Tips for My Small World Quilt {Part 1 - Fabrics, foundations, and all that sky}

Here it is, my version of Jen Kingwell's My Small World Quilt, finally finished, except for the quilting, after six weeks of rummaging through scraps, mess, fussy cutting, mess, picking threads off every outfit I've worn, ... and did I mention the mess?

My finished My Small World Quilt

From the moment I first set eyes on this quilt in the Spring 2015 edition of Quiltmania I knew it was bad news (but in the nicest possible way!).

Jen Kingwell's My Small World Quilt in the Spring 2015 edition of Quiltmania 

Like the Lorelei, this fabulous quilt, with its thousands of tiny pieces, called to me right from the start, but I knew I had no room in my life for a new project. 

With quilters the world over scrambling to secure their copy of Quiltmania, I couldn't believe my luck when I found a copy in my local newsagent (but then I am the only quilter in the village!) and I had to have it. I quietly congratulated myself on the wisdom of my purchase, "just in case I might want to make it at some time in the distant future," I told myself.

Then this happened.

I blame all the quilters posting dazzling photos of their quilts on Instagram. Inspiration overload! In a weak moment I succumbed, and in no time at all I had completed Part 1.

... and Part 2!

Virtual champagne glass in hand, I joined the worldwide My Small World Quiltalong party on Instagram (#mysmallworldqal) steered by  

Kerry of VeryKerryBerry

and ably supported by  

John Quilt Dad

Cindy of Live a Colorful Life

Danielle of Mes Petits Elefants 

and

Lisa of Vintage Modern Quilts

Each of these experienced quilt makers has offered really useful information on their blog about how to complete the various sections of this quilt, and most importantly the errata, and if you're reading this in preparation for attempting wonderful quilt you should read what they've written. 

I've found it immensely helpful.

At the risk of possibly repeating some of their advice, I thought I'd also share with you some of the lessons I've personally learnt along the way. 

1. It's not as simple as it "seams"

This is not a quilt for beginners. The pattern has very few instructions beyond the printed templates and there is a huge amount of assumed knowledge.

A short stitch length, and pressing your seams open, instead of to one side, is helpful. 

An accurate scant 1/4 inch seam is essential, with so many seams involved. I used my Westalee Scant 1/4" Seam Gauge to try to ensure I had a consistent seam measurement each time I turned on my machine. With so many seams the opportunity for distorting the dimensions is hugely increased.

Press seams open.

2. The importance of a good foundation

One of our early arrivals at the party was foundation piecing whizz, Sarah of Sew What Sherlock, who realised pretty quickly that many of the blocks could be created much more easily using foundation paper piecing rather than piecing fabric shapes cut from the templates printed in Quiltmania.

If you contact Sarah through the link above, ask very nicely and supply her with a "ransom photo" (you'll understand when you read her blog) she'll email you a PDF of foundation paper patterns which will make your job considerably less stressful.

3. Choosing fabrics

Don't over-think these, it is a scrap quilt after all. 

Search Instagram (#mysmallworldqal) and you'll be surprised at all the different colour schemes. Fabulous inspiration!

I made my quilt entirely from my scrap bin, and for once I was glad to be a hoarder. 

Since my quilt is for a little person I decided to include lots of "I spy" elements for little eyes to search out. These include the school bus, sailing boat, clown, puppy, bees, daisies, stars and little boy that you can see in this photo.

The important thing to remember when selecting fabrics is balance.

It doesn't have to be all matchy-matchy, but if you use a scrap of fabric on the right hand side of your quilt it will look balanced if you also use a tiny piece in one or two other areas. I think, in the end, I had a palette of around 40 to 50 fabrics of all different sizes, and I kept to these, with a few exceptions, trying to evenly distribute them across the quilt.

Your quilt will also look better if you generally keep a balance of dark, medium and light hues throughout the pattern. I've found the best way to keep track of this is to periodically take a monochrome photo of my quilt, so I just see the hues and I'm not distracted by the colours.

 And don't think that, just because you're making a 33" x 52" quilt using (much) more than a thousand pieces of fabric, you're going to make more than the slightest dent in the level of your scrap bin. 

It doesn't work that way. 

Don't ask me why. 

It's just the Law of Scraps!

4.The sky's the limit!

Here's Jen Kingwell's original My Small World Quilt, photographed from the back cover of Quiltmania. She's used a low volume palette of beiges and creams, but you don't have to stay with this colour scheme.

Use your imagination! You're going to spend a great deal of time piecing that sky together so you might as well make it interesting. 

On Instagram I've seen dark night skies, blue skies, bright sunshiny yellow skies and more. 

I chose to create a sky with graduated shades of blue, yellow and white. Each of those squares finishes at 1 inch so you can really have fun "painting" your sky with your fabrics.

I  didn't embroider the Sydney Opera House and Harbour Bridge, Leaning Tower of Pisa and Eiffel Tower patterns designed by Jen to 'float' in the sky, delightful as they are. Here's an opportunity to add your individual touches. I've seen appliquéd birds and hot air balloons, as well as embroidered scenes from a quilter's own travels.

Since I already had these fairytale castle towers in my stash I pieced them into my sky, along with some fat little bumble bees, and finally added a big golden sun with Dresden rays. 

I hope this has given you lots of ideas to get those creative juices flowing!

Next time I'll show you how I worked the Dresden appliqué, as well as some of the other elements of My Small World.

Blues

Blues, aquas, teals, turquoises. I delved deep into my scrap bin for all the summer sea and sky shades I could find to make this quilt.

Ever since I first saw what clever Nicole Dacsiewicz had done with the humble hexagon I've wanted to try it for myself.

With the help of her easy-to-follow Modern Hexagon tutorial I made this.

But I didn't stop there.

I tweaked my hexies by rolling back those edges and slip stitching them down, so now they look like stars. Or starfish, as one of my Instagram friends described them :-)

I like the secondary pattern that's happening here now, don't you?

If you think they're a little like Cathedral Windows, you're right! I've been spending some time lately researching Cathedral Windows variations in the hope of coming up with a reasonably simple technique I can teach at St Mark's Quilters sometime.

Perhaps I've found it?

You'll find my tutorial for Modern Hexagon Stars under the Tutorials tab.

It was so refreshing to work with these cool, calm shades for a couple of weeks.

At the year's send I had staggered across the line, weary, grumpy, over-committed and emotionally fragile, and I needed time out. My friends probably needed time out from me too :-)

So, for a week I enjoyed a 'staycation' at home. I stitched, cleaned out some cupboards, caught up with my paperwork, and walked Chester the WonderLab.

With a little photo editing of this sign from the park across the road, you can get the picture :-)

I also decided to make a couple of changes that might give me more balance in my life, and I chose my Word for 2015 - Balance.

As every quilter knows, creating beautiful quilts can be wonderfully therapeutic, and giving them away can be equally heartwarming.

Di B and I recently delivered 70 Blankets of Love, made by St Mark's Quilters, to Dahlia Brigham (Volunteer Co-ordinator) at Royal Prince Alfred Hospital's Newborn Intensive Care Nursery.

It was only a short visit, but crammed with joyfulness.

For a start, as the three of us were jostling to take turns of getting photos of each other with the quilts in the foyer, a young, very pregnant mum offered to take the photo so the three of us could be in the shot together.

We got talking, as you do, and discovered that her bub (number 5) was due in just 2 weeks. She looked so serene, waiting for her husband to pick her up after her final check up. She smiled as she told us she was having a little girl, and we were full of admiration when she calmly revealed that her 4th child, a little boy, had Downs Syndrome.

This lovely young mum really made an impression on us.

Inside the nursery Dahlia introduced us to some of the staff and nurses on duty that morning, including midwife Jan Polverino who, with her sister Shirley, a quilter, started the whole Blankets of Love venture back in 1992. The concept has since spread worldwide. I was so excited to meet her! Too excited, apparently, to get a photo with her.

Finally, on our way out, we passed this wonderful, whimsical fiberglass sculpture, decorated by Penny Lovelock, part of a fundraising venture by Taronga Zoo to save wild rhinos. Called "Beauty and Hope", it's painted with Javan fabric designs and of course depicts a baby rhino ("Hope") in utero.

We left the hospital with huge smiles on our faces. As always.

Like sands through the hourglass…

I’ve spent many a peaceful hour this weekend turning these 6 inch squares…

…into hourglass blocks with the help of this tutorial and my handy new gadget - The Angler 2.

I just taped the clear plastic Angler 2 to my machine’s surface, and managed to create a whole stack of chain-pieced half square triangles in no time.

Instead of using Rita’s method, placing two squares right sides together, ruling a diagonal line and sewing two lines 1/4 inch either side of the line, I skipped the marking and simply lined up the edges of the squares with the lines printed on the Angler 2. Then I sewed in a straight, steady line, taking care to keep the point closest to me in line with the marked 1/4 inch seam line (see photo above).

In no time I had a pile of these (can you see the double line of stitching from corner to corner?)…

 

…which I rotary cut diagonally from corner to corner between the stitching lines, and then (without moving the pieces) again on the other diagonal, creating these pairs of pieced triangles.

 

When sewn together, they became these beauties!

 

Now all I need to do is trim off all those bunny ears and square up all my hourglass blocks – which may take almost as long as it did to sew them!  Hmmmmmmm…..

 

Who was the wonderful friend who gave me this ever-so-handy little gizmo? It was Linda!

She’s an absolute genius, and Nanna to the cutest little newborn. Just saying :-))

A simple solution to an annoying machine quilting problem - “eyelashing”

You do know what I mean, don’t you? Or is it just me? OK, just me.

So here’s the thing. I’d be happily machining away on the front of my quilt, swerving this way and that, creating these pretty loops. But when I’d turn to the back I’d find this nightmare! Eeeeek! (See why it’s called eyelashing?)

I know, I know. Those of you who are experienced machine quilters will be nodding your heads sagely and saying “Adjust your tension, dear”, but I’ve already adjusted this (till I’m quite tense myself).

Finally, at a hugely enjoyable class I took with machine quilter Amanda Daly last week, I found the answer. Amanda recommended a little product that looks like a plastic tap washer (but is actually slippery Teflon), slips into the base of your machine’s bobbin case, and stops the backlash in the bobbin when you change direction in your quilting at speed.

I won’t name this nifty product because I’m certain it’s excellent. Just want to say that I’ve found a faster and cheaper short-term solution – I’ve made my own bobbin washer using a piece of Teflon applique mat, a bobbin and a hole punch. You need to punch the hole before you cut out your circle, otherwise it’s very tricky getting the punch to find the centre.

Then position your empty bobbin exactly over the hole.

Trace round it with a sharp pin.

This scratches a guide-line into the Teflon. Cut out your circle.

Then pop it into the base of your machine’s bobbin case and pop your thread-loaded bobbin in on top, and proceed as you usually do.

Now the back of my quilting looks like the front, using my little Teflon bobbin washer. Look, no eyelashing!

I just need to work on stitch length and all those other variables, but for now I’m happy!

NB This works well in my Elna 6004 machine which has a drop-in bobbin. You might want to check with your machine manufacturer first before trying this on yours.

Tutorial – How to applique a tiny (1 cm) circle/dot

At first glance Snowflake Medallion looks fairly straight forward, if on the repetitive side. 

But, as Linda and I have discovered, it has a couple of challenges - for example, appliqueeing 72 tiny 1 centimetre dots to the flower applique blocks.

For me, tracing the tiny circle onto mylar, cutting out the shape and drawing up the fabric over the shape with a gathering thread was not an option.  Try as I might I simply could not cut the edges of such a minute disk of plastic smoothly enough, and bumpy edges can really show when you’re dealing with pieces this small.  

And the thought of cutting out multiples of these babies?  No way, Jose.

The quest – Find 72 ready-made 1 centimetre circular shapes. 

The solution – Sequins!

(Forget the dimpling – the edge really was smooth.)

I held the sequin on the fabric while I traced around it, then cut out the circle leaving the smallest seam allowance I could get away with. 

Then I ran a running stitch around and gathered up the fabric over the sequin.  I drew it up quite tightly, and just left a small tail of thread (it held OK without securing it, and made life easier a little later). I had quite a bulky little bunch at the back, but this was OK. 

 

 

 

 

 

My sequin was ever-so-slightly convex, so I made sure the convex side was on top as it was much easier to sew to the background this way.  I was able to push any excess fabric under with my needle as I stitched the dot down, so the slight bumpiness in the photo above was easily smoothed in the process.

Once appliqueed, I turned my work over and simply cut a tiny circle out from beneath the shape.  Then I prised the sequin out, quite easy to do because I had left my gathering unsecured in that earlier step.

 

 

 

 

 

At this stage I could have done a tiny bit  more careful trimming of the raspberry fabric from the back, but I prefer to leave a little bulk so that the dots have more dimension on the finished quilt.

Result? A small (but reasonably perfectly formed!) 1 centimetre dot!

[Now bring on all those jokes about going dotty – I can take it!!]

Footnote: Another advantage of this method is that you can have a whole assembly-line of dots going.  My two packets of sequins together cost me $2 so I wasn’t in the least upset when my sequins often emerged bent and un-reusable at the end.