More Supernova progress

My only work in progress is my Supernova quilt.  Earlier on, I was doing some second-guessing about fabric choices, but as usual, I like it better now that I am able to see more of my blocks coming together.

I really like the colors, and I tried to plan out each block to have a progression from one color to the next, but that didn't seem to happen.  Just because it isn't what I had planned doesn't mean it isn't going to be nice, right?  Well, that's what I'm going with right now :)  Oh, also, I have been taking pictures of each finished block with its corresponding number, so I don't lose track of where it goes in the quilt.  I guess I could just lose track, and then put it back together the way I think it looks best, but that's not how I roll!

With 8 of my 9 blocks completed, and a target for this gift (good friends who just suddenly lost a very close relative), I am trying to push to finish this one by Sunday.  Then, tonight I realized I am out of batting!  I am contemplating hand stitching together a couple of spare pieces, but not sure if there will be a detectable seam in the finished product.  I could just order a roll, but I am beginning to accumulate pretty big scrap pieces, and figure I will eventually need to find something to do with them, since I don't do much "non-quilt" quilting.  Oh well, I may just give it a whirl!

Hope to have my quilt top ready to show by Friday :)

Two finishes this weekend.

The first is my long-anticipated (by me) crib quilt for my sister's new baby daughter Addie.  I think I started this quilt in mid-November, working on it bit by bit until it was ready for quilting a few weeks ago.  I encountered a frustrating problem of my machine skipping stitches, and thought I had made a complete and thorough mess of the quilt- ready to throw in the towel.

 

These are actually not the worst of it- it got a lot uglier, but I will spare you the horror!  A few readers gave me some advice which alleviated the problem somewhat, but I still wasn't getting a consistent stitch.  Anyhow, when my wife's good friend came to visit a couple of weeks ago, she connected me with her mom, who's best friend is a quilter, and she suggested I try using a Stretch needle instead of a Quilting needle in my machine.  Magic!  Not a single problem after installing the Stretch needle- Thanks Sandy!!!

So I went back and ripped out many many stitches on the quilt and re-quilted maybe 25 stretches of quilting.  I didn't have the patience to re-stitch EVERY skip, and the re-quilting stitches aren't perfect, but at least they don't skip now :)

I took this Whirlygig to the local playground for a few late afternoon pictures.  It was really windy yesterday, so those pinwheels were really blowing in the breeze!

 

Here you can see some of the quilting, which was larger-scale.  I wanted to maximize the softness, and many suggested that tighter quilting can sometimes compromise the quilt's cuddly feeling.

I did a pieced binding using some of the leftover fabrics, and machine bound it, as I have on my last few quilts.  Perhaps just laziness, but I like to think that I am anxious to get it to its new owner as soon as possible. :)  In either case, I like the look, and that's time I could be working on my next project!

This next one barely counts.  I did some FMQ practice on a quilt sandwich while I was in the doldrums of FMQ problems on the above quilt, and decided it came out pretty well, so I bound it and made a little doll quilt/blanket for by daughter's doll.

The batting is "pieced"- I took 4 strips of scraps and used it for my practice sandwich.  You can see the seams running lengthwise ( I guess if I do that in the future, I will stitch the pieces together).  Really, only the binding is pieced, but my daughter doesn't seem to mind :)

A Quiet Week

It has been a quiet week in Lake Woebegon.  I took a class at NYU this past weekend, so I am a little behind on my Supernova Quilt.  I finished a second block

I have to say that I continue to take solace in the fact that I am just starting in the quilting world, and that each new block is a lesson learned.  I am really happy that my piecing skills are coming together better and better (pardon the pun), but know that working with colors is something I have room to improve.  The hope is that when all is put together, it will make more sense, color-wise, but we'll see.

Also, check out the archive pages I recently published, with Finished Quilts from 2011 and 2012!

Another new quilting adventure!

I have been working on my Supernova project for a few days now and here's the first of my Supernova blocks:

 

Ever since I first stumbled upon the Supernova design on Freshly Pieced, have been itchin' to make one!  I love the symmetry and movement of the block, and the design is modern, but yet still retains a "classic quilt" feel.  My quilt has these yellow and green fabrics as well as teal-ish and violet-ish color scheme (see previous post).

