Tag Archives: malka dubrawsky

One down, Two to go!

One down, two to go! In my last post I outlined some goals I have for my quilting in 2015. One of which was to finish my three UFO’s before starting a new quilt. So here is the first one, the Aurifil Designer 2014 BOM quilt. You might remember that I only made nine of the Aurifil blocks and then did three blocks of my choosing.

The back (shown here by my lovely quilt model) is a sweet blue polka dot, one of Riley Blake’s La Creme line.

Technically I am calling this a 2014 finish because all I did yesterday was to sew the back of the binding on, the bulk of it was made in 2014. So bright and happy.

You might remember that I only made nine of the Aurifil blocks and then did three blocks of my choosing. To quilt it, I used my walking foot and outlined various shapes within each block. Also I quilted a 1/4″ line inside of each side of the sashing. I ended up using three different thread colors on the top, white, orange and a light gray. I kept white in the bobbin for all three colors though.

We we spent the New Year’s holiday at the Downieville house. Remember, the tiny bungalow we bought after I saw it during a Quilt Retreat weekend up here? Ray has been coming up about every other weekend to work on it. Julia and I have come a couple of times to clean. This weekend Ray made great progress on replacing a large amount of the (very old and unsafe) knob and tube wiring. Lots of this was done from the attic which is sort of unpleasant considering all the dust and insulation up there. Yuk. Julia pulled nails from the exposed studs in the bedroom. She also did some mopping. What a trooper. I sanded a few shelves in the kitchen cabinets and scrubbed down a bedroom that is technically in the basement but is actually one of the more normal rooms in this house. We are definitely making progress.

i think my next project will be to sash the blocks for the RSC2014 challenge. I am setting the finish of this quilt as my goaI for January. I am linking up with Sew Bittersweet Designs ALYOF (A Lovely Year of Finishes) which is a fun challenge for quilters to set a goal or two each month. It is a good way to keep organized and be sure to finish what you set out to do. I will link my goal(s) at the beginning of the month on her site and then report in at the end of the month.

I also plan to participate in RSC2015 as well (as always, this is sponsored by Angela at So Scrappy). This year I am going to follow along with a row quilt BOM that Mari is doing over at her blog, Academic Quilter. She will be posting the block for the first row on Tuesday of next week. I am very much looking forward to see what her plan is. (Completing the January row is another goal for ALOYF). I appreciate that Mari has taken the time to sketch the rows out and do the math for the blocks as that takes time. Since she did it, I don’t have to! It will be fun to work through this with her. If you are interested in using up some scraps, I expect this to be a great project!

Linking to Crazy Mom Quilts. If you haven’t read her post today, please do. It inspired me to see all that she accomplished in 2014. Wow!! ALso linking to Sew Bittersweet Designs ALOYF.

Making it my own

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This week I finished the quilt top for the Aurifil 2014 BOM. Kind of strange since this is only November and the Aurifil December block hasn’t even been released yet. Allow me to explain…. (or as Ricky Ricardo would have said, I ‘have some splaining to do’. How about that for dating myself.)

In June I discovered the Aurifil block of the month and decided to go for it even though I was already half way through the year. I quickly made the blocks for January through June. I had a pile of wonderfully bright fabric by Malka Dubrawsky, “A Stitch in Color”, that I wanted to use. (I did need to supplement with a few additional fabrics.) I posted about this a while back which you can read here if you want. With the first 6 or 7 blocks, I was really happy with the look that was coming go together. There were a few issues though. First of all, and this may be my naivete showing through, but the blocks varied in size. Some of the original designs were sized for a 12″ block and others were designed to be 12.5″ blocks. What is that all about? I kept thinking it was my error but no, that is how the designs were. I think the blocks should all be the same, strange isn’t it? Also, as new blocks were released (in September and October) I kept looking at them and playing with the fabric, trying to figure out how to piece them. It wasn’t working well at all. The blocks were fussy with little pieces. This fabric is bold and high volume – big prints running throughout. It just didn’t look good. I kept setting the project aside and working on something else. (Like procrastinating would magically fix the problem.) But then……

I had an epiphany! Just because I started this project with the Aurifil blocks, I didn’t have to finish it that way. Yikes, this was a huge revelation for me. You wouldn’t know this, but I am a rule follower; I don’t veer off the path very often. I started the Aurifil BOM, therefore it should be finished with the Aurifil blocks, like the Aurifil police would come and confiscate my quilt. Not so. I decided these fabrics really only look good (to me anyway, and it’s my project, right??) in a big, chunky looking block. I decided to finish the quilt with blocks of my choosing. I’m such a rebel.

