WIP Wednesday - More Rose Quilt Progress

I'm almost halfway finished with the center sections of the first three paper pieced rose blocks. I'm getting close to seeing a finished rose.

I think it will be another week before I finish all nine rose blocks. I'm excited to see them.

Make It Monday - Rose Quilt Progress

I've been working on the first set of paper pieced rose blocks. Here is one of the three nearly identical blocks of the set. I'm about a third of the way around the largest section. There are three different reds in each rose block. I think I'll really start to enjoy the look when this first set is done.

WIP Wednesday - Roses Quilt Begun

I've started a new quilt, with a rose theme. I downloaded Rosie's Rose Paper Pieced Quilt Block from Craftsy.com.

The pattern's finished size is 6", but I wanted it to be bigger, more like 8" square or 133% of the original size. I tried several methods to enlarge the pattern with various computer programs, without much luck. I finally came up with printing a plain 6" square from Electric Quilt, taping the normal sized pattern section into it, scanning, then using Picasa to crop and print the square at 8.5", the width of a normal piece of printer paper.

Left: normal sized pattern section taped to 6" square.

Right: Scanned, cropped and printed so that the 6" square is now 8.5".

(I'm deliberately hiding the centers of the patterns, since the download is not free.)

Here I added 1/4" seam allowance to the edges of the pattern section, then marked the "corners" in red to avoid confusion later. I did the same process with the three remaining pattern sections, fitting them into a separate 6" square and enlarging. I printed the enlarged patterns onto tracing paper, which is transparent and pretty easily removable at the end of sewing the paper-pieced block.

I created a design in Electric Quilt sketch. Here you can get a rough idea of the finished quilt. Roses will look different than the simplified flowers seen above.

Fabrics - most from stash, along with a few new pieces

My plan is to mix up the combinations of fabrics so that each rose is somewhat unique.

I'll begin sewing in the next couple of days. The pattern is rather intricate, so I expect it will take several days to get the paper piecing done.

Debbie

Super Mario Brothers Quilt Finish

Last night I finished a Super Mario Brothers themed quilt, for Dominic, the young grandson of dear friend and co-worker Thomasina W. 

Super Mario Brothers

For Dominic, young grandson of friend Thomasina W. 

Original design

59" square

Completed 8/11/2014

Close-up

After a fruitless online search for Super Mario Brothers fabric that interested me, I had a small piece of theme fabric printed to order at Spoonflower.com.

A few weeks ago I shared a post on Facebook about a website where you could turn a photo into a quilt pattern. The featured photo was one of the Mario Brothers (http://tinyurl.com/l358za9). Thomasina came by my desk and told me that her grandson would like a quilt like that because he likes Super Mario Brothers. That got me thinking and within a few minutes I decided to make a quilt for Dominic for his upcoming birthday.

Thomasina and I agreed that the quilt pattern, with its many pieces, would be too complicated. I tried to find Super Mario Brothers themed fabric and ended up having a fat quarter printed to order at Spoonflower.com. I took the little bit of fabric and made a simple design around it. I'm happy with the way it turned out. 

Tomorrow is Dominic's 7th birthday. Thomasina will give the quilt during their family get-together. Happy Birthday, Dominic!

Debbie

WIP Wednesday - Slow Progress

I haven't done much quilting during the past week. Tonight I cut alternate plain squares in blue and sewed them to the Mario Brothers blocks.

The deadline is early next week. I'll get going on the quilt. It won't take long to finish.

Debbie

It's Pretty Black and White

It's Pretty Black and White prompt #artjournal, a photo by quilter4010 on Flickr.

I interpreted the prompt as something that was usually colorful, but that would still be pretty in black and white. I thought of a flower. Items used: junk mail, tear strip from a box, buttons. Stamp was made from an empty sewing machine needle case.

Debbie