Dog for Luke

A while back I showed a picture of a baby quilt I'd made for some friends. (here's that post, it's the yellow one at the bottom)  Well, I wanted to make sure to do something for their little boy who is about to become a big brother.  He's got a lot of work ahead of him and deserves a little something special in anticipation of the headaches of a little brother!

This is my take on Denyse Schmidt's  Scottie Dog pattern.  Not a bad little project, though I do have to admit, the gusset gave me a hell of time. Ang had to bail me out a couple of times. (Nothing new there though I guess.)

Some Gifts

We've made a modest entry in the Quilting Gallery weekly contest again with the quilt on the right.  This is a design called "Simply Charming" by Lori Smith and actually serves as the cover for her book Fat-Quarter Quilting.  (Her version, not ours!)

This and the quilt below, also from Fat-Quarter Quilting, were the first projects Angela and I worked on together.  Since I had picked up her hobby, and was invading her stash anyway, we wanted to try some projects together.  These wall hangings were done as Christmas gifts to each of our sets of parents.  Angela did the applique work and the quilting, I did the piecing and binding.  It turned out to be a great idea, we got to work together, make some special gifts for family and have some fun.

Since these two, we've completed two more together and have another we've just begun.  So, you can imagine our sewing room is a bit crazy with each of our multiple projects in progress, the new one we're working on together, ugh.  Just watch your step and careful where you set that coffee.

So, now what?

Up to this point, our posts, the few that there are, have been about completed works.  I guess we're sort trying to catch the blog up to where we're at now and figure this whole blog thing out too. While we do have some other completed projects we'd like to share, we both have a couple of projects under way so a post about what we're working on now might be in order.

Found this old Singer in a thrift shop a couple of days ago.  It works great and was really cheap!  I even got the cabinet (needs minor repair), the original buttonholer kit and a box full of feet with it. What a kick.

                                         

The wiring is old and a bit worn, so it needs to be replaced.  But, other than that, good cleaning and lubricating, it should be good to go.  I've been doing a little homework on fixing these old machines up, but if anyone has any experience with them let us know.

That quilt on the design wall in the background is something Angela is working on.  She did a great job with the applique on the left side and there is another applique panel she's wrapping up that goes on the right.  I don't have the info right here on the designer or source, but we will get back to it.

This... this is one of my messes.

It started from this doodle:

I got this idea for a small, wonky house quilt driving down the street.  So, when I finally parked, I torn a scrap off of something in the glove compartment and made this doodle.  I don't know, we'll see what happens.  The goal is these odd little houses, bright colors (hence the note: Burano It., not to look like Burano, but to remind me bright) and just, I don't know...odd. We'll see where it goes, the fun part is trying to figure it all out.

Just finished:

I wanted to make a baby quilt for some friends, but knew time was going to be at a premium, so I chose this City View pattern from Connecting Threads.  It is a simple design, but I'd always liked it, so here was a chance to use it.  I know this is going to seem like a commercial for Connecting Threads, but so what, I found their "Kit Builder" tool very helpful and kinda fun to use too.  I know it isn't anything revolutionary, but I'm still new at this and I got a kick out it.  So if you haven't played with it, give it a try.

Jay

Check this out!

So I see my buddy Drew, of along the doodlescape, this morning and his says "You gotta check out my blog!" Well, I'll be damned if he didn't do a painting based on one of Angela's quilts, "Summer Rain in Bali."

Ok, she just posted on this piece yesterday and by 11pm, Drew had done his. Wow.

You gotta see this!

I think this is just way too neat.  I am very proud of them both.

Like this blog, Drew's is new too. So, look around at his posts and check back in with him. I've been watching him draw and create for a while now, you're going to find some great work on his blog!

Summer Rain in Bali

So, this would be my (Angela) first post. 

I made this quilt sometime during late 2009 - 2010 for a close friend's new house.  Melissa and I have known each other since we were both 14 and living in Sydney, Australia.  I was there for a few years with my family and she had emigrated with hers from Malaysia.  

The inspiration for this came from a stack of Bali batik fabric I got (on sale!) at Hancock's of Paducah.  The image I had when I saw those fabrics laid out on the table was one of gently falling summer rain through a window.  The blue and white are punctuated with flashes of light pink--perhaps the flowers outside.  What you cannot see too clearly from the photo is the stitching, which was done with light blue rayon thread along the vertical seams, to imitate rivulets of water sliding down the window.  The back and border are light denim.  I didn't have a middle layer--this is just supposed to be a summer throw--so technically, I guess it's not a quilt, but I added a sleeve at the top for her to hang, to get the feeling of the image I tried to convey.

Gavin's Squares

I seemed to be drawn to slightly out of whack geometric shapes.  

      As I'm trying to find my own "quilting voice," a lot of the quilts that inspire me, seem to be slightly out of whack geometric shapes.  I really enjoy the work of Denyse Schmidt and you can certainly see the influence of her "What a Bunch of Squares" quilt.

      This was actually made as a gift for some friends who were having a baby. I hesitate to call it a 'baby quilt' because of the style and size (basically a throw).  They were using grays and oranges in the little guy's new room and they have more modern, not flowery-print or basket-block, sensibilities, so I went modern-wonky.  I made it nice and large so that it could be used for him to play on the floor, in the yard, bundled up on the couch with mom, whatever.  

The way the back turned out on this really made me happy.  The simple design here helped the random quilting stand out. 

Jay

A crook.

"Time. Time. What is time? Swiss manufacture it. French hoard it. Italians squander it. Americans say it is money. Hindus say it does not exist. You know what I say? I say time is a crook." 
O'Hara (Peter Lorre) from "Beat the Devil" 1953

In one of the quilting magazines Ang gets, there was a project idea for quilted clocks by Linda Graham.  Of course, I can't remember which magazine it was and can't find it now, but I was smart enough to have bookmarked her blog when I worked this project.  And of course, in my typical fashion, I kinda skimmed the project instructions and then went on my merry way just winging it.

In short, in you design a mini quilt, stretch it over a painting canvas (here a 10"x10"), put the clock works through the middle and there you go. I stitched on some fun beads instead of numbers.