Sunday 23 April 2017

On Guard For Thee

Quilter's Connection is a magazine for Canadian Quilters. I don't subscribe, by the way, but I did decide to take part in their Canada Eh? Mystery Table Runner Contest. I'm still waiting for them to post the results, but the above picture is my entry. This is the very first time I've taken part in a mystery quilt. You may remember the mystery crochet along that I took part in, and quit only part way in because I was not happy with the results. But as this was just a table runner I figured I could give it a shot. 
When I chose fabrics for this project, I assumed most people would be using whites and reds, the colours in Canada's flag. I wanted something a little more unique, but wasn't sure what. I looked at various fabrics at my LQS, and finally settled on a red and black combination. This is the colour combination of the poppies we wear for Remembrance Day.  
Without the valour, courage, honour and bravery of our veterans, we might not have a Canada to celebrate. Therefore, I chose to honour those who served as well as celebrate our country with this table runner, especially since 2017 is also the 100th anniversary of Vimy Ridge. 
The backing is a floral print, reminiscent of poppies.
As far as I'm concerned the "pièce de résistance" is the pantograph I used to quilt this table runner. It's called From the Heart, and quilts the words, "honor, courage, valor, bravery" into the runner. (Unfortunately, this made in the USA pantograph leaves out the 'u' in honour and valour). It was a bit of a challenge to quilt, however, as when following a pantograph, you work right to left, so I was quilting the words "backwards." I had to just think of them as quilting patterns, not words. 
This will make a great pantograph for a QOV.
I named my table runner, "On Guard for Thee," which is a line from our national anthem, for those of you who are unaware. 
When I tried to submit my entry, the website was undergoing revision (or whatever). It seemed like a rather unfortunate decision to update their website on the weekend that the submissions were due. So, I just emailed my entry to the email address on the page that announced their website reconstruction, hoping it would get to the right place... I guess I'll just have to wait and see. 

Someone once said that colours in cell phone pictures are not as true as those taken with a camera. Until this table runner, I hadn't really noticed. The very first picture in this post was taken with my digital camera. It's having issues and I either need to get it repaired or replaced, so I've mostly been using my cell phone. But you'll notice that in the other pictures, the red looks a little pinkish. In the full runner picture immediately above, I did increase the exposure as it was quite dark, but the black flowers on the red fabric look more like dark pink. I didn't make any adjustments to the picture of the background fabric, but the darker flowers, which are actually red look more like a dark coral in the picture. I guess I'd better invest in a new camera if I want my pictures to have true colours. 

Stars All Around


Back in 2013, I picked up 14 quilting rulers at an antique mall. You can read about it in Shopping Trip: Shoes, Fabric, Books and 14 Quilting Rulers! I'm not sure why they were at an antique mall. They certainly aren't antiques. I suppose they might be considered collectables to us quilters. 😉 But I'm not complaining - I got them for very good prices!
Since then I have determined to use each ruler in at least one quilt. To this end, I have searched for books, or at least instructions, for using each of these rulers. 
This is the book I found for using with the BiRangle ruler: It's got some beautiful patterns. I chose to use Stars All Around to create a quilt for one of my newest great nephews. The original pattern was a square, so I enlarged it to make it a more appropriate size. I had picked up a fabric bundle in blues at a Creative Stitches Show, but ended up switching up some of the fabrics. 
The instructions in the book have you cut bias strips, according to the angle on the ruler, stitching the strips together, alternating fabrics, 
then cutting these into strips, 
and finally cutting these strips into individual rectangles using the BiRangle ruler. 
It's a bit of a fiddley quilt, and that's probably why I put it aside to work on other projects, 
Work in progress on my design wall
but it's finally finished, now that Aiden's a year old.
Here's the backing fabric I used: 

It's a Boy Scout fabric from Timeless Treasures. 
I used a pantograph called Shooting Stars for the quilting and did it at my LQS with a variegated red, cream and blue King Tut thread. Unfortunately, the only machine there that can accomodate pantographs is an older Handi Quilter that is not stitch-regulated. Even though I increased the stitching speed to 100%, I still ended up with BIG stitches.
And the machine tends to drift, so the quilting is not as neat. I'm not sure what's causing that. I know how to quilt on a longarm, but I don't know all of the different adjustments that can be made, so I don't know how to fix this. But it does need to be fixed somehow. I don't think I'll quilt there again unless I plan on doing free motion on the Tin Lizzie. 
And the bad news is it's snowing again today. 
Really??? Where is spring?

