weeknight quilting

Fabric Fancy: Grey, Grey, Grey, and Grey

I am obsessed with greys. Ever since this quilt, I have loved adding grey to bright colors – here and in my new bed quilt which I hope to get back from the quilters soon.

I didn’t have any greys when I started quilting again a few months ago, and so I am trying to develop a bit of a stash – because grey fabric goes quickly ’round these parts.

The grey that I love most of all is Dictionary designed by Tim Holtz in the Eclectic Essentials line. Love, love, love. The palette is beautiful – from greige to grey – but also it looks so much like paper it seems to make everything modern and fresh. Love! I used it in this and this and it is the neutrual I am using in all of my Thursday Therapy blocks. Working with this fabric makes me very happy – so seemed apropos.

‘k… really, really need to stop going on about this fabric… just well… a couple more things…

They just restocked at Hawthorne Threads. And Joann carries the line, but I haven’t seen Dictionary at my local Joann. (I have driven an hour+ to get a yard of this fabric, to later stumble upon the line at Joann. I thought for a moment about posing for a selfie with the cutout head of Tim Holtz above the bolts. I decided not to – avoiding being a spectacle and all that. Now I kind of wish I would have.)

Some other greys have made their way into my heart…

Documentation by Tim Holtz (Have i mentioned him before? I snagged this at Joann.)

Say Cheese by Print and Pattern for Robert Kauffman. Love the cameras. Got this at Sarah’s Fabrics after regretting not getting it the last time I was there. Not much worse than fabric regret. I am going to use this for an economy block quilt that seems to be ubiquitous lately. Once I get through my backlog.

Pop by the house designers at Riley Blake. Stumbled across this while wandering around in the wilderness of the Internets. Not sure what it will be used for, but it is adorable. And seems like a great basic print to have around. Also comes in other great colors. FIGHTING. URGE. TO. CLICK. ADD. TO. CART.

Color Crush

I love the combination of Aqua and Red. And it seems to be around quite a bit…

My January calendar

A recent cover of Love Patchwork & Quilting

The color selection for Aurifil’s 2014 QAL

If you search for “aqua and red” on Pinterest, you definitely get an eyeful! I love the combination, but it seems it can move from perfectly sweet to tooth decay fairly quickly.

And then I received this lovely gift from a friend in a lovely bag. Beautiful use of red and aqua, and on the front of the bag, the gold grows up the color combination. It is just gorgeous. And thusly – Aqua, Gold, Red – my new color obsession.

Golds

1920 Knotted Trellis in Gold – Bari J. Ackerman

Wishing Flowers in Gold – My Mind’s Eye

Wood Grain in Straw – Joel Dewberry

Posh Paisley in Yellow – Michael Miller House Designer

Reds

Confetti Dots in Tomato – Dear Stella House Designer

Kensington Damask in Red – Emily Taylor

Serenata Lace in Red – Samantha Walker

Ocean Ponies in Coral – Tula Pink

Aquas

Moire in Aquamarine – Bari J. Ackerman (I already own some of this one!!! 🙂 :))

Nest in Aqua – Mark Hordyszynski

Heather in Aqua – Michael Miller House Designer

L’Amor in Teal – Patty Young

My dream collection – just a dream at this point – because of my fabric ban. I have enough of this color palette to last me a few months in the QAL… and then, well, maybe…

I love how the first block turned out. For the blue, I used “L’Amor” in teal that I picked up from JoAnn the other day – the rest are scraps. I put all the spools in the same direction, because “Bowties are cool”, and because I love how the prints form two diagonal squares.

You will note that there is some pink. I cut into some precious scraps of one of my favorite pinks from years ago when I first started sewing. I have a fairly decent collection of perfect soft pinks that I treasure.

So, I have no idea what I am going to do with this – matches nothing in my house. But I know I want a full-size quilt out of this palette. Maybe just start a pile of gorgeous quilts in my bedroom? We’ll see… it is a long road from this first block to that dilemma. But I am pretty sure this color crush will stay with me for the whole trip.

Sublime!!

When working on a project, I spend half my time thinking about the recipient loving the gift. So I am full of joy to get this picture of this beautiful little girl smiling on top of the quilt I made for her. Happy happy joy joy, indeed.

Thursday Therapy

I bought this lovely book with a gift card I received for Christmas. It really has lots of wonderful patterns in it – and I have been thinking about working on a sampler quilt to build my skill. So on Thursdays, I am going to do a little patchwork therapy for myself – and in a few months I should have enough squares for quilt top. Woot.

First up is “Landscape”. Lovely – made totally from stash scrap fabric.

And I did improve my ability to make points match up.

FOCUS!!

No. More. Fabric. I mean it, srsly. Total ban on all fabric shopping until Valentine’s day. This. Means. You. (well, me). I have tried to focus on projects that use up my stash – the problem is that so much of it is pretty old and not what I would choose to quilt with nowadays. Lots of beige-y yellows and forest greens. But once I get through the following list, I will make a month of just quilting with stash – all fabric is pretty if chopped up small enough. 🙂

I will start as soon as I get through this to-do list.

1. Arrrrgh! Pirate Quilt for a baby coming soon in the family. I am going to use the Brickyard pattern to show off all of the awesome fabricy goodness in the Buried Treasure collection . Mail ordered fabric THAT. SHOULD. BE. HERE. ANY. DAY. NOW.

2. I on a whim bought some Joel Newberry bungalow charm packs. Not knowing what I was going to do with it. Rookie mistake. Super rookie. And so I started an epic baby quilt for a friend who I think had a girl. Ugh. It is beautiful… but has many many 2.5 in squares. And so it didn’t get done because I got sleepy. I need to buckle down. If she had a boy (we have fallen out of touch), I will give it to Project Linus.

3. I need to quilt and bind a top I finished a loooong time ago using fabrics from Bluebird Park. The color scheme just didn’t speak to me. I love the fabric and pattern, but I think I should have chosen another color for the background than that blue. But once I quilt and bind I can send it to Project Linus who will hopefully find a home for it.

4. Um, so I need to finish the new quilt I started on SUNDAY. (J’idiot) because I got some Oh, Deer! from Sarah’s fabrics. I just couldn’t turn away from it. I am 80% done with the quilt top. And then it will go on it’s way to Project Linus.

5. I am going to do the Feathers Quilt-a-long, using True Colors by Anna Maria Horner, I can’t frickin’ wait.

I think that is it… I’ll keep you posted. And no more fabric. No more.

Commissions in Gray

One of the things that makes me happiest is when a friend asks for a piece of custom work. It does wonders for my ego, as well as give me a chance to design something with someone else’s style vantage.

First up – some dinosaur earrings. They are made using plastic dinosaurs and an outdoor paint that works on all surfaces. A few years back I found a paint that works for painting dinosaurs – a unique and frustrating problem. It was fun to use this technique again – and the results are lovely and menacing.

Next up – a dresden pillow that I LOVE. A friend said that she would love to have the extra dresden I have, but I knew the colors didn’t match her home, so I created a new one that matched her gorgeously decorated bedroom. Did I mention I LOVE this? A great example how changing my viewpoint can create something lovely. This was done all from stash fabric except for the gorgeous linen-looking charcoal. I tried three different circle fabrics before deciding on using the dark gray in the middle. Much more modern and gorgeous.

Perfect Fabric Ribbon Squares

The squares aren’t perfect, but the fabric is. I spent many weeks trying to find the perfect fabric to fill up a big space in my dining room. I wanted something with enough color variation that I could do lots of different things with tablescapes, and bright but not too childish, and lots of blooms. Eventually I found Lilly Belle by Bari J. for Art Gallery Fabrics. I love, love, love the fabric. And the big floral prints were perfect for this project. Next time I work with Art Gallery Fabrics it will be for an actual quilt – the fabric is SO.SO.SOFT!

Blue Grey Squares

A wide and short wall hanging to cover the weird bit of wall above our bed. I don’t have a lot of wall space in this house, so I use almost every little blank spot. I am loving squares. And I loved doing the diagonal straight line quilting in this one. Might be my thang.

Welcome!

I love quilt blogs. Seriously L.O.V.E. And so I am adding mine into the world.

In addition to quilting…

1. I have a mid-to-high pressure corporate job which I almost-always love, but it does drive me to patchwork – so most weeknights you will find me hunkered down at the cutting mat and machine.

2. I have all the standard quilt blogger stuff: two awesome stepkids, a darling husband, an old-but-loved house, a sweet dog. A big fabric stash.

3. I also love ballet, modern art, indie folk rock.

I think that is all. This blog will be dedicated to my quilting follies. If you like this blog and want to read about all the more personal, less photographed areas of my life, just contact me and I will send you a link. That blog has a lot of oversharing and cursing. Woot.

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