Out With the Old, In With the New

This quilt was a great choice for putting in the hoop this time of year. I don't even remember the last time I had this much cabin fever! It's not that we've been housebound or been without electric etc., it must just be the long, never-ending winter getting to me. I'd obviously never survive living in Alaska like some of you hardy souls who seem to do just fine up north!

Improv. Postage Stamp Basket quilt is a finish!

Improv. Postage Stamp Baskets quilt has been like a breath of fresh air. The word I keep coming back to when thinking about this quilt is 'restful'. So very relaxing to stitch on this quilt. It's been much needed! I can't wait to throw this one one the bed and see how serene it makes our bedroom feel.

A little bit of basket handle stitching in the setting triangles

 As usual, the decision about what to stitch in the sashing part of the quilt was quite painful. I feel incredibly un-creative about sashings and one-fabric borders and just generally sort of panic at the thought. This time I went with my gut {although when do I ever really not do that?} and did what seemed easiest. It definitely helped when I saw that Lucy had made the same choice in her most recent finish. Her work is always so beautiful that no-one could possibly ever complain that she was taking the easy way out!

An odd color palette for me, but I'm loving it!

Though some say that these postage stamp baskets don't immediately show as baskets, I kinda like the subtle impact of the design. They were made in the improv. style which means they are not perfect at all. All the strings are varied in size which makes me like them all the more.

There's just something about hand quilting....

Originally I thought to mix up the baskets so that each block had baskets with all vertical strings or all horizontal strings. That just created a very confusing medley of conflicting blues and greens and so it seemed safer to keep all stringy baskets the same per block. In the end I found that I rather liked the way those aligning strings met up at the cornerstones, creating an indirect, secondary design. Not hugely impactful, but still, very noticeable when examining close up, such as when it might be lying across someones lap.

It acts like it needs a snuggle....

The only thing that I'm not sure that I like love, is the half cornerstone blocks on the outside of the quilt. They were deliberately chosen to sort of fade away, in direct contrast to the darker fussy-cut flower ones. There's just a question niggling at me, because it almost seems to leave the edges of the quilt looking undone. Or does it? I do love questions and mysteries in a quilt! Oh well! Keeping that in mind, I just doubled down on that particular thought and made sure the binding was extremely soft looking and wouldn't detract in any way from those busy, bossy looking baskets. Overall this quilt would readily go right into the success column, if I had any such thing. Not exactly what I started out thinking it would end up looking like, but now? I just want to cuddle up and take a nap with it. That's a very good vibe in my humble opinion...

Folksy Flower Medallion next up in the hoop!

Next up in the hoop is the Folksy Flower medallion quilt. It was started sometime in 2015 and was in the works for about two years before reaching quilt top completion. The original inspiration was lost to me for the entire time that I was working on the quilt. It was terribly frustrating when starting this quilt as I wanted to reference the picture my brain was trying to re-imagine. Though I searched and searched, I could not find this stupid picture that I KNEW had been saved somewhere in my Pinterest boards! It wasn't until the other day that I finally stumbled upon the picture, way down in the bottom of one of my boards! So crazy to see the similarities between the inspiration and my ultimate interpretation. And I wonder, what would have been different if I could have been viewing the picture all along?

Looking at the center

I do think it very important to give credit to whatever and wherever our original inspiration comes from. If we can. Sometimes we really don't have a clear answer for that and that's probably okay as long as we aren't trying to gain profit from a potential 'copy cat' design. Maybe our idea is even a conglomeration of lots of stimuli. Being awash in social media influence definitely exposes up to lots and lots of different ideas, designs and approaches. Perhaps the seed of an idea is buried so far in our subconscious we begin to think the idea is completely unique to us! You know that could happen to any one of us!  Regardless, I find it fascinating to see how far inspiration can take us into our own spin on things, then turn around and view the two results side by side. 

Getting started with the stitching!

I wondered if this quilt was a little bit too fall-ish to be working on this time of year, but no. We're doing just fine. So far there's very little precision involved in the stitching and that always makes me feel happier to dive into the hand quilting towards the end of the day. Did you notice that one of my clamps on the hoop is cracked? I'm treating it very gently and hoping it holds up for a very long time. Interestingly enough, that's the best side to slide over the bulk of the applique work. Less stress on those stitches when it's not as tight!

I Love Applique. The Round-up Post You Didn't Know You Were Waiting For

Just kidding. You can skip the reading and just skim the pictures. It's no secret that I love applique. If it even comes close to a time where all the applique projects are finished up, then you can be sure that I'm quite, quite busy in the quilt room trying to get yet another one prepped and ready to go! This time of year it is especially nice be doing hand work while enjoying the gorgeous afternoon lighting, a direct result of all the gorgeous snow on the hills and mountains around us.

