I got a lot done this weekend. I'ts just too hot to be outside so between some Olympic watching I quilted some veteran's quilts, blocked my Non Unus Pluma quilt, dyed some beach towels and finished my latest mosaic section.
We have Mallard ducks visit the pond often so I thought I should include one om the wall. Of course after I finished it and stepped back I realized I had my duck sitting on top of the water instead of floating in it so I'm going to call this the Jesus duck. He rules all other ducks. Believe it or not that beak piece was pulled straight out of my scrap container. No nipping necessary. The water came from a piece of potter that someone has used to test glazes. The mix of color samples was perfect for my water. I have not gotten my quilt blocked yet but it will be done before the weekend is out. Instead I got 3 sets of veteran's quilts put on zippers and ready to load. I have a couple of new ideas for my beginner longarm classes and I'm using these quilts to get some photos. This is one of them. It's so fast and I really like the texture it creates. You can see in this photo how I load the second quilt right behind the first one. I match up the tops so that I can use the same thread on both quilts too. On this one I'm doing continuous curves in the print fabrics only. Each row of blocks takes 2 passes of quilting. This photo shows the first pass. I'll quilt back to the start to fill the block. I'm not doing any quilting in the white areas. These 2 will be done by the end of the weekend and maybe one or 2 more.
Boy is this a happy sight. Zippers off means no more quilting! I'm going to attempt to get it blocked this afternoon, If not today, then tomorrow. As I was finishing up I kept finding more areas to fix or add something to. The unquilted section of the pale stars was way too puffy so I added a couple of arcs bordering the smallest quilted arc. It helps. It's not perfect, but it helps. This would be a good time to answer your burning question: What's up with the squiggle quilting? I have no idea what got into me to do that dense quilting in the pale stars and the orange stars. In fact, it was after doing that I the quilt got taken off the machine and set aside for over a year. The problem is that once I started that I had to continue with it so I added that element in all of the star points. It wouldn't be my choice now but I have a saying that I teach beginner longarmers that applies here. That saying is "Crappy quilting, when consistent, looks good." It's meant to motivate quilters to try a new motif and do it all over a quilt. If you are bad at it just be consistent and it will look intentional and look good. Well, that's what I did in the star points of this quilt. I just continued on with the crappy quilting. It's not that the execution was crappy. How can you screw up scribble after all? It's the idea that was highly questionable. Then I needed to do something with the narrow sashing around the center on-point section. It was way too puffy and wrinkly because all the other quilting had drawn up the quilt so much. I decided on 1/4" lines from each edge. That didn't do it either so I borrowed the hook from the inside of my pebbles and stitched a hook chain on the center of the sashing. Before I added anything else I quickly removed it from the machine, checked the back to make sure I didn't need to repair anything and removed the zippers. It was time to move on! Yesterday I started dyeing the fabrics for the piping and binding. Hopefully I'll have some finishing photos soon. Next on FloMo will be some refreshingly easy veterans quilts. These are quilted 2 at a time and I hope to get the first pair loaded today or tomorrow morning.
Before I get into the business news I just want to report that I finished the quilting on the Judy Neimeyer quilt yesterday! I think it's going to be called "Non Unas Pluma" (not 1 feather in Latin). The name is because I didn't quilt 1 feather on the whole thing. Why Latin? Because I've been listening to a lot of history lately. I'll have some photos maybe tomorrow. The next step is blocking and dyeing some binding fabric options. I'm getting on that today and I'm looking forward to quilting up some quick quilts this weekend. Fabric Dyeing ClassNow let's get to business. First up is an opportunity to learn to dyed fabric and have a lot of fun doing it. I'm teaching a 2-day Introduction to Fabric Dyeing class next weekend at Visual Arts Center in Richmond, VA. Only 4 spots open. All day Saturday and half day Sunday and you get 5 yards of fabric to dye. For the adventurous I'll have fabric available to sell if you need more and you can always bring your own. You will learn all about the chemical used, how to mix dyes and several dyeing techniques all using the low water immersion process. Learn to make a fabric color wheel, shades, different texture techniques and some basics of color mixing. We'll dye in plastic bags so that the fabric will be easy to transport home for wash out and soaking. Beginner Longarm ClassAre you a renter wanting to start improving your longarm skills or a new owner (of any machine) wanting to move beyond stipple an loops? I'm going to show you a pathway to building your longarm skills by starting with some simple motifs and using them as building blocks for more advanced quilting. Everything is edge to edge but will really kick up your quilting and give you confidence and skill to tackle any quilt. Class will be half classroom drawing out designs and half hands on. I'm teaching that at The Longarm Network in Goochland, VA. New Crystal FabricsThe biggest news of the day is that I have 15 new Crystal fabrics. The next issue of Machine Quilters Unlimited is going to have an article by Patricia Caldwell showing how she quilted some of the Crystal mandala fabrics. In preparation for that I wanted to get the store well stocked...plus they are just messy fun to do. I've added 5 new 56" square cotton sateen pieces and 10 new 38" square cotton pieces. Here are a few of my favorites. You can see them all in the shop.
In between all of the quilting this weekend I finished another wall section. I wanted to use mirror again so cut some random petal shapes and built the yellow and orange around the for my central petals. The center of the flower is a fused glass cabochon. Then I cut some more mirror to make centers for the dark red petals. I picked these colors because I wanted something bright and these were what I had. After I finished I realized that I had created a Virginia Tech flower! Mom has a VT daylily in her garden. Since I don't do any gardening beyond relentless use of RoundUp, I'll cal this my own VT daylily.
I'm making great progress on the wall since I needed to take frequent quilting breaks. I finished all of the pebbling this weekend. It took a lot of sessions but once I had a rhythm going it really didn't talk all that long.....not that I accomplished much else all weekend.I do love the effect and I'm really good at the swirly pebbles now. So, now that the pebbles were done it was time to bring it upstairs to see what else it needs. I really hadn't intended to invest this much time into it but in for a penny, in for a pound. You can see in the first photo that I need to add something else to the green spikes ad the pale border needs something too. It's too wrinkly now that the pebbles drew in the fabric so much. I also needed to bring it up to see it this way to decide how I want to bind it. I"m considering a piped binding and originally thought orange but I'm now leaning to the pale mottled fabric. I need to decide by Wednesday morning because whatever I choose has to be dyed. I also need to add a little to my pale stars. You can't see it very well on this photo but those 2 open half circle spaces are way too puffy.
I don't think I'll have any problem getting this done by the end of the month. I never intended to show this quilt when I started it but I may enter it now that I've put so much work into it. Time to get off the computer and back to quilting! |
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I'm Vicki Welsh and I've been making things as long as I can remember. I used to be a garment maker but transitioned to quilts about 20 years ago. Currently I'm into fabric dyeing, quilting, Zentangle, fabric postcards, fused glass and mosaic. I document my adventures here. Categories
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April 2024
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