New Day, New Direction

So what is this new direction? 

Small, abstract art quilts!! Yayyy!!!  

I love creating and right now have been working on a circle series.  The combination of circles and saturated colors are a stinkin lot of fun.  This bright red circle moon mosaic is one of my favorites.  

More charm squares

I am still sick.  My cold has finally turned into a sinus infection and so I'm now on medicine for that.  In the meantime I have cut more charm squares.  If there's a silver lining, that's it.  I know that some day in the near future I will have a blast using these charm squares that I cut while being sick.

I have so many squares....reds, creams, greens....

If you are sick like me, then "Happy cutting".

Jess

Charm Squares Galore!!

I have been sick with a cold these past few days and because of all the brain fog that goes with it, I've been unable to work on any projects. I have learned that when my head is full and cloudy that I should not think about sitting at my sewing machine....not even glance at it!  Nope!  I will be tempted to sew and the mistakes will be plentiful.

Instead, I have been sitting on the couch with my Kleenex and iPad looking at fabric and quilts.  Then, I got a bright idea ☀️.  Why not just cut fabric into squares.  I love charm packs, so rather than drooling over all the ones I find online, why not spend this down time making my own!?

I'm going to have fun with these some day!!!!

Jessica

Quick and easy star block tutorial

I love making this block.  Its quick, easy and stress-free with perfect points every time!!  I dont even use pins until the very last part.  Love that!

Let's make one.  You will need a dark and a light.  Cut a 4 1/2" square out of the dark fabric.  Also cut eight 2 3/4" squares from the same dark fabric.  Now, from the light fabric cut out four 3 1/2" squares and four 3 1/2" x 4 1/2" rectangles.

 

Now turn your dark 2 3/4" squares over and draw a line down the center from one corner to another.  Notice in the picture below that I have also drawn a line a half inch away from the center line.  Go ahead and do that too.

 

 

Place your little dark squares onto your light rectangles right sides together.  They need to be placed at the top upper right side with the second drawn line closest to the upper right corner.

 

 

Sew down that center line on all four of your pieces.

 

 

Then go ahead and sew down the other line that you drew a half inch away from the center.

 

Cut in between your sewn lines.  Set those tiny triangles aside for a while and iron the larger pieces toward the dark fabric.

 

Your rectangle will now look like the one on the left.  Next place a small dark square onto the left top of the rectange.  Make sure the second line is close to the upper left corner.  Do this on all four rectangles and sew them together like you did before.

 

 

Trim between the sewn lines as before, saving your little triangles.  Iron toward the dark.

 

Set up your star like this.

 

Flip the pieces on the left over top of the pieces in the center and sew them together.  Iron the first row toward the light square, the second row toward the dark square and the third row toward the light square.

Next, flip the pieces on the right over top the the center and do the same.

 

This is what your star should look like so far.

 

Now sew the top row to the center row.  This is the time to use pins so you can be sure to line up your seams.  Iron toward the center row.

 

Almost done!  Sew bottom row to center row, again ironing toward the center row.

 

Yayyy!!  A beautiful block!  It will measure over 10".  I squared mine to exactly ten inches but you could make it smaller if you like.

 

Now for all those leftover triangles.  Iron them open and save them.  After you have made several stars you will have plenty of these little half square triangles to make something else that's super cute.

 

Here's what I have so far.  My plan is to alternate light and dark backgrounds like you see here.  Im hoping to make a king sized quilt for my bedroom, but we'll see.  That would be a stinkin lot of stars. 

 

I hope you'll give this method a try.  I'm sure you will have as much fun as I did!!!

 

Happy quilting,

 

Jessica

 

 

 

 

 

Perfect star points on the baby quilt

This quilt was so much fun to make!  Mostly because it's for my new grandson, but also because of the technique I used for creating the stars.  This technique makes piecing stars faster and leaves you with perfect points every time without having to be careful.  There is NO WAY you can mess up your points!! Now THAT makes for fun piecing!!

