Trellis

Continuing my trend last year of quilting the "pedestal" quilt tops, the ones I really love and want to finish, I decided to start the year with Trellis. Trellis was one of two quilt tops that came out of my #100Days100Blocks2018 challenge ... and wow, I just realized that means it's more than 6 years old. Sometimes I can't really feel time passing, until I suddenly realize children I haven't seen for awhile are all grown up, or a quilt top I felt like I only worked on not that long ago is actually 6 years old.

But never mind the nostalgia train. I was very happy when I pulled out Trellis out of the pile and realized it looked as beautiful as I remembered. (Sometimes a quilt top is a lot less pretty than I remembered!) The pattern is by Tula Pink, and the fabric by Elizabeth Hartman. Since it is a sampler block quilt, the only parts tying it together is the frames, so I quilted those all the same: with simple lines.

The background calls for some dense swirls so that they recede into the space. The focal point of this quilt is after all the lovely and different quilt blocks.

The fun part of this quilt is really figuring out what to quilt for each block. I didn't do much advanced planning, and just quilted it with whatever I felt like at the time. I picked a few basic staples that always look good on busier fabric, and they are geometric designs, straight lines, feathers, continuous curves, and a few linear designs that look good on longer strips.

I usually plan every detail of the quilting out before I start, so doing this sort of spontaneously is a nice change. Even though each block is different, using just a few consistent designs and using the same design on the frames ties things together nicely.

I'm so glad I started the year off with such a rainbow beauty! I have a lot of plans for 2025 (not quilting related) so I don't think I can finish as many this year, but we'll see how many I manage.

Tokyo Underground

Once upon a time when I was a fairly new quilter, I saw the pattern Tokyo Subway Map by Elizabeth Hartman, and I was immediately attracted to it: scrappy fabrics, and the entire quilt was made of 2.5" squares, so easy to piece. My first Tokyo Subway Map was the largest project I've ever quilted on my no-longer-with-me sitdown longarm, and I was (still am) very happy with it.

That was a long time ago, and I've wanted to make another Tokyo Subway Map for some time, but I didn't want to make it scrappy. Then when I saw a neon collection of solids called Phosphor by Libs Elliott, I suddenly had the idea: make a grittier version of Tokyo Subway Map on a dark gray background, and call it Tokyo Underground.

One thing I wanted to do differently, since I wasn't using scraps this time, was try to minimize the seams on the subway lines. To accomplish this, I had to use partial seams, but it was much easier than I originally thought it would be. I had a really good time piecing this.

I knew how I wanted to quilt this while I was still piecing it. I decided to add some ghost elements in the background, because of course I had to. I don't always manage, but I try to introduce an element of interest into each quilt, and the ghost subway lines are it for this quilt.

And the background space was filled with one of my favorite designs that I rarely get to use because it's usually not right for the quilt, but is perfect for this quilt: steampunk gears! I had written a tutorial earlier on how to quilt gears here.

This was definitely one of the most challenging quilts I've completed recently. The steampunk gears were quite tough to fit in all these little spaces, and there were tons and tons of starts and stops. I had to make a lot of decisions about which section to go to next, which added to a mental tax. Some quilts are easy and relaxing because the quilt path is clearly defined, but that's definitely not the case for this one!

A lot of the time I will go for months just piecing and not machine quilt anything. For the last few months though, I've not felt like piecing at all and just wanted to quilt. (I'm not sure I've experienced this before in my entire quilting life.) I don't know how long this phase will last, but I figured while I'm in this mode, I might as well try to get as many quilt tops done as possible before they start piling up again.

And whew, looks like I finished it in time, this last quilt of the year. Happy New Year to all, and I wish you all a great 2024!

Rapid City

After I finished the lovely More Fishes for Cheryl's blog hop, I loaded up the next quilt, and then, my summer vacation started. I had such a nice time with lots of traveling around the country and memories made with my family as well as some solo trips for myself, but after I got back home, it was really hard to get back into the longarm room.

After a hiatus of about 4 months, I finally started machine quilting again. All this time I didn't really know what to do with the quilt, and I kept hoping an idea would come to me. But it didn't. It wasn't until I actually started quilting that I forced myself to come up with something.

Rapid City is designed by Elizabeth Hartman, and the fabric collection I used is leftover from my Cat's Eye quilt, First of Infinity by Kumiko Fujita. This whole quilt had such a graphic and urban vibe that I knew I wanted a very simple design mostly of straight lines. I allowed one curvy design: the ribbon candy, because I just really like the way it looks across long strips.

Elizabeth's designs are always intricate looking and the cutting instructions have brought me to tears at times due to their complexity. But once the dreaded cutting is over, I always have such a good time piecing her quilts. This one was no exception!

I love the texture of the straight lines running across the white fabric, as it always looks and feels scrumptious. For the border I did a simple piano keys design. It's not something I do very often, but for this quilt, it seemed fitting.

Since I love this pattern, and I love the fabric collection, I knew I was going to love the end result as well. And I absolutely do. Hopefully with me breaking through the post-summer slump quilt hiatus, the next one won't take quite so long to finish. In fact, I think I already know what quilt I want to quilt next and exactly how to quilt it. It's another Elizabeth Hartman!

Seahorse Sanctuary

Elizabeth Hartman's Neighborhood quilt in her book Modern Patchwork is one of the earliest quilts on my queue. I added it a few years ago, determined to work on it some day, but my biggest challenge? I didn't know what fabric to choose.

My favorite part of the pattern is that each little house has a window where Elizabeth placed some fussy cut birds. That was adorable, and I knew I wanted to do something similar. Yet I could not find the right fabric in the right scale that also had coordinating fabrics to go with it. That is, until I got the idea of using her Reef collection.

Reef has a cute seahorses print that felt like they could be the residents in the houses! And so, my Neighborhood quilt moved underwater and became Seahorse Sanctuary. I chose a solid blue for the background to represent the ocean, and after choosing my fabrics (which is the hardest part) everything else fell into place. This was incredibly fun to piece too, as it's a log cabin, albeit in a funky way.

The blue represents water, of course, so I wanted to go with some watery motifs. Naturally, the first things I thought of were swirls, wavy lines, and pebbles. (But this could be a sky quilt and I'm sure I'll find an excuse to use these exact 3 designs.)

But the most fun part of this quilt are the houses. I decided to make each house slightly different, because of course the seahorses have their own decor choices. I used a variety of designs to represent texture on the houses, but I think the clamshells are my favorite. And I don't think I've ever used them before ... I never saw a good opportunity, but they totally work for houses, especially underwater houses!

Here's another house, with an underwater fern decoration:

I like how this quilt is really cute but it doesn't scream kid quilt. I'm not sure yet if I'll keep this quilt for myself or give it to one of my kids. Maybe we'll just share.

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Linking up with: My Quilt Infatuation, Busy Hands Quilts, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Cooking Up Quilts, Sew Can She, and Powered by Quilting

#100Days100Blocks2018: Trellis

The first quilt top I got from the #100Days100Blocks2018 challenge is complete. Trellis is the layout I used for this one because I love the graphic, high-contrast look of the frames with the colorful blocks.

This quilt required some advanced planning, as I knew I wanted a rainbow effect that washes diagonally, and the colorways in Pacific allowed me to do that. I drew a color chart in advance so I knew how many of each type to make. Once I finally finished the blocks, I laid them out on the design wall.

Once the layout was complete, it was time to make the sashing strips and to assemble everything. While I liked the rainbow look by itself, once the graphic sashing frames came on, it became so much more beautiful.

It took me a few days to assemble this, and once it was finished, I was so incredibly happy with how it looks!

I'm not sure when I'll get to quilting this, but just finishing this top is good enough for me, for now!

Aviatrix Medallion ~ Part Four: The (Not) Finale

Aviatrix Medallion is hands down the hardest quilt top I've ever pieced, and now it's also the hardest quilt I've ever quilted.

I really enjoyed quilting all the different designs, some of which are my own ideas and some that I got from inspiration photos on the internet. A combination of ruler work and free-motion means that I never take the ruler base off. The ruler base does adds a little bit of drag, but I find I'm used to it now and can still move the machine smoothly.

And ... that's all I have for now. For personal reasons, I have to take it off the frame and I'm not sure when I'll get around to finishing it. It is my first official quilting UFO (UnFinished Object). But when I come back to it, I won't have to spend any time thinking about quilting designs, at least!

Previous posts on this quilt:

Part Zero

Part One: Center Star + Border 1

Part Two: Border 2 + Border 3

Part Three: Borders 4 to 6

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Linking up with: Cooking Up Quilts.

Avant Garde

I just completed my very first queen sized bed quilt, using the Avant Garde fabric collection that was almost too pretty to cut up. Almost ... so I cut it up into rather large pieces. I completed this quilt top a few months ago and waited until I had a longarm before quilting this quilt.

It was actually the thought of quilting this quilt that had me decide to look into a longarm machine to begin with. It might have sounded like a ridiculous idea at that point, but once the idea took hold, there was no shaking it. Suddenly, I found all sorts of excuses to justify why purchasing a longarm might be a good idea. (I even convinced myself at one point that I can make it pay for itself eventually. Some day. When my robot butler does everything else in the house.) But I'm so glad for that moment of insanity that started me down the path toward my longarm!

This quilt is fairly forgiving to quilt because the fabric is so busy and bright. I did a back and forth design on the sashing strips and practiced a lot of my favorite fillers in the wavy strips. Most of the quilt alternates between two designs: swirls / paisley allover and wonky spirals. I quilted it on a bigger scale than I normally do because this is a bed quilt and I didn't want it to be too stiff.

I highlighed a section of the quilt by quilting it differently, with pebbles and feathers. This is definitely my favorite section! I can't get enough of the texture, especially on this batting! For the first time ever, I used a polyester batting (Quilter's Dream Poly) and I'm in love with it. It's just as easy to quilt with, has a little more loft, and is cheaper than cotton.

I am so happy with this quilt! The fabric was stunningly beautiful, the pattern was interesting, and the quilting was so much fun. I think this quilt looks great on the guest bed, and every morning when I walk by the guest bedroom, I'll see it and smile.

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This post participated in the link parties at Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Cooking Up Quilts, and Crazy Mom Quilts. Link up and join the fun!

Aviatrix Medallion ~ Part Three: Borders 4 to 6

Aviatrix Medallion is a quilt that really rewards patience and concentration. I was rather concerned that the patchwork would be beyond my ability, but I'm happy to say that the top is finally done ... and it's even mostly square!

In previous posts, I worked up to Border 3. Border 4 is a scrappy border made of all gray fabrics, and because I messed up the center medallion's size previously and had to substitute Border 1, which was supposed to be half-square triangles, with a much skinnier scrappy border, it means Border 1 and Border 4 are nearly identical. But I think it looks pretty good, all things considered!

Border 5 is one of my favorite things to piece: log cabins! I just love building it out from the center, and the chain piecing involved means it's very efficient.

And finally, Border 6 is what I call the butterfly block. This was probably the hardest border to put on! My initial borders were far too long, so I had to do a fair bit of ripping, re-sewing, fudging, and easing, and in the end it managed to fit, barely.

Whew! This is probably the most difficult thing I've ever pieced. I'm excited to quilt this, but it won't be for awhile, as I want to wait until I'm sufficiently comfortable on my longarm (which I don't even have yet). After all ... I spent a lot of effort on this quilt top, so I want to make sure the quilting is worthy of it!

Previous posts on this quilt:

Part Zero

Part One: Center Star + Border 1

Part Two: Border 2 + Border 3

Aviatrix Medallion ~ Part Two: Border 2 + Border 3

Borders 2 and 3 of Aviatrix Medallion is now complete. I don't think I've ever had to pay that much attention to a perfect quarter-inch seam as this quilt, because it's medallion and every "ring" needs to be the right size! To facilitate, I really worked hard to press the seams carefully open.

Border 2 is a rail fence variation, so it was fairly easy to piece.

On the other hand, Border 3 includes one of the more complicated blocks I've ever dealt with. It involves something I still struggle with ... sewing snowball corners. It's easy in theory, but in practice, I find that it's a real challenge to make the block come out square and the right size!

I'm not sure whether it's a blessing or a curse that fabric is stretchy. On one hand, more room for mistakes. On the other hand, more fudging of mistakes. After attaching Border 3, this quilt is really starting to look like something!

Previous posts on this quilt:

Part Zero

Part One: Center Star + Border 1

Tokyo Subway Map

It's scrappy. It's modern. It's urban. It's Tokyo Subway Map! After more than a month of piecing the top, and nearly a month of quilting, I'm proud to unveil my finished Tokyo Subway Map quilt. The pattern is by Elizabeth Hartman of Oh Fransson. It is the perfect quilt for a self-professed Japan-o-phile like me.

This quilt is the biggest quilt I've ever quilted, at 80" x 80". I won't lie, it was a real chore to manage the bulk on my midarm. More and more, I find myself longing for a longarm (no pun intended). I thought the best quilting design for this quilt would be improv, and plus I've wanted to try improv quilting for awhile. I had a lot of fun doing improv because there's no planning. Naturally, I quilted this quilt to death. I really like the neat Where's Waldo effect because of all the things I threw on there. I did notice after awhile that one motif kept showing up ... the sunburst medallion. I must like it a lot!

I kept the quilting in the train lines pretty simple, and just did a continuous curve, mostly so I can maneuver in and out of the space easily.

I had a vision in my head for this quilt, and that was to make it look very urban, very modern, very colorful, but still clean and bright. (Kind of like Tokyo itself.) I think I achieved what I set out, with the beautiful and striking scrappy fabrics, and the heavily textured improv quilting. I absolutely adore this quilt! (But it's really heavy.)

Previous posts on this quilt:

Scrappy Subway Map Quilt

Tokyo Subway Map ~ Ready to Quilt!

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This post participated in the link parties at Crazy Mom Quilts, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, and Busy Hands Quilts. Link up and join the fun!

Aviatrix Medallion ~ Part One: Center Star + Border 1

Aviatrix Medallion is by far the most complicated quilt I've ever done. By far. Just cutting and organizing all the fabrics took me days because there felt like a thousand pieces that were all different shapes and sizes.

The center medallion looked really intimidating. It's a Lone Star pattern, and the pieces are tiny! So naturally I decided to do it in English Paper Piecing. It took me a very, very long time, but it's finally done. It looked pretty good, and the points lined up.

And then ... I realized my big, big mistake. I forgot to account for one side of the seam allowance, so each diamond was 1/8" bigger on each side than it was supposed to be. That means my star is several inches too big! I wasn't about to redo it, nor can I stand cutting off the star points, so my only option was to change Border 1's dimensions so that from this point on, the size is right again.

So I appliqued the star onto the background and added a scrappy border instead of the half-square triangle border as in the pattern.

That was a tough lesson to learn about double-checking my math! Hopefully there are no further snafus in this project.

Previous posts on this quilt:

Part Zero

Avant Garde Quilt

Every fabric bundle that enters my sewing room is special to me for one reason or another, but if I have to name my absolute favorite fabric collection that I acquired in the past year, it would definitely be Avant Garde by Katarina Roccella for Art Gallery Fabrics. This entire collection of striking hot pinks, teals, yellows, blacks, and whites in graphic patterns and formations is about as my style as it gets. This is a quilt that I would want to look at all the time, so I decided to make my very first queen-sized bed quilt with this collection.

I'm using the pattern New Waves by Elizabeth Hartman, because it doesn't require cutting the fabric into tiny pieces, and in big bands across the quilt, it really helps the prints to shine and take center stage. I've made this pattern once before in the form of a lap quilt, so this is just a bigger version.

However, since this is a queen sized quilt, I'm very reluctant to quilt it on my midarm. I know people have done king sized quilts on much smaller machines, and I admire that. However, for me, it's probably going to be too painful to be fun. I want quilting to always be fun. But that brings me to a little plan brewing in the back of my head ...

I'm thinking about getting a real longarm! I figured this day would come, but I didn't expect it to come this quickly. I have a tough decision ahead, and I want to try a lot of machines (meaning I'll have to go to a big show where it's all there) so I'm not sure when it'll happen, but as long as that's a possibility, I'll put this quilt top aside to wait for it.

Tokyo Subway Map ~ Ready to Quilt!