Sunday 16 April 2017

The Bluenose II Pixel Quilt - Finally Finished

Dear Cindy,

      
       Now that your quilt is finally finished and on its way to you, I decided to tell you its full story.
       Since you love the ocean and your favourite colour was blue (that was before you told me that you now prefer the jewel tones), I decided to make you a quilt with a nautical theme, and I started collecting blue fabrics (which I didn't end up using since they were print and I needed solids for this quilt). There are a number of quilt block names that are related to the ocean, and I figured I would likely pick one of these. But I was letting it percolate in my mind for awhile.
       Meanwhile I enrolled in an online quilting class called Pictures to Pixel Quilts. The quilt for the class was a picture of the instructor's eye. Boring. So I started looking around for ideas. In Microsoft Paint, I pixelated a hydrangea photo that I took at Muttart Conservatory. But I wasn't sure if I wanted to try making a quilt out of that either. It was a pretty tedious job trying to calculate the colours...
       One day I was perusing the latest issue of Canadian History while I was home on my lunch break. It had an article on the Bluenose II, and I had a sudden lightbulb moment. That was it - I would do a pixel quilt of the Bluenose II. Perfect! You love the ocean, you love Canadian history and you live in Nova Scotia - what could be better? I had no idea what I had gotten myself into.
       In the pixel quilt course, we were introduced to Pic 2 Pat, an online website that converts photos into cross-stitch patterns. Then I had to find a decent picture of the Bluenose II, and upload it to the sight. I had to play around quite a bit to get it the right size. Initially, I was going to make the whole quilt a pixelated picture. But I decided that was a little overwhelming and settled on just the bed top. More or less. It was challenging to get the size right and I settled for what would approximately cover the bed top. I also had to determine the number of squares and colours. The more squares and colours, the more detail in the picture, but also the more challenging. And I ended up settling on 1-inch squares and 77 colours.
       The pattern gave the colour requirements in DMC floss. But I was using fabric not floss. So, somehow I had to convert it. I bought a DMC floss colour card and a Kona cotton colour card. Kona is one of the best known lines of solid-coloured fabric in the quilting world.
DMC Floss Colour Card

