Another Quilt From Orphan Blocks

I just finished piecing another donation quilt using orphan blocks, but this time it’s in richly saturated warm colors.  Here are the first 2 blocks:

I know,…talk about BRIGHT!!  Here are 2 more blocks to add into the mix:

You really need a pair of sunglasses to look at these!  I have to say that working with these colors is invigorating, though.  I decided to set them off a little differently than the last quilt, so I added a sashing between them:

…and then I added a narrow border in another warm color around the whole thing:

I realize that this quilt is kind of over powering color-wise, but I am quite drawn to it.  It’s already been basted and I’ve started quilting it, which is my favorite part.  More to follow…

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Charity Quilt Ta-Done!

My pledge to myself to use up orphan blocks to make donation quilts has paid off-my first one has been pieced and quilted!  I’m very fond of blues/greens/and purples so it was very easy to work on this quilt.  I used my PTD ruler starter set for all the ruler work.  You can see the ruler work design pretty clearly in the sections made w/solid color fabrics:

…and the same design is used inside the large center blocks inside the stars, although it’s not as obvious because of the print fabrics:

One of the things I love most about ruler work is that it’s easy to create larger secondary designs that are formed by multiple adjacent blocks, as seen below:

The half triangles and squares along the outermost “pieced section” were filled with featherettes, and the outermost border is a mirror image pair of feathers in each border:

My goal is to piece at least 12 quilt tops over the next 12 months and if I can also get them quilted in that time frame, I would be on the moon!

The back side does not show the quilting well because it’s too busy of a print:

One last look:

Hospice donation quilt #1 for the period of 10/1/18-9/30/19!

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Using Up Orphan Blocks

I’ve been clearing out all kinds of stuff from my sewing room and I have many orphan blocks from old projects.  Over the past few months, I’ve participated in a few charity sewing events and was surprised by just how gratifying it was to use my skills to help someone else.  I started wondering if maybe I had enough orphan blocks to make a couple charity quilts, and yesterday I started piecing some together:

…and then there were 4:

…and then there was a whole quilt:

This quilt is now basted together and ready for some free motion quilting!  I love all these colors together so this will be a total pleasure to quilt…more to follow!

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Winner, Winner, Chicken Dinner!

The Asheville Quilt Show was this past weekend and my quilt, “Garden at Midnight” won the “Best Machine Workmanship” award!  This guild has many incredible quilters, so this is an incredible honor.  The “Best Hand Workmanship” award went to  Linda Roy for her quilt called “Ruffled,” which is pictured below:

You can’t see it in the photo above, but she created a very interesting edge finishing that included ruching all along the edges.  This added a very intriguing texture and I’m always impressed when someone does something special for the binding.  Personally, I am always at a stage of feeling “let’s just get this thing done,” and I’m pretty much out of any creative steam by that point.  The quilt that one the “Best of Show” award was called “Primrose and Promises” by Cathy Bingham and it is shown below:

This is what the quilts looked like when you first entered the hall:

The show was a great show and I spent a lot of money on the vendors.  It is always so inspiring to see so many quilts in one place, and I always leave with lots of ideas running through my head.  Thanks to everyone at the Asheville Quilt Guild for putting on such a great show!

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Wool Felt Embroidered Applique

This is another machine embroidery applique flower but this time, I used a variety of wool felt textiles for the applique shapes.  These applique shapes are all cut using my Sizzix cutter, just as I would cut cotton applique shapes.  These are not fused into place before embroidery because the wool is so thick that my mini iron really can’t melt the fusible web on them!  All of the textiles are hand dyed.

I am really intrigued by the texture that the wool adds.  Here’s a closeup of the flower section:

There is woven wool, a wool/rayon felt, and some type of a faux suede that I hand dyed using procian dyes.  All of the threads are polyester or rayon, again because I like the sheen of those thread types.  Each piece of applique is outlined with invisible thread to make the applique shapes “pop.”  Here’s a closeup of the stem/leaves section:

(For that stem, I also outlined the inner embroidered area because it seemed to poof out just a bit too much.)  Here’s a tangential shot that gives a better sense of how rich the texture is:

I feel like I have 20 million stitch-outs of various MEA flowers and I need to do something with them.  This one will be another donation for the silent auction at the Asheville Quilt Show next week.

Filed under Free Motion Quilting, ruler work on a HDSM. 2 Comments