All the fabrics were very budget-friendly.  Most all were purchased at Fabric.com for under $5/yd.  I think the gold one in the middle (not with circles) was $2.39/yd - it's called City Scapes from Quilting Treasures.  It's back up to $5.98 now, but still pretty reasonable- when I go through an episode of fabric hoarding, it's much easier to justify when I am buying stuff on sale :)

After a week of pouting, I have yet to return to the baby quilt stippling.  My good old Singer 301 needs some trial and error time with different needles, as this seems to be the consensus problem with my skipped stitches.  I think I'll wait til I have built up some patience by piecing some Supernova blocks.

Avoiding my Machine

The singer has been avoiding the Singer for several days now.  I was halfway through my big baby quilt when I just walked away!  More problems with skipped stitches left me blue, so I thought my machine and I needed a little time apart.

My wonderful neighbor has loaned me her Brother machine, which is sitting in its box in our hallway right now.  I read through the manual, but haven't opened it up yet.  Still debating about whether to give my baby a second third forth fifth chance.

In the meantime, I am working on my next project- a Supernova Quilt using Lee's Quilt-a-long at Freshly Pieced.  She's put together an easy to follow tutorial, and lots of finished quilts are linked up for inspiration!  I chose a color palette of yellow, green (I especially love the top fabric from Robert Kaufman's Imperial Collection 7, called Starburst Linen)

...blue and violet-ish

This is my first quilt-a-long, though I'm not really quilting along, since they finished last April. It's one of Lee's original designs, and it's a really fresh and modern layout.  I have finished picking fabrics and cutting 3 of the 9 blocks, which seems to be the most complicated part.  My soon-to-be quilt doesn't yet have a target owner...we may keep it as a cozy lap quilt for the couch or we may gift is to a special couple- it just depends on how generous we feel when completed!

A quick finish.

I have been reading Leah Day's Free Motion Quilting Project, getting some great guidance and inspiration as I gear up to try some FMQ stippling on my niece's quilt.  After doing some practice stippling on quilt sandwiches for the past week or so (see below), I felt ready to try it on a real quilt- then I chickened out a bit.

Well, it was one part chicken out and one part inspiration.  I thought that since the quilt got a bit out of hand, size-wise (52x64), giving her a really baby sized quilt as well might be nice.  Since I already had some big whirlygigs I made for this project (14.5 x 14.5), I decided to put those together with 1 inch sashing and borders to make a 32 x 32 baby quilt.

I also included two little pockets on the corners so it can be hung on the wall.  Hopefully this will get used a lot, and not displayed, but I wanted to try doing it (it was easy) for future quilts.  

The best part about this project is that it went together FAST!  The 4 blocks were already done, so I just had to sash, border, sandwich, quilt and bind, which to no time at all!  Also, I got to do a practice run of stippling on a real project!  It is obviously beginner's work, but I am really happy with how it turned out.  As you can see, I did a random stipple, and learned yet another valuable lesson: lighter color thread is better, especially if you don't want to draw attention to your quilting.  I am going to use a light green on the big quilt, so hopefully it won't detract from the patchwork as much as the lavender did on this one.

For binding, I used some of the "Greatest Show on Earth" pink bubbles fabric, and did a machine binding, which is fast, but I still prefer the finished look of the hand-stitched binding.  For the back I chose a purple and pink flower print.  Didn't piece the back, so that made things go much faster, too.

I also love how small it wraps up!  I think it looks like a folded up newspaper...remember what those looked like? :)  My sis isn't expecting 1 quilt, so 2 quilts should really be a surprise!  Hope she likes them!  OK, enough typing- I need to start quilting the big baby quilt!

You've Got Mail!

I just got this package from Julie at The Intrepid Thread yesterday.  Even though I bought only a couple of yards of a closeout fabric, she still wraps it up like a little birthday present, with a little thank you card and everything!

 I got two yards of the Hedgehogs from Lizzy House's Outfoxed for my I Spy charm swap.  Well, I got one yard for the swap and another yard for my stash.  I don't have a lot of blue fabrics yet, and since it was on sale...you know all the excuses already, right?

I like how Julie includes a couple of random charms with each delivery.  Of course, this makes me want to buy more, but I will try to be good, and focus on the quilts and not the online fabric stores for a while.