Diverted and Distracted

Late in posting this week, partly because not much has happened since I last checked in. I'd mentioned that I'd made a trip into the somewhat big city last week, something that at minimum takes up 3 hours of my day, but then I had to go again a couple of days later. The first trip really wiped me out - sometimes my auto immune syndrome doesn't mind the extra energy tap of trips like that, other times it hits me with debilitating fatigue once I get home. No way of knowing which it will be in advance or how long it will take to recover, but was glad that the second trip didn't bother me at all. At any rate, I didn't make progress on much of anything before the weekend, although I took a stab at reducing part of a studio pile by getting back to catching up on my documentation files.

There were back to back motorcycle races to watch on Saturday and Sunday so a few more stitches got put into the stitch camp piece. I decided to do the spiral running stitch in the two oblong blotches as well as to squeeze it into the smaller blue circles after I finished a bit of the twisted running stitch. I can see a few more areas where I can work that stitch in, hoping that I will use up that teal rayon embroidery thread. Pondering where I can work in some different stitches like seed stitch and satin stitch and what color thread I might use to do that.

I thought there'd be more to catch my eye and add to my downstairs sketchbook but there really isn't from my place on the couch. However, I realized that in watching tv, I'd become a little obsessed with eyebrows, especially as I watched different newscasters. These are just experiments as I tried to remember some of the ones I'd noticed that were different from the usual arch. Then I found myself adding some full faces which to be honest I'm not very good at. But it exercises one's imagination.

I can report that in the space of a few days we went from bleak winter with nothing showing on the branches of trees to full-on spring with bright lime green leaves unfurling and beautiful blooms emerging. The chokecherry in front of my place obliged with not just blooms but heady fragrance. I'm really feeling the urge to get out and sketch some of the trees around town before the blooms fade. The weather will be heating up again, and I am free of obligations for the rest of the week so I have no excuse not to!

That Idaho Beauty Block

Clockwise from upper left: Idaho Beauty, Washington Star, Wisconsin, California Snowflake

A few posts back, Sylvia mentioned that she was not familiar with the Idaho Beauty block, and to be honest, I don't think that in the many years I've been using it as my signature block and part of my e-mail address I've run into a single quilter who had heard of it. Like many quilt blocks, this design goes by several names, sometimes dependent on fabric and/or value placement, and according to Barbara Brackman's Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns (which my mother-in-law gave me in 1993), six in this case. I'm guessing that Devil's Claws is the most familiar name for it, but I can thank Clara Stone's 1906 Practical Needlework: Quilt Patterns for adding Idaho Beauty as a name for this block.  This wasn't the only block with Idaho in its name but it was the one I liked the most. And I can thank Barbara's book for leading me to the other 3 state blocks that I incorporated into the above quilt called Personal Geography: States I Have Lived In.

Close-up of hand quilting boldly done with blue thread

I made this quilt for a contest in 1994 for a sampler quilt contest sponsored by the now defunct Northwest Fabrics & Crafts store. I'd moved to Wisconsin with no plans to go back into the workforce, but instead to devote my time to really learning how to make quilts and about the history behind them, and this hometown store provided my first quilting fabrics. Once I'd gained some confidence and perfected some skills, I scoured the ads in the several quilting magazines I subscribed to for information on contests I could enter, both block contests and quilt contests. Yes, this was before you could find this sort of information on the internet and also before digital cameras and learning the finer points of taking evenly lit and square-on photos to submit with entry forms. (Click on any photo for a larger view.)

This photo shows a little of how the border was pieced

To my disappointment, it didn't get accepted into that contest, nor into several others I tried being held in other parts of the country, but it did get into several including ones in Florida and Asheville NC that included judging sheets with the returned quilt. I got surprisingly good marks for such a novice, but one judge did ding me on my not so mitered corners on the binding. After successfully overcoming several how-do-I-construct-this-idea-I-have challenges of the sashing and border, I could not figure out how to turn those binding corners which ended up somewhat rounded with tiny gathers. I convinced myself that I liked that look and decided to bravely go with it, but no judges were fooled. I now know there IS a way to make rounded corners and bind them and that wasn't it!

This was also before the availability of quilting software for designing, and I worked out my setting and borders on graph paper probably colored with felt pens or markers, and drew full size templates for the sashing and border pieces on newsprint (I still often do this). The idea for the compass sashing came to me, like so many other quilting solutions, while I was trying to fall asleep. As you can see in the photo above, I "auditioned" a striped border as well as the one I eventually used which seemed to echo the lines of the center compass. My husband noted that "your quilt is exploding, little pieces scattering everywhere", and I picked up on that idea in the description I submitted with my entries, saying "The octagonal border accentuates the feeling that the design is expanding, just as my horizons expand with each move." Marketing, I swear, it's all about marketing! The finishing touch was to ink with permanent pen all the addresses where I'd lived on the back of the quilt, matching them with the proper state block.

