From K - Finished New Wave Quilt

Two years ago, when I had only just started quilting, I fell for Elizabeth Hartman's blog, Oh Fransson!, followed quickly by my love of her New Wave Quilt pattern. As a novice quilter with only three other quilts under my belt, I thought this was a good next step.

This quilt marked my first foray into quilting with a more modern design, and was the first time I ever tried free motion quilting. Simultaneously, it also happened to be the first time I had ever ordered fabric online (Fat Quarter Shop to be exact!).

While I'm not traditionally a crayola colour scheme kind of lady, I feel hard for the little owl prints! I think this is a timeless treasures line, thought the name escapes me.

The bundle I purchased came with a panel featuring various forest scenes, so I fussy cut them, framed them in gray and white, and then used them on the back.

This poor quilt has been sitting neglected in my fabric wardrobe for a few years, and recently had a wee run in with a metal drawer slide. After trimming down the bottom of the quilt to cut off the hole, I debated cutting some off the top as well to recenter the quilt back. In the end I decided the future recipient (who is 3 and ADORES both owls and the colour green) won't mind the back one bit so I left it as large as possible.

It's fun to look back at a quilt that challenged me in so many ways, but also really opened my eyes to a whole new world of modern quilting. While my colour palette has matured over the years, and my FMQ has improved, it gives me a lot of joy to pull this quilt out from storage, and to gift it to someone I know will love it.

From K - Around The World Blog Hop

Last week Julia of Jada's Quilting Adventures nominated us to host the Around the World Blog Hop, so today I'm going to share a bit more about my current work in progress (while Amanda finishes up her travels down in Australia - lucky lady!).

 

For anyone who is visiting our little corner of the blogisphere for the first time, we are cousins (Kelsey and Amanda) living in different cities (Alberta Canada and California USA), who blog about quilting, sewing, knitting and travel. We have explained a bit about ourselves on our blog before - here is a link for those of you who want to know more about us and our crafting journey.

Now why don't we get to the good stuff and jump right into the questions!

1. How does my quilting process work?

Everyone has their own process, but for me, it always come down to fabric selection. I often have an idea of a pattern or design that I want to make, but it will never ever start until I have settled on the bulk of the necessary fabric to use.

I recently pull a selection of fabrics from my stash (dusty lime, sunshine yellow, gold and mustard) for a baby quilt I was planning, only to realize the next day that it was destined to be a modern maples quilt instead. I added some orange, grape, plum and brown, then tossed in some neutrals, and a new quilt plan was born.

2. What am I working on?

I'm a restless crafter, always needing a few options to choose from. Over the past few years I have learned that I do better with a few rules: a) limit my UFO and WiPs to 3 quilts, 2 knits, 1 bag/garment at any given time, and b) some form of deadline is a must, even if it's often self imposed.

Today I thought I'd share some progress shots of how this fabric pull is sewing up and taking shape.

You might have noticed that when I cut my fabric, a few new fabrics were added to the roster, and a few prints fell off. While I like making an initial pull, I do tend to tweak and refine as I go along. Even the most well curated fabric selections need a little help sometimes so don't hold yourself back if you're second guessing your choices.

 

We chose to bend the rules a bit on this one by deciding not to nominate any one blogger specifically, rather we would encourage anyone to jump on this blog hop who wants to participate. If you decide to join in, please send us the link so we can follow along!

From K - Constellations Camping Quilt Top

A few weeks back my guild had a Sunday sew day, which gave me the opportunity to finally sew my Constellations Camping Quilt top together.

I accidentally made one half way prominent oopsy in my haste to sew this top quickly - can you spot it? I'm torn between leaving it or fixing it, but either way I just love how this top turned out!

The deadline for our glamping trip is fast approaching so my finished time is running low. Fingers crossed I sneak in some sewing time between now and glamping-hour so I can polish this quilt off.

I'm getting really excited to snuggle under this one soon.

You can read more about the making of this quilt here and here.

Happy Independence Day to all our American friends today!

 

From K - Red Letter Day Quilt Top

I've said it before, and I'll say it again, one of the best things about quilting for me is the relationship that Amanda and I have built because of it. Being cousins we have always been close, but having a shared passion (and a blog no less!) makes our friendship extra special.

 

Another similar bond we share? The fierce love we both have for one very special lady, the third and tiniest in our threesome, the baby sister we never had, our cousin Bree.

Bree is getting married and she means the whole wide world to us. She is sweet, creative and loyal to the core. She has a magnetic personality that is quiet and subtle, but also equally quirky and bold. Undoubtedly the best cousin any cousin could ever ask for. The kind that deserves a celebratory wedding quilt, that's for sure!

Amanda and I dreamt up the making of this quilt together long distance. We chose a pattern, ordered fabric online, and pieced blocks in hopes that it would all come together as planned. Last Friday Amanda's blocks showed up in my mailbox and I couldn't wait to pick a layout and sew these beauties together.

