Quilting Friendlies and a Portrait

Quilting Friendlies can be found wherever quilts are being sewn, quilted or shown.  The ones I have met are so congenial and accepting.  I was in WI for Christmas where my daughter is a professional longarm quilter and quilt appraiser.  She took me to a couple of her sewing groups for sessions of sewing and socializing.  These ladies were all so friendly and accepting of me, a stranger.  Everyone is interested in others' projects and helpful when needed.  Of course we all have one common interest, which helps, and the variety of inspiring, creative artistry is endless within such a group.

I did not take my Phoenix bird with me, which was a mistake, but did take the portrait that I had designed and was ready to start.  It is a small project so was perfect to transport.  It started out great, but gradually devolved into a practice project.  Below is a small crop of what I did.

Black Belt

I am generally content with the overall technique and learned a lot about the sewing as I went, but discovered numerous problems, and am not happy with the end result.  My thread colors are really bad - way too red for Asian skin.  The ear is too defined, so it needs to be softened.  The shadow side of his face (not shown in this crop) turned out to be wayyyyyy too dark and wayyyyyy too red.  The eye is OK as the white part of it is really white, but doesn't show properly in the photo.  Some problems could have been solved, but the dark shadow on the other side of the face is awful.  The hair I love - it is perfect, but I will start over with new thread colors for the skin.

TIP:  Don't get too discouraged when a new technique doesn't work out right.  Sit down and figure out where you went wrong.  If you find you don't like working that technique, that is a positive too. It is OK to say, "forget it" like I did with landscape quilting!  If you enjoy doing it and are happy with some of it, keep plugging.  Each project will be better as you become more competent.

I had a great blog-cation, but it is nice to be home and set up to sew in my own space. My sewing room is now cleared of all the stuff that was transported back to WI and MN and feels almost spacious.

Sew a happy seam this week.

Little Crystal

If you are wondering why I am going back to my quilting beginnings I will give you two reasons.  One:  it is a good place to start my new blog.  Two:  I want you beginners to see that we all start at the bottom of the learning curve.  There is a lot to learn in quilting:  sewing, buying the right fabric, appraising values, organizing, measuring, putting it all together straight, quilting, and finishing it beautifully.  It takes time to learn the basics.  It takes time to achieve confidence.  Some of us have been sewing since childhood. Some have a natural talent for putting colors together.  Some have taken art classes, graphics classes, textile classes and more.  Others start from scratch.  The one thing we all have in common is that we like to sew and we like to create beautiful things.  That is my soap box for today.

Today's featured quilt is a little gem from a pattern called "Crystal" by Jinny Beyer, printed in "Quilts with Style" magazine in June 2004.  Using patterns is a great way to learn new techniques.  I had done some paper piecing, but this one was a challenging learning experience.  It is only 16 1/2" x 16 1/2" so the pieces are very small.  I don't think it could be done in any other way.  I discovered late in the process that one little piece was a tad bit too short and a tiny edge poked out, but it would be crazy to undo everything to get to it.  I left it as is because it was such a small imperfection and not really noticeable.  I was not into showing quilts yet and it will never be heavily used so it remains defective.  I will always know it is there, somewhere.  I am fussier now.

TIP:  When paper piecing be sure that the fabric covers the required area completely with seam allowance as necessary…as you go.

TIP:  Be sure to press the seam every time you stitch and press it all the way back away from the stitched join. I use Sulky Paper Solvy for the foundation, but if you have a lot of seams to press it gets scorched and brittle from the iron.  I now use the Hera Marker to do "finger pressing."  I find I do a better job of getting the fabric tightly pressed and I don't burn the paper or my fingers.  A toothbrush back also works.

This little quilt is quilted with the simplest looking, but a difficult type of quilting:  stitch-in-the-ditch.  It is good for a beginner to learn because while the foot helps maintain control, the eye must develop the ability to make sure the needle goes down in the right place.  Poorly done, it will show, but not nicely.  Well done, it will be invisible.

Orion Star

I loved the design of this quilt called Orion Star and found a bunch of batik fat quarters in my favorite colors.  This is one of those quilts that I did for the fun of it.  It is not hard and was great to take to a quilt retreat when you have noise and confusion around you.  I prefer not to have to think very hard in that venue.  I saw it in a magazine advertised as a quilt made with "Thangles."  Thangles are a method of making half-square triangles using pre-printed paper as a cutting guide.  You can learn about Thangles here and get the pattern and Thangles here.  Since I tend to jump in and get all wet before buying more stuff, I just designed it myself by looking at the quilt in the advertisement.  Mine is much smaller (about 36" x 48") than what they sell in the kit, but it served its purpose for me.  The biggest challenge was working on my design wall to arrange the colors in a way that pleased my eye.

TIP:  You can have a fancy design wall or use your bed.  I hang a flannel-backed tablecloth on my wall, flannel side out and use it.  It is easy to put up, take down and store, and it does the job just fine for very little money.

TIP:  Arrange the blocks the way you think you like them, then leave it for awhile.  Wander into the room now and then and look at it again, rearrange and go away again.  You can get a lot of house cleaning done or dishes washed during this process.  Do this for several days.  Fresh eyes see things that were missed.  When you are sure you are happy, crank up the sewing machine and sew it together.

I had gotten comfortable free motion quilting flowers with big, simple petals and that design served well on this quilt too.  More practice.  I still wasn't loving it, but I didn't want to pay someone else to do my quilt.  It takes motivation, determination, and lots PRACTICE, to get the hang of free motion quilting whether you are working on a longarm or sit-down machine.  Don't get discouraged.  It will come.