How do I know all this after all these years? Is my memory that good? I know all this because of the documentation file I filled out and placed in a binder with the other quilt documentation files I'd been keeping. I'd been doing a little of this, mostly notes on the back of photos, but at some point someone in one of those magazines I'd been reading talked about the importance of documenting your quilts and had pre-printed manila envelopes covering all the pertinent information you should note and giving you a place to store additional information, photos, patterns, judging sheets. Well, I'd been a secretary for so long that this was right up my alley, an aid to organization and filing. I ordered up a set and I was off. I soon devised a revised version of this original one, changing some of the categories to reflect better the sort of information I felt important. I've especially appreciated added fabric swatches as often the camera doesn't get the colors quite right. I've faithfully filled out these documentation files to this very day and am so happy I've taken the time. Where I once thought I'd never forget the details of each quilt I made, I now sometimes struggle just to remember their names. But with these files, here is the entire history of each quilt along with my thought processes and feelings as I worked through each. You can click on the photo above and below and know pretty much the full details and history of this quilt.

I often continue writing on the back

Before you ask, I think I've used this block in only one other quilt, just a single big block with a wide border. I've made a stamp of it though, to use on the back of framed pieces along with my information, and it shows up on my business cards and as my avatar on some sites. However, once I did get some quilt designing software, I mocked up a full-size quilt with just this block, in white and teal, with teal sashing and borders and star block cornerstones. Even have fabric set aside, but I've never gotten around to making it. Perhaps still some day . . .

Hand Quilting Progress

I've finished the hand quilting around the applique pieces of Rhapsody. I'll be winning no awards for even stitches but with a few exceptions, the eggshell thread blends right into the background fabric so only very close inspection would reveal the inconsistencies.

Now on to the cross-hatching, where I will use masking tape as my guide. I'm having second thoughts about adding this as I now realize how little open space there is for adding it except beyond the central design. Maybe just some echoing would have been a better choice, but I feel committed to this and have carried on.

I thought I would share with you the hoop I am using, my pride and joy: The Grace Hoop - Squared Polymer Pro. I don't exactly remember how I became familiar with The Grace Company, probably through an ad in a quilting magazine, but back in the 1980's I offered to hand quilt the queen size top my mother-in-law had made for one of her daughters. It was the part of the project she dreaded most while I was finding it difficult to get tops made for quilting, the part of the process I most liked. So suddenly I had a quilt to quilt and her hoop on a stand to do it with. It was a rickety affair with the classic round hoop but it was better than what I had on hand. I so enjoyed the process that when we fell into a large monetary gift to split, I opted to use mine for a full-size quilting frame, with the Grace Company's expensive, heavy duty well-made model with unique design features my first choice. And of course, I also opted for the one that could handle up to a king size quilt because, you know, I might regret it if I chose a smaller size. I was not disappointed, and quilted quite a few quilts of varying sizes on this sturdy frame that did not require you to baste your quilt before loading it onto the frame (did I not say it had some unique features?

The 3-rail system allows all 3 layers to be attached to the front bar, the other end of the backing to the second bar and the other end of the top to the 3rd bar while the batting hangs free. Each bar rolls independently to maintain even tension and smoothing, no basting required.

 

That frame got moved many times (being easy to break down into packable pieces), once while I was in the middle of quilting a queen-size quilt (it turned out to be relatively easy to roll the quilt on the three bars once the supporting legs were removed and a startled moving man figured out how to wrap it all in plastic and place it in the truck so that precious bundle would not be damaged), but once I finished that last queen, I was doing more machine quilting of any large projects and saving the hand quilting for smaller ones. I got very fond of my Q-Snap portable square frame. Then my husband died, I moved into a townhouse rental, and found myself with no place to set up the big frame even if I wanted to. I eventually sold it to my quilting friend and neighbor who was keen to have a full size frame and I started looking at other options that would solve the limitations I found myself struggling with using the Q-Snap frame.

Enter the Grace Company once again, as I eyed their latest product sporting more original design innovations incorporated into a quilting hoop on a stand. First of all, a square rather than round hoop, which makes tons of sense, as I'd discovered using the Q-Snap frame. Then it was the material the hoop was made out of, a sturdy polymer with no chance of staining a quilt left in it too long. The stand itself is Baltic Birch plywood, nothing rickety about those hefty parts.

