Camp Quilty

Oh, I had such a good time this weekend gallivanting with my friends Kate and Tereska. We went to the Ithaca Farmers Market (which is amazing and unlike most farmers markets, hard to describe), little country markets and of course several quilt shops. The best part though, was sitting around (drinking a little local wine) and talking quilts. Tereska brought her quilt that we helped her with last year, in hopes to make some more progress on it this year. She had gotten the blocks into rows, so we got the rows into a quilt top.

 Tereska made the blocks for this top in high school. Now she's not telling exactly when that was, but I know these blocks are a few decades old and are very fragile (and wonky).

Tereska peeking out! It took both Kate and Tereska to hold it, it turned out to be about 69" x 69" after we added a sashing width border all the way around.

We even got it sandwiched and basted. Now all Tereska has to do is straight line quilt it. She promises she will not bring it back next year! ;)

I'm linking up with A Quilt Story for Fabric Tuesday and Free Motion by the River for Linky Tuesday.  
 
Color "Us" Quilty!

Pat, Kate and Tereska

Spray Basting Using Boards

Recently, I shared pin basting a quilt using 1"x3" boards. But given the chance,  I really prefer to spray baste. (Spray baste doesn't stick to poly batting). Since I picked up cotton batting for my Grandma's quilt, I decided to give spray basting using the boards a try. I had to make a few modifications, this is how I did it with spray baste.

I started by wrapping both the top and back right side in on the boards. This is the big difference from the pin basting with boards method.

 

Then starting with the back, I laid the the batting on the table and sprayed a section. I unrolled the back of the quilt onto the sprayed batting smoothing it as I went. I then flipped the back over to have the batting on top.

I sprayed a table width section of batting, unrolled the top, and smoothed it down.

I did need to play with the quilt top for a while to get it smooth, but this was SO MUCH easier than do it on the floor or putting 3 or 4 tables together.

This quilt is 70"x 80", I now can't imagine basting a big quilt any other way.

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Make It Right Challenge

Have you all seen this challenge from Art Gallery Fabrics?

It's not like I really have time to work on this right now with spring gardening and other pressing quilt projects. But I just can't say no to this one. Yesterday, I got my Right Angles panel in the mail from Intrepid Thread. Ordered it Monday - received it Wednesday (gotta love priority mail).

The rules state you must use every scrap of the panel (1 yard), you can add Art Gallery Pure Elements as secondary/background fabrics. Quilted with Aurifil thread (no problem there, love Aurifil) and I plan on using Quilters Dream batting. Entry deadline is June 6th!

Will I be able to make this deadline? Will I be able to keep this a secret? Do I even know what I'm going to make? Good questions, no answers.

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

All Backed Up and Ready to Roll!

I'm happy to say that I have Grandma's quilt back all ready to baste.

  Since the quilt is 70" wide x 80" long, I had to piece the backing. I tried to match up the flowers and although it's not absolutely perfect, I think once it's quilted you won't seen that it's been pieced.

I even have found the perfect FMQ motif to quilt and did a little practice piece to try it out.

Of course there is no rush on THIS quilt, probably why I'm working on it. I plan on using the boards to baste this quilt, but I plan on spray basting it, not pin basting it.

I did get a whole lot accomplished on my Elephant quilt this week. All three panels are quilted and ready to be joined. I'm quite please with how this quilt it turning out.

Here are this week's stats:
In-process: (4)
Elephant quilt
Express Your Love
Layers quilt
Grandma's Quilt

New projects: (0)

Finished (0)


I'm linking up with  Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday

 

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Elephant Update

I've been working like a dog, trying to get my Elephant quilt completed.

 All three panels are quilted and trimmed, ready to join.

 I really like the different textures of the quilting.

 I plan on using a lime green to join the panels to pick up the lime around the elephants.

 I used Quilters Dream Puff batting, so the "unquilted" areas really puff up.

Humphrey said I must have worked REALLY, REALLY hard if I worked like him!

I'm linking up with A Quilt Story for Fabric Tuesday and Free Motion by the River for Linky Tuesday.  
 
Color Me Quilty!

Pat

FMQ Friday Flower

 While perusing pinterest the other day I came across the coolest FMQ Flower. I wasn't surprise to find out that Lori at The Inbox Jaunt had quilted it and even has a great tutorial on how to quilt it. She is a wonderful quilter. I knew that I would use this flower on my Grandmother's quilt.