Just a little ways downriver from where we live....

I can't take credit for that fantastic picture above, but that, my dear friends is often our winter wonderland this time of year. Isn't it beautiful? Though I'm starting to get weary of winter, it's hard to be upset by our views. You can see more of my sisters very talented photography over here if you like, she's really got the skills. In the meantime, I humbly asked to borrow her photo as mine are not proving to be very exciting. Ha! Not telling you anything you didn't already know!

Dried Flowers progress

I went ahead and attacked Dried Flowers {which looks way better than the photo might indicate}, getting the string columns all figured out and attached to the flower blocks. There ended up being a little more of the blue/greens included than I originally thought would be necessary. Still, I'm fairly happy with the results, especially the old time look of the scrappy lighter strips. It took me a couple days to {cut and} sew the large slab blocks together and as always, I was perturbed by all the excess. No matter. I simply drew up a simple baby quilt to use up all the leftover narrow string columns. It just hurts to throw away that much fabric!

An applique addition

Now that the three largest parts of the quilt are sewn together, then it was time to address the horizontal applique strips. I've been envisioning these in my head for quite awhile and was puzzling over how to put it all together. For now, I'm only planning on sewing two of these and placing them between those larger sewn units.When the hand work is finished, they will be stitched onto darker strips and then, possibly? extended into the outer border by a smidge. Still working out the details of that.

I'm pretty sure the original applique design was sparked by a piece of fabric somewhere along the line, but at this point I'm not sure if it was in a quilt or maybe even a shirt that I've worn. It was something that sparked an interest because of the repeating pattern, not because of the specifics of the flowers or leaves. Those elements were drawn and redrawn freehand, until I ended up with something that I feel will work and blend well with the rest of the quilt. Amazing how frustrating it can be to draw simple leaves and/or flowers sometimes! Pretty much the only thing that you can be sure of is when the drawing looks terrible and when the shapes aren't right! Perseverance though, and eventually you end up with something you're originally shooting for. More or less....

Antique Crows before

Speaking of which... Sometimes you just can't get it right no matter how you try! I previously failed to mention that the two bird templates used in this Antique Crow quilt were directly from Cheri Payne Saffiote's 'Wednesday's Best' pattern book. After drawing several different bird fails, I went looking for the person who did the best primitive-look birds ever. She was an incredible Folk Art/Primitive quilt inspiration and always will be. Wouldn't want to deny her any well deserved credit!

Already folded up and put away in the drawers, that quilt just kept nagging at me. Every time I looked at the pics from the last post, the missing leaves on the largest flowers bugged me. Okay, fine. FINE. Have it your way!! And now the largest flowers have their leaves and all is well again. The main reason I left them off in the first place was because all that green felt 'too bright'. Well, now it has more of it and suddenly, it looks more 'right'. Go figure. 

Antique Crows after

Another one of the applique projects lurking in the background is the Melon Patch blocks. They've been around now for a couple years. There are 20 blocks with four stacks of four petals per block. The other day I grabbed the third layer of petals and assigned them to appropriately matching/blending top petals. This means that I am almost ready to start stitching on them. Some day. Do not lose hope. Eventually this forever, slow, mind-numbingly tedious quilt will be seen to be making progress once again. It's really too late to back out now.

Melon Patch petals

And that quilt might be the main reason I have not started on the quilt below, even though I have have fabric picked out and the photo bookmarked for approximately three years.*sigh  One of my aunts {since deceased} bought me this book years and years ago. The Oak Leaf quilt was my favorite quilt in the entire book and I've been quite determined to sew it together one day. Well.... I've recently decided that those particular fabrics stacked up together and simply languishing in a tote {for three years} makes me a little queasy. I could be doing something good with them! There has got to be an answer somewhere for how to accomplish this without marking and cutting out the oak leaves.... and then leaving them languishing in the applique bag for another three to five years.*sigh again

You see my dilemma? I really feel that I want to make this quilt as it will be a lovely reminder of one of my favorite aunts; however, it's also clear that my get-up-and-go is not going anywhere very fast these days. At least as it pertains to this project. So the latest solution I have stumbled upon is to take out the entire center of the quilt and maybe do a centerpiece of sorts. Keep it basic, but intriguing enough so that it will hold my interest, then only sew two rows of those leaf blocks. It might sound crazy to you, but knocking the number of applique blocks down to 40 from 49, sounds a bit more manageable to me. We'll see. This is still in the contemplation stage for sure. I might even do an every other oak leaf block thus cutting the applique down even further! Do I really need more medallion quilts? Sure, why not? And speaking of medallions....