 

But what really cinched it for me, made me think of this as the Cadillac of quilting frames, is this ball mechanism at the base of the hoop. Not only can you turn the hoop as you would a steering wheel, but you can angle it in all directions to get it positioned perfectly for your stitching style. (By the way, those strings of selvage are a tip I ran across for when quilting a large quilt. They allow you to gather up all that quilt beyond the hoop to keep it in check and off the floor.)

The arm that the hoop is attached to also adjusts up and down to accommodate different chair heights you might be sitting in or even your own body height. So easy to customize the quilting area to your needs.

Also included with the hoop are these weighted bars, just in case you need to quilt out to an edge and don't have enough quilt for the hoop to grab onto. I've never used these as I always leave a generous bit of batting and backing beyond the quilt top, but what a nifty idea just in case.

And as if all this weren't enough, the stand is designed to fold up smaller for storage. I even read about one quilter who used this feature so she could bring her hoop to guild when she wanted to work on something there. This is a really well-thought out design. Basically, I just can't say enough good things about the Grace Company and their product.

So I popped into their website thinking I could link to some of these products and features only to find they are now all about machine frames and the machines that sit on them, not a wood product in sight. Well, I suppose that IS the market now, not that many hand quilters out there looking for quality wood frames and hoops. They do sell a few hand quilting items, but not the beautiful wood ones that served/serve me so well. It all made me a bit sad. On the other hand, I'm sure everything they produce and sell now is of very good quality in order to maintain the name they built up starting over 30 years ago.

Rhapsody

Here's the next "finish" project, the one I alluded to as my next work-on-while-watching-the-news handwork. It was started in a Suzanne Marshall workshop which featured one of the blocks from her award-winning quilt "Rhapsody", probably around 2002. I didn't start blogging until 2006, where I found a post about it when the applique was complete and I was readying it for quilting. In that post, I talk about the value of working from patterns, and as I reread what I said, I find I still feel the same and I think it's worth a read. You'll also find links to both Suzanne's website and a photo of her Rhapsody quilt.

https://idahobeautyquilts.blogspot.com/2006/02/training-wheels.html

The only other post about it is in 2008, where I was planning to take it along to a retreat since I couldn't take my machine. Apparently, I'd not touched it since the 2006 post when I was marking a feather pattern in the corners. They were so faint that I had to find the pattern for the feather so I could remark it darker.

I vaguely remember quilting on it a bit during the retreat but I think most of my time was spent prepping the applique on sashing for a different quilt. I know I quilted on it after the retreat, getting those corner feathers done and starting the quilting along all those applique pieces, but there's no more mention of it in the blog that I can find, although if I wanted to take the time to leaf through my engagement calendars I could track down my progress and the last time I actually worked on it. What I do know is that it has sat in this hoop-on-a-stand in a part of my livingroom with a sheet thrown over it for protection since I moved into my current rental in 2012 - there was no where else to "store" it. So this UFO is not a case of out of sight, out of mind, as I saw it every day, while sitting on the sofa watching tv, passing by it on my way to the front door or the stairs to the second floor. For whatever reasons, lame or valid, it has awaited my return in a patient daily stare. Wait no more.

It has been so long since I've hand-quilted on anything that I wondered how it would go. Would everything feel foreign and awkward? Would I even be able to track down my tools and thread? Turns out the latter was more difficult than to get back into the rhythm of rocking the needle through the sandwich. Were those first stitches nice and even and not too large? Well, of course not! But not nearly as awful as I expected, and getting better with each session. I've gone around those teardrop shapes above the blossoms and up the left side of the stem and calyx of the central flower. When I make it around all the applique, I believe my intent was to fill the background with a 1/2 inch crosshatch. Lots more to do before it's ready to hang on the wall. 

By the way, I have the patterns for all the other blocks in Suzanne's Rhapsody quilt. We had the opportunity to purchase them individually or as a set and the practical part of me said, "You'll never get around to making any more of these, let alone all of them," while the also somewhat practical part of me said, "But if you don't buy them now, there no doubt there will come a day when you regret it, ready to make more and the patterns no longer available!" And truly, I do think the chance of me making even one more of these gorgeous blocks is pretty slim, yet I don't regret hedging my bets.

Last of the stitching

Oh yeah! I put the last quilting stitch in Masks this afternoon. With that much stitching through a thin batt (or even with a thicker one), there's going to be distortion - can you see the rippling in spots? And so the next step is some blocking with steam. While it dries, I can proceed with the next step - printing eyes on a coordinating batik that will be cut into squares to add some focal points across the top. Pardon the pun...

Just working...

