A few days ago, I chopped up my black & white & brights quilt top. It was 44 x 46 inches, which is bigger than I usually work. I think I will make it into a couple of smaller tops, which will allow me to explore a variety of design ideas.
I started with the pieces that had colors, and cut some of the pieces even smaller. I decided I wanted the black lines to be skinnier, so I’m cutting those narrower, or removing them.
Here is my first re-design, pinned to the design wall. The “background” is the gray fabric on my design wall. I may use a similar gray fabric, or perhaps a variety of grays. Right now it’s about 22 x 4o inches, but will it get smaller as I sew the pieces together.
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creative and inspirational projects.
Have you heard of Ian Berry? He’s an artist who works in the medium of denim jeans – check out his website www.ianberry.org to see his amazing artwork.
I’ve been following Ian on Instagram and Facebook, and was intrigued by his ‘I Clap For’ project. You can read about the project on this website www.iclapfor.com. Recently, I saw that Ian was inviting other artists to make clapping hands for the project, and I decided to participate.
I emailed Ian on Friday night saying I would like to participate. He replied, asking if I could have my hands done by Monday – because there are special displays planned for July 5th, the birthday of the UK National Health Service.
There’s nothing like a tight deadline to motivate me, so I spent Saturday designing and creating my 2 pair of hands, and on Sunday I finished them up and emailed my photos to Ian. He animated them, and you can see my clapping hands with many other artists here on the website.
Here’s how I made my clapping hands. I used Ian’s templates for the hands, which saved me a lot of time. I wanted to use wild colors, so I pulled out a lot of fabrics, and spent an hour or so finding 2 sets of fabric with light, medium and dark values.
Auditioning possible fabrics, and checking values
For each hand, I cut the entire hand from the medium value fabric, then added the shadows and highlights. I used Steam a Seam fusible, which I can finger-press in place. If required, I can reposition the pieces before using the iron to fuse the fabrics together. After cutting and positioning the pieces for the first set of hands, I checked to make sure the values were working.
Satisfied with this, I continued to trace and cut the pieces for the second set of hands.
I fused each completed hand to black felt, then quilted the detail lines with thick black thread. Then I trimmed the felt close to the hand, leaving a thin black outline.
Hand fused to felt, and stitching details with thick black thread
Here are my 2 sets of hands.
My clapping hands, animated by Ian
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As I was working on this project, I made a note of a couple of tips about using fusible web and synthetic felt:
Pen or pencil – normally I trace my designs onto the backing paper with a mechanical pencil. But I noticed that I was getting smears of pencil all over my fingers, and then on some of the lighter fabrics. Part way through this project I switched from pencil to permanent marker. I think that will be my new standard practice.
Parchment paper – always put a piece of parchment paper over the paper and fabrics before pressing. This prevents the pen or pencil from transferring to the sole-plate of the iron. It also prevents any wayward fusible web from adhering to the sole-plate. And if you are pressing synthetic felt, it prevents the felt from melting to the sole-plate (guess how I discovered that!)
Edited July 1 to add: I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other creative and inspirational projects. ~ Love Laugh Quilt Monday Making ~ WIP Wednesday @ The Needle & Thread Network
In my last post, I said I wasn’t entirely happy with my finished quilt top, and that I was going to chop it into 6″ squares. Once I made that decision, I quickly cut a couple of squares, so I couldn’t change my mind later.
As I expected, when I posted the photo below on social media, some people agreed that was a good idea, and others said I should have left it intact.
Chop it up
Yesterday, I finished cutting it up. The pieces are mostly 6 inch squares. A few are bigger and some are smaller, because I fussy-cut some of the squares and then had some in-between pieces. I pinned the pieces on my design wall as I cut them, and here’s what it looks like now.
After the chopping
I like this a lot more! I’m going to re-arrange the blocks a few more times before coming to a final decision. I will likely cut some of the pieces even smaller and I’ll probably add some skinny strips. I may make this into 2 smaller quilts, which will allow me to explore a variety of design ideas.
. . . . .
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with
these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other
creative and inspirational projects.
