Tag Archives: fusible applique

Weekly Planning

18 Replies

Last week I hosted To-Do Tuesday for Christine at Stitch All the Things. This was good for me as it gave me a reason to organize my thoughts and make a plan for what I would accomplish that week. List making tends to keep me on task and it worked well last week. I didn’t put very much on the list because my first priority was to finish up the vintage quilt for my guest bed. That took a bit of time but I did finish it. I also finished item two, cut out the second Washi dress I wanted to make and number three, select a book for the Fall Book Share (which I am loving and will tell you about soon). Done and done!

This week, I have ambitious plans.

  1. Finish painting the deck railings for the upper deck of our house. The caps on the railings are forever exposed to cold winters and very warm summers. The wood is constantly contracting and expanding so the paint doesn’t hold well.  I am currently scraping, priming and painting them. Just the caps though. Not each picket because that would take about 907 years and I don’t have the patience. This is an early morning job though because it gets really warm out there after about 10:00 am.
  2. Continue working on my Mighty Lucky Quilting Club challenge for July. This month the challenge was developed by Cheryl Arkinson who is a very talented quilter. I am enjoying this month’s challenge. To be honest, I have been really disappointed with most of the previous month’s challenges. But this one is fun. She talks about creating with only one fabric, using a directional print or large focus fabric. Here is where I am so far.IMG_6836If you follow me on Instagram, you might have seen a post about this. I love where it is headed. Putting all of these blocks together creates an effect that is almost dizzying. Remember the vintage pink striped pillow cases from two weeks ago? This is the same fabric and I will make a throw pillow with this. A modern project to put on my vintage bed. I think it will finish at 21″ square – I can’t remember for sure. My quandry is the same as usual, how do I quilt this? I am at a loss. I want to retain the effect of the stripes, but how? I would really appreciate ideas on this one.
  3. Finish and take photos of the second Washi dress – I’m almost there.
  4. Prep a project for hand stitching. We are going to spend a few days on the coast soon and I want to have something to bring along. I started last night. Remember the Row By Row project I bought in Maine? The two outer blocks are traditional log cabin and I have those about half way there. The center block is a wool applique and I want to work on it during our trip. All that I need to do is finish cutting the shapes and fusing them in place.
    IMG_6835

5. Finally, if there is time, and there might not be, I picked the fabrics for the quilt I am going to make for my nephew’s wedding gift. I didn’t have all of the solids that I need so I took advantage of a sale over at Green Fairy Quilts, Judi Madsen’s online shop, and ordered some Kona solids. But I definitely have enough here to start cutting. It is all set up on the dining room table so I can do a bit of cutting here and there. I am pretty excited about this project. This is the first one that I designed myself, using the Quiltography app. (If you are unfamiliar, see this post.)IMG_6839

That is more than enough for this week. Wish me luck and then tell me what is on your list. Also, if you have a second, take another look at my dizzy stripes and tell me how you would quilt it.

Linking to Let’s Bee Social and To-do Tuesday – find the links at the top of the page, under Link Ups.

Lone Pine

27 Replies

Last night I finished my Lone Pine art quilt. I am so glad I resurrected this UFO and finished it. Two years ago I pinned a lovely art quilt that is listed in an Etsy shop, Prairie Fiber Arts. I just loved it and I based my project on hers. Overall, I am very happy with the finish.

img_20160421_4886

The background is pieced with three different low volume fabrics that exude winter. Once the background was pieced I added both the red and brown borders. I wanted to be able to let the boughs from the tree extend into the border. I fused some stabilizer to the back before I started any applique. Because I wasn’t exactly sure where I would be fusing the applique, I applied the stabilizer to the entire back side. You can see on the below picture that somehow I bubbled part of the background. Once I removed the stabilizer it all smoothed out.

img_20160415_4846

The stabilizer was problematic. It took quite a bit of time to remove it. I finally compromised and left a fair amount of it behind the tree. With the thread sketching, it was close to impossible to get all of the paper off.

Once the tree and my little cardinal were complete, I sandwiched top, batting and backing and planned my quilting. For whatever reason, I quilted the red border first and then worked the inside. I ended up with a pesky fold on the backing. It must not have been pin basted tightly enough.

img_20160421_4891

By the way, what was I thinking when I used this blue and white fabric for the backing. I know it doesn’t really matter, but every time I see the backing I wonder at my choice. Honestly, I think it was that I was so excited to quilt it that I didn’t even stop and think about the back. Yikes!

I am not going to list the negatives here.  Rather, I will celebrate what I love most about this piece.

img_20160421_4884 - Copy

I love, love, love the thread sketching on the pine boughs. To give texture and color to the tree,  I used a variegated green YLI thread.  For the branch that makes up the core of the bough, I fused teeny tiny strips of bark and then thread sketched over it tightly. Again, I used a variegated brown YLI thread. I love the texture obtained with YLI threads. I also ran stitches up and down the main trunk of the tree. (I did most of that stitching prior to adding the boughs.I am also happy with the boughs that extend over into the red. I wasn’t exactly sure how to handle this when I was quilting the ribbons on the red. I made shorter waves where I had to. Rather than turn the corner with the ribbons on the red border, I stopped and made a little snowflake in each corner and then moved back into the ribbon motif. Hard to see with the red thread but I am pleased.

img_20160421_4882

I love cardinals and we don’t get them at my house.  When we lived in State College, PA, we had many that would visit the feeder in the winter. They are such a pretty suprise. My little bird would look like any sort of bird and only by making her red did she become a cardinal. (Drawing isn’t my forte!)  On the outer border, I quilted wavy lines and did some pointy spirals to imitate the knots in a piece of wood. (Tutorial is available here from The Inbox Jaunt.)

It was an easy call to use a facing rather than a traditional binding on this project.  For those who haven’t faced a quilt yet, here is an excellent tutorial by Terry Aske. If you have not had the opportunity to look at Terry’s art quilts, please do. She is very talented!

This was so much fun. It makes me look forward to another small and satisfying project like this. The weekend is nearly here. We are supposed to have cooler days and maybe a bit of rain. Hope you all have a wonderful weekend.

Linking to Free Motion Mavericks, Finish it Up Friday, Off the Wall Friday, and Can I Get a Whoop-Whoop. All links are listed at the top of the page under link ups.