Color Palette for Springtime Garden Runner

 


I loved this palette when I discovered it on Pantone's website.  I could hardly wait to make something with this as my inspiration..

 

Somewhere I had seen this block and had made a sketch in my Ideas Journal thinking I would use it at some later date.  In order to not lose the flavor of the block, I made this mock-up block from some scraps of fabric I had in a drawer.  I had saved it for a future project.  Many times I will make up a block or a couple of blocks so I don't lose my idea and then set them aside to come back to when I am ready to make a quilted item.

 

Later I was contacted to do a Workshop for a group of ladies.  The Workshop was scheduled for this spring and I decided to use this block as the focus of the workshop.

 

This Workshop is a techniques workshop designed to teach two ways to do Flying Geese; using Prairie Points in the body of the quilt; and finishing off the quilt with straight-line quilting on the home sewing machine.

 

There are options in this workshop.  One could make four blocks for a wall hanging; make one block for a small table topper; or make a runner.

 

My version is an oversized runner that I have turned into a valance for the double window in my breakfast room.  Perhaps I will make a couple more blocks and finish them off as matching place mats.

 

 

This is not a very good picture.  The black/white background fabric gives it a little modern twist.


                                                  -sandi

 

EASY STREET PROGRESS

My last post about the Easy Street Mystery Quilt Project by Bonnie Hunter was without pictures.  I now have the capability to add some pictures.

Here are my fabrics and a few of my Step One Four-Patch blocks.

I exchanged my oranges for the Teal/Turquoise Blues and included some periwinkle in my purples.

I will be doing some blocks of each step in the beginning because of time restraints.  I will finish this after the first of the year.

Step Two was making Flying Geese with the Purples and Black/White background fabrics.

I used the EZ Angle Ruler and the Companion Ruler that Bonnie suggested.  I was very happy with my results.  There was minimum sliver trimming.

I think this is going to be another fun adventure.


                                      -sandi

EASY STREET MYSTERY

This will be my third Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt.  This year I was going to pass on it and just collect the clues.  I thought it would be better to do this project in January.  That has all changed.

After the Introduction came out with the fabric requirements, I was still convinced I wasn't going to do it because I did not have enough fabric in the color families and I did not want to start working on substitutions.  I am trying very hard to work out of stash.

I could not get it off my mind, so I started looking for fabric in my stash and found a few pieces.  Looked some more and found some more.

Ultimately I found enough fabric to do the quilt.  So here goes.
This is where I would normally post a picture of the fabrics, but I am, once again, having difficulty with Picasa Albums about posting my pics.  I posted the pics directly to Facebook.  The colors I chose were the same colors that Bonnie used.

Sorry this is all words and no pictures.  Maybe soon I will be back to posting pictures with my words.


                                              -sandi

IS THIS A SERIES?



In general, I do not make the same quilt pattern repeatedly.  However, this is my fourth Friendship Star Quilt.

The only other time that I have made multiple quilts from the same pattern was when I was teaching Beginning Level Quilting Classes. 

The pattern I chose to use was the Log Cabin and I ended up with several of these.  Each time I would teach the class I would think of another set of fabrics that I thought would look wonderful in that pattern.  Of course, the Log Cabin is another example of a value study quilt.  Each block is composed of a light side and a dark side.

The first Friendship Star Quilt I made was for a Value Play Workshop Retreat that I taught a few years ago.

This quilt was scrappy and I added a rather traditional border to it to give it a finished look. 

I loved this pattern and decided I wanted to make another one someday.

Recently my sister asked me to make a quilt for her to use as a gift for her son for Christmas.  This was the perfect opportunity to make a Friendship Star Quilt where I could use lots of scraps.  I wanted it to have a modern look so I omitted the borders. 

I also made another one.  When my daughter saw it she love it.  This one has fabrics in it that she remembers from other projects I have made over the years.  This is what is so special about scrappy quilts.  They often bring back wonderful memories.

Then I wanted to make a quilt as a thank you for a friend of ours who has been so helpful during my husband's hip replacement surgeries.  In this one I chose mostly browns and blues. 

Friendship Star seemed like the obvious pattern. 

Of course, now that I am on number four, it seems like a series.

  I laid out the blocks and carefully labeled them so that they would all go together in the proper arrangement.  Look closely and you will see that I turned one of the blocks the wrong way. 
I could tell you that that is a "design alternative" or that it is a "humility block".  But the truth is I made a mistake and I am not going to re-do this quilt. I did not see this until after the quilt was quilted and bound and posted to Facebook. 

