Baby-Size Pretty in Pluses / Beauties Pageant 172

 

So I did something I’ve never done before with a quilt project: I tried to track how much time I spent on each step of the quilt-making process.

I never had a reason to keep tabs on my quilting time. I know that some people who sell their quilts like to know the time they’ve devoted to a particular project, but I’ve never sold a quilt. Plus, I thought the exercise might take the fun out of quilting. I don’t really care how long this pattern or that takes, because I like what I like and I’ll make what I want to make—and I prefer to work on multiple projects at a time, which makes keeping track of the time I’ve spent on each difficult. My latest finish, however, is my Pretty in Pluses design, and I’ve specifically promoted that pattern as a quick-to-sew project. It was time to put some hard numbers behind my claims.

Of course, after conscientiously writing down how much time it took to cut out this particular project and piece the top, I cleaned up my sewing space and, in the process, misplaced my recorded times. Figures! This is what I do remember, though: A baby-size Pretty in Pluses is doable in a weekend. I recall that it took me an hour and 15 minutes to cut out the fabric, and I spent about 4 hours piecing the top. I call that a day’s work. The quilting and binding require another day.

 

This quilt is going to a baby boy who was born in December. I fell in love with the sweet animal prints in Acorn Wood, a collection by Wendy Kendall for Dashwood Studio. I paired these fabrics with a Bella Solid called Dusty Jade and quilted the top with a simple 3-inch grid. The binding is the sweetest stripe from Paper + Cloth’s Little Ducklings line (Moda). The stripes are broken intermittently by little gold stars, which I love, and I have more yardage of it on hand for future bindings!

As I make more and more quilts, I’ve come to realize that I prefer faster, easier projects, and I like designing projects of that same vein. I’m more than capable of working on fiddly, more complicated quilts, and I usually have one of those going at any given time. But fast and easy is my sweet spot, so Pretty in Pluses checks all the right boxes—especially for a baby gift that, I hope, will be used much. Does that resonate with you?

To read more blog posts about Pretty in Pluses, click here. To purchase your copy of the pattern, visit my Etsy shop!

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Pageant Highlight Reel: Designer Edition / Beauties Pageant 171

As much as I enjoy making quilts from my own original designs, I sew plenty of projects from others’ patterns. I always appreciate a novel take on a well-known block or a clever construction. I think the highest compliment I can give a fellow quilt designer is exclaiming an honest “I wish I had designed that!”

In that regard, I thought I’d compile a Beauties Pageant Highlight Reel that features some of the designers that frequent this linky. Here are three beauties that popped up recently ...

Yvonne Fuchs’ Sequenced Quilt

Yvonne launched her Sesen quilt pattern just last week. It’s a beautiful, modern design, but the attraction for me is that it comes with a bonus pattern, called Sequence, constructed with large scraps from making the main pattern. Clever, right? There’s something about those secondary shapes in Sequence, combined with Yvonne’s meticulous quilting, that pulls me right into the quilt.

To learn more about Sequenced, click here. Read about the primary pattern design, Sesen, here.

Melanie Meyer’s All the Diagonals Quilt

Melanie’s All the Diagonals pattern received a makeover recently, and now I’m reconsidering the to-do list in my near future! The design has always been unique and modern and hexie-laden—all qualities that make it a good contender for a future project of mine. I could easily envision All the Diagonals in solids or more modern fabric collections, like those from Guicy Guice or Alison Glass. But the same pattern in a collection from Sherri and Chelsi or in Christmas fabric, as Melanie has mocked up here? That’s a game changer for me. I have plenty of stash that is up for that challenge.

Read more about Melanie’s rainbow gradient version here.

Susan Arnold’s Wildflower Table Runner

I appreciate Susan’s designs because they’re such a departure from what I usually sew. Her Wildflowers table runner is no exception. But there’s so much to like here—from Susan’s simple (but definitely not simplistic) quilting to that super skinny inner border to how the applique pieces lie on top of other elements in the design. That runner may not have a place in my more modern home but it’s on my list of small projects that would make great gifts.

Read more about Wildflowers here.

What do you think? Leave these ladies some love in the comments or, better yet, visit their blogs for more information about these beauties.

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• 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.

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I Call This "Matchy-Scrappy" / Beauties Pageant 170

I remember years ago, when I first started quilting, walking into my local quilt shop and admitting that selecting fabric for a project was either my most- or least-favorite part of the quilt-making process. (I was too new to the craft to know for sure.) After all, picking fabrics was intimidating, and I had a whole quilt shop full of possibilities at my disposal.

Now, with dozens and dozens of quilts under my belt, I can honestly say that I love developing a fabric pull, and when I had the bandwidth to consider compiling options for a new (my second) Plaid-sh quilt, I was super excited. (Plaid-ish is a free pattern from Erica Jackman, of Kitchen Table Quilting.)

I began plotting this project by opening up a charm pack of Kate Spain’s Sunnyside collection. This line has been out of print for many years. Kate has such a way with color combinations, though, that I was happy to break into this stack of squares for the task at hand.

I picked the teal, periwinkle, and orange colorways from Sunnyside, forgoing shades of pale yellow, designs with avocado green, and prints with white backgrounds. I knew these first selections would make a good starting point. The Plaid-ish pattern is built upon three different color values: low, mid, and deep values. From the mid-tone teal, periwinkle, and orange, I could easily coordinate low and deep values from my stash and scraps.

But first, I considered all the other Sunnyside options, pulling low-value versions of my three-color palette and adding a pale gray to the mix ...