Unfortunately, the floss card only had pictures of the floss, not actual samples.
Kona Cotton Colour Card
And the Kona card only had 1-inch samples of fabric. That made it very difficult to compare colours. So my buddy, Phil, who works in a sign shop and knows his colours, and I went to Michael's to compare actual floss with the Kona Colour Card. And I duly noted down our selections. I had also picked up some solid blue fabrics in Ontario at the Aylmer Sales Arena, so they too had to fit into the colour scheme. And Michael's didn't have all of the floss colours either, so I had to do my best with comparing the two colour cards. Unfortunately, there are more floss colours than there are fabric colours, so some fabrics had to stand in for more than one floss colour. I ended up with 66 colours, 41 of which were shades of blue. Did you know that there were even that many different shades of blue? Wow!
I have to pause for a minute and give credit to my pal, Phil. How many men do you know that would have that kind of patience? So, you owe some thanks to him for his part in the colour selection.
But the fun had just begun, because I still had to calculate fabric requirements. The pixel part of this quilt is 63" x 72". That means 4,536 one-inch squares. So, I had to count symbols on the pattern to determine how many I needed of each symbol, which would translate into each colour of fabric. Now, of course, on the pattern, these squares were smaller than 1/8". So, I had lots of fun trying to count those miniscule symbols, some of which look very much alike. Then I had to calculate how many 1-1/2" squares (with seam allowance) I could fit into different measurements of fabric. I actually created a spreadsheet in Excel, indicating the DMC colour number and name with the corresponding Kona colour number and name, and the number of squares I would need of each colour. 
Pattern and Excel Spreadsheet
In addition to the fabric I bought in Ontario, I ended up ordering from three different vendors, because no one vendor had all of the colours I needed. I ordered some charm squares (5" squares of fabric, which would yield nine 1-1/2" squares), fat quarters (an 18x22" piece of fabric), half yards and yardage. And when they all finally arrived, I labelled each piece of fabric with the corresponding DMC floss number and arranged them all in numerical order. However, as I progressed through the quilt, it was very difficult to keep them that way, especially the ones that represented more than one floss colour number.
I also had to decide what to do for borders and backing. I found a boat fabric on eBay, but miscalculated somehow and didn't order enough.
Fortunately, it was still available and I ordered the rest of what I needed.
       For the borders, I decided to alternate an underwater fabric with seashells on the sand fabric,
and use a different nautical themed block for each corner. In those, I hoped to add the jewel tones that you like, and bring out some of the colours from the border fabrics.
Lighthouse Tower
Storm At Sea
Sailor's Delight
Ocean Waves
But back to the pixel part of the quilt - rather than do the large areas of the same colour in individual 1" squares, I chose to do it as larger pieces of fabric. Otherwise, you'd probably still be waiting. I realized, however, that when sewing rectangles together that went every which way, the seams didn't always line up and I had to chose to do only one row of squares at a time - not 2 rows by 4 columns or 3 rows by 3 columns. I put the main fabrics I was working with into bins on my cutting table and labelled each bin with the floss number and symbol. I chose to work in mostly 10" blocks. Once I got to the more challenging parts, I decided to draw a couple of 10x10 grids on my design wall (which is just a vinyl flannel-backed tablecloth with the flannel side out) to keep track of which square of fabric went where. I also discovered that I couldn't work on this quilt if I was feeling tired. I had to be mentally alert to keep the colours in order.
The quilt was about 3/4 finished when I decided that I really needed to get the sewing room renovations done. My design wall with the current squares I was working with came down off the wall, and everything was put away wherever I could find room. That ended up being quite a long quilting hiatus. It's very challenging trying to do renovations while working full time, and I finally hired help. Meanwhile Sophia and Damian moved in, and, since Grandma is Damian's favourite playmate, I still didn't get back to your quilt right away. To be perfectly frank, it was tedious and hard to keep motivated.
Last fall, I determined to get back at it and finally finished the quilt top. All that was left was the quilting and binding. Unfortunately, I had that aborted attempt at Central Sewing Machines, where it seemed everything went wrong. My time is limited for when I can get into the Longarm studio to quilt, but over the Christmas/New Year's season, my favourite - but most expensive - quilting studio had a half price sale and I booked 6 hours on the first available date that I had off and they had time available. That was April 7th. And I switched threads. I didn't think the Aurilux thread (on the right) was blue enough - it's more teal/aqua than blue, so I bought a variegated Artistry thread (on the left).
I figured 6 hours would be ample for this quilt, and hoped I might even get a chance to do another, smaller quilt. Ha! Fortunately no one else was booked for the Longarm machine after me as I used a fairly dense quilting pattern (Wave Upon Wave)
and it ended up taking me 7 hours. And my feet were killing me afterwards. But I was so happy to finally have it done. All that was left was the trimming and the binding, which was also lots of "fun" maneuvering all of that bulky, heavy quilt.
And, as I said, it is heavy - the parcel weighed over 3.3 kg. You'll also find it stiff initially, until it's been washed at least once.
Up close, a pixel quilt looks just like a random bunch of squares of different coloured fabric. The farther away you get, the better it looks. That's why I took pictures in the garage (it was snowing/raining so I couldn't take them outside).
Enjoy your quilt. I will likely never make another like it.
With lots of love,
Laura
By the way, I have since found a website that makes actual pixel quilt patterns, and calculates the yardage and colours for you. Oh, how much time I could have saved if YouPatch had been available when I first started designing this quilt!

