WIP Wednesday 8/29/2012

Bowls with Borders Quilt Top - completed tonight

Decided to add a narrow strip of dark blue to represent a shelf, but mostly to create a division between the foot of the far right stack of bowls and the border, which are made of the same fabric.

Stacks of bowls sewn together

Shelf strip sewn on

Quilt top laid out

Border in four pieces

Quilt top sewn together - Broken Dishes blocks in the corners

Fabric for the back

I'm really happy with the way the quilt top turned out. I'm thinking of doing a pillowcase finish, mostly because I don't want to lose too much of the corner blocks with a regular binding. I could do an escape hatch on the back, but I don't want to break up the teapots design. As for quilting, I probably will do some free motion quilting in the yellow background areas, and I'm thinking about sewing white or clear buttons in the light blue borders. I'd like to finish the quilt this week.

Bowls with Borders Blog Hop

Welcome to my blog! I'm so glad you stopped by. I'm delighted to participate in the Bowls with Borders Blog Hop. Be sure to check the end of the post for giveaways.

Three stacks of bowls

Blue and white is one of my favorite color combinations, especially in pottery and ceramics.

My blue and white collection on display in my kitchen

Broken Dishes block - will go in the four corners

Here you can get an idea of the layout

Electric Quilt Sketch showing border and corner blocks

This is what I plan to use on the back. Love it!

I hope to get the quilt completely finished in the next couple of days. Be watching my blog to see the finished product.

I'm going to display the finished quilt on the plate rack in my living room. The plate rack is horizontal and holds two plates. I'm thinking of putting a piece of cardboard in the corner flaps that I put on the back of my wallhangings to hold pieces of wood for display. The cardboard should give the piece enough body to stand up in the plate rack.

Now for the giveaways. You could win one of the two fat quarters below.

White-on-white and dark blue

For a chance to win one of the fat quarters, simply leave a comment by the last day of the Blog Hop (end of Tuesday, Aug. 28). Be sure to mention whether you prefer White or Blue. For an extra chance to win one of the fabrics, leave another comment mentioning that you are a new or existing follower. Two winners will be drawn on Wednesday, Aug. 29.

Be sure to stop by and see today's other Blog Hop participants:

Julie S.

Angela D.

Kim O.

Martine

Quilts and Pieces

Spoilt Dog Quilts

Quiltenvilt

Traveling Quilter - You're here!

Gabi Koeln

Sew Sew Little Time

The Complete Schedule

Hope to see you again soon!

Debbie

At the ready

At the ready, a photo by quilter4010 on Flickr.

Hiding

Hiding, a photo by quilter4010 on Flickr.

Protective

Protective, a photo by quilter4010 on Flickr.

WIP Wednesday 8/22/2012

First stack of bowls

I finished the first stack of bowls for the Bowls with Borders Blog Hop. I chose a variety of blue and white fabrics from stash, to represent my love of blue and white pottery. I used the pattern provided to the blog hop participants. Sorry, but I don't have permission to share the pattern.

The bottom bowl - paper pieced, untrimmed

Four bowls, untrimmed

Trimmed, ready to be sewn together

There they are! This stack will go on the far left of three stacks of bowls. The center stack will be three bowls, and the far right stack will have five bowls. I based the layout on one of the illustrations in the instructions, which has stacks of 3, 2 and 4 bowls, left to right. I added an extra bowl to each stack.

Electric Quilt sketch - gives an idea of the color scheme and border. The corner blocks are Broken Dishes blocks.

My plan is to finish the other two stacks, as well as the corner blocks and assemble the quilt top. My day to post is Sunday, so I have through late Saturday to get done what I can.

Art Journal

I've been reading about art journals for a while now. The other day I decided to go for it.

I bought a spiral bound book with sturdy, shiny pages from the thrift store, about $1. I believe the spiral binding will allow the book to expand without looking overly full.

Here are some typical pages from the book. Silly, aren't they? I plan to cover the illustrations with my art.

Here is the page for my second art journal entry. (I did one the day before but didn't think to take any pictures of the process.)

Using my granddaughters' paints and paintbrushes, I sloshed on some paint to cover up the drawings. I used my hairdryer to dry the paint.

I referred to a list of art prompts that I had created by looking around the room, writing words that popped into my head as I looked at various objects. I ended up with a list of 75 nouns, adjectives, concepts, etc. I picked 10 words at random for the first 10 days.