 Oh, well, I know that our friend will enjoy this quilt and it will keep him warm even with one block that is turned wrong.  A life lesson I have learned is that perfection is not my goal.  Enjoying the journey and sharing my passion is.

This quilt made me smile and I think that it will make others happy.
I have made enough quilts using this pattern now.  My next quilts will use some other pattern.  Stop back by to see some of my other ideas.

                                          -sandi

FRIENDSHIP STAR QUILT

What a gorgeous fall morning it is!!  The sun is shining and the air is crisp.  The leaves are starting to turn here in southeast Tennessee and, occasionally, you can smell the aroma associated with leaves burning.  That always reminds me of my childhood.

It has been a week since I last posted because I was having difficulty with my camera settings.  I think I have solved it now with some help from my friend, Ava.  The pictures that follow may not be as crisp as some from earlier posts but, at least, I can now post them.

My sister asked me to make a quilt for her to give her son for a Christmas gift.  I wanted something that was masculine, but not just sports, motorcycles, and race cars.  I went into my stash and started pulling out fabrics to use.  I narrowed it down to a predominance of blues and browns.  Again this quilt will qualify for the category of "Making Do" that I pledged to try this year.  Using fabrics from my stash without making a significant fabric purchase is a real reward in itself.  After completing this quilt, I had hardly made a dent in my blues and browns.  The neutrals are showing some "denting"  so I may have to replenish those as I go along if I want to keep using neutrals for backgrounds.

The pattern I chose is the Friendship Star made from split 9-patch blocks. This layout is similar to the way you would lay out a Log Cabin quilt top.

The neutrals vary from very light to dark light and even some with an orange floral.  There are a couple of  other "ringers" thrown in for interest.  I think putting a few patches of red in the darks and a few patches with pale pink or yellow in the neutrals gives some spark and energy to the overall pattern.

Working scrappy is a challenge for some quilters.  I have tried to encourage my buddies to give it a try.  I firmly commit to the mantra "Value makes the statement in a quilt, but Color gets all the credit".  Scrappy quilts allow you to be free with a color palette and use anything/everything in a color family regardless of its theme or style.  My one hesitation is not to use Batiks and plaids with most other fabrics.  My reason for that is not that they would not work.  They certainly would.  I just like to keep my Batiks as a separate category because en masse they give such a unique look to a quilt.  The same is true for plaids in general.  My personal preference with plaids is to make them a focal fabric and have the background/neutrals play a supporting role.  Just my opinion, you see.

This particular layout has a little modern twist to it.  It is a variation from one of Karen Combs' layouts in her book, "Combing Through Scraps".

The center detail:

The quilt measures 63" x 81".  My sister asked me to make it for him to use on his sofa for TV watching with his girl friend.  I think it will be perfect for that.

I chose to leave it without a border --  this again lends itself to a little more modern approach.  It allows the design to drift off the edges of the quilt.

I am making three more of these quilts for gifts.  I will post more pictures as I finish each quilt.  Choice of fabric certainly changes the look.

Enjoy!!

                                                 -sandi

GOING SCRAPPY

Last weekend I went to the Grand Oak Retreat Center in Scottsboro, Alabama for four wonderful, fun-filled days of sewing and creating.

There were ladies from Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi working on quilting.  We did have a lady from Alabama who was a scrapbooker.  She did some beautiful alphabet pages for a gift for a friend's Christmas.

Look at this beautiful view overlooking the Tennessee River.  We gathered on this porch most mornings to have our first cup of coffee, tea, or soda.

This was our workroom.  There were fourteen of us having a ball.

All of us worked on our individual projects.  I took a project with me that was very scrappy -- anything goes kind of scrappy.  I was working with split-nine-patch blocks with a few regular 9-patch blocks thrown in.

I spent two days before retreat cutting out several hundred squares and making a large number of half-square triangles so I could start right into sewing. 

I lined up everything on my sewing machine table and started making my blocks.

This is what it looked like under my machine as I chain pieced the nine-patch blocks together.

This was my finished top.  I love the friendship star in the center.  I don't think I will add any borders.  It looks more interesting without a border.

Now on to doing the back and binding it.  Looking at the drawer of left-over bindings and thinking I might could use some of them. 

 This is the second one of this pattern that I have made and each one looks a little different.  I really do like it!!!!


                                              -sandi