During this same time, I found out about the app called BlockFab-HD. If you are an iPad user and haven’t tried this, it is wonderful! There are most of the commonly used blocks in the library. The user can determine the size and quantity of the block and the app will tell you the size of the pieces and the yardage. It may not be EQ7, but it’s FREE! Works for me. You can put in different colorways and can look at the blocks tiled, sashed or separated with solid blocks. Yes, it is limited but it suits my needs for now.

FIrst I chose to make a pinwheel block.

Then I made a plus block.

Finally, I did a square in square block. (I like this one quite a bit!)

My biggest challenge in assembling the quilt top was dealing with the variance between the 12 and 12.5″ blocks. I couldn’t cut down the 12.5″ blocks or I would lose the points and ruin the block. I ended up sashing all of them with white. Sashing hides a multitude of problems and it worked for me with this project. I had to cut the sashing wider for the 12″ blocks so everything doesn’t line up perfectly. It isn’t very noticeable though. Look at the second and fourth rows – they have wider sashing between the blocks. I bordered it with the solid orange fabric to frame everything. Here is the resulting quilt top:

My borders are ruffling which is a pain. I will need to work on them before I quilt this. I haven’t selected a fabric for the back yet, but for the binding I plan to piece it with the leftovers. I think that will be so cute against the orange.

Lots of learning from this one, to be sure. For me though, that is what it is all about. Learn something from each project and improve. I am so happy with the overall look of this. It is vivid and happy as well as being wayyy outside of my usual work.

Looking forward to this weekend. My son will be home for a visit. It rained the last day or so and the air is fresh. Yay!! Hope you all enjoy your weekend and get to enjoy some time at your machine.

Linking to Freemotion by the River, Needle and Thread Thursday, Let’s Bee Social, Crazy Mom Quilts, & TGIFF. As always, links to each of these sites are listed at the top of the page under Link Ups.

Comments are always appreciated and inspiring. I will answer them all. 🙂

Aurifil Block of the Month

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I have never taken part in an on-line bee or a block of the month quilt activity. Not for any real reason, it just hasn’t happened. Well, I decided to join up and do one. I follow Amy Smart’s blog, Diaryofaquilter, avidly. I love her style and her genuine speak. She has wonderful tutorials. When I first got started quilting I stumbled on to her website and I never left. My first few projects were items made from her tutorials.

Like this tabletopper:

Valentine Table Topper
(Amy Smart Tutorial)
February, 2014

and this little table runner:

Pinwheel Tablerunner
April, 2013

If you are new to quilting or want info on the basics, I cannot recommend her enough!

Anyway…. lately Amy has written some posts about the Block of the Month activity sponsored by Aurifil Thread. They are featuring various designers each month and along with an interview of that designer, they post the block that the designer created for this activity.Amy is one of the designers that was featured and interviewed by Pat Sloan. You can read about it here and here and here. The more I read about it, the more I saw the look of the different blocks, the more I wanted to do it. Really, by making one 12 1/2″ block per month, you’ll end up with a quilt at the end of the year. What’s better than that? It doesn’t really get in the way of other projects that are in progress. It all started back in January so I am a wee bit late to the party. But, better late than never! This week I got everything together and started. I chose to use a collection of fabric called Stitch in Color, designed by Malka Dubrawsky for Moda. I saw pieces of this on clearance (the line came out in 2012) during a shop hop I did earlier this year and snatched them up. I love the bright colors. Plus it is wayyy out of my norm for colors and value. Much bolder than what I usually choose. I supplemented the set with a solid white and solid orange, as well as the blue stripes and dragonfly fabric. I don’t think I have enough of Malka’s line to do all twelve blocks and really, I wanted some solids in there.

What do you think??

I have finished four of the blocks so far. The thing that pleases me most is that my triangles worked well and my points line up!! Yay – that is something I have been working on. These blocks were a great place to practice. It provides the opportunity to make blocks that are different and it is kind of fun to make something where you don’t know what the finished result will be (since you don’t see all of the blocks at once). I look forward to placing the blocks come December!

See??

I love how this is coming together. The colors match absolutely nothing in my house but I am keeping this one anyway. It is going to be so bright and spirited. Just in case anyone out there decides to join up, I will tell you that the March block, called Borders (upper left block) was designed to by 12 x 12. The rest of the blocks are 12 1/2″ square. So I will have to modify it and add a 1/2″ border to it so it fits with the rest. Luckily it is an easy one to fix! If you participate, post pictures of your blocks to the Aurifil Flickr site. They are randomly picking one participant per month and sending a box of Aurifil thread. Ahhh…. love that stuff and it is spendy. I can only hope – pick me, pick me!

If you are making blocks, leave me a comment and a link so I can see yours!!

Linking up to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced as well as Let’s Bee Social at Sew Fresh Quilts. Also linking to Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation.