ngco - arts » finished quilts

Josh’s quilt… finally

Jessie — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 18:04:00 +0000

I think it was in the year 2006 when I began this quilt. I decided to take a class on paper-piecing which is a sewing technique that uses printed paper as seam guides; you actually sew fabric together onto paper then later the paper is ripped away leaving just the fabric. It allows for very precise sewing. It also think it’s more work and trouble than regular 1/4” seam piecing, so this will most likely be the last big quilt I make that uses paper piecing.

The approximate dimensions are 64” x 78”. Too small for a bed, but pretty perfect for snuggling on the couch, which was the goal. I just wanted to make sure it covered the hubby’s legs and at 6’4” tall, there’s a lot of leg to cover.

This block is called a kaleidoscope block. There are 110 blocks total in this quilt: 11 rows of 10 blocks each. But, it may surprise some to know that it’s just 2 different color ways of the same block that are arranged to give the optical illusion. You can stare at the quilt and start to see different colors of circles emerge. That’s why I like the pattern so much, even though it’s not easy sewing.

I quilted this one like I’ve been finishing lots of my quilts lately: swirl quilting. I just like how the roundness of the quilted shapes contrast the hard lines of the patchwork. That, and it’s one of the easiest all-over, unmarked designs that I could possibly do. And fastest.

Since all of my quilting equipment & supplies (everything) is at my in-laws’ house still, I finished the quilt during the days when Josh was at work. Since all of my stuff stayed there, Josh had no idea that I was working on a quilt for him. I wrapped it up and gave it to him for his Christmas gift. He was really surprised!

This is him wondering what his gift was:

And here he is when he realizes what it is (Jace naturally assumed I wanted his picture, so he’s kind of in the way here):

What a precious expression. I had promised the quilt to him a long time ago, and at one time it was a joke that he’ll never get his quilt, and then so much time had passed that it wasn’t even a joke anymore. It’s so nice to have it done and extra nice that it gets to stay in our house for us to use and enjoy. And a special way to remember our 10th Christmas together.

Oh, and Jace gave me another chance at a picture of just him:

Here’s one last shot of the back of the quilt:

Emma’s quilt

Jessie — Mon, 09 Aug 2010 21:28:00 +0000

In an effort to link to my completed quilt projects on the left sidebar of this Arts & Crafts section, I discovered that I had forgotten to share yet another quilt that was completed during the Great Blog Drought of 2010.

So here she is:

I love the way this quilt turned out; it was one of those projects that I was a little unsure of until I put it all together.

My first cousin Ashleigh and her husband Derek welcomed their first baby – a little girl named Emma – on April 7th. We had a baby shower for her in May and that was the occasion for this quilt.

Emma, of course, is a doll with such fine feminine features; I can’t go on another sentence without sharing a picture of her with you.

I really love this next picture! It’s of Emma in her 5-generation picture with Ashleigh, her dad David (my uncle), our Grandma Bev, and GG:

So now that you know who this pretty little lady is, I’ll get back to the quilt.

I asked Ashleigh if she wanted any certain colors or styles for the quilt and she thought pinks and browns were nice. I think they are nice, too.

I went to my local quilt shop, Adel Quilting & Dry Goods, and found the perfect fabric (in the center of the picture):

Not only was it brown with cute polka dots, some of the polka dots were heart-shaped. Too precious. But apparently, many others thought so, too, and that’s why the only remnant of the fabric in the whole shop was a single, solitary fat quarter. A fat quarter, to the uninitiated, is a 18” x 22” cut of fabric.

Even with the small amount of fabric I had to work with, I still knew that I needed to make it the focal point of the quilt. So, I picked out several other fabrics I already owned that coordinated with the brown polka dot fabric and set out to make it work.

As you can see, I set the brown polka dot fabric apart from the coordinating prints by surrounding it with white fabrics. You can’t see it really well in the picture, but all of those white fabrics are different. I love using as many fabrics as possible in a quilt.

I used the coordinating prints to act as a sashing of sorts, but I also wanted to add interest by offsetting the blocks, creating a staggered effect.

Really, even though this quilt did take a lot of sewing, the layout and construction could not be simpler: it was 480 – 2 1/2” squares arranged by colors to show a pattern. No difficult sewing with weird shapes or seam intersections, just straightforward, honest to goodness straight seams. It would be very appropriate for a beginner. (This is so appropriate right now.)

I quilted it using freehand spirals like I have for a lot of quilts recently and again – it turned out pretty well. The swirly pattern is pretty universal and looks good on many different quilt tops.

I had just a few lengths of the focus fabric left by the time I was done so I cut them into binding strips, added it to a solid brown binding strips that I already had, and used the combo to complete the binding on the quilt.

Hmmm… have I made any more quilts that I’m forgetting about?! I think this was the last one… I haven’t quilted in a few months now and I miss it so much. I hope to get up and running again in the near future.

Beat the drum quilt

Jessie — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 13:01:55 +0000

I posted this quilt on Facebook a while ago, but that was during my extended break from blogging and I just realized that I never shared it on here.

What prompted my memory?

The girls I made this quilt for are in Africa right now!

Two teenage girls from our church decided to raise money so that they could go on a missions trip to South Africa working with HIV/AIDS affected youth. Pretty incredible, huh?

Somehow – and I admittedly don’t know all the details – their trip was inspired by a movie called Beat the Drum. Click the link to see the official website for the movie, including the trailer.

I wanted to do something to help and I thought that making a quilt to auction off would bring more money than what I could just write a check for (wrong).

So, I made this:

I didn’t have to buy anything new to make this quilt, I had all the fabric, batting, thread… everything! I wanted the quilt to be appealing to women and men, that’s why I chose the colors and the pattern, which was essentially the same pattern I designed for this quilt. Also, red, black and white are school colors around these parts.

The scrappy back.

I loved the swirls that I quilted the last time I made this pattern, so I kept that element, too. It was a lot of fun to make.

I’d never auctioned a quilt before so after some thought, I decided eBay would be the best bet. I figured the largest audience would see the quilt on eBay. Also, as I mentioned before, I posted the information on Facebook so my friends and church family could see it. I set the auction to run 10 days with a reserve set at $100. I had no idea what to expect. When I was taking orders in my custom quilt making business, I would have charged over $300 for a quilt this size (approx. 60” x 70”).

After it was all said and done, the quilt sold for exactly $100. The good news was that a family from our church bought the quilt. The bad news was that the eBay fees ended up being over $18, so I won’t be doing that again! Ha ha! Well, I shouldn’t say that… I would definitely make a quilt for charity again, but don’t know if I’d go the eBay route again, or I would have set a higher reserve.

Ah, live and learn. In the end, the girls going on the mission trip met the amount they each needed to raise and they are in Africa right now caring for the orphans and the sick and the oppressed. How is that a bad ending?! It’s not! And the quilt is now being enjoyed by a family that I love, so classic win-win.

Baby boy quilt

Jessie — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 21:22:00 +0000

I made this little quilt recently for friends of ours who are having their first child in August.

I’ve made a lot of quilts lately entirely (or almost entirely) out of 2 1/2” squares of fabric. I have a lot of fabrics and the smaller the squares, the more I can use – I love that scrappy look. I just realized that I haven’t blogged about some of the quilts I’ve made lately. Jeeeez-o, I took a long vacation from the blog, huh? Sorry, friends, I’ll catch you up soon.

Here is a picture of the back of the quilt. It contains phrases such as: “it’s a boy”, “nine months”, “bouncing baby boy”, “a new life”, “our little miracle”, “boy meets world”, “we’re expecting”, etc.. So appropriate.

Baby quilts are my favorite. I think I’ve mentioned this a time or two. Especially when a person has limited room to sew and quilt (think kitchen table) the smaller sizes are so doable.

New baby quilt

Jessie — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 21:48:00 +0000

Simple and stylish… with swirly quilting. And did I mention reversible?!

I’m on a roll… I have bought no new fabric or batting for the last five quilts I’ve made. I’m using the materials I’ve accumulated in the last five years of quilting and having fun doing it.

Ziggy’s quilt

Jessie — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 18:58:00 +0000

I’ve been playing catch-up in making quilts for family members and friends who’ve had babies recently (or not so recently now). Ideally, I’d like to give a quilt immediately upon a birth or even before. BUT, as I’m juggling this full and happy, if not a little chaotic household, quilts are getting turned out 6+ months later. Anyway, Isaac was born in April and he got his quilt last month.

Here is his quilt:

I tried a new personalization technique with this quilt and it worked out ok – I’ll probably try it again sometime. As you can see in the last two photos, I used my sewing machine’s alphabet to embroider “Isaac” and “Ziggy” (his mama’s favorite nick name for him) into the quilt’s binding.

I made my double-fold binding strips like I do with every quilt. I will be posting a tutorial on that in the future. Before I sewed the binding onto the quilt top, I picked two random areas of the binding to place the names. I then selected the letters on my sewing machine and let the machine stitch them. Then, I sewed the binding onto the quilt top.

The “Isaac” ended up on one of the sides of the quilt, but the “Ziggy” ended up smack dab on a corner. When I try this technique again, I might take more care so the personalized name or message doesn’t end up on a corner, just because it makes it a little more difficult to read.

One last thing, this quilt pattern is the same one I used for another quilt I’ve written about recently on the blog. Here’s a photo:

With Isaac’s quilt, I made the blocks a little smaller and included more of them than in Jace’s quilt above. Of course, the color choices make the two look very different.

Here are the block instructions: How to make a snowball block

And here are instructions on sewing the blocks together: Sewing a quilt top together

Will’s quilt, pt. 2

Jessie — Tue, 05 May 2009 11:30:00 +0000

Did you figure it out?

Do you know what the pattern is?

Here’s where it came all together:

It’s a Triple Irish Chain, silly!

In unconventional colors! I let Will’s mommy choose the pattern and colors.

The back is the orange print you see peeking out above.

I love when I can get my camera to show a quilt’s texture, because that’s what is all about. Soft and a ready for snugglin’. Especially snugglin’ with a baby.

Which REALLY is what it’s all about!

So, without further adieu, here’s William. An utter doll, if I’ve ever seen a doll.

The journey of a quilt

Jessie — Fri, 01 May 2009 16:04:00 +0000

One momentous thing happened during my blog sabbatical. I finished the Grandmother’s Flower Garden quilt I’d been working on for such a long time.

Here are links to a couple of previous posts on this quilt:

Full view

Quilting the quilt/Continuous Curve Quilting

Now here are the last pictures I took of the ol’ gal before she left my house. I focused mostly on the showing the edges of the quilt, and the knife edge binding I used. Mercy me, lots of little tiny stitches. Knife edge binding does not include an extra strip of fabric stitched along the edges of the quilt much like every other quilt binding I’d done before. Instead, the top and back edges of the quilt fabric are turned toward each other, covering the batting. Then a whip stitch is used to secure the edge that is created. Get it? Maybe the pictures will help. For the back of the quilt, I used a pink 1930’s reproduction fabric I found at my local quilt shop.

Funky dog

Jessie — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 14:21:01 +0000

I finally got this quilt finished up last week. Yesterday I washed it up, took pictures of it and got it ready to send to my customer. I’ll have fond memories of this one: it was the project I was working on when I found out I was pregnant. Also, because of that, I have reminders of nausea tied to it, too. Ah well, comes with the territory.

This customer liked my Lovebirds (Circle Gets the Square) quilt and wanted to duplicate the style of that while incorporating personal photos of their family’s loveable fur-babies. Hope she likes the end result!

One down

Jessie — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 22:23:14 +0000

I’m done with the table runner! It’s official: this is my 2nd favorite quilt I have made so far. I would say as of now, my favorite quilt is this quilt pictured first because I love the block – the classic feathered star – and because of the quilting (trapunto):

But back to my most recent finished project! Here it is:

It’s a log cabin table runner, and I love the fabrics, but my favorite thing about this is the quilting. Can you see the motifs in each cream area? Here’s a closer look:

The area around the feathered motif is micro-stippled. Ok, maybe this is a better shot of the micro-stippling:

The micro-stippling makes the central motif stand out even more and it makes the whole quilt very flat. There is nearly 3 small spools (200 meters each) of #100 weight silk thread in this quilt. For you quilters out there, if you haven’t tried silk thread – you’ve got to try it! It’s awesome to work with, albeit a little pricey ($5 for 200 meters). It’s so nice for detailed quilting like feathers (where you have to back-track over a quilting line) and micro-stippling. The stitches just sink into the batting and it is remarkably strong.

And here’s one last picture of the back:

So there you have it! I can’t wait to give this to my customer!

I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving!