a photo (or two) and I’ll put them up on the blog. Happy Haunting, everyone!

Classes

Class with Gwen Marston in San Luis Obispo

July 8, 2016July 7, 2016 Elizabeth E.16 Comments

NOTE: If you are looking for the Uppercase Magazine and fabric giveaway, it’s *here.*

Last weekend I had a chance to take a class from Gwen Marston, who is retiring this year. I have several of her books, and have long been an admirer. It was held in San Luis Obispo, so my husband brought his bike and came with me to help with the driving and so we could enjoy the town. It was held at SLO Creative Studio, a place where they hold classes, teach long-arm quilting. The place was filled with tables and long-arm machines, and touches of Gwen were everywhere, as in the quilt, above. It was fun to see in person.

Just to show you I’m a bonafide Gwen Fan, here’s the quilt I made, inspired by hers.

She started the class a bit early, telling about where she lived, giving us a couple of stories, then launched into the class, which was sewing traditional small quilts. It was fun to hear her talk–she’s very entertaining–and of course, I loved all the small quilts.

Here are some students trying to figure out the sizes of pieces.

Our charge was to get cutting, get sewing. She challenged us to use traditional methods, of cutting a bunch of squares, bunch of triangles, saying the new ways didn’t seem to cut much time from the construction.

The quilts all stacked up.

A couple of her labels. She used to roll the fabric down into a typewriter, type out her label, and then sew it on. Well, they weren’t really labels–they were typing on the sleeve. I enjoyed working in the traditional methods, but I must admit my eye was drawn to this series of baskets (below), made by a student in the previous day’s class.

I took my lunch outside to get a break from the classroom. They had us order in from a local sandwich shop, Ben Franklin’s, which was great. Then I went back in and I sewed and sewed and pressed and sewed the old fashioned way.

I can’t say it was any faster, but it didn’t seem to be slower, either. But I’d have to say it was a more inaccurate to sew together a bunch of squares, than to make strip sets, and measure out my HSTs and know where I was going. I didn’t true up any squares, but just threw it together, so it’s a bit wonky. But I did get something done, which is not always possible when sewing away from my usual space. I seem to have patriotic on my mind, as it was Friday, of the 4th of July weekend.

My husband, after enjoying his bike ride, picked me up and we ran an errand to Betty’s Fabrics, a nice shop in town.

While in SLO (as they abbreviate their town’s name), we also went to their Thursday night Street Market (the night before class) and had barbecue. After class we visited the San Luis Obispo Mission (above), and tucked into the museum to see their exhibit. I loved the mixed media piece below.

And there was a quilt in the exhibit, too!

In the plaza in front of the Mission, a live band was playing (this town has all the fun!). We were able to get a seat out on the patio at Luna Red next door, and ate our happy hour appetizers while enjoying the music. (Black Bean Hummus, above)

After, we sat on the bench just outside the Mission, talked about the bikes in the “bike parking lot” out front, and enjoyed the evening. My husband is most understanding about the quilt passion that seems to leak out of me all the time, as well as being very supportive, which I appreciate more than I can say. Sitting there on the bench, watching the passers-by and just visiting about nothing much, was the perfect ending to a weekend away.

Sometimes it is the small things that matter most.

Chuck Nohara · Creating · Giveaway · Quilts

Uppercase Fabrics, Kevin Umana, and Creativity Breakout

July 5, 2016April 9, 2018 Elizabeth E.81 Comments

This post is the story of two creatives, well, maybe three. One is an artist living and working in Los Angeles. That’s Kevin Umaña, up there.

Another is Janine Vangool, a graphic artist and editor-in-chief of Uppercase Magazine in Canada, who recently released a line of fabric through Windham Fabrics (photo of Janine from *here*).

And then there’s me, but you know what I look like.

And it’s also the tale of two quilts and a quilt block (which is at the end, by the giveaway from Uppercase and Janine, so keep reading).

Some time ago, my nephew linked me over to Kevin’s Instagram feed, as he knew I am slightly passionate about quilts and designs, and I’m especially in love the the “grid.” Apparently Kevin loves it too, as well as color and shape and repeated lines. (All these images are posted with his permission.)

I had sort of been in a creative slump, slightly burned out, not really knowing what to do next besides bee blocks and the Same Old. Idly scrolling through Kevin’s feed one afternoon, I found a few designs that interested me; he and I began to correspond, and then collaborate.

About the same time, Uppercase Magazine‘s Janine Vangool announced that they were producing an Encyclopedia (images from Uppercase’s website), and the one that interested me was her Stitch-Illo, one of three that was launching the Encyclopedia series. Since I’d missed submitting to her Compendium (which is always on my nightstand), I went right to her website and started choosing pictures to submit, planning on getting the submission in early. Everything was going along swimmingly until I hit this question: “What makes your work unique?”

Unique?

No matter what I wrote, it sounded trite and useless and idiotic and banal and cliched, and believe I re-wrote the answer to that question about 50 times. I felt dead in the water. (I’m sure Kevin wondered what happened to me.) It was like coming up to a mirror and instead of seeing a reflection of my image, it was like seeing past me into an empty sewing room, forty million quilts stacked to the ceiling, but they were all somebody else’s vision or creation or idea. Nothing unique anywhere.

That question rattled around in my head while on a trip with my husband, and where it rained nearly every day, giving me lots of time to think. I slowly reviewed all the quilts I had pictures for while sitting in my hotel room, wondering; do we all make the same quilt, over and over? Not our own same quilt, but the One of the Moment, currently seen on everyone’s Instagram feed, or splashed all over the quilty magazines? Where was my unique? If someone saw one of my quilts, would they say, “Oh, yes–that’s Elizabeth’s!” And if I really had a unique, what was it? What did it look like? How could I tell it from someone else’s?

And in my more cynical moments, I’d say, “Well who cares, if it’s unique? Doesn’t matter enough that I’m a maker, that I express myself with cloth and sewing and cutting and stitching?” Really helpful, right?

Back home, I began looking at Kevin’s designs again. In college we were encouraged to do “imitations” of writers, using their form in order to get the meter and the words under our creative nails, as a way of training up a writer. It was a form of limiting, giving us structure, but not letting us off the rails, so to speak. So I decided to allow Kevin’s form to give me structure. And I chose to limit my fabrics to a (delightful) bundle of Janine’s Uppercase fabrics, which I’d purchased at Market.

The first experiment (above) with Kevin’s work was almost an exact copy.

But the second quilt took off on its own.

The center cross morphed.

Somewhere in here, the experiment sparked an original idea. And when I quilted, I kept seeing more.

Crossroads, after Umaña • Quilt #166

Until finally, I’m here.

I won’t tell you what I wrote for Uppercase, because in a way, it’s really irrelevant to the idea of this particular story. What resonates is that challenge laid down in those words of the application, one that I think about to this day. I’m incredibly grateful to Kevin for allowing me to collaborate with him, and to borrow a little from his light when I needed it.

I’m also grateful to creatives who make fabrics for me to use, such as the excellent line shown in this post. All fabrics, with the exception of the solid white, are from Janine Vangool’s Uppercase Fabrics line. Yes, even the wee metallic letters in the sunglasses below, an echo of Kevin’s at the top of the post.

(Chuck Nohara block #345. Pattern for the Crossroads quilt coming soon to Craftsy.)

And finally, the cheesy way to close out a conundrum: let somebody else do the talking for you.

I narrow-mindedly outlawed the word ‘unique.’ Practically every press release contains it. Practically nothing ever is. (Fred Hechinger)

Every person born in this world represents something new, something that never existed before, something original and unique and every man or woman’s foremost task is the actualization of his or her unique, unprecedented and never recurring possibilities. (Martin Buber)

Always remember that you are absolutely unique. Just like everyone else. (Margaret Mead)

Nobody can be exactly like me. Even I have trouble doing it. (Tallulah Bankhead)

When I saw Janine at Quilt Market, her booth was handing out free Uppercase Magazines. Since I’ve been a subscriber for several years, I mentioned to Janine that with the free magazine I could instead do a Giveaway on my blog, and she handed me another magazine, her fabric catalogue and the charm pack of her fabrics to sweeten the pot. ~~To enter, please leave a comment. Blog followers get double their chances (shameless promotion), but it’s not necessary to follow to win.~~

NOTE: Giveaway now closed. Thanks to all who entered.

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And finally…

…congratulations to the winner of the Dresden Carnival book, Beth T, who wrote about making a squared Dresden plate block for her niece’s quilt. I’ve sent you an email and I’ll get that off to you this week. Thank you to all who entered. You have lovely Dresden Plate Memories!