Oak Leaves quilt pondering

When a person loves applique like I do, it's easy to see possibilities everywhere. Do you remember the large cut-out circle from another applique project I posted about back in January?  Well, the other evening when I was hand quilting, this flower shape on the background fabric specifically caught my eye. It's there inside the bottom basket handle, partially cut off if you want to take a look. So my mind starts spinning and I'm thinking about how cool that would look in a quilt. My mind goes to repeating blocks and all those sorts of traditional settings and then, bam! I'm suddenly wondering about taking that large circle cut-out and somehow turning it into one of these gorgeous {similar look} flowers!

Improv. Postage Stamp Basket in the hoop

Can I? Should I? Dare I? Oooh, I just live for these sorts of connections! Once the inspiration was sparked, then I just couldn't hardly wait to get started. But of course, my quilt room is through my sons bedroom and it was late, late in the evening and how rude would that be....  So I had to patiently wait until the next day just to see. And yep! It's going to be a big 'ol seedpod flower for sure. After about 2 hours of drawing and cutting and drawing and cutting, it got to this place.*whew  Those leaves, the proportions of everything.... You certainly didn't expect it to be a walk in the park, now did you?

Seedpod Flower Quilt start

And that's exactly how it works in my crazy, wonderful quilting journey. One thing leads to another and another and then yet another. Lots of work and just 'putting in the time to make things happen', intermixed with wild, fun moments of lightbulb-like inspiration. These squirrel quilts...  So restorative and beneficial to our creative selves when the right one comes along. Too bad we didn't know in advance which ones were most important to pay attention to! Linking up with Wendy's Peacock Party!

Ready For Big Stitch Quilting

I've been in an odd state this past week. So surreal that 2018 is over and done with and now we're well into February of 2019? We've had some tough challenges in the past couple years and it appears that we are starting to make the transition into better times overall. 2019 definitely looks more promising than I had hoped for and that's a huge relief.

Improv. Postage Stamp Baskets ready for quilting

No doubt we will still be confronted by the issues of our parents failing health and those sorts of concerns, but we'll have to cross that bridge when it gets here. My husband laughs and tells me that if life gets too good then I'll probably lose all my creativity. Hah! What does he know? But in fact, I sort of fell into a funk this past weekend and without any resistance whatsoever, curled up with a trio of books that absolutely riveted me. I know I'm way behind the times, but I picked up 'The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and subsequent sequel in a $1 a box of books sale. Luckily my daughter had the third book so I didn't have to wait for the library to open! Down the rabbit hole I fell for all of four days, only putting the books down for necessities like making dinner etc.

The new one in the hoop!

But finally I have came back to the land of living and addressed more important things like quilting. There's a new quilt sandwiched and pinned and after the most basic of machine {stitch-in-the-ditch} quilting, it's all ready for the hoop. It's been very cold here and so this quilt feels like a great one to have in my lap. All the blues and greens against the pale backgrounds remind me of early spring. When we're young we think that life just gets more simple as we get older, but in reality, things just change and our challenges are different. Yay for the foundation of a good life and a wonderful family all around me! Just one last thought.... Why is it that women {often} have to deal with so many life challenges at a time when their hormones are whacked? I don't want to be a man in any way shape or form, but wowsers, at least they have the ability to dial back on the emotional roller coaster at a moments notice.

It's Looking Like a Finished Quilt Top

I am still crushing on this combination of blue, greens and blush pink. Not something I would have deliberately thought to put together, but somehow it all works to make me very happy.

Improv. Postage Stamp Basket quilt top

Originally the idea was to make postage stamp basket blocks with improv. string strips and then combine them with these classic looking pineapple blocks. That would have included some yellow golds and deeper pink and reds, which somehow was just a bit too clashy. Even for me! These improv. baskets have been an interesting experiment as they don't just scream out the fact that they are baskets. That was a little surprising to me, but maybe it's because I mixed the fabrics for the handles up a little too much and didn't use enough of the darker colored fabrics? Regardless, I do still like them. A lot! So that's good. Onward ho!

So hard to get a decent picture of the whole thing....

In the end though, they didn't look good combined with the pineapple blocks.*meh  Disappointing for sure, but these things do happen. And now one project has merged into two. Well, actually.... to be perfectly honest, the number is now up to four. Yep, it's a hydra of sorts! This baby quilt was impulsively started from the trim-offs from those improv. basket blocks and then also, drumroll please...., I have Tidbits. Those little cut-out pieces from all the basket handles that just wouldn't go quietly into the night either.....

Really love the busier sashing prints mixed in....

At least these original improv. basket blocks finally, finally settled into place. All it took to convince me was these random, lighter, blush pink sashing bits and a random floral fat quarter that worked quite well for the cornerstones. Sold! I love the whimsical, sweet look to the cornerstone fabric and thought it helped give a bit of necessary focus too. It was really hard not to scour the Internet for a larger piece of that particular fabric. {Why do I always buy skimpy fat quarters of the very best fabrics?} I hated, HATED! having to cut out some of the roses 'off-kilter'. Be that as it may, I also cringe at being the one who celebrates 'making-do' and then falls into a pit of despair when there's not enough fabric! lol

 Not sure if you can tell from my over-exposed pics, but all the darker roses went into the center of the quilt and the lighter colored ones to the middle-outside edges, then a lighter tone on tone fabric to the very outside edges of the quilt. It seemed to come together just fine though, and really, no reason to panic about some of the roses perhaps not being 'perfectly' centered. We quilters are so funny sometimes, the things that can push our buttons.

Still haven't managed to figure out quite what to do with all those pineapple blocks, but ideas are absolutely simmering somewhere on the back burner. In the meantime, I've just about convinced myself that this quilt won't be needing a border after all--you know that's the default position around here. So that's that. It's all trimmed up now and resting with the oodles of other quilt tops waiting for sandwiching and quilting. Two down, two to go on these blue/green quilt spin-offs. Maybe I should start calling it the 'Don't Tell Me What To Do' series?

Trimming off the excess....

Over the previous weekend I also addressed the applique prep for the latest big basket quilt. Just a matter of making some final decisions about fabric and proportion and then getting pieces cut out.

Applique prep time!

As usual I am nervously wondering if the flowers will be large enough after the seam allowance is turned under. That's the main thing that gives me concern until most all the stitches are completed. As I already increased the size of the drawn out flowers by two more seam allowances, I'm making myself leave it alone at this particular point. Oh yeah, I have already sewed another seam on the bias vine to make it more narrow than the original desired width. You know, for proper  'proportion'.*sigh  Enough is enough. Freehand applique is always such a trial and error process anyway. No way to know for sure about the end result until hello? it's a done deal. If it ends up looking terrible, then I'll just rip it out and start over. Good thing I don't make patterns as the end result is always a totally different shape and size from the original.

A Little Bit of Improv. Progress

So I spent so much time on the Vintage Lily quilt that I basically ran out of time to spend on the other Improv. quilt projects. There are a lot of different ideas for moving forward with my Playing With Scales quilt but nothing seems absolute.

Auditioning ideas

Which in my book translates into just get started cutting and sewing and see what happens! I'm really on this fence about letting this turn into a medallion quilt, but that being said, it felt like it needed one border surround. And as soon as that was in the works, these little strips of blue jumped directly onto the quilt.

Trying to see what works

I played with a couple ideas for the pink and brown border and eventually settled on what is pictured below. Okay, that's it--carry on. Right?

All sewn together

Well maybe not. After sleeping on it, I thought this particular border needed just a touch more energy. The lighter ends on the top and bottom border especially bother me, how they just sort of drift off into blah, blah, blah. I tried auditioning extra strips on the sides, turned in the opposite direction thinking that could be a bold move. Yuck.

Auditioning again....

And then you know how it happens, I basically went back to the original {sewn together} border audition. Maybe with just a slight 'off row' alignment? Now to just get the seams unpicked and the new segment cut and sewn in. Right now it's just resting on top there in that bottom right hand corner.

Sorry for those of you who will greatly dislike them, but the blue 'tabs' on the applique centerpiece are completely sewn down and there to stay. There is just something about them that intrigues and won't allow for their removal. At least at this particular moment. If, at any time, my opinion changes about their value to the rest of the quilt, it really is an easy fix to get the seam ripper out and discard them--minutes is all it will take. It will be like they were never there. Much easier to sew them on now while the quilt is little, than to try and add them in at the monster quilt stage!

This could be the one...

And as for the Improv. Postage Stamp Basket quilt, there is definite progress being made, albeit slowly. Thanks for all the great suggestions to help make the baskets look more like baskets. It really made me think. For the time being tho, I'm fairly content to let that be an abstract thing and just soak up the colors. This blue,green and blush pink color palette is making me feel very happy and I don't want to over think the quilt to the point that it loses it's simple charm.

Improv. Baskets

'Cuz that can happen. I've been there, done that. Striving for a lost element can make us totally forget to enjoy the good things already going on in the quilt. Linking up to Kaja and Ann for AHIQ #31.

February Adhoc. Improv. Play

The next AHIQ challenge is an interesting one. It's all about playing with scale--in whatever manner we'd like to interpret. I've been contemplating the idea of making a quilt with rows of simple blocks and/or shapes. Something in subdued colors and just playing with value changes to see if I could make something with an antique 'utility' look.

Playing with Scale--The start

It was an obvious choice for incorporating scale changes as I already had the fabric pull and rows can be easily tweaked for size. As I went digging for inspiration, I kept coming back to the idea of having a centerpiece though. There's something about the idea of a pretty center with radiating piecework that just appeals to me. So of course it had to be applique. Everything lit up when I saw this on my Pinterest boards {sorry Lori for not linking directly to the pertinent post}.

Sewing together the foundation piece

So as things go when we're making things up as we go along, I doodled some quick ideas until one looked about right. Not an exact copy, but something with similar vibes! Then it was time to start making the drawing happen in fabric. I started with rows of small strings or coins for the background. Just a mellow blend of sagey greens and a piece of cream/black toile. I deliberately left the middle of the foundation free of pieced units as I didn't want to cut any of that fabric out of the back of my applique. It's really not large enough, but I also needed enough foundation to securely sew the applique 'circles' to.

To get the appropriate sizes for the applique, I re-drew my doodle drawing onto a perfectly sized piece of freezer paper. Then I carefully cut out each circle, ironed it onto the chosen fabrics and cut out with plenty of seam allowance--especially the inside brown circle as it's easy to move overlay applique a little too far in one direction or another. At that point, I sewed the outside seam of the brown applique with a quick straight stitch on the sewing machine. Who cares. Nobodys ever gonna see that seam! I trimmed the pink circle a little bit, especially at the bottom where it was too flat looking and hand stitched the outside edge of the circle. I cut the cream {applique foundation} circle out and carefully slipped it inside and underneath the brown circle. And yes, I deliberately chose a fabric with a smaller scale of print! Ooh... gotta love layers of interest!

And so I stitched the brown circle to the cream applique background and then the pink circle to the brown circle. On and on until it was time to cut out my flower pieces, still from that same freezer paper drawing! {So efficient!} It was tough on my fingers stitching over areas with seamed rows, but like I said, NOT going to cut the background out on this one. Too much fear of raveling. It's a good start to my 'playing with scale' quilt and for now I'm mentally calling it 'The Quiet Quilt', the centerpiece notwithstanding.  Lots of the fabric pull are soft, quiet and a little blendy. We'll see where it goes from here. At some point I definitely intend to start with some vertical rows, but just had to establish the beginnings to get a feel for the rest!

Adding some applique details

I was hoping to be farther along with the Vintage Lily quilt, but these snowball blocks have been soooo tedious to sew. Easy as pie, but just yawn inducing. All are sewn now, but next up is the ironing and trimming.*ughh  Not my favorite part of the quilting process! Robin is doing something similar with her scale challenge, so it should be interesting to see both of our quilts progress. My snowballs are a little different than hers as I wanted the corners on mine to end up looking very scrappy and a bit messy. You might remember the look from my Scrappy Tulips finish?

Improv. Snowball blocks for Vintage Lily

So the other adhoc. improv. work in progress are these postage stamp baskets. Originally I had plans to mix them with my pineapple applique, but that flew out the window in a hurry. These baskets are just a little too strong to mix with sweet looking applique shapes. First I laid them out next to each other and tried every which way to be happy with the look. I'm certainly intrigued at the intersection where each basket joins up, but it's so not me. It just feels like a waste of all that time I spent stitching on the basket handles!

Improv. Postage Stamp Baskets

On to other plans! There's not much I can do to make these look more like basket blocks and less like loops with stripey corner units. I contemplated adding 'feet' to the basket like someone suggested the other day, but it just made a muddle at the point where the baskets met. There's probably oodles of different things that could be done with these basket blocks, but what appeals to me right now is giving them lots of breathing room.

Auditioning a layout

So yep. The're going to get the good old, classic sashing treatment. Kind of a fall back around here, but when you like something, there's not point in trying to reinvent the wheel! I cut up all the rest of the pale background fabrics {had barely enough} and started auditioning placement. Two brighter blocks got tossed out immediately and the rest seem to be cooperating. For now, I'm using little fussy cut roses I cut out of a fat quarter for all those inside sashing squares. There's not enough for the outside squares, so that and the setting triangle fabric still remain a mystery. 

Overall, I'm quite pleased with where this quilt is headed though I admit to being a wee bit disappointed when the original plain went south. It's not a bad thing to be surprised by a quilts independence though. Just makes us more determined to try and get it right! Linking with Kaja and Ann for AHIQ #30. Are you having fun yet? 'Cuz I certainly am.....