Tag Archives: C&T publishing

Modern Wall Quilt

Isn’t that a boring title for a post? I don’t know what to call this quilt. Maybe after you look at the photos and read the post you’ll come up with a clever name for it.

Love this quilt book!

I bought a book for making baby quilts a couple of years ago. There are a few quilts in it that I thought would be very fun to make. There are ten projects, each one by a different designer. C&T Pubs just happens to have the book on sale right now. Make Baby Quilts includes designs by Camille Roskelley, Allison Harris, and Latifah Saafir – among others.

The Sweet as Pi pattern really drew me in though. Sure, it would be wonderful as a floor mat for a baby. Designed by Malka Dubrawsky, it is a strong graphic pattern and the colors could be changed as needed. But I decided to make it as a wall quilt.

Cutting the strips was easy. Choosing the colors – not so easy! I knew I wanted the colors to be bold and to have a strong presence in the quilt I had just made for our bed. After some back and forth with a stack of solids, these are the fabrics I selected. Assembling the wedges was a breeze. This all happened in early fall. With the holidays and all those silly viruses we all had, it was shelved until recently.

One wedge of the circle

Ignore the wrinkled appearance of this wedge! I was taking pictures to communicate my project to my son in Brooklyn NY. There are instructions for creating the template to cut the strip pieced wedges but I wasn’t getting it. Thank you FaceTime! Kyle was able to take a look and tell me what I needed to know!

Too long!

Somehow I made the template slightly longer than it should be. My sweet husband was able to trim it just a smidge and it was perfect.

Thread decisions

Once it was put together and basted, it was time to select threads. I normally quilt with a neutral thread and if this was to be a floor mat for a baby, that is what I would have done. However using gray or off white just didn’t cut it for these colors. Each stripe was quilted with a matching thread. I quilted a spiral in the yellow section (center). Then I switched to straight line quilting for the other stripes. No marking was done. It seemed if this was going to be on the wall, above the bed, no one would be face to face with it. (Unless the viewer chose to stand on the bed to get a closer look – haha). Viewing from a fair distance, the placement of the quilting lines wasn’t a huge deal. I basically set the width by using the outermost part of the walking foot as my guide.

It is done!!

Total honesty here – all the while I was working on this quilt, I never once considered the how heck it would be hung on the wall. It is quite large (approx 40″ across) and with a hanging sleeve on the back, it wouldn’t have laid flat on the wall. I was at a loss for a while. Then I thought about making some sort of circular frame with wire. I had florist wire but it was fairly light weight. So I measured out four (very long) lengths and twisted them into one piece to give it more strength. Then I pinned it around the circumference of the quilt. I wish I had taken pictures of this but I totally forgot. I sewed the wire to the back – butting it up as close as possible to the binding, being careful not to go all the way through to the front of the quilt. This kept the quilt flat and held it’s shape perfectly.

Hanging it was a bit of a chore. Ray was standing on the bed with level, screws and screw gun. He had to put screws all the way around because I really wanted it flat on the wall. Success!

I love it! The wall hanging contains many of the colors of the rather bohemian quilt I made for the bed so it just works.

I love looking at the quilt and the wall hanging together. Makes me happy!

It was my goal to finish this wall quilt in January and it is down! I checked it off the list of unfinished projects which is always a good feeling before moving on to the next thing! Now that you have seen it, what do I call it? Many of you are so clever at thinking of names for your finished quilts. This is not my strength. Help a girl out?

Linking to my favorites – check them out at the top of the page, under link ups!

(Note – this post contains affiliate links. Should you purchase something via the link, I will receive a small compensation at no cost to you.)

Quilting Cozy Series, Book Review & Giveaway

It has been quite a while since I have done a book review. When I saw an email from C&T Pubs in my in-box a couple of months ago, I was delighted.  I really enjoy working with them as they publish so many high quality books.  This set of books is a bit different though.

