New Year's List Writing / Beauties Pagent 242

I am a big believer in making lists. It doesn’t matter whether I write a list out by hand or type it into a digital document, the activity is worthwhile. It gives me the opportunity to process my short-term tasks and establish some long-term goals, but perhaps more important, it frees up space in my brain. Sometimes it seems as if just writing something down and committing to tackling it is half the battle.

My quilting-related lists usually focus on WIPs, but since the new year is upon us, I like the idea of writing out some general goals and making a few detailed lists to set the stage for my 2024 quilting journey.

Stashing Goals

I have a lot of fabric. I suspect you do, too. And if you’re like me, you start each January by resolving to buy less. Yup, that’s a goal for 2024: I don’t want to buy pretty fabric just to buy pretty fabric. (Have you seen the posts about recently restocked Starry from Ruby Star Society? I’ve resisted them all!)

In addition to using up a good portion of my stash this year, I also plan to destash fabric I don’t love anymore or don’t think I’ll use anytime soon. I posted a dozen lots of fabric on Instagram and FeelGood Fibers in December, selling several of them. I plan on posting more to FGF in January. It feels great to see space in my drawers of fabric!

Related links:

• How to Destash on Instagram
• Fastest Way to Finish a WIP: Sell the Fabric!
  
• Learning How to Destash
  
• 10 Ways to Quilt on a Budget
  

Pattern Design

I released just two patterns in 2023: Set to Spin, which is an intermediate paper-piecing pattern, and the Still Pretty Simple Jelly Roll Quilt, which is one of my $3 Almost Free for Charity PDF patterns.

Most of my designing and quilting time for the next few months is already spoken for, so I don’t expect to release any new patterns until the second half of the year. Still, I am looking forward to adding to my collection of offerings. I’m hoping for two, perhaps three, new patterns. (Hold me accountable to that, friends!)

Related links:

• Set to Spin PDF pattern
• Still Pretty Simple Jelly Roll Quilt PDF pattern
• From Bolt to Beauty on Etsy

From Bolt to Beauty Blog

I am committed to writing Friday posts here on the From Bolt to Beauty blog and hosting the Beauties Pageant linky. I know that in general blogging has taken a backseat to social media, but this platform continues to be my preferred place to document projects, celebrate triumphs, and discuss the speed bumps along the way. Thank you for being here, for participating in the linky, and for making blogging regularly a worthwhile goal for me!

Social Media

I’ve lost a lot of love for Instagram in the past nine months or so. Algorithm changes over the past year have caused even fewer people to see my static pictures and rendered my involvement on the platform halfhearted at best. Will I post in 2024? Sure, but I expect it to be sporadic. (Darn you, Instagram!)

I’m considering playing around with YouTube in both the long and short formats, but that’s another idea to pursue the second half of the year.

WIPs

I took stock of my works in process, and I have just five of them! Sure, there are a few others that have been cut out, but these are the ones I’ve actually started sewing. (The pictures in this post are testament to that.) One way or another, I can bang these out in the next 12 months. Here is the rather short list, with links to blog posts that discuss them:

• Sandhill Sling (Anna Graham)
  
• Patchwork Sky (Camille Roskelley)
  
• Leaded Glass (Tracey Jacobson)
  
• Random Hearts (Make Things. Grow)
  
• Pineberry (Pen + Paper Patterns)

What is on your list for 2024? Your list doesn’t have to be anything fancy, and I wouldn’t approach it as a legalistic I-have-to-accomplish-these-things-in-the-next-12-months activity, just an opportunity to have a think and give your year of quilting some direction.

Follow Me On ...

 

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The pageant rules are simple:

• Post your finish in the linky tool. (No links to your own giveaway or linky, please!)
• Point your readers back here with a text link or use the button above.
• Visit and comment on other participants’ finishes.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

A Plaid-ish Finish! / Beauties Pageant 220

A guildmate once shared a scrap quilt of hers in which there were no repeats—each fabric was used just once. Can you imagine the scrap bin necessary to create such a masterpiece?! Although a challenge like that would be a worthwhile one, my taste in scrappy quilts swings to the other end of the spectrum. 

First, I like my scrappy projects to have a strong geometry. Sharp, predictable lines create an orderly environment for me and my scrap bin to play. Then I need a well-defined palette to reign things in—I can’t handle what I’ve heard others refer to as “scrap vomit”—and my favorite way to develop a color scheme is to use a few fabrics as inspiration. 

My latest finish, a second go-round with Kitchen Table Quilting’s Plaid-ish pattern, meets both of those criteria. I started with a few prints from Kate Spain’s Sunnyside, and from there fleshed out a sizable  enough fabric pull to complete this 64-inch by 82-inch quilt.

Some fabrics make a single appearance, but there are many others that are represented a half-dozen times or more. I like that kind of repetition in my scrap quilts—it creates some cohesion and helps me bust through a few fat quarters while I chip away at my stash of scraps.

I’d be remiss not to mention the beautiful quilting in this finished quilt. It was done by my friend Ophelia and is a pantograph by Urban Elementz called Diamond Plaid. Those angled lines soften the horizontal and vertical seams in the piecing, don’t they?

To read more about how I built my palette (and expanded it when necessary), click here. To see my first Plaid-ish quilt, read this blog post. And to make your own Plaid-ish, visit Kitchen Table Quilting and click on “tutorials.”

 I have more to say and show you about this Plaid-ish finish. Come back next week to see what I did with the back. Spoiler alert: I used Kelly Young’s new book, Perfectly Pieced Quilt Backs, to make it!

Follow Me On ...

 

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The pageant rules are simple:

• Post your finish in the linky tool. (No links to your own giveaway or linky, please!)
• Point your readers back here with a text link or use the button above.
• Visit and comment on other participants’ finishes.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

A Purple Retrospective / Beauties Pageant 64

It’s funny how this sewing hobby of mine has affected my relationship with color. After assembling fabric pulls for countless projects, I am much more comfortable using color and creating unique palettes. Sewing and quilting, for example, are responsible for my current love affair with orange and my affinity for red as a source of pop and interest. One color that has little place in my life despite my hobby is purple. I’m more of a warm-color girl, and although I find myself using greens and blues to some degree, purple rarely takes a big role in my projects.

So when Sarah Goer unveiled her new Sew Me Something linky and announced that the theme for January was purple, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to play. But a look through the From Bolt to Beauty archives proved me wrong. I have sewn with purple—orchid and eggplant and lavender. What follows is a look at some of those projects.

The Must-Have Fabric

When I saw this beautiful eggplant fabric, from Amy Butler’s Love collection, I bought many yards of it. It was an unusual fabric-buying strategy for me, but it resulted in two fabulous bags, one for me and one for my sister. (See the original posts here and here.)

The Workshop Quilt

Years ago, when I coordinated events for my guild, we brought Amy Garro to New England for a workshop and trunk show. I am not sure what drove me to purple for this project, but I love the results. Amy made her original quilt in blues and called it Icy Waters. My rendering of the same design in purple is called Grape Fizz. (See the original post here.)

The Scrap Buster

All it took was a project or two, and suddenly I had a pile of purple scraps. I paired stash with solid scraps from Grape Fizz and a cute fox print from Judy, of Sew Some Sunshine, to sew this Penny Patch quilt. I think it’s my favorite purple make to date! (See the original post here. Find the Penny Patch quilt-along at Stitched in Color here.)

Do you sew with purple? Let us know in the comments, and add your projects to Sarah’s Sew Me Something Purple link-up.

* * *

The pageant rules are simple:

• Post your finish in the linky tool. (No links to your own giveaway or linky, please!)
• Point your readers back here with a text link or use the button above.
• Visit and comment on other participants’ finishes.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

February, Don’t Fail Me Now! / Beauties Pageant 21

From the get-go, I knew that I would not be replicating January’s level of productivity in February. There was just too much to do—and in a short month, at that. At the very least, I thought I could finish piecing the scrappy quilt top I have been working on. Right now, all 48 blocks are finished. I still need to sew those 48 blocks together, but I have seven more days before March comes in with its own set of expectations.

This quilt has been fun to work on because it features many fabrics I haven’t had an opportunity to sew with in the past. These prints—all beautiful in their own right—just didn’t fit into previous projects.

Most of what you see is from Anna Maria Horner and other Free Spirit designers ...

This diamond is almost all Anna Maria Horner fabrics.

Rifle Paper Co. for Cotton and Steel ...

I love that Rifle Paper Co. floral with the periwinkle background. I used every
last bit I had left over from my Circa 1870 quilt.

I was happy that Alice made an appearance in these strips.

 Among others, like Lizzy House, Bonnie Christine, and Basic Grey.

There are many, many points to match on bias edges when I sew these into rows.
Wish me luck!