Other posts about the Bluenose II Pixel Quilt:




Wednesday 5 April 2017

Train Cardigan for My Grandson

Woohoo! It's finally finished.
I don't even remember how long ago I started it. I got the left front finished and then stalled there for awhile, then got to just below the train on the right front done and stalled for even longer. But, through sheer persistence, I am finally finished.

It's a size 4, and my grandson is already 4-1/2 years old, so I was afraid he would outgrow it before I got it finished. However, there's still lots of room to grow in it.
The original pattern called for a white background, but Damian's favourite colour is orange. And orange is a more practical colour than white for a little boy. The two train cars on the back were supposed to be the same colour, which I thought was boring, so I changed that as well.
By the way, my grandson has a headstart on Donald Trump when it comes to wall-building.

Two Quilts Find a Home

I don't always know who the recipient will be when I'm constructing a quilt. Yes, for many of the quilts I make I have a definite recipient in mind. But sometimes I'm making it for a quilt challenge, a quilt-along or a block of the month, or just because I like the pattern and/or fabric. Or sometimes I plan on it being for me, until I find out it's the perfect quilt for someone else. That happened with Wild Mustangs of the Painted Desert.
I really loved the fabric I was using in this quilt. But then horse-loving friends were moving to a different province and I knew this quilt must be theirs as a farewell gift. 
Scrappy Shine was a different matter altogether.
I had a definite recipient in mind - the adopted daughter of one of my nephews. Unfortunately, the adoption fell through and Scrappy Shine was "homeless." The next children of my nephews were boys, and with it's pink binding, I really didn't think this quilt was appropriate. And I resolved to make neutral baby quilts from then on unless I definitely knew the gender. Meanwhile, Scrappy Shine languished, unclaimed for over 2 years. But then - serendipity - the wife of another nephew gave birth to a beautiful little girl. And Scrappy Shine is now on its way to Andrea Jane. 
You'll notice I used this quilt as the background for the slogan at the top of my post. I don't think it's that catchy, but it is how I feel. A girl can only wear a dress for so long before she outgrows it. And then it gets handed down or sold in a yard sale or donated to a thrift store. But I try to make my "baby" quilts with fabric that isn't too baby-ish and make them big enough so that they can be used throughout childhood. And then, if good care has been taken of them, they can be stored and passed down to the next generation. Of if they've been enjoyed until they are rags, then that's good, too. 
And then there's Stars Over Africa.
I made this as my entry in last year's Johnson's Sewing Centre/Quilter's Dream Quilt Challenge. And I won second place - A $150 store credit! But who to give it to, I didn't know. If I owned a castle instead of a bungalow, I might have space to keep all of the quilts I make. But I don't. I offered it to another nephew (yes, I have quite a few of those) as a housewarming gift, but he doesn't like green and opted for a red, white, blue and black quilt, that isn't quilted yet. 
I don't remember what it's called. You'll have to wait until I quilt it and blog about it, and hopefully I'll find the book that it's in, in the meantime. 
So what to do with Stars Over Africa? I liked it, and it was kind of a nice idea to keep it since it was my first big win. Yes, I've won a few firsts in the local fairs, but those are local, small town fairs. This was Edmonton! And I wasn't able to enter this year. I wavered back and forth. And tried to listen to the Holy Spirit's guidance. After all, my talents and abilities are because of His blessings, so I try to find out who He wants the quilt to go to. And tonight I dropped it off at a retired pastor's place, for him and his wife. He's had some very serious health - and other - challenges in the past year or so. And God knew he and his wife needed a "hug." That's what I consider my quilts - hugs from God, a tangible reminder of God's great love for the recipient. 
So, two less quilts in my house - that means more room for fabric.