When I read that these books, the Quilting Cozy series, were described by the author, Carol Dean Jones, as a Cozy series of books, I didn’t know what that referred to.  Of course Wikipedia answered all my questions. Per Wikipedia, ‘Cozy mysteries, also referred to as “cozies”, are a subgenre of crime fiction in which sex and violence are downplayed or treated humorously, and the crime and detection take place in a small, socially intimate community.’ This is new to me. (I don’t generally read mysteries).  C&T Pubs provided me with a copy of a book in the series. Titled Tie Died, it is the first book in the series. About a woman who has recently moved into a senior living village,  she takes up quilting (among other hobbies) to meet other people.  The story is sweet and short and of course there is both a love interest and a murder mystery to be solved. I will say the twist at the end took me by surprise.

Each book includes the full pattern for the quilt shown on the cover.

There is a reader’s guide available too. Ms. Jones put together a collection of discussion points and questions that go with the books.  Some of the questions do contain spoilers so you may want to read the book before looking through the reader’s guide.

I found it interesting to learn that the author, Carol Dean Jones, wrote her first book at the age of 73. She was a geriatric social worker prior to retiring.  This gives her a realistic perspective on the issues with aging and all that comes with this stage of life. This insight adds a very genuine touch to her books. Carol is also an experienced quilter which adds greatly to the stories.  Having the stories built around the lives of several women in this retirement village, Carol brings up thought-provoking questions about friendship, crime, responsibility, aging, and marriage. The books would be fun to read and chat about at your next small group quilt club meeting. You can read more about this author on her website.

These books were actually self published at first.  C&T Pubs is releasing the second edition now.  They are available as both hard copy and e-books.  The first six books in the series (Tie DiedRunning StitchesSea BoundPatchwork ConnectionsStitched Together, and Moon Over the Mountain) are already out; the next four books (The Rescue QuiltMissing MemoriesTattered & Torn, and Left Holding the Bag) are coming out in December and January.

The release of the Quilting Cozy series is being celebrated this week with a blog hop.  There is a very generous giveaway on each blog in the hop. C&T Pubs has given each of us one full e-book set to give to a lucky reader.

Check out these posts for more on this set of books as well as more chances to win.

Monday 12/3: C&T Publishing

Tuesday 12/4: Bonnie K. Hunter at Quiltville

Wednesday 12/5: Barbara Chojnacki at Six Gables Designs

Thursday 12/6: You are here!!  Bernie Kringel at Needle & Foot

Friday 12/7: Carol Dean Jones

GIVEAWAY NOW CLOSED.

To enter the giveaway for the series of Quilting cozy e-books, leave me a comment.  Tell me if you are a reader and what genres do you enjoy?  Do you like mysteries? Did you know what a cozy was??  Have you read any of the books in this series?  I love to read and would love to chat with you about what you enjoy! Good luck everyone!  Giveaway is open until Sunday.  I will announce the winner Monday.

 

 

Making Connections; Quilting Book Review & Bloghop

About two weeks ago, I was contacted by C&T Publishing asking if I would provide a review of one of their newest quilting books. Always up for learning something new or reading pretty much anything about quilting, I was happy to help.

The author, Dorie Hruska, is a long arm quilter, mom, and blogger.  She has her website,  Forever Quilting, set up as both her blog and her professional site for her long arm business. I really enjoyed looking at her gallery to see the work she has done for others. Her quilting style is lovely with many intricate patterns.

The book, Making Connections, is all about free motion and long arm quilting. The goalof the book is to help the quilter choose a motif or pattern for the quilt and then to set a travel path up for moving around the quilt in the most efficient manner, with the least amount of starts and stops possible.  This is really appealing to me. Like many of you, I struggle with how  to quilt something once that quilt top is done.

Reading this book through, I noticed two things that I really liked.  It is written as a workbook with very clear illustrations and directions. The practice builds in complexity as the reader learns the steps.  Also, there are lots of grids printed in the book to draw on.  The grids are bigger than graph paper but not quite big enough. When I practiced, I copied the page and enlarged it on our printer.  Finally, the book is printed in landscape orientation, not portrait. This makes it much easier to use as you don’t have the binding on the left side making it awkward to draw.

I took away a few really helpful ideas from Dorie’s book:

  1. Doodle the design before quilting.  I know this, we all know this, but it helps so much! There is such muscle memory in free motion quilting and by drawing it several times over, that routine settles into our brain before we begin quilting.
  2. While doodling the design and then while quilting, think, or say, the pattern you are moving in to keep you on track.  For example, Up, Down, Over, Up, Down, Over – or whatever works.  When Dorie maps out a path in the book, she sets this up for the quilter. As a beginner quilter at best, this was pretty helpful.  Seems so simple, but that little mantra was kinda cool. 🙂
  3. Don’t try to quilt the whole design in one pass.  Dorie layers the design so you might do one pass, the come back and add a layer to add another detail.  I get this and think, eventually, it will be helpful to me.  I am not quite there yet.  Some of the designs she illustrates for the reader are quite complex. She does use different colors so you know which pass you are working on each time. Also, she numbers the path so you can see what direction she is taking you in. This is quite helpful.

Note the complexity of the design, stitched in several passes.

The method used in this book is based on grids.  The perfect example is basic patchwork, or nine patch blocks, where there is an obvious grid.  The more experienced quilter would be able to apply it to more complicated blocks.

I didn’t have a quilt top on hand that would work for this so I didn’t actually quilt anything.  I did do some drawing to get that path ingrained into my brain though.  After drawing a bit, I made a quilt sandwich with some scraps of fabric and batting.  I drew a 3″ grid on it to practice.  Once I got going, my sewing machine gave me fits.   So, I had to quit and I took the machine in for service.  I have been putting it off and now it was sending me very clear messages that it wasn’t going to perform well! But ugly as the stitching was, the idea worked – I knew how to move along the design without getting stuck in a corner somewhere.  This methodology requires planning though.  It isn’t one where you move freely around on the quilt top, filling in sections as you go along.

If I were asked, I would tell the readers this is probably a book for an intermediate quilter. I think I could follow it for the basic design and travel flow but I don’t think, as a beginner, I could layer the designs and achieve a nice result.

Overall, I enjoyed the book and think it is a valuable resource for my library.  As I continue to practice, this will be very helpful.  Dorie and C& T Publishing have generously provided a book for me to giveaway to a lucky reader.  If the winner lives in the US, a hard copy will be sent.  For winners outside of the US, an Ebook will be provided. For those of you that want to go ahead and purchase the book, it is available through C&T Pubs or directly from Dorie’s website (she will send an autographed copy!)

To enter to win, please leave a comment on this post.  If you follow me on Instagram or Facebook, you are welcome to leave a 2nd comment for another entry.  Sign up for my newsletter (which is sent out every month) for another entry.  (Sign up form is at the top of the page on the right side.)  That is three possible chances to win!!

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.

For even more chances, please visit the other bloggers involved in this hop.  Lots of gorgeous quilting has been done to display all this book offers. Go check it out!  Here is the schedule:

BLOG HOP SCHEDULE

Friday September 1st

C&T Publishing Blog@ctpublishing on Instagram

Monday September 4th

Holly Anne Knight Blog@stringandstory on Instagram

Susan Arnold Blog@quiltfabrication on Instagram

Tuesday September 5th

Becca Fenstermaker Blog@prettypiney on Instagram

Teri Lucas Blog@genqmag on Instagram

Wednesday September 6th

Sherry Shish Blog@poweredbyquilting on Instagram

Pam Morgan Blog@sweetlittlestitches on Instagram

Thursday September 7th

Katy S Blog@katyquilts on Instagram

Laura Piland Blog@sliceofpiquilts on Instagram

Friday September 8th

Suzy Webster Blog@websterquilt on Instagram

Bernie Kringel Blog@needleandfoot on Instagram  — You’re here!!!

Monday September 11th

Jamie Mueller Blog@sunflower_quilt on Instagram

Nancy Scott Blog@masterpiecequilting on Instagram

Tuesday September 12th

Sherri Noel Blog@rebeccamaedesigns on Instagram

Anorina Morris Blog@sameliasmum on Instagram

Wednesday September 13th

Yvonne Fuchs Blog@quiltingjetgirl on Instagram

Barbie Mills Blog@thequiltingmill on Instagram

Thursday September 14th

Afton Warrick Blog@quiltingmod on Instagram

Kathy Bruckman Blog@kathyskwiltsandmore on Instagram

Friday September 15th

Susan Arnold Blog@quiltfabrication on Instagram

Dorie Hruska Blog@foreverquilting on Instagram