Stepping Up - December Island Batik Challenge: 3D

Welcome to my 3D quilt for Island Batik.   I had a beautifully sunny day to take a few photos out in the cold.  But seriously, look how blue that sky is today.  Of course I want you to feast your eyes on my quilt, also. There is a closer shot later. So don't strain.

The challenge says: "Explore the world of 3D using your creative talents for this month's challenge. Bring your inner artist out by using optical illusions, textures, trapunto or whatever else will make your quilt pop into life." 

I think I nailed it!  I have always loved the Baby Blocks/Tumbling Blocks quilt pattern but the number of y-seams was just too daunting. So, for this challenge I played around in Electric Quilt 8 software to design a version that is simple to make. 

My plan included using the Accuquilt Go! Cutter and the Triangle in a Square die to make the blocks.   Each colored triangle was paired with one black and one gray side. When they are joined together they make a short Tumbling block design.  (Short in that the blocks are not "cubes" but a shortened cube.)

It was surprisingly simple to sew.  The challenge was in ironing all the seams neatly so that it would lay flat.

The quilting was fun.  I chose to use a lovely Silk Blend batting by Hobbs Batting.  It quilted beautifully.  I did curved lines in the top of the 'cubes.'  In the black and gray portions of the 'cubes' I did long  u-shapes to press that section down a bit more. 


 
In the colored sections of the borders, I quilted circles with a wavy line running through them. 

In the solid sections of black and gray that are not in the design I pebble quilted  because I love the texture.  The exceptions are the narrow inner border, which got a simple wavy line. And the outer border which got a variation on "ribbon candy."

I am very happy with both the piecing and the quilting on this little quilt. 

The quilt measures 34" wide by 36" long. The design is my version of a Tumbling Block quilt that has been simplified.  I love the 3D effect of the blocks shifting as I look at it. 

It is just right when I need just a little something over my lap. But it would also be a great baby quilt.

Now here is the closer look at the entire quilt that I promised earlier.

The Island Batik fabric, Hobbs batting, Aurifil thread, and the Accuquilt Go! cutter were given to me as an Island Batik Ambassador in consideration for promoting these brands while creating the challenge quilts. Thank you all so much. I hope I can work with you again in the future.

This will be my last post as an Island Batik Ambassador as I did not apply for the program for next year.  The simple reason is that I am choosing to spend more time with my Mom and family.  I had a wonderful time creating all of my Island Batik projects and I have purchased more Island Batik fabrics - so you will see more projects featuring these fabrics.

Until Next Time,  

Stay Creative 

Comments are welcomed. I will reply when possible. Of course if you are a "No Reply Blogger"- I can not reply. Links in comments will result in the entire comment being deleted.

Child's Play -The Absurd Bird - Island Batik

Welcome to my take on the Island Batik Ambassadors' September Challenge.   We were challenged to make a juvenile inspired quilt using Island Batik Fabrics and an Accuquilt Block on Board die that was supplied to us in our July shipment.  The block I received is the Accuquilt Spiderweb 6" finished die.
Confession time - I saw this die and said "What can I make with that except a Halloween quilt???!?!"  So I was determined that my quilt would not be overtly "halloween."  I wish that I were a writer of children's books.  You see after lots of playing with ideas and what ifs, and Electric Quilt designing software, I saw a full fledged character.   He needs a book to tell his story.

 May I present to you------The Absurd Bird!

In my mind, he is a type of super hero, although just a bit off kilter. 

I had a wonderful time using the Spiderweb die

and the wonderful bundle of Island Batik fabrics - Electric Desert - designed by Jackie Kunkel. 

I cut lots of pieces using the Spiderweb die.

Then I sewed several spiderweb sections. 

And I constructed the bird's face.

As you can see, the entire rectangle that makes his face is all "spiderweb" blocks. 

I cut his spiky "hair" with another Accuquilt Go! half square triangle die. 

I used that same die for his beak/neck.   

Then I used other dies to make his body and wings and the top and bottom "slanted checkerboard." 

For the outer borders, I used strip dies and a small tumbler die. 

The bird really wanted to fly around and play. So we went to a local park where he 

enjoyed the kids playground. 

