Outside my front window the Mockingbird is chasing the Blue Jay away from the berries on the Dogwood. The Mockingbird’s nest is towards the top of the tree so apparently the tree belongs to it. (I don’t know the difference between the males and females.) Spring happens in just about fourteen days, to say I’m eager, though this winter is amazingly mild, is something of an understatement. I’ve been enjoying the days filled with more light, the sunsets through the studio window inspiring. One of our hyacinths has bloomed, so we’ll see what happens with the rest.
Back to our regularly scheduled post:
Keep stitching until it makes sense, pull out the seam ripper if you’re not happy, play until your heart is content.
I made this stitch sample a few years ago and gave it away. I think I’m going to make another one using this as inspiration.
This piece is one way of practicing, and keeping a library of stitching motifs.
A piece like this helps explore stitching motifs until you’re really good at it.
A piece like this can grace your studio walls giving you inspiration.
Perhaps done quarterly, a piece like this can show your progress as a free motion machine quilter.
Stitching different motifs across the surface of the quilt is something that speaks to my quilterly soul. As the words flit from my brain to my fingers I can see three quilts in my head that I want to work on, okay 5…okay it’s an unending roll of visuals. By keeping the quilts smaller I can make more of these.
This might sound a little overly dramatic and it’s intended to be because drama can be so very much fun. I shopped on Small Business Saturday #smallbusinesssaturday for the fun of it. I don’t need fabric, but I love it so what the heck.
This will live as a reminder that quilt making is a messy process.
Shop 2: Colchester Mill Fabrics – Colchester, CT for my local peeps this is a small version of Hartsdale Fabrics with some fashion fabric, home dec fabric, yarn, quilt fabric. Friendly staff, and sewing machine repair. They do have crafty stuff including chalkboard paper. I need this! (Melissa when you read this I have an idea to bounce off you for the magazine) Wandering around a shop to listen to what speaks to my soul is fascinating. While I didn’t get any Christmas fabric the rounder of red and silver/gray caught my attention. There is something nostalgic about the color scheme, like a childhood memory of the silver tinsel tree in the corner of the living room decorated with chains of red and green construction paper, and cranberry and popcorn.The fabric was tempting however, when I revisited the rounder, not so much.
The solids and batiks are situated near each other. I seriously contemplated a few American Made Brand – but couldn’t remember what I had at home so left those. The batiks though, that’s a different story entirely. So I’m getting fabric cut and one of the ladies asks what I’m going to do with the fabric. . .shoulders shrug, hands lift up and the question is asked, “I have to do something with it?” Which had the desired effect of a laugh. I offered the gal who asked, and her friend a quarter yard of the fabric if they purchased something. You can take the woman out of the quilt shop staff, but she’ll always enable customers, quilters any chance she gets because it’s fun.
I did answer the question a little more directly, I might hang the batik on the right above on the wall because I love it so much. It’s inspiring, it simply makes me happy. Right now I have some fabric samples by Valori Wells on my wall, three different colorways. By hanging it I get to enjoy it and figure out what, if anything I might do with it down the road. This suggestion gave the gal behind the counter some ideas for the white, bare walls of her sons apartment. Just a little something to add some fun and color.
The light batiks from Hoffman simply spoke to this quilters heart. With my back to basics trend in piecing right now my gut tells me these may be involved in a couple of quilt remakes. I’ve been wanting to remake a favorite quilt for our bed and I’m not one to make the quilt exactly like the first time around. Even doing step outs is kind of challenging for me.
I visited this place years ago and they’ve painted and refreshed the place. The walls are white giving the fabric pride of place, there are good samples around. Staff, warm, friendly and helpful. Lots of quilt samples around and some fun stuff overall. Some coming in on their day off to shop for their own quilts.
Meeting facebook friends is always fun! Christie is sweet, enthusiastic and her shop is simply adorable! As of last week she is now a BERNINA dealer. Christie really loves her local fabric designers: Jennifer Paganelli, Kate Spain, and Denyse Schmidt showing their current fabric lines with great enthusiasm. Both Kate and Denyse teach in the shop. There are also classes for kids.
I picked up some Kona solids and these beautiful fabrics from Jennifer and Denyse.
Christie had a small tote with a few things inside for her first 20 customers. I was one of the 20 so check this out! There’s a mug inside as well.
Here’s a better shot of all of the fabrics from Christie’s shop. I love the fabrics, her enthusiasm. Christie carries the hardware for bags and totes. I was able to pick up some d-rings to make either a couple of totes or key rings. Not sure which yet, but oh the possibilities.
