Blogger's Quilt Festival Entry #1- Wonky Star Metamorphosis

I am entering two quilts into the Blogger's Quilt Festival hosted by Amy's Creative Side.  My first entry is "Wonky Star Metamorphosis".

I am entering this quilt in the "Original Design" category since I designed it myself.  The design starts with a wonky star in the center of the quilt and then "morphs" outwards slowly losing its points until the star is completely gone.  It is approximately 42" square.

I used circular quilting starting from the center of the quilt to emphasize the metamorphosis of the star.  The fabrics used are a purple Kona and a Kaufman gray crosshatch in the background.  I went bold and used purple thread for the quilting, a big departure from my normal white and gray.

I love this quilt so I hope that you enjoy it too!  The pattern is actually for sale in my Craftsy shop here if you are interested in making one for yourself!

Where I Sew

One thing that I am always curious about is "where do people sew?".  On Pinterest you see beautifully organized sewing and crafting rooms, but how much sewing and crafting gets done there?  I know that my sewing room always looks it's worst when I am in the middle of projects and it is hard to keep that organization going.

This calendar year I have finished a record 9 (!) quilts so far, and I am currently working on one with plans for at least one more before the end of the year.  This has been a record year so far for quilts produced!  Therefore, my sewing room was kind of a disaster, so I spent some time recently cleaning it up and then took some pictures to memorialize the occasion.

I took over one of the bedrooms in the house as my sewing room, and it is wonderful.  This is the view from the doorway looking into the room.  You can see my Koala sewing table in the middle of the room (that I found on Craigslist after 3 years of searching). 

9 months later, I still LOVE this sewing table and I believe that it is partially the reason why I have gotten so much sewing done this year- it is the perfect size and height for everything that I need.  I usually keep my laptop in the sewing room to consult patterns, read sewing blogs, write this blog, etc.

This is the view to the right when you enter the room- I have one wall with 2 Billy bookcases from IKEA and my ironing board.  The bookshelves hold the bulk of my fabric "stash" in the clear containers- I organize by color and rarely buy more than 1/2 yd at a time- I like the scrappy look in my quilts.

Then this is the view as you walk around behind my sewing machine.  You can see my Texas Quilt and my "What's for Dinner?" placemats on the wall.

Finally, the view looking back at the doorway.  You can see my design wall- it is 2 giant pieces of foam wall insulation covered with batting and hung on the wall.  It is one of my favorite parts of the room, it makes it so easy to lay out quilts!  They hang on hooks on the wall so they are removable if I want them to come down.

I hope that you enjoyed this tour of my sewing room!  What is your favorite part of your sewing room/area?  Mine is my table closely followed by the design wall1

"1st Anniversary Dinner"- A Quilt Show Reject

If you have been reading this blog for a while, you know that last year I had a quilt accepted into the "What's for Dinner?" exhibit at the Houston International Quilt Festival.  It was so amazing to go to the show and see my quilt there that I decided to try to enter the same exhibit this year.

The description of this exhibit is:
"We’ll “set the table” for this Special Exhibit on the show floor with enlarged “place settings”, complete with a placemat/tablecloth, napkin, fork, knife, spoon, and a plate full of “what you are eating for dinner.” This could be your favorite dinner at home, in a restaurant, or what you have for Sunday dinner. We are excited about this theme and hope that it will show a variety of interpretations, fabric choices, and views into different cultures, rituals, and lifestyles. Think colorful, fun, outside the box, and visually appealing!"

This year I decided to create a "1st Anniversary Dinner" placemat.  It is a tradition to eat the top tier of your wedding cake on your first anniversary, so I designed the quilt around that.  I have a piece of (our delicious) wedding cake (which is 3-d) on the china that we received as wedding gifts.  I used the embroidery part of my machine to create two napkins that look like the cake napkins we had at our wedding and then I finished it off with 2 glasses of champagne and a picture of us cutting our wedding cake.  Our wedding colors were blue and yellow.

I am totally in love with this quilt, but unfortunately it was not accepted into the exhibit this year.  Instead, I have hung it on the wall in my sewing room in a place of honor, since it makes me so happy to look at the quilt.

I wanted to share pics of the process of making this quilt since I am always curious about other people's design process.

1. First, I quilted the background in a crosshatch pattern.  Then I appliqued on the napkin squares that I had already embroidered and added the napkin crinkle around the edges.

2. I added the plate and quilted the circle pattern around the edges to match my chine

3. I appliqued on the forks

4. I appliqued on the champagne glasses and quilted a bubble texture in the "champagne"

5. I added the picture- it was printed using my printer onto fabric paper, and then I made the picture frame for it

6.Finally, I sewed on the 3-day cake and added the binding.  Mmmm cake :)

Here is a detail shot so you can see some of the sewing and quilting details:

And the overall pic again:

I am so sad that this won't be seen in the quilt show but at least I don't have to wait a year to hang it on my wall!

T-Shirt Quilt

My sister-in-law used to play competitive tennis when she was in high school and college and she had amassed quite the collection of tennis tournament shirts.  I volunteered to make them into a t-shirt quilt, my only request was that I be given a year to finish it to work it in between all my other projects.  Luckily, I finished it in 8 months, well within my self-imposed deadline.

I have made 2 t-shirt quilts in the past, one for me and one for my husband, using our old college and high school t-shirts.  It is such a great way to get those shirts out of your drawers and made into something useful that you can enjoy using.  Plus, I love the way that t-shirt quilts are heavier than the usual quilts that I make, it makes them especially comfy in the colder months!

Here is the finished quilt:

 

I bound it and backed it with a gray crosshatch fabric.  I ended up using only t-shirts with a white background, and it is neat the way that they all blend into one another that way.  

I don't like t-shirt quilts that only use the one size t-shirt with the sashing between each shirt (though I realize that it is a lot easier to do them this way).  Instead, I use a basis of 3" for my shirts and cut all shirts either 3.5" square, 6.5" square, 9.5" square, 12.5" square, 15.5" square, or any rectangle made up of those numbers (ex 12.5" x 15.5", 6.5" x 9.5").  Then I lay them all out and fit them together like a giant jigsaw puzzle.  This method takes a little bit longer but it makes a one-of-a-kind quilt!

New Pattern- Wonky Stars!

I got my sewing machine back from the shop a couple weeks ago and I immediately started my next quilt!

The name of this quilt is "Wonky Star Metamorphosis" and I have the pattern listed for sale on Craftsy here.  But first, let me tell you all about it!  Here it is laid out in EQ6:

I wanted to make a design where there was a full Sawtooth Star in the middle of the quilt and then have it slowly morph out and lose points as you get closer to the outside of the quilt and eventually just fade into the background color.

Here it is in some different colorways:

And here are some pictures of the quilt in progress (I need to get better at taking pics of the quilt in progress!):

Once it was all assembled, I quilted it with a spiral (of course) from the center out to the sides.  I was brave and used purple thread instead of gray!

Here is the final quilt:

The final size is 42" square.  It makes a great modern baby quilt!

Now go and check out the pattern for this quilt on Craftsy!

I opened an Etsy Shop!

I have had some free time on my hands lately since my sewing machine has been in the shop and I have noticed that my pile of quilts sitting around is getting larger.  This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but I have been thinking that I would like to try to sell some quilts in order to make some money to buy fabric and make some more quilts.  Therefore, I have opened an Etsy shop!  Click on the link below to visit.

So far I have sold 2 notebook covers.  I am excited to have a reason to sew some more things (notebook covers, pouches, quilts, bags, etc) and try to sell them too!

Quilt! Knit! Stitch!

Does anyone out there live in Oregon?  I got news the other week that my quilt, A Quilter's Christmas Eve, will be part of the "What's for Dinner?" exhibit at "Quilt! Knit! Stitch!" at the Oregon Convention Center in Portand Oregon.  Today is the last day of the show, so if you live near there, go check it out!

Click here to see what the exhibit looked like in Houston last October!