How devoted to to-do lists and deadlines are you when it comes to your quilting? For me, it’s a fine balance between making progress on the quilts at hand and not becoming so legalistic about finishing project after project that this hobby feels more like a job.

Of course, if you’re a stickler for deadlines, you might have a finish this week. I hope you’ll share it in this week’s linky!

Mice to Go with Those Cats / Beauties Pageant 18

What’s cuter than a Cargo Duffle Bag that’s covered in cat faces?

A Cargo Duffle Bag that’s covered in cat faces and accompanied by a coordinating pouch adorned with silly mice.

Today’s finish is an addendum to yesterday’s project. It’s a pouch I have made before. You can read the specifics, including how I transform pouches like this one into toiletry bags, here.

There’s not much more to say about these mice, other than a little part of me died inside when I took a rotary blade to them. I have just scraps of these brown mice left. The fact that the same print can be found in both peach and mint in my stash doesn’t lessen the blow.

What’s the precious fabric in your stash? (Obviously, my heart belongs to Lizzy House’s long out-of-print Catnap line!) And how are things on your sewing table? Please share any recent finishes with us in this week’s pageant ...

The pageant rules are simple:

• Post your finish in the linky tool. (No links to your own giveaway or linky, please!)
• Point your readers back here with a text link or use the button above.
• Visit and comment on other participants’ finishes.

Two January Finishes and a February Goal

I can’t wait to return to all this scrappiness!

January has been blissfully quiet around my house. I have had my share of commitments, but it all has been manageable in the wake of the holiday chaos. I’ve even made some good progress on a bunch of projects and met my One Monthly Goal for January: finishing two Cargo Duffle Bags. Yahoo!

A Second Finish

I blogged about the first completed bag here. I installed the snaps on the second just minutes ago, found an acceptably well-lit spot to take pictures, and am ready to share it with the world ...

This is my fourth Cargo Duffle. Pattern by Noodlehead.

I am very pleased with how this bag, made for my niece, turned out. My love for this little girl is evident in my use of the beloved Lizzy House Catnap print on the exterior. I don’t cut up yardage like that for just anyone, you know.

The Upcoming Sew-Along

The most exciting part about these finishes is that they’ve convinced me to hold a sew-along to encourage you to make your own Cargo Duffle. If you’re a quilter who’s scared of three-dimensional projects, this sew-along is for you!

I took a bunch of pictures as I sewed up those Lizzy House cats, jotting down notes on how I approach the pattern and why at times I veer from it. This is an opportunity to get in my brain and understand why I do what I do when making a bag.

The schedule details as well as my thoughts on the materials list will post on February 11. The sew-along itself will launch on March 4. Now, this pattern is no quilt. I consider it a weekend project. Despite that, posts about constructing a Cargo Duffle will span two weeks, and the subsequent linky will be open for two weeks. Read that as: There will be plenty of time to play catch-up if you’re not ready to sew on March 4.

My February Goal

Here I am explaining how great and productive January has been, but February is breathing down my neck. There is a bunch of stuff going on with me and my family next month, the thought of which makes me want to curl up in fetal position. Plus, I’m headed to Nashville for QuiltCon, and although I’m super excited about that, there’s planning and packing and preparing to be done. So far, I have done nothing. (Insert deep-breathing exercise here.)

I figure the most I can do at my machine is make headway on a scrappy, stringy project I started a few weeks back. Simple, mindless sewing will be just what I need to escape from February’s demands. And I’m only shooting to finish the flimsy as my goal. Basting and quilting can wait until March. : )

Here’s a little preview. It’s the Valentine pattern from Elizabeth Hartman’s first book, The Practical Guide to Patchwork . . .

These jewel tones are a departure from my usual palettes!

How is January wrapping up for you? Did you start the new year as I did, at top speed?! I will have to hit the breaks in February, but the productivity streak has been fun while it’s lasted

To join the goal-making fun over at Elm Street Quilts, go to the February goal-setting link-up!

Linking up to Main Crush Monday and Needle and Thread Thursday ...

You, Too, Can Sew Improv!

Bloom Chicka Boom, my first improv quilt.

There was a time in the not-too-distant past when I thought improv was a magical kind of quilt making. It was beyond my skill set and best left to the masters—Victoria Findlay Wolfe, Sherri Lynn Wood, and other sewists known professionally by three names. At that point in my sewing career, creating without a concrete plan seemed hard and inefficient. How did I know whether I was going to like my finished product? The idea of wasting my time and fabric on a project that I might not love was unappealing.