Then I dove into my scraps and stash. I had many more options than I originally thought for the dark tones. (I love when I can find all I need from what I have on hand!) See the picture at the top of the post for all three value categories laid out. Of course, I have many more squares and rectangles to cut before I have enough to start sewing.

I am calling this approach “matchy-scrappy.” I enjoy sewing projects from a single fabric line (to those who consider that cheating—including Past Michelle—I blow some messy raspberries your way!); I also enjoy super-scrappy projects. Matchy-scrappy marries the two. Sunnyside did the heavy lifting for me: Determining where to start with a color palette is, I think, the hardest part. But once that foundation was laid, I got to have fun finding coordinating fabrics from all the designers and manufacturers represented in my stash and scraps.

I think a disclaimer is called for here. Erica Jackman has a highlight saved on her Instagram profile about tackling a Plaid-ish pull, and she specifically encourages the viewer not to overthink things. Friends, I specialize in overthinking. This is my anal-retentive way of developing a pull for this pattern. It is by no means the only way or the right way (whatever the heck that means). Do you like to play fast and loose with your fabric pulls? Well, I am going to stand alongside you, cheering you on and applauding when you get to the finish line! : )

To read about my first Plaid-ish project, see this post and this post.

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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 Finished Fire Truck Quilt / Beauties Pageant 169

Kindly pull to the side of the road! There’s a quilt finish coming in hot!

I am happy to share my latest project with you. This sweet fire engine is my first pixelated quilt, from a tutorial by Kitchen Table Quilting’s Erica Jackman, and it makes me so happy. I love how a quilt doesn’t need to feature difficult piecing or intricate quilting to be beautiful and bring joy to its maker.

 

As I mentioned in a previous post, the challenge with this quilt was amassing the necessary 2.5-inch squares (all 750 of them!). I scoured my scrap bin, cut 2.5-inch strips from my stash, and got some scraps from friends. It took years, but my patience paid off: I did not buy any fabric specifically for this project. 

 

After collecting the fabrics, this fire truck was an easy sew. Erica’s tutorial breaks down the piecing into several sections, so I laid out each section before sewing to distribute the prints evenly throughout the top. I pressed the seams open as I sewed. I know a lot of people (maybe most?) would have pressed the seams to one side and nested them, but I would rather devote the time to pressing seams open and pinning where they intersect. Doing so creates a flatter, easier-to-quilt top in my opinion. 

 

Again, my persistence paid off here. The quilting was surprisingly fast. The flat seams were a dream to quilt over, and it was a delight to quilt a grid by traversing the seams diagonally with my walking foot without marking anything. I did, as I always do, start in the middle of the quilt for my first set of diagonal lines and quilted outward. Doing so requires burying a bunch of threads, but that’s another step I’m willing to invest more effort in. Once it was time to quilt the diagonal lines running in the opposite direction, I was able to quilt edge-to-edge with no puckering. If you’ve read about my quilting trials over the years, you know that’s a win. : )

I already told you about a pixelated Hello Kitty quilt I have planned. Well, I have since placed another pixelated beauty on my to-do list. Check out the Embroidery Flower Quilt here. (I am also going to sew the My Colourful Town Quilt, featured on the same web page.) 

I always like to have an easy project at the ready. I’ve been doing a lot of design work lately, which requires more from me creatively and cognitively, and it’s nice to relax to the hum of my machine piecing some simple patchwork together. Does that ring true for you, too?

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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

And So the Stash Grows / Beauties Pageant 168

I love quilting cotton, and that love runs the gamut of manufacturers and modern designers. I am also a stasher. I applaud quilters who buy material for particular projects, but I like to be able to start something new whenever I want to without running to a quilt shop or placing an order online. The downside of this stashing philosophy is there are times when it feels as if my real hobby is fabric collecting and quilting is my way of justifying my fabric purchases!

But I do use my stash, and it’s all for sewing, not just admiring. Whenever I am considering a project, I start with what I already own and try to purchase only if I need to flesh out a palette or meet a particular pattern’s fabric requirements.

This week I placed an order with Sew Lux Fabric for eight yards of fabric. That’s a decent-sized order for me! The main objective was to purchase a selection of Starry, a new collection from Alexia Marcelle Abegg of Ruby Star Society (see pic, below). I’m making a rainbow quilt that requires seven different colors. I purposely selected eight colors so I would have a little wiggle room in homing in on the final seven. Now I’m thinking I should have added a ninth, just to be on the safe side. (Could another fabric purchase be on the horizon?!)

The way I see it, there are two issues with online fabric purchases. First, it’s easy to end up with fabric that looks a little different in person, thanks to discrepancies in monitor settings and such. (Often I’ll purchase multiple cuts, especially of solids, to account for this. Now, that’s a fast way to grow your stash!) Second, is the shipping. I am known to add to my cart willy-nilly to reach a free-shipping threshold. In the case of my Sew Lux order, I added four additional cuts not because I was going to get free shipping but because I knew I would be paying for shipping, so I thought, Hey I might as well stuff my package with more fabric. Below you’ll see two cuts from Tomato Tomahto by Kimberly Kight/Ruby Star Society, a pale floral from Basic Grey’s Cider collection, and a dark navy floral from Fancy That’s Songbook line. I know I can easily put the flower prints to good use, but I have no idea what I’ll do with the tomatoes yet!

Do you have a stash, and if so, what is your philosophy to what you buy and what you don’t? And do you have any favorite websites for fabric purchases? I have a quilt shop about 25 minutes from me, so when I need to buy fabric—especially solids—I try to start there. I found Sew Lux about two years ago. Chrissy and Linda stock a great array of fabrics and a ton of my beloved Moda. Their response to emails and their processing of orders are super quick. I highly recommend the site!

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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