adventures of a quilting diva

Still making a block a day for my Dear Diary 2010 quilt. (I’ve got 33 blocks now! See a few recent blocks below.) For a couple of days I fell into satin stitched applique. I didn’t mean to … it just happened.

Satin stitching is one of those techniques I just don’t do. Too much stress, too much hassle, too much thread to cut out when things go wrong. I’m more of a blanket stitch kind of gal.

Unfortunately the fabrics I chose for this little blue mushroom didn’t have as much contrast as I’d imagined they should. So it was either make an entirely new block from scratch or attempt to save the day with some satin stitching in bright blue rayon.

Not bad for a satin-stitch-a-phobe. I could definitely try this again. Maybe someday I’ll even make an entirely satin stitched applique quilt.

So the very next day I did. I had a sample of Glide Trilobal Polyester thread from Fil-Tec Bobbin Central that I’d been saving to try out on a mini quilt top.

As you can see on the cloud applique, it satin stitches beautifully. Notice the tight curves and inside points of the cloud. (These are 4-inch blocks.) I LOVE that even though I stacked up quite a bit of thread to cover the corners and curves, this thread was fine enough that it didn’t jam up or get caught in the feed dogs.

Glide’s shine matches that of rayon, plus it’s colorfast. Check out their wide range of gorgeous colors. There’s even color conversion charts for Madeira and Robison-Anton. The only thing I could wish for is Glide Trilobal Polyester thread in variegated colors. Until then …

Get 10% off all Glide colors for the month of February. Stock up on your favorite colors and fall in love with Glide.

I’ve learned a thing or two during the first 12 days of Dear Diary 2010. For example, there are some blocks that I would really rather not make multiples of. A four-inch 16-patch (shown above) is one of them. I don’t mind making one every now and then, and this quilt is the perfect place for it.

The purple and black Square-in-a-Square at right is another one of those blocks I don’t see myself making more of. (The dime is for scale.) It is pieced for real, not painted, stamped or fussy cut. I can’t imagine why I ever made it in the first place, but I can see why there is only one.

I was digging in my scrap box for more of the sheep fabric, but couldn’t find any. What I did find was this little gem, already inset into the muslin and just waiting for me. I think it fits in rather nicely.

happy quilting! =(^_^)=

There’s a new blog in my life. It doesn’t run on WordPress or Blogger, and has no URL. I don’t need a PC, a Mac, or even an internet connection for uploading to my new blog.

It’s my Dear Diary 2010 journal and I post every day with my Zig pigment pens.

But unless you happen to meet me in the street (or maybe at Road to California later this month) you might never get to read it. I promise to give you updates here every now and then.

Dear Diary 2010 is coming along quite well. I’m still working out a few kinks in the program, such as: maybe it’s not the most realistic expectation to design, create, and quilt a new block each and every single night when you get started around 10 or 11 pm. I can definitely design it and at least fuse or piece each one daily though. As long as I don’t skip any days I’ll be able to catch up.

None of them are quilted yet because I’m still deciding how I want to quilt them. I’m leaning towards hand quilting around the edges with big-stitch quilting with top-stitching thread. (I really love the look of bold hand stitches, and the 4-inch blocks are great for taking along.) Once they’re quilted I’m going to connect them with E seed beads.

Here are my first week’s blocks:

Stay tuned for more!

Celebrate the ordinary, extraordinary, and everything in between with me in 2010!

Although I only reached 50 blocks or so before I called it quits in my Dear Diary 2006 quilt, I’m now ready to give it another try.

One quilt block per day, inspired by each day’s activities. Sketched, sewn and quilted each day. Every several days I’ll sew them to each other so that I won’t lose any blocks. By January 1, 2011 the quilt will be complete.Here’s my journal, all ready to go. My daughter and I have broken it in so that I won’t have any empty sketchbook fears come January 1.

Come back and visit my blog in the new year. I’ll post my Dear Diary 2010 progress for you to see.

This Christmas, why not remember the festivities large and small by creating quilt blocks for each one. My tree block at left is from my Dear Diary quilt. It’s actually a January block, “Taking down the Christmas Tree” but it could just as easily depict a tree going up.

Make blocks for baking cookies, shopping for presents, attending a Christmas pageant, and more. Just about anything, really. Then make a New Year’s Resolution to piece the blocks together and quilt them so that next Christmas you can reminisce and enjoy your quilterly creation.

Quilts inspired by laundry … why not? You’ve got to do your laundry anyway. Might as well get a little inspiration out of it while you’re at it.

Here is an original block I designed called “Mismatched Socks”. My daughter was in kindergarten and one sock from each of her favorite pairs was missing in the laundry, a white pair that I crocheted a beaded trim to and a purple pair with butterflies. I think she may have worn this mismatched pair one day if my memory serves me correctly. Here are her mismatched socks, memorialized in a quilt block. This block would make a fun quilt. It could be a matching game to find where all the different pairs are.
The traditional “T” block offers a lot of fun laundry-inspired possibilities as well.
Click here to find out more about Dear Diary 2006, the quilt these blocks came from.

Dear Diary 2006 is a journal quilt of sorts. That is to say, I planned to make a 3″ block every single day relating to some event of the day. At the end of the year I would have an epic quilt along the lines of Dear Jane.

Instead of 365 I ended up with 60. Designing, pulling fabric and making an entirely new block each and every day proved to be a bit more than I could handle. Even though many are traditional blocks and a few came from books and magazines, there was still the work of choosing a symbolic block and redrafting it because not very many people design 3″ blocks.

For 2009 I vowed to complete some of my UFOs and these blocks were even mostly sewn into rows already so it was an easy decision to tackle Dear Diary rather than some of my less complete projects. I’m really glad I did, because I love the way it turned out even though I only got through about 16% of the year’s blocks. I can still remember what most of the day-blocks I did finish represent. Here’s a sampling:

Shoe Shopping: Annika and I were shopping for shoes and these beaded silk shoes caught her eye. Since they were a bit impractical for kindergarten, we settled on an appliquéd quilt block to remember the shoes by.

Road to California: I chose this traditional block for the day I attended the Road to California quilt show in Ontario. The orange and green fabrics represent oranges in the citrus trees.

Taking Down the Tree: This represents the day we took down and put away the Christmas tree and ornaments. I’m pretty sure it was still January.

Snow Day: Yes it actually snowed right here in sunny Southern California. The kids (and grown-ups too) had a grand snow day, although it only lasted until about 11:00 am, when the sun came out and melted it all.

Ladybug Hunt: Annika and her friends had a wonderful time at the park one fine spring day when the grass was a veritable garden, not of flowers but of ladybugs.

Nancy Halpern wrote a great article, Quilting Day by Day, about this daily kind of journal quilt in the May 1997 issue of Threads magazine. In it she told the story of her daily quilt journal that she made in 1990.

Nancy had the foresight to set down some rules before she began. One of those rules was to finish the block by the end of the day even if it’s just to cut a single piece of fabric to represent that day. And she wrote her daily records in an actual journal, not whatever scrap of paper happened to be sitting next to her sewing machine that day.

If I had read this article and Nancy’s rules before I started, Dear Diary 2006 would probably have been a much larger quilt. But there’s always 2010 … or maybe simply summer vacation 2009 or Labor Day weekend for a trial run.

Completely on the spur-of-the-moment I decided to take part in Project Spectrum today. March is the month for red and pink, so with less than one day remaining, I scanned in some of my pink and red dear diary blocks and photoshopped them together into a mini digital quilt.

Actually, much of my effort this month went into the boucle jacket I am working on. I have made quite a lot of progress; alas I am too mortified to show it under construction. As you can see from the fabric scraps above, it is VERY pink!

happy quilting!

April is use-what-you-have month and I am sworn from purchasing anything for any project (quilting, scrapbooking, painting, crochet/knitting, etc.) . The idea is to use what you have in your stash.

I have already started and have actually not bought a thing since I signed up (March 25). I save myself the temptation and simply stay away from the stores. Yesterday, I needed a particular shade of yellow for one of my dear diary quilt blocks (not any of the blocks pictured in yesterday’s post, this one is not finished yet). Coloring in a yellow on white print from my stash made it just the right shade of pale yellow. I am feeling very virtuous. Even after my shopping fast is over, I will definitely be using that trick more and more often. After all, how many fabric stores make instant deliveries at midnight, 5:00 a.m., you get the picture.

happy quilting!

use-what-you-have links:
Quilt Studio forum challenge page
Simple Sparrow blog
Flickr group

Dear diary 2006 is my quilt project of the year. Its Dear Jane and journal quilts all rolled into one (very large quilt). The concept is simple: make one small (3″ finished) block a day. Relate something about it, such as the pattern, the colors, or the fabric, to something that happened that day. It might be a quilt project I worked on that day, something significant that happened or a small, random activity, or when nothing else jumps out a me, a favorite block or one I’ve always wanted to try.

String them all together into rows chronologically, and ta-da! a chronicle in quilt blocks of a year in my life. When I started out, my plan was to also write up a line or two about the block and what it meant, but that fizzled out before January ended. Now the blocks themselves are the sole storytellers, and that’s kind of neat (and much less to stress over).

I have completed all of January, except for one block (Cross and Crown) which came out too small. Imagine that! When I first attempted it, I was unsure that I could do it at 3 inches. Lo and behold it came out at an incredibly miniscule 2 inches. I tried to save it by adding a border around the whole thing, but the pieces are so small that it doesn’t read well from even a short distance away.

Most of February is finished. Some of the applique blocks are a bit detailed and I haven’t been in the mood recently to fuss with tiny bits of fabric and even tinier stitches.

March has exactly two blocks completed: an Irish Chain-type for March 2 (that had to do with what seemed like an endless chain of little tasks to complete that day) and a T-block (for my contemplations of becoming a teacher that started that day). Not uncoincidentally, March is when I began blogging and it has taken up quite a bit of my regular quilting time in figuring out how to blog. I don’t foresee that being a problem in future months when I better know what I am doing in the Blogosphere.

What I’ve found to be most efficient is to string piece the daily blocks along with whatever other project I am working on or to save up a few days worth of diary blocks to piece at the same setting. This way I don’t spend my whole time bobbing up and down between the sewing machine and the ironing board. I have to remember to make sure that I write down the block pattern, fabrics, colors, etc. that I want to use for each day’s entry.

Looking back at early diary blocks, I can totally remember the events I made the blocks for and that’s loads of fun. It’s also a great creative exercise–I’ve created quite a few original blocks, some of which I’d like to make a whole quilt out of someday.

When I look at the blocks all together in rows, I really get a sense that each day of my life is unique and precious, not just days of monotony strung one after the other. One small block on its own may be nothing special, but put them all together, they become a magnificent tapestry. Similarly, each day, even a seemingly insignificant one, is part of something amazing–life!

happy quilting!