Then the Absurd Bird went to a small dogwood tree to rest for a bit. 

 But the sun was very strong and hot here in Alabama on an early September day,

 so we decided to go home.

But here are a few more pictures - just in case you haven't seen enough just yet. 

Tumblers in the outer border.

Fun quilting textures

More texture in the quilting

 For now, the Absurd Bird wishes you happy quilting and lots of smiles. 

Note:
Quilt Details:  Designed, Pieced and Quilted by Gene Black.
Quilt Size: 44" by 61"
Batting: Hobbs Heirloom Cotton
Fabrics: Island Batik
Thread: Aurifil.

The fabrics, batting, cutting die and thread were supplied to me at no cost as an Island Batik Ambassador.       

Until Next Time,  

Stay Creative 

Comments are welcomed. I will reply when possible. Of course if you are a "No Reply Blogger"- I can not reply. Links in comments will result in the entire comment being deleted.

More Design Fun

My brain clearly kicked into play gear while working with the Garlic Knot block in Electric Quilt 7. I love being able to recolor a quilt in the design stages. I also  love being able to try alternate settings.

Debbie mentioned that an on-point setting could be done.  Needless to say that sent me right back to EQ7 for more play time.
On point?

The on-point setting gives it more of a diamond shaped feeling.  I like it.

But I also had to play with coloration  on the layout I showed yesterday.  So perhaps a nice rainbow version would be good.

I really like this, but then I thought what if..... the background fabric were black instead of the mottled tan???

I wonder what else I will discover with this block.

Comments are welcomed. I will reply when possible. However at this time Blogger is not notifying me of comments. Of course if you are a "No Reply Blogger"- I can not reply. Links in comments will result in the entire comment being deleted.

A Little Design Inspiration

Reading blogs often leads to inspiration - or a condition that I call "I want to try that."  But sometimes I look at a design and the "what if" muse kicks me.
Yesterday my friend, Debbie, posted about a table topper that she made with some leftover Garlic Knot blocks.    She had made a larger quilt with this block that I had seen also.
Somehow, seeing the smaller one caused the "what if" to kick in.
SO ---- what if you laid out those blocks differently?
Here is a representation of the table topper that I created in Electric Quilt.

As you can see the secondary pattern created by the light background blocks is an irregular shape. That prompted me to put the block in EQ and play with layouts. Here is the final result that made me happy.

It creates a completely different effect that is like an interesting lattice.  Of course using different colors could change that completely. Hmmm.....maybe I need to play in EQ a bit more.


Comments are welcomed. I will reply when possible. However at this time Blogger is not notifying me of comments. Of course if you are a "No Reply Blogger"- I can not reply. Links in comments will result in the entire comment being deleted.

Finally Feeling Better - So I made some Quilt Blocks

After a couple of days feeling blah and wishing I felt better, I have finally rounded a corner.  I am doing the AccuQuilt GO! Quilt Along hosted by Ebony at Quilt Possible. The first block was posted back of February 17th.  Yikes!  I am late. At least block two hasn't been posted yet. 
For block one we were to make eight of the Whirlwind blocks.  Here are four of my completed blocks laid together so I could see this secondary design. I love it, I could make an entire quilt of this block. 

Since I cut the pieces for this block with the AccuQuilt Go! cutter, all the pieces fit together wonderfully and the cutting was fast. My points are near perfect and I am happy. (Disclaimer: I don't stress over perfect points; but I do like them.)  

For this quilt along, we were to pick two neutrals and six other fabrics. The other fabrics are 3 sets of two in light and dark, as are the neutrals. My light neutral is a natural muslin, the dark is a tan. 

The fabrics in the dark triangles are a bit confusing as they did not photograph well. The triangles that form the center pinwheel are a hand dyed fabric that is burgundy with a bit of green in it. The light that goes with that is the mottled light burgundy/pink.  

The dark outer triangles are a mottled purple that goes with the light purple/white floral. 

There are two colors that are NOT shown, as they didn't come into play this round.  I have a solid light green and this green with purple and yellow in the foreground:

I think the purple in this will play nicely with the other fabrics. 

If you are on FaceBook you may want to "like" AccuQuilt.  It will let you see what other people are making with the GO! cutter and occasionally they give away some great prizes. Tell them "Gene Black sent me over here" if you want to.  And you might mention that I should be on their "Blog Friends" wall, too. (Yes that is shameless self-promotion) 

I just spotted this: If you sign up for email updates at the AccuQuilt website they have a $100 monthly gift certificate giveaway.  I am glad I am signed up. I would love to win one of those! 

Thanks for all the 'get well' wished over the past couple of days. You have really made me feel loved. 

Design Idea - Electric Quilt

A few weeks ago, I saw a picture of a quilt that struck me.  It is really a simple design, however it looks like there are blocks set on point.  Setting blocks on point is scary to  a newbie quilter.  While I am past being scared by it, maybe some of my readers aren't.
First the picture:

Then the explanation:

There are two simple blocks in this design.  A quarter square triangle and a nine patch.  The trick is to alternate the direction of the quarter square blocks in each row.  That makes the square that appears to be on point be solid. If you put them all the same direction your quilt will look like this:

Not nearly as effective, it is?  I did use the dark blue in all of my nine patches (remember this is just done in EQ5, I have NOT made this quilt - yet)  However, you could alternate those also: 

That gives more contrast in all the blocks, I also alternated the center of the 9 patch in this one too.  Honestly the first one shown is easiest to make. Why, you can speed piece the 9 patch blocks by making strip sets and sub-dividing them.  Also, I like the way the first one makes the corner and center square of the nine patch seem to float in the dark "on point" blocks. 

If you wanted to get really wild with this, you could do applique blocks instead of the nine patches.  Go ahead and see what YOU  can come up with.  Let your imagination run free! 

My latest design

I took the "Flies in the Butter" block and made a slight adjustment to it, then laid out a quilt from it.

 I am calling this the ShooFly quilt.

Wish I had time to make it.


(((NOTE: I edited this to include the link to the block, it is my design.
I had to after Jandi made her very funny comment.  And to answer Pat's question, yes I did it in EQ5 )))

Crinkly Quilted Goodness

First off, I washed three new lap quilts to get them ready for the sale. How is this for a pile of crinkly soft goodness?



Now, I showed a bit of this quilt earlier when it was just my "framed square" blocks. Well this one is one of my favorite squares. Isn't the little bird on the branch a happy sight?




Here is most of the quilt, some of it hung over the back of my easel and didn't make it into the picture.



I think I love doing wild free-motion quilting. For a while I thought I did too much quilting on this one. Now I understand what Goldilocks was talking about "this one is just right"

The Un-Quilted

One particular quilt top I made has never made it to "quilted" status. It is simply too big for me to quilt on my machine. Well, okay, so I really just don't want to ---mess it up. Yeah, I worked on it a qood while and the fabric is really nice stuff. These days I could piece this top a lot faster than I did, but, that is beside the point.
I will have to get it quilted someday. It is very nice and truly a masculine quilt. I still love it, but it is certainly different than my current style. I used just one line of fabrics (so not my scrappy style) and the colors are muted (so not my bright/loud style) Anywho, here is the top on the bed. Whadda ya think?
Oh, ignore the tissues sitting in the bookcase part of the headboard. (thank you)

Bright Idea - Conception to Execution

Yeah I woke up slowly this morning. The temperature had dropped overnight and I slept in for a bit. But once I got awake, I thought "I will do something bright today.
So after breakfast, I started on a quilt top. I was going to do it "quilt as you go" but after I got all the blocks made and laid out, I didn't want to add the joining strips. SO!!! I just sewed them together and added a border.
There is no pattern, just a general idea to make these. I stacked up four pieces of fabric (size -about 14 inches square, so I could trim to 12.5 inches square later)
I made one cut across it with the rotary cutter and my long ruler. Shuffled it and sewed them together again. Repeat a couple of times. For part of them I did 8 pieces, cut sewed, split into two stacks and the shuffled the stacks and repeated. Get the idea? I needed a couple of extra squares so I made them with whatever was left over. I call that "granny piecing." Because that is something my Grandmother would have done.