The first time I saw Tokyo Subway Map, I was still a fairly new quilter, and though I loved it, I was really intimidated. It looked so tiny and intricate. I put it on my "make someday" list and didn't think about it much. Then, about a year later, I remembered it and suddenly, I had to make it now. Talk about queue jumping!

Making this quilt first consists of cutting 1600 squares. After that, it's piecing those 1600 squares together. This quilt took more than a month to piece the top, just because there were so many little pieces. While it shouldn't have been difficult, I had a hard time with this. I think I just don't do very well with little pieces, but that doesn't mean I won't keep trying.

I love this top so far, and I'm so excited to quilt it. I think I'll have to finally try my hand at improv quilting, or wild quilting. I took a class with Christina Cameli on wild quilting that was incredibly inspiring, and I've always admired the amazing work of Karlee Porter. I can't think of a more perfect canvas to try wild quilting than this quilt, because it's got an urban feel, it's asymmetrical, whimsical, and has so many odd spaces.

Since I've never done wild quilting before, I figured it wouldn't be a bad idea to sketch it out some. I just randomly doodled some stuff without thinking too hard about it, but I kind of like the way it looks! In a blending thread, it'll be great. One thing I always have to take into account, though, is contrast, as it's something I struggle with.

Well, I can hardly wait to get started! This will probably take me a month or so to quilt, but it will be a really fun one.

Scrappy Subway Map Quilt

Every few months, I feel the need to do a scrap busting quilt. The last one I did was the Irish Chainish Quilt which turned out great, but since then my scrap pile has once again climbed to the top of the large scrap bin. So this time, I decided to make Elizabeth Hartman's Tokyo Subway Map quilt.

While the piecing of this quilt shouldn't be difficult at all, it does have 1600 pieces, so that's a lot of tiny squares to sew together, and a lot of seams to match. Even so, I expect I'll slowly churn the blocks out in between other projects, and it will be fun and relaxing. The end result should be quite beautiful.

The first thing to do is to pull stuff from my scraps to fit the 12 subway "lines" and cut lots and lots of tiny squares. I quickly discovered that I have a lot more of some colors than others! Green, in particular ... I actually had to pull from my stash for the greens, because I didn't have much in my scrap pile.

I just have to cut the white squares (and there are almost 1000 of those ... *gulp*) and then I'll be ready to assemble. This will be so much fun (I hope).

Boardwalk Delights

Some fabric bundles are so special that I will hold off on using them until I find that perfect pattern. My Boardwalk Delight by Dana Willard for Art Gallery Fabrics is such a bundle. But I've found a great pattern: Elizabeth Hartman's New Wave. I like it so much that I'm planning on making a queen sized bedquilt using the same pattern (and another treasured bundle), so this lap quilt is sort of a trial run.

The fabrics are very summery, with ice cream, sprinkles, and boardwalk treats all over, and it makes me hungry but happy just to look at it. I don't think making it now that winter is upon us is really out of place, as it's a reminder of fun things I can look forward to next summer.

This is one of the harder things I've pieced, simply because it's not just rectangles, squares, or half-square triangles, but wedges, and matching them up at the corner to sew perfectly is a challenge. But I know I need to move beyond squares and rectangles some time, and this is as good a time as any.

For the quilting design, I knew I wanted to do simple back-and-forth lines in the white sashing strips. For the horizontal rows, I tried to let the name and theme of the quilt guide me. When I think of boardwalk, I think of ocean ... which to me translates into swirls and bubbles, of course! So I quilted a swirl chain and bubbles in alternate blocks. The swirl chain is a new design for me, while bubbles (pebbles) is more comfortable for me. Due to the busyness of the fabric, it's hard to see the quilting for this quilt on most of the strips, but oh, can I feel it! The texture is wonderful.

This quilt is, at the end, mostly about the fabric, and I loved that I didn't have to cut up that gorgeous fabric into teeny pieces. I think it's part of the motivation behind Elizabeth's design, that it's when we can't bear the idea of cutting some of our favorite printed fabrics up into tiny pieces. With this one completed, I'll feel more confident about tackling this same pattern but for a queen-sized quilt, my first ever bed quilt.