It's 45x45.

I have so enjoyed making these stars that I bought some more fabric and just kept going.  I chose the Evening Mist line of fabrics by Moda.  I love the calming colors.  A completely different look from the baby quilt.

Next weekend I'll post a tutorial on how to make these stars.  So drop back in to check it out.

Happy quilting,

Jess

Memory quilt in the works

My oldest daughter and her husband are visiting from Moscow so they could have their baby here.  It's been an exciting time for us!  The baby came six weeks early though so the baby quilt I'm making didn't get finished in time.  I still have to quilt and bind it, but I love it and will be done soon.  I'm also working on this memory quilt for her as well.  The body of the memory quilt is almost done.  It is made entirely of Jinny Beyer  fabrics and Kona Snow and I found a great batik for the border.

I just know she will enjoy having this quilt for her friends to write on.

Happy quilting,
Jess

Wholecloth done!!!!

Well, almost.  I need to go over it very carefully today to see if I missed any spots.  I'm guessing that I probably did.

I have so much enjoyed making this quilt, even though it meant hours and hours of going cross-eyed with my nose to the fabric.  I really should invest in a magnifying glass for my machine.

Here's a sneak peak.  I don't want to show the whole thing quite yet since I will be entering it into a show.  Not that many people even view my blog, but showing just bits and pieces of a quilt before entering a competition seems to be what quilters do...so that's what I'll do too....lol.

 

You can see I decided to quilt my name right into the quilt.  I put my last name in too.  I don't want my kids to ever wonder if I made a quilt or not, so I always quilt my entire name.  Also, if anyone steals it, they sure can't claim it as their own.  Mostly, though, I do it for my kids.

 

Now back down to my studio to finish up. 

Jessica

Grandbaby keeping me from quilting today

Today I had big plans to get a lot of work done on that Christmas quilt I showed you yesterday, but life got in the way....stickiness to be exact.  Having a baby living in my house sure makes things sticky and just super messy in general.  So today I washed all the stickiness away and cleaned up the clutter.  Not nearly as fun as quilting but it had to be done!

Then I went out and bought him his first toy truck and little red car.  He sure does like them!  I raised three girls who liked dollies and coloring books so this is the first truck I've ever bought.  So fun for me!!!

Here he is enjoying his new toys.

I sure love this little guy!!!

Jessica

What I have on the frame

Here's a tiny peek at what I'm working on lately.  I'm back at it after taking a few days off to stare at my daughter before she moved away.  It's a real joy to quilt....so beautifully hand stitched as well as perfectly pieced.

 

 

I'm using wool batting to give it a nice loft.

And I drew a bunch of snowflakes in various places, stitching on the lines of the snowflakes three times with a metallic silver to make them stand out a bit.  I like it!!

Happy quilting,
Jessica

Comfort sewing

Often when I'm sad about something I will sew.  I have found that hand sewing is the best remedy for sorrow.  So yesterday that's what I did for hours and hours and hours.  I sat on the couch with my big blue crochet hook and worked on a blanket that I started a couple of weeks ago after my oldest daughter, Emily, taught me how to do a simple crochet stitch.  Its red.....red for Russia....that's where she flew off to yesterday to live.  Those Russians are going to love her!!!!

That's Emily on the right and Molly on the left.  Such sweet faces.

Back to crocheting.

Jessica

A quilt for my daughter

I just finished this quilt for my daughter.  I wanted to make it look modern...since she is 16...and so I designed one big block with a gray background.  That's modern...don't ya think?  The modern style of quilting nowadays seems to be just a lot of straight lines but I like a bit more variation than that, so I did what I usually do....my own thing.  I'm not sure if she will like it, but oh well...I like it.  Lol.

I used wool batting for added dimension and matched the thread color to the fabric except for the feathers.  I went with a light gray thread there so the feather design would stand out a bit.