But I have grown, friends. I’ve learned that improv doesn’t mean sewing without a plan. It doesn’t mean you start piecing fabric, willy-nilly, and end up with a fabulous finished quilt. You might not be following a pattern per se, but you do sew within a framework, the rules by which you select fabrics, cut them up, and sew them back together. I can say all of this with confidence because I just completed my first quilt with lots of improv sewing. : )

The difference for me was the instructions set out in Stash Statement, a new book by Kelly Young, of My Quilt Infatuation. Kelly approached me a few months ago about participating in a blog hop for her book, and I agreed to it with some hesitation. I am happy to report, however, that Stash Statement has helped me conquer my fear of improv, and it has the potential do the same for you, too!

Still skeptical? Let me address your likely concerns ...

It Seems Hard

Creating your first improv quilt can seem daunting, but having a framework makes the task manageable. And that is exactly what Stash Statement provides. Following Kelly’s advice, you learn how to sew improv panels, blocks, or strips and incorporate them into patterns. In other words, Stash Statement marries what’s scary and new (improv) with what you already know and love (bold, modern patterns).

Bulldogs, curlicues, flowers, ducks ... this background has it all!

Sometimes the improv panels you make will appear in the foreground of the quilt top. In the quilt I made, Kelly’s Bloom Chicka Boom pattern, the improv is in the background. For me, this was extra fun because I got to use up a chunk of fabric in cool shades of gray, blue, and periwinkle, not my typical palette. (See my first post about this project here.)

The variety in the background prints creates great texture.

I Don’t Have a Big Scrap Bin

When I first received Kelly’s book, I had just given away the majority of my scraps. Lucky for me, Kelly addresses using yardage in improv piecing. You’d never know that almost all of my low-volume fabric choices came from yardage in my stash. There’s such a great spectrum of fabrics, including many novelties that were aging in my fabric drawers for years. It felt good to get those beauties out of my stash and into a project.

I spy Lizzy House’s constellation prints from her Whisper Palette.

It Seems Time Consuming

Some of the patterns in Stash Statement are more time intensive than others. Bloom Chicka Boom, with all that improv in the background, is probably one of the more time-consuming ones. I started well in advance of today’s deadline, sewing my improv panels here and there when I wanted something fun and relaxing to sew. If you’re looking for a faster project, choose a different design, maybe one that features the improv in the foreground. Check out Beach Retreat, for instance. I think that would go together a lot faster. (In fact, I think I’ll be making a rainbow-y version in the future!)

Something to keep in mind is that you don’t have to be super legalistic about this process. After all, it is supposed to be a fun opportunity to use what you have on hand. Bloom Chicka Boom calls for sewing improv panels and then cutting them down into smaller sizes for use in the blocks. When I found a stack of low-volume 2.5" squares in my stash, I could have sewn them into panels and then cut them back into 2.5" squares, but I used them as is and they look great in the quilt.

The Bloom Chicka Boom block also calls for 1.5" by 4.5" strips. Since I was cutting from yardage anyway, I simply cut 1.5" strips of varying lengths, sewed the short ends together, and then cut them into the needed 4.5" lengths. You would never know by looking at my finished quilt that I took a shortcut.

I love these chummy little mice!

There Are So Many Seams

Your finished improv quilt top may have some spots where the seams are bulky. I didn’t want to quilt not-so-straight lines through any bulky areas, so I chose to free-motion quilt my project. Granted, I didn’t know how to free-motion quilt at the time I made this decision, but I thought it would be more forgiving. In the end I figured out how to FMQ, and it worked well for me with this project.

The one issue I did not foresee is how the bulk would affect my binding. I machine-finish my bindings, and I wish I had given myself more wiggle room than I usually do to compensate for that extra bulk at spots along the edge of the quilt.

If you have sewn something improvisationally, how did it go? If you’re new to improv, are there other concerns that are preventing you from making the leap?

The back features prints in the same palette as my improv background.

Now that I’ve covered improv, I need to tell you all about my adventures with FMQ! Stay tuned for a future post on that subject.

Linking up to Let’s Bee Social and Needle and Thread Thursday ...

On My Sewing Table

I currently have four WIPs going right now. I don’t mean I have three stacked neatly up and one at my sewing table. I mean I have four going simultaneously, strewn about my dining room and cluttering an 8-foot table. I’ve been picking up a different one when I need a change or run out of fabric. (So far I’ve run out of a Kona solid and a shade of Grunge. In other words, I have a legit reason to step foot in a quilt shop in the very near future!)

