Happy new year.

It's tradition now. I blog at new year. This year though is a lot more sedate and no fire. Hope you are all doing something you enjoy. Have a great new year.

Free quilt patterns

Being on several mail lists I get a lot of messages suggesting sites and blogs I might be interested in. I look at a lot, but few really grab me. This one however I think is great. Cindy has several quilt patterns available for free, in a nice range of complexity. Take a look, you might fins something will tickle your fancy too. Quilt patterns from Seattle, by Cindy Carter.

Can you guess what it is yet?

What on Earth would induce someone to stand outside in their pajamas in the middle of winter? Spray baste! It was a piece too big to do in the house so I do them on the hedge outside. All my neighbours already know I am nuts so I don't have to worry about what they think.

So any ideas what my latest piece is going to be?

Two Christmas Quilts

I am sure you remember me saying I had two Christmas quilts on the frame. Well I have finally had time to upload my photographs so I can share them just in time for Christmas.

The first one I felt was the easier one. If nothing else it told me what it wanted, but it also has larger pieces which I often find easier to quilt. The star blocks are all quilted with a continuous curve. I kept all the stitching on the background of the star so they pop up. I wanted the stars themselves to come forward as much as I could.

The Santas are all quilted in the same way, but not the same. Each is outlined and then the back ground filled in with feathers and pebbles. The pebbles take a while to do, but I like the effect that the figures have something to stand on. The background of the figures are pieced, in a churn dash pattern. This gave me a good starting point, and I only quilted some parts of the block, hopefully making the block clearer.

The second of the Christmas quilts was O'Tanenbaum. I've been looking at this quilt hanging on the wall at the shop for a while and I've often wondered how you would quilt it. Well it finally became more than an academic question. This quilt has come closer to stumping me than any I've had before. I was torn between doing some sort of all over and not doing anything that would take away from the huge amount of work that went into piecing it.

Working with the piecing won out. OK no surprise there. The problem was then trying to do it quickly. I didn't want this to take too long and get too expensive. I decided that the houses needed a lot of attention, mostly because I couldn't think of a quick and sympathetic way to quilt the half timbered house. Each house I quilted in a way that added detail to the building, so roofs got tiles and walls got bricks. To make the applique flowers and tree pop up I needed some pretty dense quilting. As I don't often stipple I went for that in those areas. It is a good pattern for holding down an area.

The stars have the same continuous lines that I used on the first quilt. It works, and I guess I had it on the brain at the time. This just left the log cabins. I would normally like to quilt along the logs, but in this quilt they are only 1/2" wide. I also wanted to add some more flow to the quilt, to draw you around the big star. To do that I've put feathers into each of the triangles in log cabins. As the thread is quite a close match to the fabric it doesn't fight with the piecing, but when light falls across the quilt the texture does flow.

So there you go, two quilts just for Christmas.

Why do longarm quilters want so much backing?

Ever wondered? Well there are several very good reasons. Longarm University has a great video that talks you through some of the issues. If you would like to have a look it is the first video on this page. It is intended to explain to new quilters why they might want to have more backing, but I think it will make sense to everyone who has had (or is thinking of having) a quilt longarm quilted.

Do I get my domestic goddess badge yet?

Over the weekend it struck us that it was time to get a tree, but it's really hard to buy a proper tree now. What do I mean by proper? Well a tree that smells like a tree, and ideally looks like one. Not a short fat tree a proper triangular tree. Apparently these requirements mean we need either a Norway Spruce or a Norway Fir. OK, so now we know what we want all we have to do is buy one right? Wrong, everyone (who are these mythic every ones?) now wants a tree that will not drop it's needles smell and shape aren't important. We looked at a huge number of trees on Sunday but none would do for us.

We did however find two silicone cake pans. I'd been after them for a while, but when Tet put in a request for a Christmas cake it seemed a good time to get them. So two pans and a lot of hard stirring later, we have two cakes, (one with peel cherries and ginger) iced and ready to go. There are some advantages to not liking alcohol on your Christmas cakes, I don't need to feed the cake so I can get it done over a shorter time. Also the paler cakes I make don't need to mature in the same way as the darker ones.

In between baking I continued the search for a tree. I eventually found a garden center who did understand the difference and had a whole range of trees. I don't have as tall a tree as I would like, but it smell great. I also managed to pick up some plain silver tinsel to go with the black ornaments I picked up at Ikea a while ago.

So, I've finished the two Christmas quilts, baked and iced two cakes, caught and decorated a tree and made a batch of biscuits. I think that's pretty good going really.

For a while I've been feeling a need to play with my longarm. Just spend some time messing about and trying out new things. In between batches of biscuits I finally managed it. I've had some new rulers I wanted to have a go with for a while and boy they are good. I am going to have to design a quilt that needs lots of little circles. They are fun and much quicker than I had expected. I am also quite taken with the chain of hears ruler. It's great and again much quicker than I had feared. While I've got the big test panel on I am also making up some samples for the shop, illustrating quilting patterns. I'd like to do a sample of my new wholecloth class too. When I get a chance I will take some pictures and post them. I don't have space at home to hang the Christmas quilts so I have to wait until I return them to the shop.

Feeling Festive

The Santa quilt is now finished, but as it is sharing a back with another quilt it is still on the frame. I can't wait to see it hung up so I can see all of it. I really enjoyed it and I think it's come out pretty well. The other quilt it is paired with is another Christmas quilt. This one is even trickier from the quilting front. It has an amazing amount of intricate piecing and plenty of applique. I don't like doing anything that takes away from the top when I quilt, so it is taking a lot of work to quilt it. I think it is coming up OK, but even with sitting down to quilt I can only work for about an hour at a time. I will try and remember to post pictures when I get these two finished.

finally, a quilt I can share

This is the quilt I have on the frame today. I was a little daunted by it. It had 6 applique Santas on it. Now I've started I am really enjoying it. It is a shop sample for Patchwork Corner that has been waiting for quilting for a while. I just hope Jenny likes it as much as I do.

Frustrated

I've been quite recently for a couple of reasons. I've not been well, it seems that once I get a bug I keep getting new ones. I know it makes sense and working with people it's an occupational hazard, but it really does slow me up and I get so bored when I can't quilt. Still I seem to finally be on the mend so keep your finger crossed for that.

Other than that I seem to be working on an increasing number of projects I can't talk about. I know that at some point I will be able to post about them, but right now I just have to work away and not say anything. It wouldn't be so bad if I had time to do things I can share as well, but I don't. So much pouting is in order. Rest assured as soon as I can share, I will.

Herd home safe and sound

I got a very exciting package this morning long and skinny. I guess being excited by your own quilt is a little odd, but I was guessing it would have it's ribbon with it. As you can see it did. Very well wrapped too, my cats are thrilled with the bit pf tissue it was wrapped in. Yesterday evening I came home to find their cheque had arrived as well, so all present and correct. I was a little disapointed that there weren't more picutres in the show guide, but I am so thrilled they sent me one with my quilt.

The judges comments were also in with it, and they pretty much agree with each other which is unusual. One even complemented me on my binding. Maybe not thrilling to anyone else but having and the reverse comment for the other quilts I have sent to America I was very pleased with that. All commented that they would have liked to cows rro be clearer and more distinct, which is fair comment, but I like them as they are. I see coments about colour coming up again for me :)

For the next week they will be hanging at Patchwork Corner if you are near Hemel Hempstead and would like to see them. It's the only wall I have access to that they fit on.

Bryan Talbot talk

I'm guessing most of my readers won't have come across Bryan Talbot. It's a shame he is a fantastic writer and artist, but as he writes (and illustrates) graphic novels he hasn't reached as many people as I feel he deserves. As part of the year of reading, libraries have been organizing events to encourage reading. Last night Cheshunt library played host to Bryan, who was largely talking about 'The tale of one bad rat'. This graphic novel was very unusual when he wrote it, as it was intended for a mainstream audience not a comics audience. It was fascinating to learn how many comic book tools he chose not to use to make this book as easy to read as possible. It worked too, I had tried several comic books before this one and found the impossible to read, this was the first that really grabbed me. It is a rather unusual subject for a comic book too, the psychological after effects of child sexual abuse. No it's not a laugh a minute, and he worked very hard to avoid anything cartoon like in the book, but it isn't grim either. It's a good, fairly serious read.

In his talk he explained a lot about the things going on in the background of his work to set scenes and get you to feel what he is telling you. It is amazing how many very subtle things he does to change the feel of the story. Things you would never notice but do respond to. Having been working for many years he had a huge catalogue of work to draw on to explain how he makes a story work. One thing that really struck me about the talk is he delivered it as a story. He spent a long time filling in back story and giving us all the clues to understand what he had really come to say, and yet I didn't see him do it until afterwards. That's one heck of a skill to have.

The biggest surprise for me is how much I learned that applies to my textile art. One piece I have been planning will now be redrawn. What I had done was OK, in fact I was pretty happy with it, but now I know how I can make it better. Somehow in all my reading about composition and drawing the eye I hadn't got it, it took a story to show me how different lines and directions work. I went to be entertained, and a learned a huge amount. If I get another chance to see this talk I will be going again, I know I missed more than I got, and it will take another couple of tries before I come close to getting as much as I can from it. If you get a chance to hear him, do take it. You may not get all his comic book references but he explains things so well you don't need to, and who knows, you might find a whole new literary genre opening up to you.

Some Quilts!!

There are some quilts that I put on the frame, quilt and take off. I like these, and I do get a fair number of them. Then there are the others. They fight every step of the way. They don't want to load properly, they could fit the backing either way around, almost. They wriggle, they move and generally cause trouble. The worst bit is I don't seem to be able to spot these trouble makers in advance. It's nothing to do with the quality of the top, or indeed any of the materials used, there are just some that will not co-operate. As you can guess I have one of these on the frame right now. It should have been a really fun quilt to work on, but it is doing everything in it's power (and a lot I would have said that wasn't) to make things difficult. The latest (and by far the most annoying) is taking up wadding far faster than it should. I measured before loading and I had loads of wadding, now it looks like being a couple of inches short. I have spare and can join it, so it isn't a disaster, but it shouldn't have happened. I can't even say I've learned from this and won't do it again as I did check everything before I started and I don't really want to ask for any more spare on the wadding it's getting daft. Rant over, I had better go and convince this quilt to behave, and people wonder why there are longarm quilters? Who would want to deal with these monsters if they didn't have to :)

New quilt to share

I've been dying to share this quilt on here, but I wanted to wait until the model had seen it. I had been asked to take a photograph for his web site, but this one struck me as too good not to use as a quilt. Fortunately he is quite obliging and gave me permission to use it, but I did feel that gave him the right to see it first. He only ran screaming as much as you would expect anyone suddenly meeting a large portrait of themselves so I figure I've done OK.

It isn't quilted yet, and that will be a challenge, I find faces very hard to quilt, but I guess I had to tackle that problem sooner or later, and as this is part of a triptych I should get a fair amount of practice. The tattoo will also be a challenge. I normally like to quilt in the contour lines of the body, and I like to match the thread to the fabric, so I guess there will be a lot of starts and stops there. Well it will be fun I am sure.

Yesterday I got to help a friend make her first quilt. An advent calender. I would like to point out we even made it in time. That's pretty impressive given the idea was only formed at the NEC this year and we a are both stupidly busy. She would like to add more quilting (it already has more than most get) but will probably leave that to be done in time for next year. I wonder if you would have one which you added to every year so it would be both an old friend and something new each time. I guess that will be one of those ideas I have to kick about for a while as I think it would be quite a nice thing to do. Now I need to go and work on a customer quilt and a clever idea I had an started yesterday. People really should start saving me from myself. I have far too many ideas.

Oh Wow!

I've just had it confirmed that 'Herd Mentality' won the viewers choice award at the Houston Festival. I am so thrilled, thank you very much to every one who voted for me. It's an award that means a lot to me as this is the opinion of quilters, with no agenda and who mostly have no idea who I am. I feel pretty happy that this was won by the quilt on it's own, and to me that is the best sort of award I could ever hope for. I am celebrating with a new heat pack for me neck. It's from John Lewis and is so good it works without me actually heating it :) I promise I will stop grinning at some point, honest. If you would like to see a picture of the quilt with it's ribbon take a look here. I haven't got hold of the owner of the picture yet so I can't put it on my blog. If I do get permission I will later. Thanks again to all those who voted for it.

Fabric boxes

On another blog I read regularly I found a post about making fabric containers, and how time consuming it is. I have a different method which I found a lot quicker so I will try to share it with you. Having had a go at doing this in just words, I've taken time to make a sample so I could photograph it. It is easy, but quite hard to describe.

As I hadn't planned on making boxes I have had to improvise. The thickest stabiliser I had was thinner than I would like so I have used two layers. You need to cut pieces for the base and the four sides. I used 6" squares in this sample, but you can make any size you like. I find larger is easier, but see what you can come up with. Also there is no reason for the boxes to be cubes. You can use rectangles, just make sure that sides that join to each other are the same length.


Roughly zigzag the sides to the base. You can see in the picture that I am treating the two layers are one. Had I been being careful with this I would have spray basted the two layers together, but I don't worry for a test piece.

When you have made a cross use it to cut two layers of fabric that are the size of the outer edges of the cross. I actually layered it up and then felt for the edges of the cross to position the ruler. Again if I had been trying to make a great box I would have spray basted the layers together, but pins will do the job.

Now you start to form the box. Pinch two sides together at a corner. You will have a big ear of floppy fabric, this is good, it will strengthen the corner later. You now need to sew down the corner to hold the sides together. Use a straight stitch and a thread that matches the outer fabric. You will find that you have to bend the box quite a lot as you sew the seam but it will bounce back when you have finished.

Sew all four corners then fold the ears flat around the corners. The point of the ear ends up exactly in the corner. If you have an overlocker this is the time to dig it out. It will trim the top and overlock it at the same time. If you don't have an overlocker go around the top with a zigzag, then trim the top flat. Stitch around the top again with the zigzag stitch to make a really firm edge. There you go one box. My sample took me about 30 minutes and I was taking pictures as I went which does slow you down, so hopefully you should find this pretty quick too. I think with a bit pf playing you will be able to come up with lots of interesting shape boxes with this technique.

Quilt mountain depleated

Well after quilting every hour I could fro weeks I've got the mountain down to two quilts. It has meant that some have gone back so fast I haven't had time to photograph them but I am feeling much better with a smaller pile to work on. So if you have quilts that have been waiting for me (and thanks to hanging on to them for a while) now is the time to pounce.

The charity quilt for Macmillan Nurses went back to the group that made it yesterday. Once they have the binding on it will be displayed at Patchwork Corner for about a month. I will get a picture of it while it is there. If you get a chance please do go and look at it, you might even like it enough to buy a raffle ticket for it.

ARGH!

I can't believe it. I missed the deadline for Road to California. I know I have had a lot going on, but this show is important to me and I really wanted to enter again this year. How could I miss something like that? Still nothing I can do about it now, so I will spend some time checking all the other shows I might want to enter and making sure I don't miss them. I think I either need an assistant or some software to warn me of impending deadlines.

I've had an enjoyable but very tiring weekend manning the Patchwork Corner stand at the Wye Valley Quilters show. Sadly you will have to wait 5 years for their next exhibition, it was a good event, well attended by a very friendly bunch.

Quilt japan

Magazine out now with my work in.

Whups, I had intended to send that to myself. Oh well. now I've said it, I've heard that Herd Mentality and my large whole cloth are in it. I don't know how to get a copy though. I guess this is proof I can't multi-task. Well not to the extent of sending an email and serving a customer at the same time. No I wasn't actually supposed to be working I was just trying to be helpful.

Silly things to get excited about.

OK, I'm sad. Very sad, but a friend's book is out to pre-order on Amazon, and I am really thrilled. They haven't got the image up yet, but I am sure it won't be long.

I've been having a weird day all in all. I got up to find my necklace had broken again, so a trip into town was required to get it fixed. With a whole stack of work to do that wasn't ideal, but I figured I could at least make it to the bank as well so it wasn't entirely wasted time. So as I was heading out of the door the post came. Including a cheque I didn't expect. Well that makes the trip into town more worthwhile. So I go to the bank, put my necklace in the the jewellers and have lunch while I wait to get it back. Even though the weather has been getting colder I am still living in my Crocs. A lady came up to me and asked me if they are as comfortable as people say. Strange, but not a problem and we get talking. It turns out that she would like to get into quilting. Her mother was really good at it and now she wants to try it. How strange is that, well it gets stranger. She was most concerned about getting the layers together. Her relatives had told her about people in other countries that will do quilting for others, but had no leads on anyone in this country. Now what are the odds of us just happening to run into each other? It was a very cool lunch and I think she left inspired to start working on a quilt. I can't believe a day that started to poorly could work out so well and it wouldn't have happened if I hadn't broken my necklace in my sleep.

Quilting

Just for the record I have been quilting. Unfortunately it has not only been customer work, but it's been going back so fast I haven't had time to photograph a lot of it. I will try to do better.

I am also working on a new pattern. A couple of weeks ago Jenny at Patchwork Corner challenged me to come up with a pattern for some black and white and red and white prints. Fortunately this really appealed to me and an idea came very quickly. I hope I will be able to share it here sooner rather than later. I've only been able to work on piecing this new quilt in down time before classes at the shop, so it hasn't gone as fast as I would like, but hopefully today I can finish it.

Once I have this top made I want to do a second from the same pattern as I think it will look great n a very different colourway, and I can't wait to see it. So expect this project to be taking up my 'spare time' for a while.

One of the customer quilts I have waiting, that I will definitely get a picture of when it is done is a fund raising quilt. It is a fairly traditional bed quilt that I will be adding feathers to, which will be raffled to raise money for Macmillan Nurses.

I am also making good progress with my second book. Apparently my students are enjoying it so they are working faster than I expected, which means I have to as well. Unfortunately this is stopping me finishing my quilts from the first book. How embarrassing is it when your students are finishing your quilt before you do. Oh well at least one has been kind enough to lend me her quilt for talks, so if you do come to one you will see at least one finished example. It also looks like I finally have a title for it. I want to try it out on a class or two before I share it here, so watch this space.