TBT-All Framed Up

Oh my goodness, where has the month gone??  I know February is a tiny month, but it just seems like it was January.  That's okay, I'll ring in March with a little Throwback Thursday fun and my dear friend, Sandra at mmm!quilts.

For today, I chose my version of Melissa Corry's All Framed Up baby quilt for Moda Bake Shop.  I used precuts and yardage of Moda's Blue Berry Crumb Cake line.  To this day when I see this fabric I still want a blueberry muffin.  I'm drooling now.

I made this quilt simply because I wanted to make something and I loved the fabrics and pattern.  It currently lives (all finished) folded on a shelf in my back room.  I guess it ended up in the back room kind of forgotten because I didn't think it was good enough to give away.  This quilt is part of my learning to free motion journey.

These two pictures are of a different quilt, earlier than All Framed Up, but I wanted to show the stitching on it.  I attempted to meander/stipple in the white fabric.  My stitches were so microscopic and close together you couldn't pick them out if you wanted.  My movements where kind of jerky and didn't flow with ease.  I think that's normal for most people starting out.  Even though these stitches are far from perfect, it still created wonderful texture and my (at the time) seven year old daughter, didn't care.  She loved it.

I show you those stitches, so that we can talk about these stitches.  I again tried stippling all over All Framed Up.  I guess I really had not been brave enough to try other motifs at this point and I also find myself wondering why I never quilted with my walking foot?

My scale is of course bigger than the previous quilt, but with the challenge of quilting on a larger scale, my stitches became bigger.  Some are much bigger than I would like.  My movement in the shapes are much better, but still jerky in places.  I will note that I did continue to practice (sporadically) between these two quilts, meaning practice does make you better.

If you look to the right of my hand, you may notice a thick goop or thread and I just noticed a spot where it looks like the thread just stops.  This is in the center of the quilt (of course).  I remember having a HUGE bird's next on the back.  I probably cried for a little bit, but eventually picked it out the best I could.  I am assuming that was me trying to back track or travel.  The random stopped stitch, not sure about that one.

But lets fast forward to now.

This is the back of a quilt I have recently finished.  My stippling is much more curvy and flowy.  It's not perfect because it never will be, I'm human (and I own cats that like to jump on said quilt while I'm quilting).  I show you all this, because I'm going to keep harping nagging encouraging you to free motion quilt.  I'm going to guess 90% of people who start out free motioning end up feeling discouraged and depressed that their stitches don't measure up to someone else's.  STOP.  I look at it this way, maybe the universe says you have to stitch so many bad stitches before you stitch good ones.  Again I think it's called practice, believe me I avoided it too.  So don't be afraid to quilt, it puts you one stitch closer to where you want to be.  Ok, it's getting windy up here on top of my soap box, I'll come back down.

All in all from the back I think it looks pretty good, wobbles and bobbles.  You can barely even notice the use to be birds nest spot.

And there is another picture of the front.  I should do something with this quilt other than leave it on a shelf, but I have no idea what.  So until next month, I leave you with Blueberry Crumb Cake All Framed Up.

Do you have a quilt from your quilty past you'd like to share?  Take some pictures, write a post and hop over to mmm!quilts and tell us all about it.

Today I'm linking up with Throwback Thursday.

TBT-Carpenter Star(s)

February is officially here and do you know what time it is?  It's time for some Throwback Thursday fun with Sandra at mmm!quilts.  But just for today it's going to have to be February Flashback Friday...I'm a day late...but for a good excuse.  I was partying a little to hard because of the kickoff of the sign ups for the 2018 New Quilt Bloggers Blog Hop (read more about that here) yesterday.

This month I decided to flash back to a quilt pattern, not just a quilt.  Some people only make a pattern once, but that's not me.  I love repeating quilts that I love.  The Carpenter's Star happens to be one of those patterns.  It's a great pattern for a beginner, lot's of half square triangles and no Y-seams.

This scrappy version in tans and blues was the first one I made.  I made it for my sister in law.  She loved nautical themed things at the time and I hoped the tans, blues and white would have that kind of feel.  Not sure that it does, but hey, I hadn't been quilting a year.  It was quilted with a stipple pattern by a local quilt shop.

Fast forward to summer 2010.  My aunt was getting married and I thought an Americana themed quilt would be perfect for celebrating the occasion.  I loved the white and blue border/binding fabric.  It had a colonial feel to it.  This one was also quilted by a local quilt shop.

Now let's travel to August of 2012.  This was a miniature version of the Carpenter Star Quilt.  I am proud to say that I stippled this one myself.  Every year our family has a huge reunion.  When a family of 13-sh kids has families of 10 or more kids each...well things multiply exponentially.  I'm talking about my grandparents and great grandparents and further back.  Every year at the reunion, we have raffles to raise money for the next year.  I donated this quit.  I was excited to hear that my cousin (more like a brother) won the quilt.  I still see it at their house when I go to visit.

Then there is this one, made in early 2013.  I loved the blue and yellow fabrics.  I made it just for me.  It was also quilted by a local quilt shop and is quilted with and edge to edge flower design.

I can promise this will not be the last one I make.  David actually pieced one last year in civil war reproduction fabrics.  I can't wait to custom quilt it.

My grandmother's maiden name was Carpenter...I think that is why I love this block so much.  I feel a connection with it.

I have a dream of making one for each of my mother's siblings and my cousins.  That means a total of...I've already lost count.  Mom has eleven siblings, add in the cousins and I just ran out of fingers and toes.  Maybe one day.  So for today, I will just have to reminisce about these quilts and dream about the future ones.

If you have a quilt from your quilty past, please write a post, share it and link up with Sandra.  It's always fun to see where we all started before he found Quilt Blog Land.  Also, if you are a new quilt blogger, take a few minutes to read about the 2018 New Quilt Bloggers Blog Hop and sign up.  I promise you will thank me later.

Today I'm linking up with Throwback Thursday, Finished or Not Friday and Can I Get a Whoop! Whoop!

TBT--Rail Fence Quilt

It's back!!!  Throw Back Thursday!  It's a day to celebrate those quilts you've made before you started blogging and give them their 30 seconds of internet fame.  Sandra at mmm!quilts contacted Jenn at Quarter Inch From The Edge and asked if she could baby sit this very fun linky party until things slowed down for her a bit.  Jenn said yes and so here we are.  The quilt I'd like to remember today, kind of has a tragic sad quilting story, if you are a quilt.  I say it is overall a quite happy ending and one I'm very thankful for.

This rail fence quilt is the first quilt I actually bound and completed and the second quilt I ever pieced.  After finishing my first quilt (a beastly Turning Twenty)  I decided to try something smaller.  I wanted to make a quilt for my good friend, more like a sister (people actually think we are sisters).  She lived in a beautiful log cabin (we are talking authentic log cabin) and loved the color red, so I thought she needed a quilt.  Not that she is lacking in quilts, her mom is one of my real life quilting friends, so she has tons of them.

This was my first time strip piecing and I wasn't sure how successful I would be at it.  I think I made around forty blocks in order to find the twenty you see in the picture that I could live with.  Some of my seams where pretty wonky and left a bit to be desired.  This was before I discovered a 1/4" foot.

It was quilted by one of our local quilt shops using a red thread and loops and stars.  I was so proud to give her this quilt and she loved it.  It was displayed in her house.

This is a picture of the quilt in 2009 (so I know I made it before then) I snapped of it on the back of a chair while visiting her.  Her house was always a place of gathering, family and friendship.  One of the most beautiful things in the house was the fire place.  I always thought of it as kind of a fire pit.  You actually had to kind of step down to it.   It was a great place to sit and enjoy a glass of wine...especially when it was pouring the snow down outside.

Sadly, a few years ago, something went terribly wrong after she and her husband had went to bed.  Thankfully, their kids where not home at the time.  While they where asleep, something in the chimney caught fire.  They were both able to make it out of the home, but everything inside was a complete loss.  I learned so much, things are just things.  They are replaceable.  I'm so thankful she and her husband made it out of the home completely okay.

Now they live in a beautiful farm house.  It still is a place of gathering, family and friendship.  Just goes to show you, it's the people not the home.  Home is where your family is.  This post makes me realize, hmmm...maybe I owe her a quilt.  Trust me, she still isn't lacking in quilts, but this time it could be one I quilt myself and I think that would mean even more to her.

Now to dig through my pictures and quilt stash to see what quilt we can talk about next month.  So excited this party is back.  Speaking of next month, don't forget sign ups for the New Quilt Bloggers Blog hop will be open.

I promise we are all busy behind the scenes getting this hop organized and ready.  I can't wait to meet all the new quilt bloggers, talk some tech and community stuff and most importantly....quilting!  So if you have been blogging for 3 years or less or know someone who has, stay tuned...hop with us.  Even if you don't fall in that category...hop with us.

Today I'm linking up with Throw Back Thursday.

Weaver Fever--TBT

Time to join Jenn over at A Quarter Inch From the Edge for another installment of Throw Back Thursday.  Today, let's travel back to the year 2010.  By this time I had pieced several quilts and decided it was time to try something a bit harder...enter the pattern Weaver Fever by Jackie Robinson.  This pattern appealed to me on several different levels.  One, someone assured me that although it looked like a complex quilt, the strip piecing was really quite easy with seams that didn't have to match up.  Two the design its self spoke to me.

I am from north central West Virginia.  I love my beautiful state and one thing most West Virginian's are very proud of are the West Virginia Mountaineers.  Be it West Virginia University's college football, basketball or, for my little family, the air rifle team, we bleed blue and gold.  We love our Flying WV symbol and the West Virginia Mountaineer.

So when I laid eyes on this pattern I thought it would be perfect to create  what I refer to as my West Virginia Quilt.  I set out to find shades of blue and gold that I thought best represented WVU's colors and began constructing the quilt.

One thing I remember best is that I used a ton of sandwich bags to keep my strip sets organized.  This was probably the first quilt that I took a picture of it's construction.

This is a picture of the quilt top after it was finished.  The hubs was nice enough to help model it for me.

I think he's actually standing on our bed holding it up for some reason.  This was before I gave any thought to what my pictures looked like.  As long as I snapped one, all was good.

According to my FaceBook posts, this quilt lived in UFO land for two years until I was brave enough to quilt it.  I was getting better at stippling so I chose to meander all over the quilt using a blue and yellow variegated thread.  I have to say I'm pretty proud of the quilting job I did on this one.

And here's another one of Miss Maggie checking the quit out right after quilting.  Bless her heart, she wasn't gray in the muzzle then and both of her little ears stood up like huge saucers on her head.

I had kind of forgot about this quilt until last week.  When my husband started working out of town, he took it with him.  Since it wasn't being used at home he decided the WVU quilt could live with him at work when he was gone.  He just recently brought it back home with him.  I started to fold it and put it away and realized, duh, TBT.  So here are a few up-to-date pictures of the quilt...since I try to put more thought into photographing my quilts.

A better picture of the fabrics.

And a picture of the quilting from the back.

This concludes my little jaunt into my quilting past for the month.  And it feels good to write about my quilty past and not have a single negative thing to say about it.  Just happy memories of making this quilt and seeing those bright colors that bring so much pride.

Today I'm liking up with Jenn's Throw Back Thursday Linky Party.  If you have a quilt from your past you'd like to share, hop over and link up and if you have time please check out everyone's posts.  It's so refreshing to see we all have a quilting past, good, bad and otherwise.

Today I'm linking up with TGIFF, Can I Get a Whoop! Whoop! Throw Back Thursday and Let's Bee Social.

Indian Summer Part 2--TBT

Time for another addition of TBT to pay homage to quilts from our quilty past.  Jenn over a A Quarter Inch from the Edge hosts a linky party for us on the first Thursday each month (with a give away) so that we can all see the quilts that help get us to where we are today.

Last month I posted about my version of Indian Summer Wallhanging by Kim Sherrod, a free pattern over at Moda Bake Shop.  If you are not familiar with its sad and lonely story, you can read it here.  If you are familiar you may remember it has lived its life without a binding.  I am happy to report that as of last month it suffers no more.  It can be considered a completed quilt.

So after what I had considered a train wreck version of Indian Summer (which in reality is wasn't a train wreck) I decided to give it another go using a different color scheme.  I keep a board on Pinterest that I call Color Ideas that contains various pictures I have ran across on Pinterest that could be used for color palette ideas.  I decided to put one of those pictures to use.

I tired pulling the browns, creams, reds and whites from this beautiful snowy picture of an owl.  Since this is from my earlier days of quilting, there are no pictures of "in the making."  After the quilt was completed I wanted to give custom quilting another go.  So I spent some time drafting a new plan (before my Plexiglas days) and got to work.  I have to say I was quite proud of my finish. 

 I had hoped to get newer pictures of it for this post, but time just didn't allow for it.  After finishing it I gifted it to a friend who had been asking me for a wall hanging.  I'm not sure why I felt like I had to make a second one so badly.  I guess I felt like I had something to prove to myself.

So this concludes my addition of TBT and is the last part in the Indian Summer tale, at least for now.  It was a very quick and easy pattern that just required a few FQ's, so if you need a quick easy project check it out.  And don't forget to hop over to A Quarter Inch From The Edge and check out all the other TBT posts and sign up for the give away.

Today I'm linking up with Throwback Thursday and Needle and Thread Thursday.

Experiments in the Quilting World

Sometimes the best things come from  no planning.  Lesson: life does not have to be over planned all the time.  When it comes to my quilting (and piecing) I always have some sort of plan in place.  I have an extremely hard time just letting things flow.  I need direction.