So as I build my stash and share it with you. The possibilities are endless. That’s the fun part of building a stash – the possibilities. Oh I long to say something beautiful and encouraging about growing as quilters. But I think I’ll say simply, whatever you do…have fun. Quilting doesn’t need to produce a lot of angst. But it does. As I’m beginning to quilt again and I mean really quilt I feel the anxiety of what putting these quilts out into the world will be met with. The work is interesting to me again and I long for it to be interesting on a grander scale. I will have one piece ready for next week that I’ll probably be binding it on the plane to Chicago, as I do, because the last minute is always the perfect deadline.
First up: it’s Thankful Thursday! Time to thank a quilter who’s made a difference in your life. Today’s gratitude goes to: Melissa Thompson Maher, C0-Founder, and Editor-in-Chief of Generation Q Magazine. Melissa has a long history in the publishing world, she sees trends happening, has the skill of making a writer sound more like the writer, is a fab mentor, and has one of the kindest hearts I’ve ever met. I am privileged to work with her.
I’m heading to Houston for Quilt Market this morning and will have breakfast with Melissa tomorrow morning. While I enjoy seeing everything at Market, I’m giddy that Iget that time alone with her. Tomorrow afternoon Generation Q Magazine has a Schoolhouse Presentation with Sizzix at 3:10.
If you’ve ever taken a class, or purchased a sewing machine from me, it’s entirely possible we’ve had “the talk”:
You are a smart, intelligent woman, and you’ve got this.
I’m specifically referring to skills and techniques in quilt making or teaching people to use their sewing machines however, this applies to life in general. I tend to take the approach that if I can do whatever this technique is, that anyone can do it. So often the talk is accompanied by an experiential story such as how I learned how to be careful using my rotary cutter, and rulers. Let’s just say that no stitches were involved, and I’m still quilting, and I’m very careful when I cut.
Sometimes I tell the story of making “When Alex and Jinny met in NY, Beauty Happened” and I kept cutting the wrong piece of fabric. I can see myself sitting at the sewing machine, the smaller mat, a ruler, and a rotary cutter next to me. I can feel the frustration as I cut that wrong piece yet again. I remember walking out of my sewing room vowing to sell every piece of fabric that I owned at a serious discount. That was over ten years ago. And now I’ll teach paper piecing.
Quilt making, teaching quilt making, sewing, garment construction and teaching garment making are skill sets that are acquired over time. Each skill improves over time. We all start out trying to cut correctly, and piece correctly, and then quilt correctly. A funny thing happens when we begin to see “mistakes” as an opportunity to cultivate a desired skill set. When we stop, take a look at what’s happening, perhaps ask someone, or several someones some questions, think through the answers and get stitching.
Now you’ll probably note that when I answer questions I can be a bit, mmmm indirect. If a question is about technique, I’m more likely to be direct, and give clear information. When a question is about the artistry I’m more likely to start asking you questions, to get information from you to help you see, that like Dorothy, you have the answer but just need some help getting there.
And there are moments when I give myself the talk, when doubt creeps in. When I’m trying to finish a quilt and I just see every.single.mistake. that is being stitched into that quilt. Or when I’m teaching and a student is struggling and I’m having a hard time figuring out what to say or do to help them understand whatever I’m trying to teach.
On this Thankful Thursday, as I depart for Quilt Market I thank you for being part of my quilty world. You’re helping form me into the quilter I long to be. If you’re so inclined, thank a quilter for helping form you in the quilter you long to be.
Several months ago Donna from Follow That Thread sent me a spool of Aurifil Lino (linen). Donna has a bit of a sense of humor and drew a smilie face on the wooden spool. That wooden spool will be a keepsake forever. All it needs is a little red pompon and voila! a clown like me.
I asked Donna what size needle, I’ve learned one very important thing – a size 100/16 needle is essential for machine work as the thread is slightly slubby, only slightly and not in an unattractive way. I love how this stitches up. I could have played with the Lino for hours and hours and hours. And hours. I My next bit of play was to draw something of a Zentangle type quilted block with “Aurifil Lino” stitched in. I will need more of this thread.
I used Superior Magnifico in the bobbin and would do so again not to waste this precious thread.
A couple of weeks ago Katia asked on the “Quilting, bubbling, quilting” post where we find the stitch count on our BERNINA 7 Series Machines. Below are a series of photos below showing step by step how to get to this screen. This is a good thing to know particularly if BERNINA has come out with software and/or firmware updates for the 7 Series machines. I have a habit of touching the screen with my finger and that’s good. Using the stylus is so much more effective.
Step 1: Press the GearsStep 2: Press the Sewing Machine
Step 3 Press the “i”Step 4 press the Version button – this is on the left side of the screen
Step 5 – this is where you see the version of the software stitch count number of stitches since the last service
After weeks of very long days and not meeting an obligation I have a down day. We’ve been members of the Botanical Garden for years, joining when our youngest nephew was coming to visit for a few days…unfortunately the weather when he and his parents were here was rather yucky and we never got to take him. The nephew and my sweetie spent hours watching the trains on the internet. It was rather sweet to watch.