The prompt for the day was "hiding". I wrote Hopes, Dreams and Fears in fat permanent pen, then covered the words by gluing a piece of scarf material from a bag of scraps.

I've done three pages in three days, and I kind of like it. Although I'm a perfectionist, I've told myself that the pages don't have to be perfect. I try to get a page done within 15 minutes. I don't have fancy art supplies, but at this point they aren't necessary. When the book is full I'll find another, probably at the thrift store.

Fabrics Chosen for Bowls Project

Tonight I chose fabric for my project for the Bowls With Borders Blog Hop.

I love blue and white pottery so I pulled a bunch of fabrics in those colors from stash. Yellow will be the background.

Fabrics from scrap drawers

I played around with combinations for quite a while, and decided to go with these. Each set of two fabrics will make a bowl. There are 12 bowls in my design, so I'll make two bowls using each combination. That's the plan, anyway.

I'll start paper piecing tomorrow night. I'm guessing I'll have the bowls pieced by Wednesday night.

Debbie

WIP Wednesday 8/15/2012

Every Seven Minutes Quilt Top

Partially quilted

Marked with Frixion pen for quilting

Chose this fancy stitch, which looked good on the sample, but I didn't like how it turned out. I took out the stitching, which took a couple of hours.

Fancy stitching removed

I opted to do a straight stitch about 1/4" inside the seam. I like this much better.

The red squares and the side triangles are done. I'll do a similar pattern in the dark blue squares. The quilt is almost done!

Debbie

Progress - Every Seven Minutes Quilt

Every Seven Minutes Quilt Top

I decided to finish the Every Seven Minutes quilt before I started another project. Last night I got the quilt sandwich layered. Tonight I plan to do some simple machine quilting, using a fancy stitch in straight lines. I hope to have the quilt finished tonight or tomorrow.

Debbie

Bowls With Borders Blog Hop Begins!

The Full Schedule

Bowls with Borders Blop Hop begins today and runs through Tuesday, August 28. My day to post is Sunday, August 26, when I'll reveal my Bowls with Borders project, along with a giveaway.

Meanwhile, please visit the other participating blogs each day. See you back here soon!

Debbie

Idea for Bowls With Borders Project

Electric Quilt Sketch for Bowls With Borders Project

The next blog hop that I am participating in is Bowls With Borders. I came up with a design for my project (see above). The blocks in the sketch are pine trees turned upside down - the closest thing I could find in Electric Quilt. It's good enough for illustrative purposes.

There is an actual pattern provided for blog hop participants, which has bowls that are more rounded and stacked messily one on top of another, similar to the badge below. I'll be following the pattern as far as construction of the bowls is concerned.

I love the color combination of blue and white, especially in ceramics, pottery, etc. So my bowls will be in that color scheme and I'm planning to draw from my stash for the bowl fabrics. I probably will have to buy the yellow background fabric and light blue border fabric.

By the way, in the corners are Broken Dishes blocks, a personal touch, not included in the bowls pattern.

I'm so excited about this project. I've been wanting to do a wallhanging of blue and white bowls for a long time, so this is a great opportunity to make that wish a reality. My day to post is August 26th, so I have some time to sew up the quilt top. I'll start gathering blue and white fabrics in the next day or two.

Debbie

WIP Wednesday 8/8/2012

Every Seven Minutes Quilt Top

Tonight I sewed deeper seams where the border is attached. When I added the border there was excess fabric and it was bugging me, so I was trying to reduce the extra.

One corner - the seams of the border should have crossed where the bright blue and light blue are joined. I'm going to try to tighten that up.

Removed stitching part way. Folded border back, re-sewed with 1/2" seam allowance.

Pin head shows new seam

Pressed seam - crosses in the correct place now (see pin head)

Preparing to sew adjacent edge, the one I had folded out of the way

New 1/2" seam. Note I left the original 1/4" seam unfinished. Should be fine.

Seam pressed open

Trimmed excess fabric

All seams re-sewn and trimmed, without much fuss. Not perfect, but I can live with it.

I'd love to get this wallhanging done, but I may set it aside temporarily while I take care of more pressing matters. I'm doing another blog hop soon, and I need to begin working on my Bowls With Borders. I'm thinking blue and white, one of my favorite color combos. I have a weakness for blue and white pottery and ceramics. I may get to use some of the blues that have been in my stash for a long time, just waiting for such a time.

Debbie