Freehand quilting

Back in the saddle again...sort of...and very excited that creativity is still possible after so many months away from the machine.  Sooo happy about that!

This is something I am making for one of my daughters.

It's just one big block.  I kinda like it. 

Jessica

From Painting to Quilt

I have been frustrated at my inability to work on the projects that I have hanging on my design wall.  My biggest sewing problem is that my left wrist doesn't work so I can't use my rotary cutter at all.  You need two hands for that.  Ugh!  My right shoulder doesn't work too well either, but in spurts I can use my right arm.  Anyway, I am going to try to make something that does not require a rotary cutter.  Here's my plan.  I am going to take a section of a painting that my daughter made and turn it into a quilt.  Doesn't that sound fun?

Molly, my daughter, was visiting with my new and super adorable grandson yesterday.  I was painting and so she joined me.  I threw my painting in the trash because it stunk....really stunk.  Her painting, however, showed some potential, so I cropped it down till I found a piece that I thought would be asthetically pleasing and make a nice quilt.  Then I blew that little piece up to about an 8x10 and traced it onto acetate.  My traced design looks very complicated, kind of like a paint by number, so I may need to simplify it a bit.  I'm not sure.  Tomorrow I will look at it again and adjust it where necessary.  Next week I will take my design to Staples and have them blow it up to....well....I don't know exactly what size yet.

Anyway,  check back next week.  I will know by then what size my quilt will be, will have blown it up and will start making my templates.  The quilt will be almost entirely machine appliqued....no rotary cutter needed. Now, lets see how many minutes I can use a scizzors before being put out of commission.  Lol.  I am so stinkin determined!!!

Quilt making on hold

I am having health problems bad enough to keep me from what I enjoy so much....quilt making and quilting.  I have been spending most of my days on the couch reading, playing candy crush, watching TV, surfing the net and being bored.  Then, just the other day, I ran across a biography of Renoir.  He was an amazing painter, but did you know he was severely disabled from rheumatoid arthritis?  Yet, he kept on painting.  You should see his hands...they don't even look like hands!  Well....that got me to thinking and thinking and thinking till finally I called my friend Soozee and told her I needed her to come get me and take me to the store so I could buy some paint.  She came right over and off we went to buy paint and brushes and paper.

Today I turned on some beautiful music and tried my hand at it.  It was so wonderful to be creative in a new and different way.  I like my first painting.  There are things I don't like about it and there are things I need to learn....lots of things, but all in all, I like it for my first try.

I will keep at it.

Jessica

Chubby Lattice Progress

Here's what I have so far.  I'm not used to using precut charm packs, and while I like the diversity of fabrics, I am not liking the inaccuracy.  I guess I'm just going to have to let that go for this quilt and be okay with points that don't match up the way I like.  Oh well, I'm sure I'll survive.  Lol

By the way, those little pink square are just little papers with numbers written on them for placement.

Happy quilting :)

Jessica

I am back to sewing

After a few days of settling into being a grandma, I am finally getting back to sewing.  I made a design wall with my husband and hung it in the dining room where a big picture used to be.  It is 4 feet by 6 feet and i love it!  It is safe to say that I have now taken over the dining room and it is now my sewing room.  I still have my sewing studio downstairs, but that is now specifically the longarm quilting studio where I work.  The dining/sewing room is where I play.  I much prefer being on the main floor close to the action.  It's warmer up here too.

You can see that I have started puting together the chubby lattice quilt.  I decided to put the squares together in groups of four to make up 9 1/2 inch blocks.  I have three blocks done and all the others are at my machine, lined up and ready to go.

Today I became a Grandma!

Today was a long but wonderful day.  I became a grandma!  This little ones name is Ollie and he is just the sweetest little thing.

Being a grandma is great!

Jessica

Show and Tell

Here's a quilt that a customer of mine made for her husband.  I love it!  It's a perfect man quilt. I enjoyed quilting it and always love when I am given open spaces to play in.