Now that it's all sewn up we've been tossing ideas back and forth on how I should quilt it. Denyse Schmidt style loops, double meandering loops, and straight line are a few of the options we've considered. By all means, feel free to share any other suggestions you might have.

The quilt back and binding are prepped, all set for a long weekend quilting session. I'm hoping I can settle on a quilting technique come Saturday!

From K - Red Letter Day Quilt Progress

Time is ticking and our cousin Bree's wedding is nearing closer every day. With an international border between us and a whole lot of trust in two notably slow postal services, Amanda and I are still planning on starting and finishing a quilt together over the next four weeks... yes we know we're crazy but we figure it must run in the family.

We both spent our weekend trying to finish up our Red Letter Day Quilt blocks, so I figured I would share my progress with you.

Amanda and I thought this pattern might be a good choice for us given it was striking, relatively gender neutral, and also because we might have been running out of time. Why yes, procrastination runs in our family too...

While Amanda's blocks are hitting the mail soon, I wrapped up my three blocks and have started on preparing a quilt back and binding. With only 9 blocks, this quilt top should be quick and easy to piece once Amanda's additional 6 blocks arrive in the mail. Fingers crossed they show up soon so I can baste, quilt and bind this beauty before the big day in July approaches. Keep your fingers crossed for us!

From K - Quilt Design Dabblings

Decisions, decisions... I'm required to make a hundred decisions everyday at work (literally)... so when I need to make them in real life for quilts, I'm often all 'decision-ed out'.

Right now I'm debating a few quilt layouts for my Constellations Camping Quilt, and honestly I'm really struggling. Any input it wholeheartedly welcomed!

Option A:

Option B:

Option C:

I really love seeing quilty friends' dabble in their design process, so I thought I would share these ideas with you. I'm torn between which design to choose, but figure I can't really go wrong, can I?

From K - Constellations Camping Quilt Prep

My fondness for all things Lizzy House continues to grow with my newest quilt - a posh camping quilt, for the likes of the Travelux Pearl.

I decided to make this quilt almost exclusively using Lizzy's out of print Constellations line, with a few jewels and pearl bracelets tossed in for good measure. I'm banking on the tone-on-tone gray metallic bracelets to make for a nice moody background *fingers crossed*.

It's taken me months of internet stalking and LQS hopping to track down two missing prints from this line. A big shoutout goes to the generous IG peeps who resolved months of searching in a matter of mere minutes. For those of you that helped, thank you!

168 HSTs pressed, trimmed and ready to roll. I'm just waiting on two more prints to arrive and I'll start working on a final layout.

Then I think I'll take a little break from HSTs for a while.

From K - Directions Baby Quilt Top

When life gets crazy, I often find that the best solution to slow it down is to sit down at my Janome and sew. I'm not talking 'mandatory sewing to narrowly meet a looming deadline' sewing either. I'm talking about the type of sewing that is defined by not being defined at all. No plans, no limits, no rules - that is the type of sewing that stops time and stress and just gets me energized again.

A couple weeks ago I cleared my sewing space, removed all my WiPs from sight, and just sat down to sew. No real goal in mind, no real plan, just a charm pack of Simply Style and some Kona yardage.

I started by making half square triangles and ended when I had a quilt layout on my design wall that seemed fitting. Toss in some sashing and a border, and before I knew it, I had a baby quilt!

Amanda pointed out that the negetive space in this quilt resembles a north arrow from a map. It felt a bit ironic but still fitting to call this quilt 'Directions' as this quilt started with no direction, but then ended with one.

You win some, you lose some, and sometimes you just learn something. I definitely learned something in this quilt. I'm definitely seeing more of this laissez faire quilting style in my future.

From K - Simply Style on the Design Wall

A new quilt popped up on my design wall this weekend and I'm excited to show a few process shots of how it's coming together.

64 HSTs in a rainbow of colours makes playing around with a layout so much fun.

To speed up the process of making a stack of HSTs for this quilt top, I used my fancy new Fons & Porter 1/4" ruler and a pack of Simply Style charm squares by V & Co.

I'm still playing around with the final layout but for now I'm really happy with the direction that this quilt is taking.

 

I took a mini hiatus from quilting over the past two months while I was caught up in sewing cat dresses and knitting all the things. This is the perfect project to get me back in the quilting game.

From K - Finished Mermaid Triangle Quilt

In 2013 I learned two important things about my crafty nature. The first being that I never start a project without intending to learn at least one new skill set, trick of the trade, or perhaps more importantly, insight into myself. And the second, is that 'random' absolutely does not come easy to me.

This quilt reinforced this by providing me with tons of new opportunities to learn - piecing triangles, matching points while seaming, and well, the whole random issue. I call 'random' an issue not because it's a problem, but because while making this quilt I learned that I need to push myself to just let go more often... or at least sometimes... or even just once as a start.

