WIP Wednesday

It seems that I always have at least 3 projects going at a time.  Usually more.  Here's a look at what I have in progress this week.

First up, I finished the January portion of The New Hexagon Millefiore quilt-along.  Whew.  It measures about 36" across.  It's been fun so far, and great to have a project that I can work on practically anywhere.  Now that I'm waiting for the February block instructions to be released, I don't quite know what to do with myself while waiting at piano lessons and wrestling practice.

I'm also working on this tiny quilt.  It's the first true mini quilt that I've made, and it's for my local quilt guild's mini quilt auction in March.  The guild raises money for scholarships each year.  I decided to torture myself with 1" blocks.  Some of them are made up of two half-square triangles.  Eek.  It's turning out well, and all that's left is binding. If I finish it up this week, I'll share more about it on Friday!

I initially wanted to quilt in a rainbow of colored thread.  But I couldn't get the thread tension quite right for some reason, and the stitching on the back was not good.  Oh well.

The back, with quilting complete

I'm also still working on a new quilt for my bed.  I started it in September and meant to finish it up this month.  Oops.  Not gonna happen.  It includes gorgeous fabric from the Indelible collection by Art Gallery Fabrics.  And it's all straight lines.  You'd think I would be able to zip right through it, but I keep getting distracted by other ideas.  More on that next week!

The New Hexagon Millefiore Quilt-Along

It's been quite awhile since I've blogged, mainly because I've been busy sewing things for my shop.  Now that the holidays are over, I'm taking a break to work on some projects for myself.  I use Instagram on a daily basis, for ideas and inspiration.  I've been admiring some pics of Millefiori-style quilts for months.  These quilts are meant to represent Italian glasswork that has a kaleidoscope effect.  They are also sewn ENTIRELY by hand.  Yikes.  If you know me, you've probably heard me say how much I dread hand-sewing.  If you follow me on Instagram, you've probably also noticed my obsession with the gorgeous, modern prints from new fabric company Cotton + Steel.  I just want to buy it all up and use it for everything.  I've probably become one of Hawthorne Threads' best customers.

Thanks to Instagram, I stumbled upon The New Hexagon Millefiore Quilt-Along.  Created by Katja Marek, author of The New Hexagon, it's a Millefiore-style quilt composed of English paper pieced hexagons.  I thought this might be my only chance to actually complete a quilt like this, one portion a month.  And since I am using only fabrics that I absolutely love from Cotton + Steel, I have a great motivation to work on it.

Just a small portion of my fabric selections!

PaperPieces.com is putting together packs of the correct shapes for each rosette (what they are calling each monthly section of the quilt).  You can also copy them out of The New Hexagon  and then cut them all out yourself, but it's SO worth it to have someone do that all for me.

Here are some pics of my progress this month. January has the largest rosette of all the months, and it was a bit overwhelming at first to think that I might not finish before February!  But it's now looking like I will be done within the next few days.  Katja suggests the glue-basting method, which is a huge time-saver.

I have been loving this portable project more than I thought possible.  I sew every evening while watching TV, bring it to my son's wrestling practice, and even to my daughter's piano lessons.  There is a fabulous group on Facebook (with over 1000 participants!) where others are showing their progress.  It's an open group--stop on by and browse through the amazing photos, and remember that most people are doing this entirely by hand.  Wow.

Cathedral Window Quilt: Complete!

It's finished!!  I know I got a bit behind on posting each of my blocks in the Cathedral Window Sampler Quilt-along.  You can see the detail on each individual block here in my flickr set.  I love how this came out so much that I decided to take it to one of my favorite spots for a little photo shoot.  I made this for my own living room, with fabrics from Fly a Kite and Outfoxed.  I used Maureen Cracknell Handmade's quilt-as-you go method, so when the quilt along was over all I had to do was sew my blocks together.

I added a cathedral window block of my own, based around a little cathedral window I already had waiting in my stash for just the right project.  Then I added two plain 12.5" squares of fabric to make a 3x4 quilt.  And I even remembered to add a label.

The backing is from Loulouthi by Anna Maria Horner.  I had it in my stash, and it happened to go perfectly.  I used the "self-binding" technique for the backing for the first time.  Basically, I trimmed the backing to 1.5" larger than the quilt (after quilting the backing fabric to the rest of the quilt) and then folded the raw edge of the backing in to meet the raw edge of the front.  Then I pressed the folded edge over the front and machine stitched all the way around.  Voila!  No hand sewing involved.  In the whole quilt.  Hooray for that!!

Here's a little better look at the quilting on the front...although the bright sunshine this morning makes some of it hard to see.

Perfect for a cold Alaskan morning at the beach!  And since the sand is frozen, it didn't even get dirty.

Cathedral WIndow Quilt Along, Block 1

Now that I have gotten in the groove of having the kids back in school and the hubby away, it's time to start working on some projects for myself.  I have a rough plan in mind for a new quilt for my bed based on the Uneven Coins block in the book Block Party. I have a whole stack of Indie, plus yards of navy solid to use with it.  I just need to make myself cut into it and get started.

I spotted this Cathedral Window quilt-a-long last week and thought maybe I'd use it to make some pillows to go with my quilt.  I like "a-longs" because I usually learn new techniques and make something I otherwise wouldn't.  Today was Block 1, a layered cathedral window from Sara at Sew Sweetness.  I love her choice of fabrics, as usual.  I also really like the look of the finished block.  But when I realized how much fabric goes into one 12" block (almost half a yard, really), I put away my special quilt stash and pulled out some things from the back of my fabric drawer to use first.  I paid attention to my print directions and order of assembly to make the design of the block stand out more than it does in Sara's scrappy version.  I really like the end result.  However, there are 5 layers of fabric in most spots on the block. That means you sew through 10 layers to join the four squares together.  I felt like I should have pulled out my walking foot.  I can't imagine making a quilt using this block.  It would be very heavy.  It would make a great pillow, though, which is what mine may become.  Eventually.

I'm looking forward to the next block on Thursday, and will probably use the same fabrics as long as I have enough of them.  In the end maybe I'll go back and choose my favorite blocks to go with my quilt.   That I still need to start.  Hmph.