Very Belated Look at Finished Quilts From 2022

It's way late to do a end of the year wrap up post so if this isn't your thing, please feel free to move along. It's mostly for my own records anyway, since quilts tend to get lost in the shuffle if I don't keep track. Last year ended with a respectable 15 quilts totally finished up. Not my best number, but definitely nothing to sneeze at. If I wouldn't have gotten so sick, there would possibly have been another to add to the list. Apparently it wasn't meant to be!

2022 Finishes (1)

As per usual, I find myself reaching for a mix of applique quilts to put in the hoop and then, maybe a totally machine pieced quilt just to change things up. As the years go by, there seems to be less and less quilts without some form of applique involved in the making. Hmm... I wonder what that says about me?

2022 Finishes (2)

I always keep a master list of completed quilt tops which is supposed to have the projects listed in order of completion. This helps ensure that I don't end up neglecting a quilt top well beyond the point of being impossible to drum up interest in quilting on it. This list is, of course, cheerfully ignored at whim. Mostly tops are pulled out of the drawers depending on whatever color and mood {or vibe} that I'm currently searching for. Or if a quilt is destined to be gifted. Sometimes that moves a quilt top up to the top of the list in a hurry!

2022 Finishes (3)

Quite to my surprise, the quilt top list shrunk last year--down to 20 unfinished quilt tops! And two of those tops were given to me by my sister a couple years ago, so really. They don't even hardly count.

So..., the 2022 Finished Quilt details:

• 7 Lap Quilts
• 7 Bed Quilts
• 1 Comfort Quilt
• 9 Quilts completely hand quilted
• 5 Quilts mixed hand quilting and machine quilting
• 1 Quilt completely machine quilted
• 8 Quilts gifted, gently used or newly finished

Towards the end of the year I had quite a few ideas and goals for the winter quilting efforts and going into this year. All of that has been turned upside down and now I really don't know if I'm coming or going. I had to cancel the winter quilting meetings at our church after losing the entire month of January. Thankfully, everyone seemed very understanding. Am finally starting to feel somewhat normal again, but am still not at 100%. Have only left the house five times in fact since this all started, but I'm getting there! Which, frankly, is a huge relief. I'm asking everyone to please give comment amnesty for past posts. Have so appreciated the kind comments, but did not have the energy most days to try and 'catch up'. 

Cheddar fabric

I also wanted to give a shout-out to Lizzy at Gone to the Beach blog. She has a very charming blog that I have followed for years and years. At some point this winter, she had offered to send me some pieces of cheddar colored fabric to help out with a specific project where the stash totes were seemingly lacking. By the time we had made proper connection, I tried to tell her that I was actually currently too sick to be working on any quilt project. She insisted, I couldn't resist and these fabrics have been such a joy to me just to look at, even if only wistfully in passing. Really, really sweet of her to share fabric so generously! 

Still haven't done anything meaningful with that project yet, but you know me. It's only a matter of proper time and focus. If I have any big plans for 2023, it's to take time, try and be mindful and not be in a big rush to check things off a list. Thanks to all who keep checking in with the blog. I'm not ditching it, I promise! {Though the posting might be slow for a bit.} I am reading and trying to catch up on quilting blogs now and finding myself missing some older blogs that have totally drifted away. There are a lot of things still needing my attention before I can dive into quilting at full throttle and well, guilt free? At least I am slowly starting to get in a bit of hand work most evenings. Have missed it so very much.... 

All the Hiccups in the Process

The Big Kiss quilt is totally finished up now! This one was started back in 2020 mostly because I could not resist the siren call of the simple, graphic design. 

The Big Kiss quilt is finished!

The top was complete {I thought} in about June of that year, but then, it just wasn't. I fiddled around with idea during the following January and then, finally got to true-blue quilt top stage by April. 

A little applique can go a very long ways!

Anyone who knows me understands that a quilt top has to be 'just right' before I can rest easy. And now it has a lot more of ME in it, I totally can.

Keeping the stitching simple as usual

I went with a very basic stitching pattern in those long strips. Totally copied Clare because it just made sense to keep things simple. The more that I stitched, the more I fell in love with this cheerful, happy quilt.

It definitely has the cozy vibe I usually shoot for

It always seemed kind of like a step-quilt instead of the real deal if you know what I mean, but now? I'm thinking it's all coming together just the way it was always meant to be.

Can't even hardly tell where the fabric was pieced

It's been really challenging over the past couple years to pull fabrics just from the stash totes and hardly ever buy anything new. Sometimes I feel like I'm thriving in this make-it-up, make-it-work sort of effort. The creativity is going gangbusters and good quilts are being made.

