Also in the Pipeline

I don't think I've ever mentioned Colsie (finding comfort and warmth in life's simple pleasures), a low volume project for use in January each year.  I'm planning to make this one in the same manner as Koselig (gifted to my sister).

All of the strips are cut and waiting to be sewn.

These are the leftover HSTs from Haru, my Tussie Mussie project.  

I'm not sure yet if I'm going to follow through with this idea or not but Audrey's introductory quilt number two post as part of her Bramble Blooms quilt series got me thinking.

This is a new project - one patterned after Macnas.  

I've named it Reverie (the state of being pleasantly lost in one's thoughts).

And this is another new project, again inspired by Macnas.  

I've named this one Rubricate (to mark or color with red).

All in good time . . . 

Quiltdivajulie

Bramble Blooms QAL - Real Progress

The latest challenge within Audrey's Bramble Blooms QAL is to play around with some floral appliqué for the center panel of our quilt.

So naturally I started scrolling through photos of Audrey's work along with that of Gwen Marston and Freddy Moran.  

By then I felt totally overwhelmed since appliqué, especially needle turn is SO not my thing.

And then I glanced up at the magnetic bulletin board in front of my sewing machine.

"COMPARISON IS THE THIEF OF JOY" - Theodore Roosevelt

(interestingly, Mark Twain's variation goes even further - "Comparison is the death of joy")

At that point I thought about my years-aged French Roses pattern.  I've made numerous quilts using this method, but all of them have been gifted.

Why not use these templates for my QAL project AND have a set of these blooms for myself?!

(bonus - there were even a baggie full of pre-cut leaves leftover from the making of Forty-Six and its string-pieced tulips)

I quickly cut out four two-layer blooms and pinned a series of leaves "in place" (of course, things will shift around before this is finalized).

And then I played around with the fabrics I'd pulled . . . 

Bloom one

Bloom two

Bloom three

And bloom four.

Another major decision - I will apply these using machine appliqué.

I love Audrey's handwork and admire her results enormously, but that just isn't me. And if I want to love this quilt when it is finished, I have to honor that.

Quiltdivajulie

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"Never cut what you can untie."

Robert Frost

End of October Bits and Pieces

I had held off doing anything to the cover of my Flowers Magic Art Fest journal because I hadn't decided what to do.

And then I knew.

I have started making a journal cover to slip over the binder's cover.  

(click HERE for Wanda's journal cover tutorial)

This photo shows the unpressed slab loosely wrapped around the book's front cover.

And this is the back.  

(the jury is still out which orientation I'll end up using - I think that back might become the front . . . )

It won't take long to get the cover trimmed, quilted, and finished and; since the interior of the book is done aside from a couple of small items I want to add like the book's provenance, the whole thing might be done before the week is out.

For the record, I've named this journal A Garden of Collage (name inspired by a snippet cut from a magazine).

Elsewhere in the studio, Audrey has revealed the name of her QAL - Bramble Blooms.  

So I will use that name as the label for this quilt project here on the blog.

She also suggested we choose fabrics from our recent fabric pull to create the first quilt's center panel.

I've chosen these - none of them are large and some have gaps where sections were cut away, so I need to puzzle out a layout for that center rectangle.

And many months ago, I purchased this blank fabric book from Baumcat, a currently on-break Etsy seller - mostly because I wanted to see how she put it together.

Since then it has sat.

Now, with younger son doing twice-weekly PT for an inflamed rotator cuff (and my ensuing waiting time in their lovely lobby) I've pulled out this book along with four neutrals plus a soft pink No. 5 Perle cotton and have started using a kantha-style stitch to fill each of the pages.

I unstitched the three signatures from the cover and have found myself wondering if I'll end up making my own cover before the book is ultimately reassembled.  

If I had to guess at this moment, my answer would be absolutely YES.

* * *

Again this year we will be holding down the trick-or-treating candy station at elder son's house while he and Mommy take Little Man (a ninja this year) around their neighborhood.

We had our first frost/freeze last night with two more freezing nights on the horizon so the hordes of candy-hunters will likely be wearing coats over their costumes.

Quiltdivajulie

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"Don't bend; don't water it down; don't try to make it logical; don't edit your own soul according to the fashion.  Rather, follow your most intense obsessions mercilessly."

Franz Kafka 

Studio Time - Part 1

Audrey over at Quilty Folk is proposing an informal quilt along - you can read about it near the end of this post.

She suggested we start digging in our stash for older fabrics to use.  I went with the colors in her fabric pull (shown near the end of that post) since I so admire her quilts and I didn't want to re-invent a color palette that might not have worked as well as hers.  

I decided it was time to move the three remaining seasonal dining room wall quilts forward (I was tired of them lurking about the studio).

January's Gnomeville is now ready for pin basting - that's the backing you see around the edges.

The runner pieced with Gnomeville's extra parts now has backing (upper - aged Moda diagonal stripe) and binding fabric (lower - more recent Art Gallery diagonal stripe) chosen and cut to size.

I've hung this project in the closet for now (sans batting) since it is not on my get-it-done-soon priority list.

Then I completely changed my plan for February's Heart Throb.  

Instead of using a panel, I went with these charm squares from a Moda line named Flirt (lots of hearts and love language text).  

Since this photo was taken, the squares were taken down and clipped and are now ready to web together into a top.

For March's Smaragdine, I cut the sixty alternate squares (KF's Moss Rose) and have paired/pinned so I can leader-ender the pairs as I work on the next few Dumpster Diving 12 blocks.

The Brandon Mably Chips yardage under the blocks will be used for backing and I went ahead and cut the binding strips while the Moss Rose yardage was out.

No more serious pondering for these three - only a need to sit and sew (or quilt).

* * *

I'll be back in a day or so with Part 2 to share the progress on my various paper-based projects.

Quiltdivajulie

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"Deciding what not to do is as important as deciding what to do."

Steve Jobs