I've not picked up my camera much lately, though I suppose the changing landscape of spring and recent storm clouds should have given me reason to. No new experiments in the studio either, although projects await. Instead I've been pretty focused on steady progress on Masks. I'd finished a background section and had nowhere else to go but back to the mask images I tried picking out early on. Added a line of darker stitching to better bring out eyes and mask, then pondered how to fill in the space around the eyes.

Just finished doing that on one of the masks and like what I chose. Now there's a second mask to work on, slightly different shape, probably slightly different approach to additional quilting. We'll see. The callous on my under finger has returned yet I still occasionally poke through with the needle and draw blood. Still, I do enjoy this slower pace and the softer line of hand quilting.

More quotations for you to ponder taken from Rhizome | A Conversation with Jonathan Lethem:

Lethem on art and identity and betrayal:

We are so prone to feeling betrayed by the artist in some way. Because the art does something so extraordinary to us that then we find out some detail. “Oh! He stole that from Willie Dixon.” “Oh! He beat his wife.” “Oh! He picks his nose in public.” “Wait a minute. He made that thing that changed my life. This is incongruent. I don’t like it!” That’s why we get so betrayed by the knowledge of appropriations, because we’re holding art to this very weird standard where it is actually about us. It’s about our own lives.

On T.S. Elliott and art that lets you cite:

T.S. Elliott has this appendix to The Wasteland where there are all these citations. We’ll put aside the fact that probably no one ever bothers to read that. But it’s there. He tried. It’s right there. But if a painter makes a canvas, it does not have room for footnotes on it. And a lot of art, the form doesn’t invite the same kinds of embrace of transparency. The specific gestures just don’t work. So what do you do? There might be follow-up. You could speak in an interview, you could make a gesture. But you know what? Not everyone wants to do that. Not everyone wants to be interviewed about their work at all. They want to just make it. And that’s okay.

On Led Zeppelin and Willie Dixon vs. Paul Simon and Graceland, and the axes of judging appropriation:

There are sort of two primary axes on which we make the individual judgment. One is: degree of transformation and the other is degree of transparency and or citation. In other words, how much do they really make something different out of what they appropriated? And how much did they make it easy to see that there was someone else’s gesture behind their own?

Happy Dual Holiday!

Happy St. Patrick's Day - how are you celebrating? I've decided to try my hand at making some Reuben sandwiches a little later. I love Reubens but I've never made them at home. I do however bake bread, although I haven't for awhile, so decided to bake up some rye bread. I'm trying a recipe on the rye flour package which is different from what I usually make - it has onions added to the batter. This is the first rising which is promising. It has completed the second rising and is now baking, sending forth a wonderful aroma. The recipe was very detailed until it got to the part about forming loaves or rolls and what to put them on. After consulting several other recipes, I opted for a single round loaf in a cake pan which may have been a mistake. By the looks of that second rise, I probably should have made 2 round loaves on cookie sheets. Oh well - I'm sure it will taste just fine and work for my sandwiches.


And Happy National Quilting Day! The third Saturday in March is designated as such - what special quilting have you been doing today? Are you working on something green? ;-) When I belonged to a traditional quilt guild, I often organized a work day for my quilting sisters so we could work on charity quilts. Some years we ended up doing demos at the local mall. More commonly now I just sew at home and that is what I did today. Actually, I would have sat enjoying hand quilting on Masks today whether or not it was National Quilting Day. It is coming along nicely.

Hope you have found fun and safe ways to celebrate both of these Saturday holidays.

New Year's Eve

Here it is the last day of the year, and I am still in a cheerful mood. The year is going out on a high of sorts, at least my mood is high. The sun made an appearance, weak through the thin clouds but sun all the same, brightening all rooms of the house. Thank goodness for lists, by the way. In the aftermath of the mostly pleasant distractions of the holiday, I could not think beyond one thing what it was I wanted to address as December's contribution to "the plan". I unearthed the list and...oh my. Quite a bit and not many days left. It was a happy discovery though, as "continue quilting on Masks" was one of the items, and I had not touched it all month. I picked it up as I watched a little tv this morning and it was like a treat.


Later, I continued yesterday's work on the 3 x 3 discharge piece (really gotta come up with a better name for it). Still puzzling how to flatten the circle centers (didn't like either attempt yesterday) and what else to do around the outside.


I've also returned to a thought which followed the making of Willow. I thought I'd done at least one sketch of a possible layout but couldn't find it. This is frustrating me a lot because the idea was very clear in my head, but I can't seem to make it happen on paper. I ran across something yesterday which gave me an idea for a border and did a rough sketch. Today, the thinking is progressing, curves coming to mind, and I spent a little time paging through a book for ideas.