Using it up on the back

Then, at other times, I look at the available fabric and sort of die inside. What in the world is this garbage and what possibly good can come from that? But yeah. I'm sort of digging in and definitely not giving up. For instance, that batik fabric really did get used on the backside of the Big Kiss quilt. Uh huh. On over half the back in fact. Yep, I did soak it in boiling water {thanks for the tip!} and that helped soften the fibers. Also bled out a whole lotta black dye so now it looks more purple {in the soaking water thank goodness}. Whoopsie daisy! Now it doesn't match and blend quite so wonderful anymore.

AHIQ Hourglass quilt top

I'm sure the people using the quilt in the future will totally turn up their nose at the quilt and think it's 'not good enough'. 'Cuz that's clearly what all users of awesome quilts do.... And I'm still gonna make awesome quilts even if they are a different kind of awesome because of those self imposed limitations. Can you tell that I was a teenager in the 80's?

Time for the quilting stitches to commence!

The AHIQ Hourglass Tulips quilt is the next up for quilting. I am so loving the raspberry pink in the hoop! Just makes me feel happy to be stitching on it. It seems so basic, I should be able to plow through this one in a week or so, right? But no. It will probably be a good three weeks to a month like all the others. 

The strangely appealing blend of green blues, pink and olive

Kind of funny that I'm doing the hand applique for the cut-out tulip shapes from behind that AHIQ quilt right now. Kind of a compare and contrast thing. It's a really interesting color palette that I'm experimenting with, all the funny, old green/blues. I took the stack of fabrics and tried to use all the bits that I could in the block backgrounds. So much work but always something that I enjoy seeing in the finished product. These lanky tulips will obviously have their very own vibe and that's a relief. I can tell you that I'm still consciously {and unconsciously} dreaming up ideas for other tulip quilts, and actively working on them only makes it worse. It's probably starting to be a condition.

Still working at the applique ideas

Still playing with the possible applique for the Improv. Strip Quilt #2 Blue too. I know what some of you were saying about it looking fine without the applique, the quilting stitches filling in texture later on etc. Uh huh. Yep. I totally agree. But the thing is, it just doesn't feel like a me quilt for some inexplicable reason so I can't leave it alone. Just can't. 

Putting the flower shape inside an oval shape and then shortening the stem helped a lot, as did flipping the leaves so the tips were pointing down. Then it looked like it was sort of plopped onto the quilt top and soooo of course I had to make scallop shapes to over-compensate. And now we're cooking with Crisco! Totally feeling that glimmer of satisfaction of an idea starting to bloom. Such a hideous fabric with all the starfish and other fishy things on it. Uggh. Can't even believe it will do the trick, but the color was perfection for what was needed. Am thinking this is the real deal but we'll see after some more time spent simmering.

Kind of a county fair look

Got the main part of A Tisket-A Tasket quilt top put together. Now I will be pursuing borders. I mean, look at it? It doesn't have that I-am-completed look at all yet. Terribly hard to get a good picture of this one as the colors are so yellow-brownish it looks dull very easily. In actuality, it has a soft, down to earth vibe that feels somehow restful but cheery. I know, totally contradictory. Gonna have to trust me on this one.

Putting the quilts out there for stitching inspiration

And that's it for the quilt wrap-up for the last week or so. The bags of quilts are what I took to the last quilt meeting for people to look at in terms of quilting stitches and also, thread colors in use. One of the younger gals asked me to bring examples and it was a lot harder to put together than you might think. Once I started pulling quilts off of shelves it seemed that they all just sort of looked alike. At one point I threw my hands up in despair and told my daughter it seemed that all my quilts were practically identical! 

Hmm.. Maybe that's because I tend to use the same color palettes over and over until I get it 'just right'. Or I continually play with limited color palettes or softer hues. Maybe because I take the cast offs and cut outs from previous projects and dive right into the next quilt? Do basic hand quilting on all the finished quilts? Or perhaps it's because I've worked and worked for years, trying to get my voice inserted into every single part of my quilts. Yeah. It could really be just that simple.*whew! I was starting to think things were getting starting to get boring around here.

Seriously though, as crazy as it seems, it took me a couple days to work through that conundrum. It didn't help that I was right in the middle of perusing all my gathered stacks of fabric and trying to assign quilt design/ideas to many of them.  Coming up very empty. Feeling antsy and disconnected as a result of all this time spent directing my time to strippy quilts and planning directions and demos for quilt meetings. It took several days of fondling fabric and rearranging the stacks, looking through the inspiration binders, Pinterest boards, and even the quilt top drawers! until I found my center again. What is it that I truly want to make? Am I doing that? Or am I just going through the motions? Why is it that I use so much cream/green/gray/brown whatever fabric and can never find a piece of fabric large enough for good background flow? Does everything have to have applique? Silly, silly questions like that.

If you know anything about me, it's that I LOVE making quilts. Passionately, scarily laser-like focused in on what's coming next. When I start questioning what it is I'm actually producing and if it's any good? Well... it can get a little hairy around here. Okay, quilty meltdown all over, crisis has been averted. Time to get quilting!