A row of quilted flowers

 Basically, it's a row of spirals, then outlined with three bumps and a leaf, then echoed. Easy, peasy!

Close up of the flowers.

The perfect motif for Grandma's quilt. She would have loved them.

I'm linking up with Leah Day for FMQ Fridays at the Free Motion Project.

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Straight Line Quilting

Most people begin learning how to quilt with a walking foot and straight line quilting. Not me, I never could seem to get the hang of it. Of course, I did realize later that you can adjust the foot pressure, which was my problem. I still don't like it, boring! Although, I do like the LOOK of it.

The front of the third panel of my Elephant quilt. The rows of stitching are about an inch apart

This week has been dedicated to getting my Elephant quilt closer to the finish line. I basted the third panel, using two 1"x3" boards and my dining room table to baste it. That worked really well, click here if you want to see how I did that.

Three full yards of fabric

The back of the panel you can see I still have quite a bit more stitching to do.

The only other thing I did this week was another strand of Goddess hair on Express Your Love quilt




 Here are this week's stats:
In-process: (4)
Elephant quilt
Express Your Love
Layers quilt
Grandma's Quilt

New projects: (0)

Finished (0)


I'm linking up with  Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday

 

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Board Basting?

Nope, not a typo (although, I sometimes do get bored while basting, not my favorite part of quilting). I'm constantly looking for new ways to baste a quilt, that doesn't not include getting down on the floor.  My knees just can't take it.  This technique also allowed me to do this on my dining room table. I have seen this method to baste a quilt on several blogs and I just had to try it. I think it originally was Sharon Schamber's technique, but she hand bastes her quilts. I quilt way to dense to hand baste. So I decided to try using the 1"x3" boards with pin basting.

Start with your backing fabric wrong side up on the table. Wrap the fabric around the board. Make sure that you keep both ends even.  Smooth out any wrinkles as you go, start in the middle and push the wrinkles to each end.

back

Top

 Do the same with the quilt top, but the fabric will be right side up.


Now, both the top and the bottom of the quilt are wrapped around the two 1"x3" boards. The back shows the right side of the fabric, the top shows the wrong side.

 The batting floats between the top and the back. Smooth out any wrinkles and start pin basting.

 When your done pinning the section on the table, pull in forward and let it hang off of the table and unroll another section of top and back. make sure you smooth it out and feel for any wrinkles. Continue this process until you get to the end of the quilt. Voila'! Your quilt is basted, no kneeling, no finding room to set up 3 or 4 folding tables.

So, now I have the third panel of my Elephant quilt basted. Just have to quilt it now.

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

Expressing My Inner Goddess

I just love working on my Express Your Love quilt. I don't have to spend a lot of time on it, just a little bit here and there, kind of like a little candy now and then. Last night I quilted another section of Goddess hair.

 I was going to do McTavishing, but it's kind of a hybrid between McTavishing, Sharp Stipple and flame paisley. It seems to work, I like it.

I'm linking up with Leah Day for FMQ Fridays at the Free Motion Project.

Color Me Quilty!

Pat

A Kick in the Seat of My Pants!

Last year I participated in Quilter In The Gap's FAL and really finished up all of my UFO/WIPs. Yes, I was feeling pretty smug, but recently I realized that I've been resting on my laurels, obviously wearing them on the wrong end. It looks like I need a kick in the pants to get them readjusted. I need to work on some projects. So, I'm going to play this quarter in She Can Quilt's Finish-A-Long and get some control again. I NEED to finish some long standing projects. So here's my list of Q2 projects.

1. My Elephant Quilt

This is a queen sized quilt that I'm quilting in 3 panels and will join them after I quilt them. I have the navy panel completed and almost finished FMQ the elephant panel. I need to baste the diamond panel and quilt, then join and bind. I would love to think I could finish that this month, fingers crossed.



2. My Layers quilt

 This is another queen sized quilt that I'm doing QAYG (quilt as you go). I have 2 of 9 blocks assembled and basted. Lots and lots to do on this quilt.

3. My Grandma's Quilt

This is a quilt top that I found tucked into some of my mother's stuff. I'm sure this is a top that my grandmother made back in the 1940's or 50's. I found some nice backing and binding. There is no rush on completing this quilt, therefore I'm likely to want to work on it. So I will put this quilt on my list, just because!







I'm linking up with Leanne at she can quilt for the 2nd Quarter FAL.

Color Me Quilty!

Pat