I'm needing to get creative because of a shortage of fabric. When I got the fabric out that had sparked the idea, I instantly remembered why I'd set it aside for so long. That blue on the left is what I want as background for rectangles of the leaf batiks. But it is only 9 inches wide and not the full width of the cut anymore. The other fabrics are a few I pulled which are similar but not as perfect, and equally small in quantity. I'm trying to think of a way I might piece a background, and that is what led me to the thought of curves. Part of me mourns the inability to capture and execute the original idea, another part of me thinks that inability is leading to a more interesting design. So much for what I thought might be a quick quilt to throw together. But I like that my mind is working again, not blocked for solutions as it has been much of the year. All in all, it's been a delightful day.

So this is a different ending to the year than I often have. No rush to get the last stitches in something to say I finished it in 2011. No feeling of disappointment or failure because I did not do everything I thought to do. No "the year can't end soon enough" nor a "I don't want to see it go" - the year had its ups and downs but overall it was a good one, with lots of growth and healing, and ending in pleasant peace. I can't help but think the new year will only build on this, a slow and steady progression to more good things so I face it without qualms. I hope you are feeling the same sense of satisfaction and hope.

Can't wait to crack open the champagne and toast the New Year!

Slow & Steady

As I wait for the part to arrive, I quilt some each day on "Masks" while catching up on recorded Masterpiece Theater episodes - quite pleasant. And as I study my cloth, searching out where to place my stitching lines, I consider that this process is not unlike my life right now: thinking I see a pattern, then losing it; diving in even though unsure, because it is the only way to make progress; focusing on an area until I can go no farther because of a barrier, then stepping back to see the larger picture; sometimes satisfied, sometimes seeing an error to be fixed. Sometimes I feel in charge, then just as quickly the job at hand takes on a life of its own. It's slow going, this hand stitching, this negotiating of life. Both take a lot of imagination, a lot of trust.

Minor Setback

I'm surprised I did not view what happened as the gods conspiring against me. Above you see the type of screw that holds the needle of my sewing machine in place. Next to it you see what came off in my hand when I went to loosen that screw to change needles in preparation for a major round of machine quilting. The stem broke far enough down the shaft that there is no way to back it out. Not even my trusty repairman could help, save to order a replacement part which is small and easy to switch out. This would not be quite such the game stopper were it not for the fact that the needle stuck in the machine is the smallest size, suitable only for monofilament or 100 wt silk thread, neither of which I'd be using on the two pieces ready to quilt. Oddly, this turn of events did not even elicit a disgusted sigh from me.


Instead, not being able to proceed with machine quilting has merely freed me up to start the hand quilting on "Masks". It's been basted ready to go for weeks, but I've put it low on priorities because it IS hand work and the machine work always takes undue importance when considering what's next on my list. I've also been putting it off because of the confusion I experienced when pulling out the thread I thought I knew I'd be using. Suddenly it didn't look right, maybe I wasn't remembering properly and before I knew it, I had 5 options laid in front of me. I always dread making that final decision, which is in fact the first step. Today, I just said, open up the quilt and don't think about it. Just grab that lighter thread that you instinctively know is right. And also don't think too much about how you will be quilting, where best to start. Just put the needle in and go! So far so good.

And quite amazing the sensation that quickly comes over me once I start plying that needle in and out of the fabric.That's why I was so interested in this off of Austin Kleon's Tumblr:

When you do meaningful work with your hands, a kind of neurochemical feedback floods your brain with dopamine and serotonin. These happy brain chemicals are natural antidepressants, and we've evolved to release them both to reward ourselves for working with our hands and to motivate ourselves to do it some more.

How could I forget??? Now go get happy!

By the way, thank you to those who gave input about my orientation dilemma regarding the poppies and peonies piece. Just like with the thread choice for "Masks", I instinctively knew which was best but allowed myself to doubt that instinct. I guess I'm more comfortable with safety in numbers.

Mixing Machine and Hand Quilting

If perchance you thought you heard a squeal of delight earlier today, it no doubt was just me, reveling in the fact that I have put the last of the quilting stitches in my nephew's quilt, although not without a little drama. The photo shows the center of the quilt, which I'd hand quilted around the interlocking motif and machine quilted curvy lines through the diamonds, stopping short of the plan yellow diamonds. I was sure that area between hand and machine quilting would need to be hand quilted, and while working on the other filler designs, had decided spirals would be the thing. So I boldly began by hand stitching with the blue thread used elsewhere...and it looked dreadful. Not to worry, I'll just do it in yellow thread so that it doesn't stand out so much. To my surprise, that looked dreadful as well.