I added a border to make it a bit larger. Now all I have to do is piece a backing, quilt it and bind it. I wonder if I will finish it this weekend. Wish me luck!



One other question- "Is it loud enough?"

Triangle Half String Squares

After playing with String Blocks and making several, I started thinking about making a different design with them. Then in a old book that was given to me, I saw a variation on the string square. It is made from a triangle of solid fabric and then so strips over the rest of the square. The one in the book had them just kind of random. It didn't appeal to me at all. BUT it turned on my thinking cap. So I sat and 'played' on the computer. This is the design I came up with.
I like the motion and illusion it creates. The color possibilities are endless.....and imagine using a pattern -say a BIG pattern - for the solid areas. What do you think? If you try this design, let me know. I would love to see it.



Size is up to you...but I see 10 or 12 inch blocks. and adjust the number of squares to suit yourself.

A Quilt for Myself and a giveaway alert

I have been blessed to have quilts made by my grandmother that I use and enjoy. Sadly, she made them all for a full-size bed and my bed is a queen-sized bed. While I love and enjoy using them, they are just a bit small. Plus they are beginning to show wear and need to be taken from constant service and placed in semi-retirement.
So, I have been working on a quilt for myself, hence the title of this post.

Several posts back, I posted the exported picture from EQ where I planned this quilt. Since then, I have been working on it in odd moments. A few minor changes have been made "on the fly." ((that means I pieced it together differently than planned and decided I liked it and didn't want to "un-sew" it))

Last evening and tonite, I made great progress. The quilt top is in three large pieces that I will put together within the next week. For now, the pieces were kindly modeled by my bed. You see, I don't have a design wall so I have to use whatever spot works. I laid the pieces in formation on the bed and took several pictures. None of them came out great, but a couple did okay. Here they are for your viewing pleasure.





I did notice that I will need a top and bottom border. I am undecided if it will surround the sides also. Likewise, I am not sure what it will be. Ooooh, I feel a "fabric audition" in the near future.

Okay, I hope you didn't just skip my post for this - If you did, go back and read it BEFORE you click the link. (please?) The giveaway alert: Chris at WeLoveQuilting is having a new giveaway. She has a nice prize package posted. So go to here blog post here or to the We Love Quilting blog and see the February Giveaway. It closes on Valentine's Day.

Also, if you didn't enter my giveaway, there is still time. My giveaway closes on the 25th. Be sure you comment on post 125, that is where you will find the requirements AND the only place you can comment to actually enter the giveaway.

A Plan and an Update

First the plan: A while back I ordered a fat quarter sampler and a jelly roll of some fabric that appeals to me. Using some lovely software, I have planned a quilt that will be just for me. The fabric collection is called "Irresistable Indigo 2" and is from Connecting Threads. I may possibly add a border of some other fabric, but that decision will be made LATER. Here is an exported picture of my planned quilt. I think it looks perfect for a man's bed. It is not at all frilly and the colors are pleasantly masculine. Don't you agree?

Now the update, I would like to thank those that comment both on and off the blog about my wall hanging piecework. Thanks to you, I added the two extra rows at the bottom. It does look more in proportion now.

Next will be the fun part. I will add the white outside pieces. Then I will put the "quilt sandwich" together and be ready to make it a quilt! I am both excited and a bit scared about that part. Stay tuned!

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to all my U.S. readers. And have a Happy Day to all those in other countries.

I am off for a lovely four days starting today. I suspect I will play with designing Quilts on the computer. Like this one I did last night.


I also need to import my fabric files. Oh, and download a few more. If I were at home, I would photo some of my stash and import that - very handy - the I could actually MAKE the quilt as pictured. Ha ha.
If you want this pattern in EQ-5, let me know. I will email the file to you.

Edited to add:
ARRGH-blogger cut off my picture-I hope I have it fixed now. I wanted to post the BIG picture of it.

Quilt Design

I have been playing with designing my own block and quilt. Here is what I came up with. I will have to really decide on fabric, for this I was going for contrast.
I did find out that different layouts of the blocks can really make it a different quilt.