One of these projects is from Kelly Young’s new book, Stash Statement. I’m pretty excited about this quilt. It’s a departure from other projects of mine because of both its palette and its construction.

The Palette

I’ve had a stack of fabrics from Lizzy House’s Whisper Palette in my stash for a year or two. I love these fabrics and the cool grays in them, but most of my projects call for warmer grays, and I’ve struggled to include these low-volume fabrics in projects at hand. The solution, it turns out, was to let the cool grays dictate the palette of an entire quilt.

You can see some of these prints—specifically, the flags, mice, and constellations—in the pictures below. I paired them with other grays from my stash, some pale periwinkles, and some prints from Kate Spain’s Aria collection. (I sewed with Aria here, too.)

These fabrics in different, (mostly) muted colors compose the background for the blocks in Kelly’s Bloom Chicka Boom pattern.

The Construction

Those background fabrics have been sewn together into panels and then cut into the necessary sizes for the pattern. I’ve heard my guildmates call this “made fabric,” and it’s the technique that Kelly employs throughout her book.

I tried my hand at sewing made fabric before, in this quilt, without success. The advice and framework in Stash Statement, however, gave me the guidance and confidence I needed to sew some made fabric and use it in blocks for Bloom Chicka Boom ...

There is a blog hop with patterns from Stash Statement happening now. (Visit Kelly’s site to see what others are quilting from the book.) My turn isn’t until mid-June, so you will have to wait until then to see this quilt and all 16 of its fabulously oversized blocks. ; )

Also on My Sewing Table

I couldn’t leave you without sharing a few sneak peeks of other projects. After all, the problem with having so much stuff going on at once is that it will be a while before I have a completed project. (But when I do get to that point, the finishes should come in quick succession!)

I took three charm packs of Janet Clare’s Aubade collection and some Kona Snow, and made a few hundred half-square triangles. Eventually, I’ll sew them together to make a simple quilt top!

I’m also sewing up wonky stars, including the ones below. (This design, called Blaze and created by Adrianne Ove, is from Classic Modern Quilts.)

And I’m piecing a medallion top by Lynne Goldsworthy from an old issue of Love Patchwork and Quilting. This pattern has everything—arrows, crosses, plus signs, and more—and I’m sewing it with Karen Lewis’s first Blueberry Park line and a not-quite-white shade of Grunge.

Can you relate to the multi-project chaos I am experiencing now? I have other WIPs to tell you about, but I won’t be sewing them until a few of these are in the bag!

Linking up to Let’s Bee Social ...

The Thrill of a Finish

My new year started with a bang—and that bang was the sound of me, at 8 a.m. on January 2, backing my minivan into my sister’s car. I didn’t have any grand expectations for 2018, but starting off with a thousand dollars in car repairs was something I would have preferred to avoid. : /

This event affected my crafty to-do list. I needed to feel competent at something, so instead of starting a new project, I opted to finish up some stragglers from 2017. I needed the thrill of a finish, friends! I pieced a quilt top and two backs for my guild, and passed those projects to a guildmate for quilting. Then I moved on to this baby quilt, which I had started back in October ...

There is something about me and small projects, whether they’re quilts or pouches or baskets: I’m notorious for making more than 1 (and up to 15!). This simple baby quilt is no exception. It’s the foil to this finish. Both use the Little Man pattern from Simplify by Camille Roskelley.

The beauty of this project was that the inspiration for the palette came from that old Alexander Henry 2D Zoo print. I only had scraps of that fabric left, which was just fine because the pattern didn’t call for any more than that. Everything else came from my stash, including the Yale Blue Free Spirit solid featured on the back. It was one of those not-so-smart fabric purchases—both considering the color and the amount of yardage I bought—from my early days of quilting. I was happy to use it up in this baby quilt.

A triumph with this project and its lookalike is that I made franken batting for the first time! I cut clean, straight edges off of batting scraps, abutted edges, and sewed them with a zigzag stitch. Those scraps were all at least 12 inches wide, they were the same brand and type of batting, and they were all prewashed (because I’m the only person in the world who prewashes her batting!). I figured if I quilted densely enough—the grid here is quilted every 2 inches—the franken batting wouldn’t affect the integrity of the final product. It takes some time to piece batting scraps together, but it feels good to put them to good use.

Have you cobbled your batting scraps together like that? Any words of warning on that front? And to those of you who don’t quilt on a domestic: Would you ever use franken batting on your longarm?

Linking up to Finish It Up Friday and Let’s Bee Social ...