There's an art to mixing hand and machine quilting. Not only do they cause different rates of shrinkage, but the lines themselves look so different - one hard and visible, the other broken and softer. With care, they can work well together as long as their differences are kept in mind. After a little contemplation, I could see that machine quilting the spirals made more visual sense. Once again with boldness, I threaded up the machine with the blue thread and free-motion quilted the spirals. I'm surprised that I like it so well, but I think if nothing else, it's speaking the same language as the quilting in the adjacent diamonds, is much less disruptive to the eye since the hand stitching around the motif shows so little. So done done done with the quilting,


And not a stitch too soon. This is all I have left of the Oliver Twist hand-dyed thread. It is lovely thread but the disadvantage is that you can rarely buy individual spools. This is the third spool of it that has gone into this quilt - the first from the usual 5 pack of coordinated colors, the other two from the "two of a kind" pack that gives you one spool of thread and a variety of coordinated cotton and rayon specialty threads. I have found uses for some of those specialty threads, but I surely did not need more of them. Fortunately, three spools were enough.

So now it's on to trimming and binding and creating a label. I've tracked the days spent working on this over the past 11 years, so I will be going back through my records and adding up the days. I think I kept track of the actual hours spent on the hand quilting - I hope so. I know a lot of hours have gone into this quilt and I'm curious to find out just how ambitious a project I devised for myself.

Adding spirals

I've finished the filler quilting on all four squares in the big quilt and have moved on to the triangles. Echoing was sufficient in the squares, but the triangles have odd spaces that did not look right with the echoing. It was my chance to insert some traditional spirals.


I must admit, though, that these spirals were not quilted free hand as I talked about in this post. I found I just couldn't get the outer curve right. So I resorted to free hand marking in advance of quilting, using a prismacolor verithin silver pencil. Unlike regular graphite pencil, this rubs right off when no longer needed. Or, as in my case, when the lines need slight editing... Each square took about 3-1/2 hours to quilt. I think the triangles will take a bit longer, but it's hard to tell from this first one - I spent quite a bit of time taking out stitches that weren't working.

You might also want to check out the latest post on my Newspaper Blackout Obituaries blog.

Free-motion Hand Quilting

Years ago I had the fortune to attend a lecture by Welsh Quilt expert Jen Jones. I already knew a little bit about Welsh quilts and could not pass up the opportunity to view some wonderful antique ones in person. What I learned form Jen that day whet my appetite and opened my eyes. I stayed for the workshop led by Martha Waterman to learn more about specific Welsh quilting motifs and how to draw and apply them as wholecloth designs. One of the things I learned was minimal marking could be done, then the spaces filled free-form with traditional spiral and leaf shapes (not unlike the current Zentangle drawing craze). I couldn't imagine being able to quilt such designs without them being marked, but I tried it on a batting sample, and indeed, I could.

Today has been a cold and dreary day (hard to believe it's late July), so perfect for spending some time with the big quilt and the additional hand quilting I know I must add. Quilting, after all, is first and foremost functional, there to hold the layers together and especially in the case of a bed quilt, extend its life. Gaps too big between rows of stitching will cause many problems down the road and detract from the overall appearance even now. There are many reasons I've been trying to get out of adding more quilting and I finally figured out how to get around a couple of them. First, I didn't want to have to mark additional quilting lines (really hard to do once the top is layered), and I didn't want to wrestle with all that weight and bulk as I found I was doing in my hoop on a stand. After finishing the last round of machine quilting, I spread the quilt out on my work table and realized I could hand quilt it right there, letting the table carry the weight and not needing a hoop since so much quilting was already in place. Huge relief when I figured that out, and it is indeed working well.


As for the marking problem, I'm getting around that for the moment by starting with the appliqued squares to which simple echoing adds adequate filler and can be eyeballed accurately enough. This is similar to that lesson I learned about Welsh free-form quilting. I've also dabble a bit in Hawaiian quilting and learned that all that wonderful echo quilting done on traditional quilts typically was measured by the width of the quilter's finger. Straight pins might be placed for a few inches along the track as a guide but otherwise no marking. I discovered that the spacing for my echo lines are about a finger width - very convenient! However, I'm not bothering with pins for guides.

I may add some spirals to other areas of the quilt and am screwing up my courage to do them without marking as well. Just as free motion quilting with a machine can be liberating, so too can unmarked "free motion" quilting by hand. Give it a try!

Last of the hand quilting...

...I think. This is the center of my big lone star quilt with a bit of Celtic interlaced bias tube design. There's a lot of reproduction fabric in that star, along with some batiks. All the bias tubing on this project was made from my own hand-dyed fabric. It's amazing how these very different fabrics work so well together.