As I predicted, there was a lot of un-sewing and re-sewing and partial seams involved in the piecing of this quilt – but the top is now all sewn together. It’s about 44 x 46 inches. Here it is on my design wall.
I like the mostly black & white blocks with touches of bright colors. I like that the blocks are offset both vertically and horizontally, not lined up in a grid. I like the light gray sashing, and the darker gray outside border. But . . .
But, I’m not truly happy with it. When I started this process in May, I intended it to be more of an improv design, and not as precise as it is. I wish I had not made the sashing so precisely square. And, I actually said in the first post “if I don’t like how it’s looking, I’ll cut the blocks up and reassemble them”. So . . .
So, now my plan is to cut it up! I’m going to cut it into 6 inch squares (or perhaps 6 x 8 inch rectangles), then reassemble the new blocks.
Here’s one more photo of it on the design wall. Stay tuned . . .
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Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with Nina-Marie’s Off the Wall Friday
Last week, I had 14 blocks pinned to my design wall over a background of solid gray fabrics. Since then, I’ve added 2 more blocks, and I’ve sewn black borders to 2 sides of each block.
When I arranged the 16 blocks on the design wall, I purposely did not line them up in a grid. As I started to piece together the blocks with light gray sashing between them, I realized I had created a bit of a puzzle for myself. I briefly thought about rearranging the blocks to make it easier to sew together. But I like the current arrangement, so I’m going to figure it out as I sew. There will be lots of partial seams, and some un-sewing, as I piece this quilt top.
. . . . .
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with
these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other
creative and inspirational projects.
I made 14 blocks from my black & white & bright fabrics, as described in my previous post. I pinned some black and grey solid fabrics on my design wall to see how they would work with the blocks. Here’s what it looks like now.
Here it is in gray scale to check for values. I think the black behind the blocks is overwhelming, so I’ll try another shade of gray instead.
As I completed each block, I pinned it to up without any design considerations. Now I need to rearrange the blocks, cut some of them up, and add strips and blocks of the gray fabrics. Looking at the photos above, some of the circle fabrics appear to be eyes staring at me, so those will be the first blocks I cut up.
I find that having a deadline really gives me the incentive to finish a project, rather than abandoning it partway through and moving on to a new project. There is no specific deadline for this project. I posted about it here and on my Instagram account, partly to record my techniques and progress, but also because I knew it would make me feel accountable to complete it.
I recently came across another link-up that will help me focus on finishing projects. Patty at Elm Street Quilts hosts a link-up called One Monthly Goal. Finishing this quilt top will be my goal for June.
. . . . .
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with
these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other
creative and inspirational projects.
I finished sewing the curvy strips into blocks, which are approximately 6 x 12 inches. (See my previous post for more information about that step.)
Now I’m using them to make 8 inch square quarter-circle blocks. Although I’m calling this an improv project, I’m not using free-hand cut circles. I prefer the look of precise circle shapes. The improv part is how I’m going to assemble the blocks together.
To create the precise quarter-circle shapes I created freezer paper templates. I’m using the techniques described in this post to sew them together, covering each curved seam with 1/4″ black bias tape.
I’m adding bright solid strips as necessary to bring each block close to 8 inches square. I’m not trimming the blocks yet, as I will probably slice some of them up and then reassemble them.
Here are my first few blocks on my design wall. I’m very happy with how this is looking.
By the way, this design may look familiar to some of you. I’ve had this design in my head for a long time, but I was inspired to finally get it out of my head and onto my design wall by Margo Yang‘s recent quilt Subtraction. I’ll be happy if my quilt looks as good as hers when it’s finished.
