Memoire A Paris 9-Patch

Yesterday afternoon I happily took my final stitches on the first quilt of the new year. To have a finish so fast this early in the year gives me quite a boost; I feel like this year is going to be awesome with (hopefully!) lots of finishes this satisfying.

The fabric for this simple 9-patch quilt is a collection called Memoire a Paris by Lecien. I had a FQ pack of 14 prints and combined them with some plain white from my stash. If you looked at the post from a few days ago, I explained that my inspiration came from an Instagram picture. If you click back, you can find the IG link to it and compare results.

My photography skills are quite poor compared to Helen Philipps' - hers are amazing! I know nothing about proper lighting and effective editing. For example, the picture above looks a bit washed out - we had a sunny day when the picture was taken - probably had something to do with it. These next couple of pictures are from other rooms in the house, and I have tried editing; it's the best I can do.

This picture above was taken in the family room which is a good bit more shaded as it is in the back (north) side of the house. No direct sunlight and a covered porch keep this room dark.

Draped over the front room sofa on the south-facing side of the house, the sunlight is more predominant. I think this picture is the best representation of the true colors of the prints.

Okay, enough with the photography analysis. The topic at hand is this super-fast and super-easy quilt. I did all phases of it with strip-piecing methods, and did not obsess about fabric placements too much at all. I pieced the blocks in two batches so that my centers would  have variety. I thought I had made way more blocks than I would need, but as I neared the finish of the quilt top, I actually had to make 3 or 4 more blocks to finish out the final row.

I pieced the top in two sections (shown above) and then attached the two halves. It prevented me from having an unwieldy mountain of quilt parts on my sewing table. I will do this on future quilts, as it was much less effort in managing an ever-growing quilt top.

One final seam attaching the two parts, and she's done! I didn't work terribly hard to make all my intersections perfect, but I was careful from cutting to stitching and most have matched up satisfactorily. All in all, I am quite pleased with my finish.

And I say finish, but technically, it might not be. To border or not to border? That is the question.

I had no yardage of this fabric with which to make a border, so today I ordered a 3-yard pink floral from an Etsy shop. It is one of the prints in my quilt, and while it might be too pink for my taste, I will probably use it anyway, just because I think in the end it will look great. If not, then this quilt will be a borderless quilt. And I would be okay with that, too.

So, January 2019 is off to a grand start! Wouldn't it be great if I can continue this pace? With classes beginning next week, that isn't very likely, you know?

Hope your January is off to a grand start, too! Next for me: get my Christmas put away, and then re-introduce myself to that longarm machine in the basement. Ahem. I know. I have ignored it long enough. I am ready to dive in. This week, hopefully!!

Happy Quilting, Friends!

A Year's Progress on Lake Effect

Since it's the first Sunday of 2019, I thought it would be a good idea to see how far I have come this past year on my English Paper-Piecing project, Lake Effect. Here is the post from a year ago. What slow progress it seems, but when realizing where I was a whole year ago, all those slow stitching days have really added up. It's rather astounding, actually. *smiles*

In the late summer (I think), I had my pattern copied onto large paper. I didn't necessarily need it all enlarged, but in order to get my applique patterns at the correct size for transferring, this is what I did. I like that the front shows a good picture of the quilt.

This page is an example of the applique components. I will be totally challenged when I get to this phase of construction. I am entirely unprepared for how I will do it, and I seem to be forever changing my mind - raw edge? needle-turn? machine? hand? I am all over the place; however, there is still time to make decisions concerning applique while I continue with the EPP.

I have a few sections sewn together. As I said in that post from a year ago, I always work on this when I meet with the Frankfort Girls, and occasionally I pick it up here at home. Not as often as I should, sadly. Maybe I can make improvements on that this year.

I have said from the very beginning that this was going to be a 10-year project; I have reason to be optimistic - I believe I can accomplish it more quickly.

Hope you are having a lovely Sunday! I have had a marvelous day. The biggest achievement was that I finished the quilt top I was working on! I hope to blog about it tomorrow!

For now, why not have a look at Kathy's Quilts and her weekly feature, Slow Sunday Stitching! She has set 3 slow-stitching goals for the year. My single slow-stitching goal continues to be Lake Effect.

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Getting Organized?

In a few days I will celebrate yet another trip around the sun, and a goal for most of those trips has been to try to get organized. This year will be no exception. And I have a new tool that is going to finally be the magic that will help me accomplish it - the Quilter's Planner. Magic. Truly!

We shall see about that as the year unfolds. I have used planners for a few years now, with some degree of success. Isn't it pretty? The floral cover is a fabric called The Good Life by Bonnie and Camille - and yes, I have a bit of it up in the stash. Pretty stuff. Those pieces are half-yard cuts, so I have 2.5 yards.

For each month, I can have a full month view with spots to record information and commitments. The following few pages are weekly calendars that allow more detailed planning. There are places to track habits - I like this feature. I have put some inspirational quotes in to keep me centered. As far as beginnings go, I am ahead of things this year. I hope I can keep it up.