Is It Really March Already?

There's been a lot going on at the home front lately. Nothing new and earth shattering, just the normal things that burn up the time. I put the last of the hand quilting stitching in Spring Flowers and found a little moment to machine sew the binding on. Maybe I can hand stitch the binding down later this week when my company gets here.

Spring Flowers moving along

One of my sister-in-laws will be here for a long weekend and other family will be in town too. Second weekend in a row for out of town company. Always nice to have a bit of hand work ready to go for these times. When my hands are busy maybe my mouth will be less so? lol

Big Kiss getting ready for the hoop!

I also managed to get the Big Kiss quilt sandwiched and pinned. Went ahead and kept the Batik backing, though I did soak it in boiling water for several hours, refreshing when the water cooled. So far it's behaving nicely, though not quite as easy to quilt through as a normal 100% cotton fabric. Or a woven fabric backing. Thank goodness it's not a large quilt!

Always enjoy seeing the applique bits

Lovely to work on a colorful quilt after the softer colors of the previous one. It's good to mix things up and keep things interesting. Still working on the Improv. quilt for the quilt meetings. It's driving me crazy to keep to the slower pace, but I am super glad that I went ahead and decided to make a new quilt alongside of everyone else. Much, much easier when it comes to the demonstrations.

Improv. Quilt strip sets getting cut

And.... somehow I found myself jumping into a brand new quilt project. It's improv. strips too, but these are 17'18" long instead of 10". This is something that I've been thinking about for most of a year. Probably be for my youngest sons, thus the color choices. He always somehow ends up with blues and golds and browns. Good thing he likes them!

The new Improv. quilt

At this moment in time I've got all the slabs sewn. I'm doing repeats of fabric instead of mixing them all up and I think that's going to work very well with what I have planned, but we'll see. For now, it's a little bit boring!

Probably have too many slabs!

As you can see, I snuck a plaid shirt in with the fabrics. I love the look considering it's intended for a mans quilt. Am currently trying to decide if I want to have straight cuts on the ends of my cross-cut strips or if I want to go with the more organic look. Does it even matter? Questions, questions.

Testing out the strip sets

Here's the videos my daughter helped me put together for the last quilt meeting. She was very insistent that this would be a good thing. Hmm... Prior to the meeting we knew there would be two to three people absent and I'm not thrilled with the calls for 'catching up'. Also, I wanted everyone to have the option of refreshing their memory in case they got stuck. This phase of cross-cutting the rows seemed important for everyone to get right.

1st part of Cross-Cutting the strip sets

I typed out a sheet and drew some diagrams as well, but some people are more visual. As you can see, I was TERRIBLY nervous to be doing a video {and this was our 2nd take!} So crazy. Can't think of the proper words for what I'm doing and my mind is just doing a constant stutter. Like I'm looking down at myself thinking, what is she doing????  I think I've relaxed a little bit in class by now and it always helps to go around and personally help people after demonstrations. Then I can make sure they are 'getting' it, they can ask questions while they are attempting to do what I just showed them, and no-one feels ridiculous. One on one just feels more natural all the way around.

2nd part of Cross-Cutting the strip sets

Please don't be too critical of our video. Oh my goodness, I can't even believe I'm showing you this! My daughter is not a pro. I am not a pro. No money is exchanging hands! We are just doing the best that we can and hopefully helping a few people learn how to quilt. Also, in class, I always try to go through things a couple of times and of course, tell them, {over and over} there are many ways to do things. I am showing you this way for the purposes of this quilt! 

While walking around and helping after, some people were eventually {instinctively} using the right sides of their mats to line up the slabs and/or whatever else made the most sense to them personally. Which I love and encourage. I tried to show how to straighten the ends of the cross-cut rows using 'just the ruler' and some people liked that better. I know I do. The beginning quilters however, liked having the crutch of lining up the whole row along a horizontal line and cutting along a bold vertical line. Whatever it takes! 

So far there is a very good feeling at classes, lots of smiles and camaraderie. Most are moving along with the project without feeling pushed or pressured so I've had to back off of trying to hurry it along at a faster pace. I come home after the classes all wired up and can't turn off my brain for a couple of hours. Did I do that right? Am I really encouraging them to enjoy quilting? Ahhhhh.....

I am really enjoying the colors of my project, but I've already made one almost exactly like this design-wise. I'm finding myself wondering what I can do in order to spice things up. Of course I am.... Hmm... maybe I can make an applique centerpiece and leave the middle out? If it was oval that would be even more interesting, just have to cut the center out instead! Lots to think about for sure. Hopefully we'll all have a brand new quilt top by the end of March. When/if that happens I'll try to post a pic of all our finishes!