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Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with
these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other
creative and inspirational projects. ~ Love Laugh Quilt Monday Making ~ WIP Wednesday @ The Needle & Thread Network
I’ve started a new quilt with only a vague idea of how it will look at the end. I’m making blocks of 6 black & white prints plus a solid black. Then I am going to do some or all of the following:
leave [some of] the blocks 12 inches high by 6 inches wide
cut [some of] the blocks into 6 inch squares
add some large circular shapes
add some other black & white prints
add some bright colors
if I don’t like how it’s looking, I’ll cut the blocks up and reassemble them
I cut freehand curves through all the fabrics, so I could mix and match the fabrics when I sewed them together. I knew I couldn’t cut through 7 layers at one time, so I made a freezer paper pattern for the curved shapes. This let me cut the same shapes though all 7 of the fabrics, by stacking them 2 or 3 at a time.
freezer paper templates ironed to top layer of fabric
I saved the templates. They will be useful if I decide to add other fabrics later.
fabrics cut and ready to sew together
I’ve sewn together some of the blocks and pinned them to my design wall. I like how it’s looking so far.
But I think I like it even better with some accents of bright colors.
Check back in a few days to where this goes.
. . . . .
Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with
these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other
creative and inspirational projects.
The Vancouver Modern Quilt Guild is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year. We have a new logo, and a modern mini challenge with the theme TEN using only the new logo colours. Each mini must be 10 inches square.
I immediately ordered a fat quarter bundle of the new logo solids, and started designing. There was enough fabric that I could make at least 2 mini quilts.
White, Wasabi, Aloe, Kumquat, Nightfall
My first mini is called ‘Ten Geese A-Flying’. I made 10 improv flying geese blocks and pieced them together to make a 10 inch square. I started the quilting by outlining the geese with a triple-stitch, which looks a bit like hand-stitching with embroidery thread – but it’s much faster! Then, I quilted vertical straight lines with orange thread. I used 1/4 inch wide painters tape to mark the lines.
I added more orange quilting in the binding.
‘Ten Geese A-Flying’ by Terry Aske
For the next mini, I started with some of the scraps from the first one, and insert skinny lines of contrasting fabric. I started with some of the Nightfall with Wasabi skinny lines, then added more fabrics to my design wall.
I decided the Nightfall was too dark. When I removed it, I liked the look of the white paper behind it, so I used mostly white instead of the navy.
I quilted each section separately and finished the edges with facings. When I looked at the completed quilt, I was surprised and delighted to see there were 10 sections – honest, I didn’t even think of that when designing and piecing this. So I called it ‘Improv 10-Patch’.
‘Improv 10-Patch’ by Terry Aske
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Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other creative and inspirational projects. ~ Love Laugh Quilt Monday Making ~ WIP Wednesday @ The Needle & Thread Network
My next idea for the Canadian Quilters Try-A-Triad Challenge, was to do intense matchstick quilting with a variety of thread colors to see how much it would appear to change the color of the base fabrics. This time, I’m using a lighter blue and a darker red than I used in my previous 2 entries (which you can see in my last 2 posts).
Original thread selection for matchstick quilting
Because I wanted the thread colors to be obvious, I stitched more closely together than I sometimes do. I swapped out some of my original thread colors that were quite close to the fabrics, and instead used threads that were lighter or darker than the fabric colors.
This is the first time I have used Gaffer tape to mark lines. I’ve used masking tape in the past, but it doesn’t stick well enough. A friend told me about gaffer tape, and raved about how it stuck well without leaving a residue, and that it could be reused several times. I finally ordered some – and I love it! (I bought mine from Amazon.ca, and bought yellow tape only because it was the only reasonably priced 1″ width. I would have preferred white, but couldn’t find it.)
Matchstick quilting with gaffer tape as a guide
The effect of the thread colors is more subtle than I hoped. But this was an experiment after all. (I plan to try this again in the future on white fabric and black fabric to see just how much difference the thread will make.)
Here’s my finished mini quilt. It’s 14″ x 12″, and I’m calling it ‘Color Flow’.
‘Color Flow’ by Terry Aske
Here are a couple of detail images showing the matchstick quilting up close.
Detail of matchstick quiltingDetail of matchstick quilting
The original deadline to enter this challenge was April 15th. It’s been extended to July 15th, so I may yet make another entry. However, for now, I’ve had enough of primary colors, and I’m going to create my next project with other colors.
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Thanks for stopping by. Today, I’m linking up with
these blogs – click on the links below, where you’ll find many other
creative and inspirational projects.
