ABSTRACTION

INSPIRATION

Tannehill Valley, Alabama

Four of us signed up to do a program on Abstraction for our Chattanooga Modern Quilt Guild.

As we looked for inspiration this covered bridge became the picture we chose.  I was fascintated by some of the angular elements of the bridge and built my sketch piece from that.

My favorite part of this Covered Bridge is the support poles on each side of the opening and the "window openings" along the inside walls.

This is the first piece in this Abstraction process.

This was so much fun!!!  Will continue to play with this.


                                 -sandi

MORE MAY FINISHES

I have a large stack of quilts and quilt projects to be quilted.  This month is dedicated to getting many of them quilted.  They are all layered on my guest bed.

The first one to be finished is a small (16.5inches) piece that was appliqued using a back basting needleturn technique.  I love hand applique.

Another finish is my Thoroughly Modern Mini Swap quilt.  It is about 16 inches by 24 inches and has already gone to the recipient from the Memphis Modern Quilt Guild.

I worked on some alcohol ink jewelry pieces.  These are so fun and addictive.

It was fun to get some pillowslips made for my guest room that coordinated with my QAYG Quilt.

This month I have worked on several things but have not completed them, or, they are complete and I cannot show them until next month because they are part of a program for Chattanooga Modern Quilt Guild in June.

Here are a couple that I cannot show the front of yet.

Both of these pieces are abstract work.











Perhaps, I will make a bigger dent in that stack in June!


                                  -sandi

OOPS!

Sometimes I plan a project and think I have a real clear idea how it will go, then something happens.

Recently I did a Back Basting Needleturn Applique piece.  Pretty straightforward.  It was a basket with a couple flowers and a heart.

The first step is to trace the design on the wrong side of the foundation fabric.  I wish I had a picture to show you, but maybe I can explain it.  I laid my background fabric onto the light box and thought I had lined up my basket to fit diagonally from corner to opposite corner.  So I guess the fabric slipped or I moved the pattern.  Nevertheless, my drawing was not on a true diagonal.  It was a little skewed to one side.  

When it came time to square it up and add the finishing touches, there were some gaps along two corners.  Uh-oh!  So I had to get creative!

I simply decided to start adding borders and working to get it square.  I was really pleased with how it turned out.  You will note that the corners are not alike.

It is square but it gives an illusion of being a little off center.  I was able to take a very traditional pattern and turn it into a modern version.  
I faced the piece instead of adding a binding.  I am a happy camper!


                                     -sandi

2016 FIRST QUARTER FINISHES

This year I would like to do better at posting my finishes.  Below are a few things I finished in the First Quarter of the Year.  Let's see if I can do better with all of this.


JANUARY

Made a new cover for my daughter's vanity stool

A really nice lap quilt size

Snowflake QAL

Faith, Hope, Love Angels

FEBRUARY

Needle Case made from selvages

Needle Cases for Retreat Guests

                                                                MARCH

Modern Mini Swap

Mug Rug for my Modern Mini Swap

                                           -sandi

NEEDLE CASES

I love working with selvages.  I make some neat mug rugs using them and keep several on hand for little quick gifts.

The other day I was looking for another quick little gift that I could use these selvages to make.

I started with a bin of selvages....

This is one of the bins of selvages.  







Then I took a stack of used Color Catchers ...

I foundation pieced my selvages onto the Color Catchers, layered them and quilted them.

I dug into my bin of leftover bindings to complete them.

After binding them it was easy to create the little felt inside layer to put needles in.

After adding the ribbon ties, I had a really neat little Needle Case.

Of course I could not stop with just one, so I used up all the mug rugs I had completed ...

Now I have a stack of Needle Cases ...

Love these!!!


                                                -sandi

GYPSY ALONG 2016

Gypsy Wife by Jen Kingwell is a very interesting quilt pattern. A friend of mine was working on hers at a Retreat.  I could hardly wait to get my copy.  Well, that was several months ago and I am just now getting started.

After I opened the pattern, I realized this would take some reading ahead to figure out just exactly what was going on.  I put the pattern aside.

