Monday, June 7, 2010

The sewing room doubles as a guest room



This is a very comfortable bed with a girly feel. Just have to watch out for pins in the rug, since it's my sewing room. When I first posted this, I had just completed a pillow cover for this quilt, which started with giveaway blocks from a 2008 quilt shop hop with my Mom in upstate New York. After two years it was finally done and I took it back to New York for very affordable long arm quilting by a friend of hers.


Each block finishes 16 inches square. For each block you need 8 dark and 8 light 5" squares, which you sew into eight each 4-patches and half-square triangles. The pattern is Pat Speth and Charlene Thode's Sunny Lanes, from her first Nickel Quilts book.

I sewed quantities of four patches and half-square triangles each with a 2 lights and 2 darks, then laid them out on my bed. I arranged them so that the dark triangles and dark four patches created the grid pattern. I just kept making more patches til it was big enough. I started with the nickel squares we got at each quilt shop, which tended toward Moda county-style prints, using mine and Mom's, raided her nickel square stash, then went and bought fabric to make more patches that gave it some consistency and to create the borders. The binding is pieced from the left-overs.  


The dress on the teddy bear on the bed was cut down from a velvet top of mine that I loved but always twisted sideways. When I took it apart to make a dress for my granddaughter, I discovered that it was cut sideways rather than with the length of the grain, and maybe that it why it creeped around me when I wore it. Unfortunately, I didn't really use a pattern, and so it turned out to be to small to go over here head, and instead dresses up an old bear of my boys from their younger days.

More recently I guess I've been busy:
Two baby quilts for co-worker (forgot to take pictures)

My sister's quilt is now done. Eve bought the fabrics, Mom and I sewed, and the New York long arm quilter put it together. I just completed the binding and have started working on some pillow cases.

I also completed this tablerunner for a raffle prize: it's left-over blocks from a quilt I made my mom a few years ago, and the photo is a lot brighter than the actual fabric. I took pictures of flowers in the neighborhood one spring and manipulated them in photoshop, then printed on fabric treated with bubblejet set. For quilting, I did freehand feathered wreaths in the plain blocks, but my skills in this regard leave much to be desired and my machine needs attention. More practice needed in free motion work.



I've also sandwiched and quilted a pre-printed panel as a donation quilt... still need to bind that one, made a pillowcase to go with it.
Next ideas. I get so greedy for new fabric watching the modern quilt blogs, but I am committed to stash clearing and with more than a closet full of fabric, it will be quite a while before I can justify new stash. Still I find plenty to inspire: I am thinking about a block with hand-pieced diamonds, and a cute tablerunner from a quilting mag, just to be ready for the next request.

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