NOVA Modern Quilt Guild Preemie Quilt 3 and Wonky Cross Block Update

I finished up my third quilt top last night using the remaining six squares from my charm pack: all pinks and reds. I added six white squares to the mix and made pinwheels from them. I used strips of varying widths in white and two prints from my stash to border the six pinwheels.  If I could do it all over again I think I would have swapped the placement of the two prints but I still like the way it all came together and I still have a chance to balance it with a darker border.

I couldn't resist snapping a quick photo of some of the perle cotton I received earlier this week from Purl Soho. I am definitely going to go there someday and shop in person!

I plan to use these on the Wonky Cross quilt I am making in honor of my friend who passed a few months ago. This photo is a little old--all the blocks have been pieced now and it's ready for basting--but it's laid out the way I sewed the blocks together so you can get a good idea of what it looks like now:

Thanks for stopping by and reading my blog. I don't think I say thanks enough....without you readers I am literally just talking to myself. Thirty readers and counting! When I get to 50 I have something special in store for you...

Happy Quilting!

NOVA Modern Quilt Guild Preemie Quilt 2

I finished the second quilt top for the NOVA Modern Quilt Guild preemie quilt challenge. I still have some pinks leftover so it looks like I am going to be able to make yet another quilt from the remaining squares. It's amazing how far you can stretch a charm pack!

For this quilt, I selected 3 yellow, 3 orange, and 3 pink charms. For each colorway I selected 1 light, 1 medium, and 1 dark charm. I bordered each charm in white first and then connected everything with a gray background.





Happy Quilting!

p.s - I am crossing my fingers that I will have news to share about this quilt!

Project Modern: Challenge 1 Announced!

Re-post:September 1, 2010 by themodernquiltguild
 

 
Here it is!  Challenge 1.  We hope that you all dive in and get started.  We can’t wait to see all of your inspired quilts! 

Make a quilt based on an inspiration of your choice. When submitting your entry you will have to submit a photo of your particular inspiration, along with a photo of your quilt and a few paragraphs explaining your quilt.  How does it relate to or display your inspiration?

Meet our judge, Valori Wells:

Photography and printmaking brought Valori Wells to her present career as a fabric designer.  She is also a professional quilter, author, and fabric and pattern designer who, with her mother, owns the beloved Stitchin’ Post quilt shop in Sisters, Oregon.  Valori’s quilting books, including Simple Start, Stunning Finish, Radiant New York Beauties, and Stitch ‘N  Flip Quilts, explore innovative techniques with natural and floral subject matter and her beautiful photography as inspiration.  She and her husband live just outside of Sisters, with their son and two daughters.

The Prizes:

Each of the three winners will receive a fabulous prize package, featuring the following products from C&T Publishing:

A copy of City Quilts by Cherri House, a book of beautiful quilt designs inspired by modern urban architecture and landscapes.  City Quilts is published by C&T’s exciting new imprint, Stash Books.

One package each of these amazing tools for exploring appliqué, paper piecing, and more:
Silicone Release Paper, Wash-Away Applique Sheets , Carol Doak’s Foundation Paper, and Quilter’s Freezer Paper Sheets.

A 3 in 1 Color Tool for handy reference and help planning color schemes.

Each prize package will also include:

A bundle of 12 coordinating half-yards of beautiful, modern fabric, courtesy of Fabricworm.

A Kona Cotton Solid Roll-Up in the popular Bright color palette, courtesy of Robert Kaufman.

Six yards of 90” wide Warm and White batting, courtesy of Warm Company.

And be sure to check back here on Sept. 7th to find out how you can be in the running to win a Janome Horizon Memory Craft 7700QCP sewing machine, courtesy of Janome America.

Thank you to our wonderful contest sponsors!

The Rules & Details:
- All quilts must be 45” x 45” or larger
- Limit of one submission per person, per challenge
- To enter your submission for Challenge 1, email one photo of your quilt, one photo of your inspiration and a brief write up (one or two paragraphs is fine) explaining your quilt and how it reflects your inspiration to: projectmoderncontest@gmail.com.  All entries for Challenge 1 must be received by November 30, 2010.
- The winners of Challenge 1 will be announced on or about December 15, 2010.
- US residents only are eligible for the prizes.
-  The three winners of Challenge 1 will be selected by our Guest Judge, Valori Wells.  At the judge’s discretion, members of The MQG Planning Committee may aid in selecting finalists.  However, no person involved in the judging process will know the identity of contest entrants.    Each winner will receive an identical prize package.
- Project Modern will be conducted on and through The MQG’s website. The details of each challenge, and the winners will be announced on the blog.
- All Challenge 1 submissions will be posted in a public Flickr group after November 30, 2010.  .
- Full challenge rules here.

Batting Scrap Challenge - Project 1

Hello everyone!

If you haven't already checked out this post about the Batting Scrap Challenge, go check it out!

Ok, now that you're back I'll show you what I've been up to tonight.

First, some background info: I love to read and prefer hardcovers because I DESTROY paperbacks. I learned this the hard way when I borrowed The Da Vinci Code from my friend Nick. By the time I was done with his book it was scratched, worn away, water marked, and bent to the point that I was embarrassed to return it to him. And I was being careful!

From that point forward I swore off paperbacks and stuck to buying hardcovers. One day I found this book (hardcover), Dark Celebration, in a bargain bin at Borders for $3 and got totally hooked. The story is about a race of people (Carpathians) similar to humans but with super strength, speed, ability to shape shift, and other supernatural powers who become vampires if they don't find their soul mates, and have to hunt their brethren who succumb to the temptation of power and lust for killing. I had no clue the book I picked up was #14 of a 20+ book series still being written and that most of the books are only available as mass market paperbacks. That's how they get you with those bargain books! They hook you into a series!

I liked the first book so much I decided to buy a couple more from the beginning of the series. When they arrived from Amazon I decided to make a quilted book cover to keep myself from destroying them. My first attempt was pretty lame. I took some Amy Butler Midwest Modern fat quarters in my stash and some Amy Butler Midwest Modern scraps from a blue and green quilted nursing cover I made my sister and (without a pattern) made myself a cover that would work for a mass market paperback. I found out first hand why it's better to use a mitered binding rather than sewing the strips together in a straight line (very bulky). I also made the mistake of using minky fabric for the binding on the book sleeves (I don't really know why I thought this would be a good idea) so they ended up more bulky than I would have liked but the book cover worked for my purpose so I was pretty happy.

Since that first book cover I have tried to perfect the process. I think the quickest method so far was to just buy fabric already quilted from my local JoAnn Fabrics! JoAnn.com seems to be down right now but check out this link at Fabric.com to see what I am talking about. The only problem with that method is you have to bind the edges of the sleeves, bind the cover, and hand sew the bindings to the back which adds more time to the process.

Tonight I tried something a little different. I wanted to avoid hand sewing if at all possible so as I constructed my book cover I kept in mind how it needed to be sewn together to ensure no hand sewing was necessary. I used scraps from Maura's Strata Square quilt made from Bali Pop in Kiwiberry. The scraps were teeeeeeeny tinnnnnny leftovers:

Which I sorted and combined to form a piece I could use for the outside of my book cover:

I ironed as I pieced:

And kept adding and adding:

Until I had a rectangle big enough for the cover:

I found another scrap of a purple and blue fabric (from the batik bundle Ginny gave me for Christmas--thanks again Ginny!) that was the perfect size for the inside and the sleeves:

I pulled out some batting scraps from the wedding attendant quilts (I think this was from Maura's too):

Cut some for the sleeves and the cover and started sewing keeping in mind that I wanted all my unfinished edges to end up inside the cover:

Once I had the sleeves done I arranged them, the inside fabric, batting, and outside fabric and pinned them with safety pins:

I sewed around the edges leaving myself about 2 inches to turn it right side out, pressed it, sewed about 1/8 of an inch all the way around to close the hole I left myself, and then quilted down the middle to fix some of the odd fitting scraps I used (totally quilted it out lol):

And presto change-o, a book cover:

I am still perfecting this process so until I do I am not going to do an official tutorial but I hope this project has inspired you to go get your binding scraps and make something totally awesome! I'm signing off for the evening to go do some reading using my new book cover. Thanks for letting me share with you!

Happy Quilting!

Threaded Mess Challenge Project: Batting Scraps

Hi Readers and Followers!

One of the things I have wanted to do with my blog are challenge projects where all of us would work on something theme related together. Guess what?? I have a challenge project for you!

Nancy over at Patchwork Penguin, who might I add is the first official NOVA Modern Quilt Guild member besides myself (sweet!), recently posted about not knowing what to do with batting scraps and inspired this challenge project. This is what her batting scrap stash looks like:

picture taken from Nancy's blog

Here's my stash:

My problem is that I rarely follow a pattern or have one to begin with. I don't take the time to plan things out on paper often and I don't always stick to whatever planning I have done. The pinwheel quilt is a great example of that! I started making the pinwheels, I had some fat quarters so I decided to border the pinwheels, I liked them so much I wanted more so I made more pinwheels and strips for borders, I've changed my design several times and still haven't decided which one I like best, and I have to figure out how to make it big enough for my guest bedroom bed. It started out as a lap quilt and now it has more than doubled that size. When I ultimately finish my quilt top I will likely have to get a batting that doesn't fit my top perfectly which means I am going to have some scraps. So where does the challenge come in? Well...

I challenge YOU, Readers and Followers, to join me in creating something from batting scraps.

How this works:

1. Become a follower. There will be perks involved (hint, hint). If you already are, skip this step (and thanks for following!!). To follow, click the "follow" button on the right side of my blog.
2. Leave a comment on this post letting me know you're going to participate in the challenge.
3. Grab this button and put it on your website (if you have one)

 
Rules:

• You must use scraps of batting (no new batting) for this project. If you don't have any, ask a friend (and get your friend involved too!).
• You must create something you or someone else can use i.e. a finished product that can be hung, wrapped, pinned, stuffed, covered, snuggled, tossed, or otherwise used and loved. 
• You must take pictures as you make your batting scrap project.
• You must send me those pictures once you're done and tell us how you made it. 

I will be showing off my favorites on this blog (with your permission of course). If you want you can add them to the Threaded Mess flickr group or send them to me by email at threadedmess(at)gmail(dot)com.

I don't know about you but I work better with a deadline so let's say that all challenge projects must be submitted by October 3rd (that's 2 months!) which should give you plenty of time to participate even if you don't get to sew very often. 

1,2,3, go!

Happy Quilting!

p.s.- future challenge project hints: save your scraps! save your selvages! save your strips!