A few months ago after I discovered Marti at 52 Quilts and her Susie's Magic Binding (my new favorite binding) my local guild asked if I would do a demo this month to explain how the method works.  They were in love with the new binding on my quilts.  Now a few things you should know about Tish...she is NOT a public speaker.  You stick me in front of people (even if I know almost all of them) and make me speak I will shake like a leaf.  I have even passed out before (sad I know)...can't control it, it just happens.  So I wanted my presentation to go as smooth and quick as possible.  My plan was to demo the binding on my Indian Summer wall hanging from my TBT post from March. (you can read about this poor neglected quilt here)

The goal was to have the binding mostly sewed on (I showed how to make the strips separately to save time) so I could show how to turn a corner and connect the tails.  Ah, connecting the tails...this seems to be something that either:

 A) I get correct and lined up the very first time
 B) takes a million times and wine to accomplish.

Since drinking at the guild meeting and having a melt down probably wasn't the best plan, I decided maybe I should have another small quilt with tails connected in case I couldn't get it right the first time.  So on Saturday (two days before the demo) I decided to give something a try I hadn't before.  Flow quilting or Wild Quilting.

After seeing Beth at Cooking Up Quilts amazing whole cloth baby quilt (check it out) a few weeks ago, I knew I wanted to give this type of quilting a go.  So I decided it was time to watch Christina Cameli's Wild Quilting class I had purchased from Craftsy.

In this class Christina talks about showboats, those bigger elements you add in your quilting and how to highlight them (embrace the echo).  I decided that I would have one large showboat that would be a big billowing feather (thank you Patsy Thompson and Ultimate Free-Motion Feathers).  Then I would organically fill the area around my feather with pebbles and sprinkle in some paisleys and what turned into this seaweed looking shape.

I started with a yard cut of plain blue green fabric.  I knew that my finished piece would not be this big, but I wanted to let the quilt tell me where it was going and give it plenty of room to grow.  So I lightly marked a spine for my feather, got my Aurifil #2021 (natural white) and let the plumes bloom.  Do plumes bloom?

After adding the echo, it was time to throw down some pebbles and see how this played out.

After two paisley combos and some surprise double pebbles (can you spot them?) I had to stop.  No really I ran out of bobbin.  But also I was feeling a bit over whelmed about where to go next.  I was totally over thinking things and worrying about the roundness of my pebbles so....

I opened a bottle of sweet sunshine and relaxed a bit.  In no time at all I had found my groove again and that's when I added the suppose to be pea pods/but turned into seaweed shapes.

I called this the halfway point slept on it and picked back up Sunday morning.  The second stitching went much faster because I understood better how I was moving around the quilt.  After a bit of trimming my first wild quilting piece was complete!  I have to say I was on cloud 9.  I did it!   I want to do more!!

This is just a small sample of things that Christina goes over in the class.  My next goal is to play around with layering and combining the technique with showboats.  It also makes me realize the importance of documenting all the quilting motifs you know how to do.  I want to quilt or record (doodles) in a notebook of all the different things I know how to quilt; ribbon candy, pebbles, paisley, etc, so that when I get stuck I have something to glance at and find inspiration.

So how did the demo go?  I think it went really well.  Sandra (mmm! quilts) was sending me positive vibes and assuring me I wouldn't let my goober side show.  I did start out shaking a bit (goober side), but after a few minuets of talking it stopped and my love for what I was doing shinned through.  I got my tails connected (pretty darn close) and was able to get Indian summer bound in front of the group.  I handed out little slips of paper directing the ladies to Aunt Marti's blog so they could view her tutorial and video after they got home.  Success.  So without further ado...Indian Summer as it should have been.

I'm glad I waited all these years, this binding is what it needed.

And how about one more picture of my flow piece?

I'm seriously considering creating a slightly bigger piece to enter into the machine quilting division of our local quilt show, but I have a few things I need to accomplish before that can happen.  I'm all revved up and ready to quilt again.  So on that note, it's time for me to go.  Let's go quilt!!

Today I'm linking up with Can I Get a Whoop! Whoop! TGIFF, Free Motion Maverics, Needle and Thread Thursday, Midweek Makers, Let's Bee Social, Sew Cute Tuesday, and Linky Tuesday.

For more information on Christina Cameli's Wild Quilting and Patsy Thompson's Ultimate Free Motion Feathers click on the pictures below.

And this just in...Sale-A-Bration Alert!  For a very limited time, you'll find top designers, beloved brands and much more marked down on Craftsy  With up to 60% off best-selling kits and supplies, you can shop 'til you drop!  Hurry, the deals end Sunday.  Click on any of the pictuers below to check out these awesome deals.