Extra Time Just to Get it Right

Do you remember the Big Kiss quilt? Over the winter I decided that it probably needed more attention and pulled it out of the finished quilt top drawers for further scrutiny. {Or maybe it wouldn't quit haunting me?} After much pondering, I finally decided to go for it. The applique that I decided on has been prepped and waiting for quite awhile, just patiently waiting their turn in the queue!

Big Kiss quilt top is finished! 

It's kind of a bold looking border, but very simple in terms of hand work. Then of course,  I made it more complicated by deciding to put a little crown on the top of the center flowers {for the pomegrante effect}, and then later, eight leaves on each border instead of four. Just can't leave well enough alone!

Close-up of the border work

I did something that rarely happens around here, with the fussy cut flowers on the ends of the vines. There was only a fat quarter of that particular fabric, so there wasn't a lot of cutting options to choose from. Some of the flowers look better than the others! It seemed like they needed to be cut out larger, but that wasn't possible either.

Fussy cut flowers

In the end, I just made that specific fabric work {regardless of its limitations} because it really looked to be the best option for the overall look I was aiming for! In the case of the flower below, I actually pieced four different pieces of fabric together from that same fat quarter. Super obvious up close, but not at all noticeable from a distance. Whatever. It works, right?

Very pieced flower

Though the border fabric looks quite black in some of these pics, the previous color is probably closest to reality, more of a dark gray. That charcoal-ish gray really makes the colors pop and lift up the entire quilt. On another note, I knew there was a bit of bias stretch in this quilt and wowsers! Adding the borders made that even more obvious. As I was sewing, that is. 

The Whole quilt

I carefully measured and pinned so that I didn't make things worse and in fact, it looks quite a bit better overall. Crossing my fingers that the hand quilting {which will happen later on} will ease out the worst of the rumples. It usually does! 

 So glad that I went with my instincts and tapered the vines down in a slight curve instead of keeping them in that straight line that I originally intended. Looks loads better this way! The only thing that I seriously regret at this point, is that I wish the little pomegranate crowns would have been pushed down further behind the flower. Oh well. What's done is done! The quilt top definitely has a cozier, more personal vibe than it did before and really, that's all that matters. We are all very happy campers now and this top is going straight back into quilt top drawers for a good long nap....

Loving the brighter colors!

Moving on to a different project, here's a few pics of the 1991 quilt that somehow snuck into the hand quilting line-up. It was never, ever my intention to hand quilt this one, but since the HST Medallion has been finished up, I've been gravitating to really basic hand quilting efforts.

An old project

Sometimes it doesn't even matter what is in the hoop, it just matters that the stitching can be done with a minimal amount of thinking, marking and effort! Call me crazy, but I just adore hand stitching through strips and log cabin type quilts are an easy pick-me-up.

30 years married in June!

This is such an oldy moldy quilt start, I almost don't even like the color palette anymore. Most of the blocks are from the early 2000's and all the house blocks were finished up by 2007. They represent the first seven homes my husband and I lived in after we were married, one of those 'good idea quilts' that never really gained enough traction to flourish.

Very soft colors

At some point, I did a Marie Kondo thing to the quilt room and purposefully got rid of many of the parts. This top is what happened when I decided to make a few comfort quilts from various orphan blocks here in the quilt room. Whether or not this ends up being given away though, remains to be seen. This quilt finish would have positively delighted me even ten years ago. Today, I'm working on much more exciting things, though of course, I'm happy to bring it to a proper finish.

Interesting to see it without the words...

Speaking of which .... Here's Coronacrazy, back for another day in the sun! It's trimmed down now, with a strong looking sashing added on. I loved the look of the edges before the sashing was sewn on, but alas, there's no way to finish up a quilt without adding fabric onto the sides, be it sashing, border or even a binding!

Working on the border

As per usual these days, I had to make-do the border, as most of the yardage I have is in too small of a piece for the entire surround. That's okay though, as the look is very appealing to me in it's rough form. Add a little bit of applique over the top, and I'm practically swooning!

All prepped and ready for hand work

See? There's always a silver lining if you care to look for it! I ended up using a striped green fabric for the vine and what you see in the previous picture is where I determined to sew it onto the border. All prepped and ready to go! One large applique flower is cut out and ready for hand work too. It had to be figured out before moving forward as the vine will be tucked underneath at both sides of the flower. 

The vine will actually only be sewn down within a couple inches of each border length {for now} as several parts of it will need to 'flow' from one border to the next. A little bit of extra time and effort trying to get this all figured out 'prior' to sewing the borders onto the centerpiece, but very worthwhile in the long run. Though it might not be obvious to the casual reader, I do actually expend quite a bit of effort trying to sew as much of the applique onto smaller pieces of the quilt, rather than try and work with a whole big quilt! If I wasn't such a make-it-up-as-I-go sort of quilter, things would probably go along much more smoothly. Hmm... maybe not.