Chris's minis pack some big personality!!!

I just finished two mini quilts for Chris who blogs over at Chrisknitssews.  She made this two beauties! The first is the feathered star - oh oh oh my!! This sweet lil charmer is 29x29 inches - so you know those HST's gotta be tiny!  I just adore this red and white little quilt.  If I weren't so afraid of piecing I might even try my own. But remember my last finish?  The HSTs were 18 in square!!  One of these days I'll try.   Until then, I"m am just so happy that I get to quilt the works of art that others create!

Hobbs 80/20 batting, Glide thread - 40 wt on top, 60 wt in the bobbin, Micro quilter for SITD  I really am sad this one is going back

Tools used on this one, Linda Hrcka's curves 8 on the white areas, 12 on the red.  No marking for the cross hatch.  I actually found that I couldn't mark as accurately as I wanted so I used the lines on the ruler instead, worked well for these small cross hatch areas.  I did use a stencil for the center feathers, I wanted them to be a bit more accurate than if I did them with the aid of a stencil.  That little feather round is the most used stencil I have, it's come in handy so many times.  I used a 2.5 in circle guide for the curly feathers in the border.  I seriously just need to purchase a circle template set.  Who doesn't like twirly curly feathers?  Kim Brunner has a get book and DVD set.  I adore this one.

Yep that seam ripper was one of the most used tools on the berry baskets :)

You can see how I marked the spins of the twirly feathers, they are C's that have the opening offset.  So much fun!

As if that cutie wasn't enough, she made this 24 inch square berries basket quilt. The colors, be still my beating heart!  Just love these colors.  Cross hatch areas were a little bigger, but still no marking on these.  This was the first mini I have ever quilted.  Boy there is just no place to hide.  On a quilt with 30 blocks you can hide a mistake or two (or five or more).  But on these, nope, you have to be right on.  I did a bit of ripping of stitches and then I just slowed down.  For me, the quilting of a mini is just a bit different than any quilt that has more than 12 blocks!  It was a great learning experience for me and I loved quilting these for Chris.  Chris thanks for letting me quilt for you!

Hobbs 80 / 20 batting Glide thread top and bottom, 40 wt on top, 60 wt on bottom 

At our January Quilt Guild mtg I signed up for a round robin quilt "thing". A number of people signed up, and we trade them every month until they get pretty big then every 2 months - we're doing 6 rounds.  I decided to go outside my comfort zone and join in the fun.  I had grand dreams of piecing this wonderful center, starting the year off right and  you know doing the piecing thing.  Well, I decided that I'm going to use a panel for the center.  I just LOVE LOVE LOVE it.  It's actually fabric that I purchased at our Guilds Garage Sale, see putting that stuff to use right!  Just take a look below?  Isn't that just made for a round robin quilt?  I think so!  No piecing this time, but I promise to make it on the next round.  I've got this.  Well if I don't I may be asking for some help :)

A little progress on Good Fortune, I'm a bit undecided on this one, anxious to get some borders on

Oh I don't think I've the proper introductions.  I'd like to introduce our newest family member Isaac.  Zaffle left us on Halloween last year and I thought for sure that I would wait at least another year. But no, the break during the holidays made me realize I need a furry friend.  Well here he is.  This little guy has been down in the quilting studio, but hard to tell if he likes it yet or not.  Zaffle always kept me company when I was quilting. I think Isaac is going to love being down there.

hmmm is he amused or no?? I think yes!

Isaac, my new baby!

Now that those minis are done, I get to start on a special project.   This one I get to do what every I want.  Oh you know there's some thread that's going down now.  I can't share until the reveal so I'll have to think of something to do for next week...hmmm maybe I'll get some piecing done....ya that's it!

Hope everyone has a great week and don't forget to check out the linky parties on the side bar, so much inspiration out there!

June's Home and Hearth Log Cabin

I just finished this custom beauty for June.  First I'll show the pictures then a little bit on how we collaborated on the quilting design and the tools used.  There were things flying everywhere in the studio with this one!  Templates, rulers, stencils, marking tools, manila folders, all of it all over all the time, what fun! You can find June Bacchi on Facebook for more info on the wonderful quilt.  This one has two layers of batting, Hobbs wool on top, heirloom 80/20 on the bottom. Glide 40 wt thread on top and 60 wt in the bobbin.  Man, my machine LOVES this combination!

Now, wasn't that something.  The pattern is Hearth and Home from Today's Quilter Magazine.  They have a facebook page as well.  These blocks were really big and I'm not accustom to such large blocks.  For this I really wanted to try the pattern on the actual size block (rather than marking something up on the tablet).  I used florist cellophane (you can get a large roll from Amazon for less then 10.00 delivered to your door).  I use painters tape on the edges so it's crystal clear where the cellophane ends and the quilt is unprotected.   Then I just draw right on the plastic.  I had some ideas about some simple feathers in the colored part of the log cabin (without the house) and drawing that simple idea I quickly found out that was NOT going to work.  I was drawing a few ideas for the white area of the same block, one of them involved cat tails ( the plants not real cats :).  June  then thought 4 seasons would be good (which really is a great idea) but then she thought of the hearts, which was a fabulous idea.  After a bit of back and forth together we came up with the quilting design.  And that is how one idea leads to another which leads to another.... I love the collaboration.  It brings things that neither party would have come up with on their one.  I was just in love with this.  I  added a heart in the colored area a bit larger and that made the feathers much easier to quilt in that area. Then took the heart and put those on the door and above the door.  That unifies it all - my home is my heart as June puts it.  Home definitely is where the heart is for this quilt!

Good tool to find out what *doesn't * work.  The ones on the right were original thoughts until I drew then full size, then on to plan B

Other tools that were used once the design was done  - the sashing and first border needed a serpentine spine feather.  In Margaret Solomon Gunn's book Featherless Feathers she shows how to use adding machine tape to calculate (hehe) the curve for the space.  Fold in half as many times as you like, then mark the centers, add your curve and cut.  I used a really thin paper, so I took a complete piece of the arcs and made a template from a manila folder, one for the border, one for the sashing.  Worked like a charm.  I just used one of my many curved rulers for the corners.

Stencils - I used a couple of stencils for this project. The clam shells and the 1/2 in cross hatching were used on the roof and the bricks.  Deloa Jones has some wonderful grid based stencils I had one stencil with two hearts just the right size for the door and above the door.  No reason you have to use the entire stencils, just use the parts you want!!

I didn't have stencils nor did Santa bring me a set of circle templates, so I made my own hearts and circle again.  I add registration marks to the templates for ease in placement.

Rulers - of course I used used Linda Hrcka's curved rulers this one used the 20 and the 34, first time I got to use one of the big curves. Was perfect for this big blocks!  I also used Bethanne Nemesh garden line straight edge and quilters Rule curves - that is just a great one for same curves, used it on the curtains.

The usual marking tools no change here.

I'll be sad to see this feathered beauty go, Thanks for letting me quilt for you June, loved the collaboration and what we came up with for the quilting plan together!

I was having so much fun with this feathers that I neglected Good Fortune, but I did get a couple of the blocks done

Just an FYI  -  I am not affiliated with any of the products that I show here, I'm just a very happy customer and highly recommend their products.