I admit that while making this quilt I struggled a lot with just trying to be random. In the end I settled on two guidelines to help me maintain a wee bit of structure. First that I did not want to place the same print side-by-side (because let's face it, I think we'd all struggle with that), and second, after much deliberation I did consult my Ruby Beholder (because people, sometimes value overrules random placement).

I finished up this quilt in the wee hours of Christmas Eve morning. Just in time to photograph, wash, and wrap it so that it was ready for Christmas morning.

It's now at home with its new family. The super sweet and adorable recipient is my 3 month old niece. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that she grows up to love mermaids because I am a wee bit obsessed with the Sarah Jane print I used for the backing from Out to Sea. 

Final Quilt Details:

• Quilt Name: Mermaid Triangle Quilt
• Finished Size: lap sized (67" x 76")
• Fabric: total hodgepodge of semi-solid prints from my stash to match the feature print (AMH's Sundials in Amethyst); Sarah Jane's Mermaid Play in Breeze (backing fabric)
• Pattern: Sewing Summit class taught by Jeni Baker from In Color Order
• Quilting: FMQ swirls in the background and a FWQ feature flower in the purple hexagon
  

 

To learn more about the making of this quilt, go here and here. This is my forth completed project for the Q4 2013 Finish A-Long - read more about my other goals here.

From K - Mermaid Triangle Quilt Top

A started this quilt back in September and am a bit ashamed of how long it's been sitting around on my design wall. Last month in my desperate need to finish this baby I even polled the audience for arrangement suggestions. In the end it was pretty much a 50/50 split so I decided to push myself out of my comfort zone with this one by simply doing a random arrangement.

Random is easier said then done. At least for my A-type ways....

I couldn't help myself though when I decided my eye needed a place to land in all the randomness, so I added a subtle purple hexagon.

The hexagon on its own isn't very easy to spot but I'm hoping that if I quilt it differently than the rest of the quilt, it will really make it pop.

I'm typing this out with very sore shoulders. I was able to quilt 1/3 of it yesterday and I'm back at it again today. Swirly swirly swirly. 4 days left until Christmas! Tell me I'm not the only one with unrealistic finishing goals this holiday season!

p.s. If you're wondering why I have prenamed this quilt my Mermaid Triangle Quilt, just wait until you see the back *eek!

From K - Finished Manly Plus Quilt

Have you ever had a quilt transpire in your mind with such a presence that you just couldn't shake it until it became a reality? That's what this quilt was to me. I tiny compliment from my husband on my Pink Pluses Quilt was all I needed to dream up this manly plus version for him to keep.

 

For someone who is extremely supportive of my 'more often than not' all consuming hobby, I have yet to thank him with a quilt of his own. He has never nagged for one but I know he feels a bit slighted every time I show him a finished quilt and he says "wow! That one's great, do we get to keep it?!"... and then the answer is always "no".... *insert wife hanging her head in shame here*

 

I know what you're thinking - just give the man a quilt already Kelsey! And so I will.

 

I wanted the backing to be timeless, simply, and obviously a bit manly. Using fabrics from the quilt top, I laid out varying widths of remnants in a strip to play up the gradient from the front.

 

I didn't want this quilt to be stiff, so I went with a combination of straight line quilting around each plus shape and then added some dense FMQ in a few feature pluses.

 

Most of the prints in this top are patterned which adds a fair amount of texture. Two solid fabrics however stuck out, so I decided they needed a bit more attention.

 

The dark gray solid pluses received pebbling while the light gray pluses received a somewhat topographic design. I love that these designs are both inspired by natural elements and that they compliment the Architexture prints in the top.

I also absolutely adore the texture that the randomly quilted pluses add to the quilt back. Happy surprises are the best surprises after all.

 

Final Quilt Details:

• Quilt Name: Manly Plus Quilt
• Finished Size: large lap sized (54" x 75")
• Fabric: various prints from my stash
• Pattern: I didn't follow a pattern. I just laid out rows using one 3.5"x9.5" and two 3.5" squares for each plus.
• Quilting: quilted on my Janome 8200. Straight line quilting to outline each plus block, supplemented by FMQ pebbling and topographic lines in feature pluses.

 

I started quilting more than three years ago and I have never snuggled with a quilt that I've made, I don't even own a quilt myself (shameful I know). I'm feeling a bit selfish that I can't wait to gift this - not only because I can't wait to see his face, but also because it will undoubtedly be followed with a good ol' fashion couch snuggle fest. Pass the popcorn please!

 

Read more about this quilt top here. This is my third completed project for the Q4 2013 Finish A-Long - read more about my other goals here.

 

 Linking up to Needle and Thread Thursday and Finish it up Friday.