My Next Project

So yesterday I was surfing on the Oh Fransson! blog and came across this. She’s soooo creative and makes the most fabulous things. I immediately fell in love with this quilt and have decided that it is going to be my next project. Instead of the botanical pop fabric that she’s using, I’m going to use the new Ginseng line by Joel Dewberry in Mulberry. I was sent an e-mail for the presale and I was instantly drawn to the Mulberry colorway but I couldn’t figure out what I would use it for. (Side note: I’ve decided that I’m going to stop buying random fabric unless I have an intended project for it. Wow, I know, super mature! That’s total self discipline there.)

I haven’t felt inspired to craft for so long but this new posting gave me inspiration and I have been working feverishly on my aviary quilt in order to finish so I can start on this new project. My aviary quilt has been collecting dust underneath my table for almost two months now. =( I’ve finally finished it.

Quilting circles using a 3/4 sized sewing machine and extra thick batting is the most frustrating & annoying thing in the world. Never again! I’m sticking to stitching in the ditch from now on. I did an awful job on the quilting. All the “circles” are different shapes & sizes; and there are puckers-galore but I don’t care. I’m just glad I finished it. I’m counting on the washing machine getting rid of all the flaws. =)

I ended up using the lighter woodgrain for the backing. It measure 60″ squared.

Now, on to the new project! =)

 

All wrapped up!

The Argyle baby quilt is all wrapped up and ready for gifting. I chose the box and ribbon to match the quilt. I bought both the box and the ribbon from Costco. I love Costco! The box came in a stack of nesting boxes in different colors. Really great deal! The ribbon I bought later to match the gift.

(I’m putting the pictures in backwards order of when they were taken so it feels like you’re opening the gift =) I know, I’m cheezy.)

The “tissue” on the inside is a very light Japanese fabric. It’s so light and soft.

Anyway, the quilt’s all washed and finished and now I’m a bit sad to give it away. I almost don’t want to. =X

It took took a lot of time and creative folding to get the quilt inside that box and to present nicely. But now it fits perfectly so it was totally worth it. =) It looks like an obi.

 

Backing for my Aviary Quilt

So now the only thing hindering me finishing my aviary quilt is the backing. I can’t figure out what fabric to use. I wanted to find some fabric that I could buy at a physical store instead of buying online because then I’d have to pay for shipping too. I feel guilty spending too much on the backing but at the same time, I think the backing should be equally beautiful and should match the quilt and add to the total aesthetic.

I really like the thought of using this wood grain for the backing.

But I think I like the lighter one better because it won’t make the quilt look so heavy.

I’ve called around to all the fabric stores in the area and it doesn’t seem like anyone carries this line. And it’s pretty expensive at $9/yard. I’d like to finish the quilt by the end of the month but it all depends on me finding a nice fabric.

This fabric might also look nice. It would be such a nice bright surprise on the back.

 

Argyle Baby Quilt

I just finished the argyle baby quilt that I’ve been working on for my friend’s baby. She’s turning 1 in April so I’m glad I was able to finish it on time. It actually came together pretty quickly. I got the batting on Thursday and I basted, quilted & bound it in 3 days. I’m not sure whether the argyle shows up as well as I’d hoped. I used black thread to do it and used a green thread in the bobbin. The quilt store only had the highest loft batting so that’s what I ended up using and noticed that it as considerably heavier than the lower loft batting. I hope she’ll be able to drag it around when she gets older. But then again, it is kinda big too- 60″x60″ so I’m not sure whether she’ll be able to drag it around at all. It was my first time doing mitered corners and I probably shouldn’t have started out my first time using stripes because I didn’t realize I was going to have to match up the stripes when I pieced together. That was a frustrating day! The stripes are still not completely matched up but I figured close enough was good enough for me. Plus it’ll get hidden away once it’s washed anyway, which is a great thing about quilting; the washing process hides most of the imperfections. =)

This is the back of the quilt

I’m going to force my friends to let her use it. It’s all cotton so it can be washed, dried, ironed anyway. I really don’t want it to suffer the same fate as the generic, mass-produced quilt that’s hung up on the wall of her room.

 

My Aviary Quilt

I saw this quilt a few weeks ago on this blog that I love reading. I thought it was the most fabulous thing and I totally wanted it. I commented about it on her site and she was nice enough to share how she did it. Here’s a link to her finished quilt.

The basic concept of my quilt is the same but her version was a doll quilt and so was smaller. She also used dupioni silk for her borders. I wanted mine to be a big lap quilt so I made it 62″ x 62″ and I wanted to be able to wash mine so I used cotton from the Robert Kaufman Kona line. The dark brown is espresso and I can’t remember the name of cream-colored one. It’s the same fabric I used for my new clutch

So this is the quilt top. I’m not sure what I’m going to use as the backing. I was thinking I would use the wood grain and then do the binding in the same Espresso brown Kona fabric. The Aviary line by Joel Dewberry has several different wood grain colors. There is one in a cream called Almond and I think that might look nice as the backing. I really like the dark brown too but I’m not sure whether that may be a bit much.

I can’t wait until this quilt is finished. I absolutely LOVE it. A lot of my lines don’t quite match up but I figured once I quilt it and wash it, it’ll all be hidden anyway. Initially, I had used a lighter orange fabric. The Aviary line was pretty hard to find so I ended up buying everything online. The orange actually matches perfectly but I thought it was kinda light; it didn’t pop. I figured I would try one square and see how it worked out. One square turned into all the squares and soon, I had finished basically the whole quilt top. I sat back and looked at it and the more I looked at it, the more I disliked it. So I ended up unsewing/resewing all the little orange squares to brighter orange ones. It kinda sucks because the original squares were all perfectly nested (I was so proud of my matching corners) but the fabric stretched a little from the unsewing and the new squares didn’t match up as perfectly. Also, the resewing process was a lot harder because the orange blocks are actually one block that has been cut into fours. So the resewing part was like 4x the work.

Anyway, I think the effort was worth it because I like the current quilt waaay better. The older version was nice too, it just wasn’t as modern as I wanted it to be. It’s funny how one shade darker completely changes the look and feel of a quilt. I had also bought a marble brown fabric that I was planning on using for the grid part but decided against that as well. So now I have all this extra fabric.

 

I’m going to pull my hair out

So a few weeks ago my sister asked me to make her a quilt. I asked her what type of quilt she wanted and she said she didn’t want anything very patchy because she already had a patchy quilt, albeit being from a mass-produced store but whatever…

Anyway, so she said she wanted something with big blocks and solid colors. At that time, I figured it would be pretty easy. I had it all planned out in my head. I was going to do bright solids and marbles and use contrasting colored thread to free motion all over it. Well now that I have everything pieced together, I’m stuck on the quilting. The quilting needs to basically be the design of the quilt because there isn’t much pattern going on otherwise. I have no idea what I should do. I was planning on using turquoise thread on the brown, pink thread on the yellow, and yellow thread on the pink. I was going to just use yellow thread throughout for my bobbin so the whole back section would be quilted in yellow.

This is the front of the quilt.

Here is the back of the quilt.

I was trying to get artistic with the back. It’s very Mondrian to me. Now, I’m afraid to start the quilting because the quilting needs to make the quilt and in it’s current condition, the quilt is very BLAH!  While I was working on the quilt top, two different people asked me if I was making a flag. =(