This year it is my intention to be very deliberate about recording my tasks, my appointments, sewing goals, fitness goals and whatever other important things I need to remember. I will try to zero back to this planner periodically through the year to report how I am getting along with it. For the price I paid, I better! It was not inexpensive, for sure.

I made my second batch of 9-patches made yesterday and plan to start constructing the top today. Further details and pics to come soon.

Happy Quilting, Friends!

More Memoire 9-Patches

As is normal for me, I am working on making a quilt without a pattern. I do this often, and this usually does not pose a problem for me, with the exception that I never know if I have cut enough of things or have I estimated fabric amounts accurately enough to complete the project.

Great unknows!

In the case of the current project, I believe I am going to be fine. I had a fat quarter pack of Memoire a Paris fabric and several yards of the background. I started by cutting 2 strips off each fat quarter - 14 fqs x 2 strips = 28 strips cut at 2.5 inches. Then I cut enough 2.5-inch strips of the background to make as many 9-patches as possible with those 28 floral strips. Below are the results - 38 9-patch blocks that stitched up just as easy as can be.

My plan is to set them together with alternating background blocks, and (after doing some math,) I realize I need many more 9-patches.

And to that end I have repeated the exact same cuts from all the fabrics, and will begin stitching those this afternoon. Before too long, I will have 76 9-patches, and that will likely be too many, but oh well. I am sure I will find a use for any extras.

I hope your new year is off to a rousing start! I am completely satisfied with my first project of the year, and already find myself thinking about the next one. I love starts!

Happy Quilting, Friends!

A Pretty Beginning

Way back in April of last year, I found a deal I couldn't resist on a fat quarter pack of Lecien fabric called Memoire a Paris. It is soft, feminine, dreamy and romantic.

I have petted, patted, played and auditioned it frequently in these intervening months, yet nothing really grabbed me until just this past weekend when I saw this gorgeously simple 9-patch quilt from Helen Philipps' Instagram (@helen.philipps) feed. Since I haven't figured out how to copy/paste the picture from IG, just click here to see it.

I have followed Helen's blog for a long time, and since I enjoy her beautiful blog photographs so much, I began following her on IG. More pretty pictures, you know. *wink*

The inspiration was instant, and I began straight away. I am using 2.5-inch strips to make the necessary units for fast results. I am liking the look already! And I have only completed 2 blocks! It will be so much fun to work on this in the next couple of days.

My plan is to be as random with the placement of the prints as I can be, and I am not going to obsess if two squares of the same fabric happen to end up in one block. As the quilt will be covering a bed, this will be insignificant in the grand scheme of things. I may only get one or two more blocks made today, and tomorrow is booked, so maybe on Friday I can get a whole stack of blocks made.

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Happy New Year!

Welcome 2019!

It seems not so very long ago that we celebrated the last new year, and here we are already, celebrating yet another. Gee whiz, time sure flies when you're having fun, right? *grin*

I follow an entertaining antiques collector on Instagram - @jesselauzon. (I highly recommend you go look him up!) He writes the greatest posts, and today's is no exception. Here is a snippet that resonates with me: …"I can't come up with a resolution that I don't want to break already..." I fear I lean that way, too, but doggone it, I make resolutions every year as if my life depends on it! I prefer to call them goals, as opposed to resolutions. I can't explain the difference, but I am sure there is one. *wink*

One goal for me this year is to do better than last with blogging. That should be easy, because I was pretty bad this past year. I need to get my mojo back! I think it all rides on being super busy with sewing projects, and this past year found me with fewer projects which led to fewer posts. I gotta' work on this!!

I have done some sewing today, and I have done some organizing, too. Both of these appear on the aforementioned goals list. I will be sure to talk more about these in the next few days.

Happy New Year, Dear Readers and Followers! Let's have an amazing year!

Happy Quilting, Friends!

Final Post of 2018

But NOT my final post ever. I have decided that I want to continue to blog, and after giving the entire situation a good amount of pondering, I do think I can keep it going. I will talk more on this in the coming days; for now, I want to show you my final project for 2018.

Simple Sixteen is a free pattern I found several months ago, and as I wanted to get one more fast finish in before year's end, this was perfect for easy, satisfying work. The pattern comes from a company called Fort Worth Fabric Studio, and the website has quite a few very attractive free patterns available. I do expect that I will make some of them.

So on Wednesday, the day after Christmas, I cut these out. The original pattern is a 9-block design, but they tell you that it can easily be enlarged which I did. I had enough 30s prints on hand to make 20 blocks.

By last evening (Sunday) I put the final rows together. It was fun and pretty much mindless. Just the type of project my brain needed after all the hustle-bustle of the month.

My stitching had really slowed these past few weeks and I believe this lack of sewing was my major reason for fewer blog posts. Sometimes a break is a good thing, though. I definitely had lots going on around here, which took precedence over stitching. Finally, when an easy project presents itself for those days that linger between Christmas and New Year, grab on and go with it!

Have a safe New Year's Eve, if you are going out to celebrate. We will go to Harold and Judy's with our friends Bob and Vickie - the 6 of us have been doing New Years for 25 years, I think.

Happy New Year and Happy Quilting, Friends!