Just recently, Hydeeann of Splish, Splash, Stash and www.hydeeannsews.blogspot.com posted that she would be leading a quilt along using Jen Kingwell's pattern, Gypsy Wife.

 I am joining with Hydeeann and doing this as a monthly quilt along.

I plan to work from my stash and use up all I can from my Freebird by MoMo and Juggling Summer by Brigitte Heitland leftovers as well as other miscellany that would go with this palette.  

I am choosing to use Kona Bone for my background.  I think this will calm the pattern some and give a cohesiveness to the design.

So, let's go with these fabrics:

Next up, start cutting!

                                                       -sandi

2016 DEAR DAUGHTER BOM

2016 has started off with a bang for me!  I have completed three projects already.

Another quilt I have finished is my Vintage Quilt Revival Sampler.  I still need to add the binding and the label.

Today I pulled fabrics to make RebeccaMae Designs Dear Daughter BOM 2016.

I have chosen some solids, stripes, and some bright prints.

It took me about an hour and a half to cut the components of the first 7 blocks.  Now I am ready to sew next week.  This will make the First Chapter.

I am looking forward to this adventure this year!!!!


                                      -sandi

UFO FINISHED

I always have more plans for Holiday gift giving than I ever get finished.  This year was no different.  I had planned to have these Wall Hangings done for Christmas 2015.  Did not happen.

They are now finished and I will pass them on to the lucky(?) recipient by Christmas 2016 so they may be used in the Holiday festivities.

I fell in love with this pattern when a friend of mine shared it with me.  I decided that it would be gorgeous done in Batiks.  Making three separate pieces seemed to be a better plan than making one large piece.  I thought this allowed the pieces to be displayed in more ways.

This is raw-edge applique with organic straight line quilting.  These are very contemporary pieces and I decided less was more.

           FAITH is actually done in purple, the color of power

HOPE is done in green, the color of abundance

LOVE is done in red, the color of strength

HOPE, LOVE, FAITH

Pattern by J. Michelle Watts

-sandi

UPDATING A STOOL

My mother had a vanity stool that was part of her bedroom suite that my daughter loved.  Eventually this vanity stool ended up at my daughter's home.  For several years it has needed a fresh cover for it.

This is how pitiful this cushion has looked!









I decided to recover it as a gift for my daughter.

So I made this little piece using the Mini Quick Curve Ruler from Sew Kind of Wonderful.  Love these Drunkard's Path blocks.

Quilted it with a serpentine stitch.










So I had the hubs get out the stapler and we covered the vanity stool.

Love the way this looks!!!



                                              -sandi

SNOWY STARS

Every year I think about making a quilt for each month of the year, or certainly for each season of the year.  Well, it has not happened yet.

This year is no different.  However, I was asked to make a special quilt for a very talented photographer in Austin, TX.  (Check out http://kerrygrayphotography.com/ to see her awesome work.)  The quilt that resulted makes me think I would like to make another one for me.  It makes me think of Winter Star-Snowflakes.

She needed a quilt that was crisp and bright and would be a good backdrop for her winter scene photography.

She chose her color palette of cyan, azure, and lemon yellow with a pure white background.  All of these fabrics are from Kona.

The pattern for the stars came from Vintage Quilt Revival written by Katie Blakesley, Lee Heinrich, and Faith Jones.  This pattern was designed by Lee Heinrich.       

After I completed these blocks, I decided to go back and re-work the center and I reversed the positions of the yellow and white in the center pinwheel.

I like this much better.
It has now been quilted with an overall pattern using stars and swirls.  Thanks to Pat Pike who did a wonderful job with the longarm.

Kerry chose a toile for the backing.

Using such a drastically different fabric on the back and keeping in mind the possibility of using the reverse side for backdrops made me consider doing a two-color binding.

I cut the toile at 1 3/4 inches and the white at 3/4 inches which resulted in a 2" wide binding.  Next time I will alter these measurements because I would have liked the white to be a little wider and the toile a bit more narrow.

I joined the two together and then pressed in half and applied the binding to my quilt in the usual manner attaching the white binding to the top and folding the toile to the back.

I like the way the binding matches to each side.

I definitely will be using this more often!


                                     -sandi