We missed last year with my sweeties surgery and finally got to go today. The time of day really changes the overall look of the gardens and the Train Show. This year they have added a special exhibit about the artist and the creative process. Each one of these buildings are made from leaves and twigs and acorns. It’s such a neat thing to see all of these landmarks, some of which are gone, preserved for all to see in tactile form. A trip to the Garden is one of those amazing, re-energizing respites in City Living. We are so blessed to have this treasure and others around the City. Since Autumn is my favorite season the colors right now are just inspiring. I’m also loving all of the details we get to see close up.
The rose making one last valiant attempt in blooming, nodding her full heavy head to the weight of winter clearly around the corner.
And yes, you did read that I missed my deadline on finishing the quilt. I am gutted on somany levels. The quilt is making the trip anyway and I’ll get to finish it later. I can tell you this: I have stitched bubbles for about 70 hours (probably longer) and have about 10+ hours to go. It’s well worth it. Every.Single.Stitch. Because I’m a curious sort I started counting stitches (well, actually checking the stitch count on the machine) to see how many stitches are in each section and oddly enough in a 1 x 8″ section plus a wee bit more there are over 6,000 stitches. The more I stitch the more I love this quilt and the more I admire Jeanie, her piecing skills are off the hook!
My next piece I’m working on I’ll share a bit more of and hopefully will get started this weekend. It will be on chocolate Radiance with shades of red and pink.
Happy Quilting!
Teri
PS I’m working on several teaching dates for 2014 and 2015 as soon as everything is in place I’ll let ya’ll know!
Piecing. It’s not been very much of my quilterly life over the last few years as I’ve focused in on machine quilting and have in essence become a whole cloth quilter because I love to play. Oh how I love to play at machine quilting. Watching what develops under the needle is so exciting and peaceful. There is something incredibly beautiful about watching a piece of cloth become something, oh something different and exciting. Changing thread and fiber.
Over the last few weeks I’ve been enjoying some piecing. I think I’m doing a bit of a creative reset. It started with Gramma’s quilt and has just moved right along. I love stitching tiny pieces together. There’s something oddly comforting knowing that I can cut accurately and piece well. Please take a moment and pick your chin up off the floor. Thank you.
Last week I posted that Melanie Testa gave me some of her hand printed fabrics. I love them. I think Melly is pretty fab – her creative spirit is energizing. If I ever owned a quilt shop each one of the employees name tags would say “fabric enabler”. I have learned something over the last few years I might be introverted by nature but by quilting bold would do quite well. To me, black would be too strong, a deep gray a bit less strong still deep enough to make the color just pop. I also thought of fuchsia. (please tell me that you’re not really surprised by this fabric choice.)
The lighting is bad here really bad.
I found a way to incorporate the fuchsia into the quilt. The fuchsia is from dyeing to sew. To go with this the choices were a more solidly cheddar orange or a paler orangey/yellow. I went with the palery orangey/yellow to pop the fuchsia. And it worked!
The strips for these 9 patch blocks are cut at 1 1/4″ making the blocks 2 3/4″ finished. Can I just add how fun it is to piece this size block? Part of it is the challenge and part of it is my own confidence level has really changed over the last 5 years. I’m not planning on competing with these, it’s just play time.
Back in 2003 or 2004, I went to Lancaster for the first time for the Quilters Heritage Celebration a quilter quilted cheddar orange cotton. I remember saying aloud this quilter was crazy. Another quilter said she’s brave. I’m inclined to agree with the 2nd quilter. Well now I am, back then I still thought quilts needed to look a certain way, have a certain feel, be hand quilted and use cotton batting in order to be a quilt. Yes, dear friends, I admit to being a bit of a quilt snob. I still have certain quilt snobbery tendencies for my quilts and my quilts alone.
Oh my how times have changed. I’m in love with orange. I’m so in love with orange that when this cheddar orange came through the quilt shop the other day I immediately purchased 3/4 yard and 3/4 yard of the purple with red undertones. Yes I did and I can hardly wait to get stitching.
I may even come up with a plan.
Oh pick up your chin off the floor, wipe the coffee off the monitor (or wine if its evening). Yes I can plan quilts. I can hardly wait to share with you a quilt that is planfully unplanned. Planfully unplanned, hmmm…what do I mean by that? When I get to quilting the cheddar and the purple I’m going to create structures and blog the journey of quilting. In the meantime I’m back to paperwork.
Here’s a better shot of all of the fabrics from Christie’s shop. I love the fabrics, her enthusiasm. Christie carries the hardware for bags and totes. I was able to pick up some d-rings to make either a couple of totes or key rings. Not sure which yet, but oh the possibilities.
First up: it’s Thankful Thursday! Time to thank a quilter who’s made a difference in your life. Today’s gratitude goes to: 