When I basted the top, I wasn't sure how I was going to deal with this area in the center, since the star itself would be machine quilted. Thus the safety pins in an area that I now know is to be hand quilted, and so should be thread basted. I left them in anyway (not the first time I've hand quilted around safety pins, and yes, the thread does catch on them frequently), and in a couple of hours, the quilting was done.

Theoretically, that is the last of the hand quilting on this, unless I cave and decide certain areas really need a little more added. I'll decide after the rest of the machine quilting is completed. I plan a serpentine line of quilting through the diamonds in the star, and have yet to work out the border design but have several ideas. Needless to say, I am excited as the light at the end of the tunnel glows brighter.

Another View

I feel badly that I haven't had my usual studio progress reports to post, but there's nothing much to show as I work on the hand quilting here. However, I am pleased to show you a new section that I will start quilting today. I am a little excited that this is the last major area of hand quilting (a small bit has yet to be done in the center of the quilt). I estimate I have 10-12 hours of hand quilting left, and then the borders to machine quilt. Barring life intervening, as it often does, it looks good for my goal of completing this by April. I'm holding fast to my resolution word: focus, focus, focus!

I've mentioned that this quilting is not coming easily because of several characteristics of this particular quilt. As if to emphasis that, last night I bent a needle trying to manipulate it through a particularly recalcitrant section, then for no apparent reason, a second needle snapped! You know it's rough going when a short and stout needle breaks and it hasn't hit anything solid...

Moving along

I finished the quilting on the Celtic applique as shown in the last post, and shifted to this new section today. I couldn't remember if I'd finished one previously to this last one so was relieved to find that I had, meaning that two of the four appliques are quilted. I also was reminded as I shifted the quilt around, that there's some Celtic applique over the center of the star waiting to be hand quilted, but it is a much smaller area. Still, assessing how far along I actually am is encouraging. And for as much of a struggle as the hand quilting is through some of the sections, I'm finding enjoyment in the stitching.

Hand Quilting

Yesterday I said I wasn't sure which project would be getting my attention next. Today there was no question and if you're a long-time reader you may recognize this quilt. It's a lone star with different Celtic Applique patterns in the four corners. I'm doing a mix of machine and hand quilting on it - the star portion has been machine quilted and I've hand quilted Celtic motifs in the background around the star and applique. Now I am in a bit of drudgery stage of quilting, essentially stitching in the ditch along all that bias tubing that makes up the interlocking design. It's hard work since I've used cotton batting and a slightly heavy background and backing fabric, and quilting next to a seam is never easy at best. Small wonder that I haven't touched it much in the three years I've been here.

But I said one of the things I wanted to do this year is make time for handwork, which includes quilting, and attend to more unfinished business. This one definitely deserves to rise to the top of the unfinished business list. It is a wedding present for a nephew who will be celebrating his 10th anniversary in April. Ahem! In looking back at blog entries, I see that last year at this time I'd started quilting on it again with the resolution to finish it by the end of the year. Well, I didn't get very far on that resolution obviously. I don't have any notion of how many more hours of quilting remain (once the hand quilting is done, the border will be machine quilted), but I do wonder if I can get it done for this anniversary. I'm at least going to try (and harder than I tried last year). It helps that I've quit worrying about doing exhibit quality work. I'm sure the nephew would rather have the quilt in hand than perfectly spaced and tiny stitches.

Quilting Coming Along

I spent some lovely time hand quilting this afternoon. As near as I can tell, the 505 Spray Baste used to hold the layers together is doing just that and is not causing any drag on the needle. The untested batting is behaving as well. I may need to buy some of this and make up a real sample, one I can test both hand and machine quilting on, then wash to see how it reacts. It appears to have good stability while maintaining a lightness and needles easily.

The book showed two ideas for quilting: crosshatching (hand quilted) and meandering (machine quilted). One of the reasons I chose handquilting was because of the difficulty of manuevering around the embroidery by machine. I wanted to outline various parts of the cross with stitching comparable to stitching in the ditch - something I felt much easier to do by hand as in the picture above

My first stitches, however, were taken in the ditch between the panel and first border. Everything I read when I first started quilting recommended quilting from the middle and working to the edges. I started to question the necessity of this once I purchased a full-size quilting frame. It was made by Grace and rolled the quilt from one end to the other. I just knew my quilt would be skewed in some way because I wasn't quilting from the middle out, but it was not. I questioned more when I read of women like Suzanne Marshall quilting full size quilts without benefit of any hoop or frame. I had to agree with the logic that, if I quilt were properly and thoroughly basted, shifting or bunching would not be a problem so it shouldn't matter where you started quilting. This theory was reinforced once I got into machine quilting. I was taught by Harriet Hargrave and Diane Gaudynski that my first machine stitches should be ones to stabilize the main vertical and horizontal seams of the quilt. Once done, then I could start quilting any section in any order.

And so you see, with a bit of confidence, I stitched around the border seam first, then stitched around the ouside of the cross, then went back to complete the border. It has the most "fragile" marking, and I wanted to get those areas quilted before any of the markings rubbed off - easy to do when rolling and turning the piece to get to the middle section. Having the border quilted first will also help me know how much quilting to put into the body of the cross. I could stitch along each embroidered line but I don't think that will be necessary or even desirable.

As far as what I quilt with, I am using Coats & Clark 100% cotton hand quilting thread with a Roxanne #11 between needle (very short and fairly thin). I also use a Roxanne Thimble. I'd tried several different thimbles and brands of needles, but after watching Roxanne's daughter demonstrate the thimble and her method of hand quilting, then trying the thimble myself, I was sold on the advantages. My stitch length immediately shortened and the strain on my hands and fingers nearly disappeared. Yes, I'm a convert, but unless you do a lot of hand quilting, you may not want to make the investment as those thimbles do not come cheap. And as long as I was sold on the thimble and her basting glue as well, I decided to give the needles a try. Here is the website where you can see all the products and learn more about "that perfect stitch."

Moving On

Now that the pink quilt is done and gone, I've dived into finishing out the redwork cross panel. The goal is to have complete it for the church auction on Sunday, but since I didn't get going on it until yesterday, I'm not sure that's realistic. However, I'm not letting that stop me, and even if it isn't totally finished by Sunday, it's going into the auction, and the successful bidder will have to be patient.

The book doesn't give specific directions for finishing these panels, just pictures of several ways the author has done it. Using a ruler and a good guess, I estimated that she had added a half inch inner border and a two inch outer border, proportions that looked good to me. After blocking and squaring up the panel to 9-1/2 x 11-1/2, I added the borders, butted, not mitered. Now it was time to consider the quilting design.

It was the friend I visited at Thanksgiving that gave me the idea for quilting the panel itself: lines radiating from the cross arms and circles echoing the redwork center circle. These I drew on using a silver Berol Verithin pencil, ruler and compass. Then it was time to search my files for a border pattern.

I've been collecting quilting patterns and ideas for quilting for nearly 15 years, dutifully filed away in this folder. There's no way I will ever use all the patterns in there (let's not talk about all the books I own with quilting patterns in them), yet I rarely cull the collection. That's the thing about quilting - you just never know what idea will suddenly be just the thing for your current project. I was actually looking for a Greek Key design for the border, but instead, I found the border idea cut from a Piecemakers calendar a long time ago, and this is the first time I've had an opportunity to use it. It perfectly picks up the design elements in the cross itself. (Click on the picture for a larger view - it is the strip to the left of the panel.)

It took a little figuring and fudging to come up with a dimension for the triangle that would fit evenly in both the top and side borders - cutting a strip of paper the two lengths and playing with folding them yielded the dimension that would work. I used this Omnigrid triangle ruler as my template, placing a piece of painter's tape on the back side where I needed to line the ruler up to the border seamline. Spacing of the inner lines were a guess - what looked right. The semi-circles were drawn with a compass. Simple simple simple. No templates to make, no stencils to cut. I've used my absolute favorite white marking pencil (that is, when I need more permanence than soapstone or chalk can give me). It is a Nonce pencil, inexpensive, easy to sharpen, but soft enough to mark easily. Most important of all, I've never had any trouble removing it when the quilting's done. It can be rubbed off or washed out either one. I've had the same good luck with the Berol pencil.

I'm really looking forward to quilting this piece, now that I've got the design figured out. I'm hand quilting it - something that has always been a fairly relaxing way to keep my hands busy. This time I feel like I'm taking a risk. I'm trying two thing without testing them first. I want to quilt this without a hoop, which I've done successfully before, but I didn't want to spend time thread basting it. I've had good luck spray basting smaller pieces for machine quilting, so I'm taking a chance that it will work equally well with hand quilting. But that's not the only risk. I'm using a batting I've not tried before. I've been collecting batting samples almost as long as I've been collecting quilting patterns, and for awhile I was quite diligent about making up batting samples before committing a new one to a project. No time for such a luxury today. The batting in question is a piece of Mountain Mist Gold (50 poly 50 cotton) which I snagged at a quilt show when it first came out. I'm trusting that it will be easy to hand quilt, and since this piece won't be washed, I don't have to worry about shrinkage.