Wednesday, April 28, 2010

I love Blue and Yellow quilts...

There is something about Blue and Yellow quilts.  They always look so incredibly clean and crisp.  
This beautiful top was pieced by Julia.   It is a Jelly Roll quilt, but it really doesn't look like one.  Julia has a plan for this quilt and decided on UNC blue thread.
  
The after picture is dark, so you can't see the thread color, but the blue thread really worked well on this quilt.    Since the backing and a lot of the fabrics were florals, I used an all over Pothos leaf design.  It is one of my very favorite all over quilting designs.  I love the texture it gives and quilting the tendrils is really fun.   

Curved Quilt from Studio Picture

There is a beautiful quilt hanging over the rails, waiting to be loaded, in the pictures I posted of my new studio.  Julia did a beautiful job piecing the quilt.    I have not seen a quilt pieced like this one before, it is kind of like a Drunkards Path with it's curved piecing but it is done free from and has multiple arcs.  I really love the way the piecing looks.


For me the focus of this quilt need to stay with the piecing.  So I quilted an all over swirl design from border to border then did a complementary design in the border.  


My first thought had been to use a light teal blue thread which was the color of the backing fabric, but I really liked the sage green thread better on the top.  Luckily the sage green blended with the backing fabric too. 

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

New Studio

I can't believe that we have only been her for 3 weeks.  I am still working on getting things put away in my studio.  It is taking longer then I wanted it to, but then I have been steadily quilting customer quilts and putting things away when I get a chance.  I love my new space.  I have windows across one entire wall.  It is so bright that I don't have to use any lights for most of the day.  The only issue is that the wall of windows faces due west so the sun beats into the room from about 4PM to sundown.
The first picture is the view from the hallway into my studio.  

This picture is from the corner when my DSM is toward my longarm.

I have only gotten one quilt hung so far you can see part of it on right behind my longarm.  My design wall in the first picture is actually centered between 2 windows.  I also have a large walk in closet and a powder room in my studio.

Funky Lighthouse Quilt

A couple of weeks ago I showed the first block I quilted on this Funky Lighthouse quilt.   I did finish quilting it.  I just have not gotten a chance to post it on my blog.  This is one fun quilt.  It is being raffled off at the United States Power Squadron - District 15 Fall Meeting.

Mystery Quilt

Wish Upon A Quilt sponsored another Mystery Quilt.  We started in July of 2009 picking up one clue a month for 6 months.  We had our reveal party in March right before my move.  I am always amazed at how different our quilts look.  We are all using the same pattern, none of us know what it is going to look like when we pick out our fabric, but they all work.  The quilts were all beautiful!

I picked out a really wild multicolored batik and picked colors out of it for my other 3 fabrics.  I love, love, love this quilt.  It is bright and happy!  
I did a border to border all over swirly design on the body of the quilt and the did separate border treatments in each of the 4 borders.   I used Superior Rainbows thread.  It is a wonderful, shiny variegated thread.  This is the first time I have used it and I really like it.  
I am still thinking of what I am going to name this quilt.  I am leaning toward Prof. Plum in the Studio with the Rotary Cutter.    

Monday, April 12, 2010

I'm Back!!!

Yeah, the move is almost over.  My longarm is set up and and I have been happily quilting away.  I have actually done a couple of customer quilts already and currently have a custom job on the frame.  I have not however gotten the room put away well enough for pictures.  Maybe next week... but NO promises. 

Now for our funny moving story of the week...

Matt and I went to the house in Wake Forest on Saturday to fix some items that were found on our sellers inspection.  We figured that there was about 2 hours of work so we thought we would be done by noon.  We had been there about 5 minutes when Matt asked me where the keys to the van where.  He drove, I had not taken my set of van keys with me.  We looked for the keys in our empty house, the van and the lawn for 3 hours!  Our neighbor offered to take me the 20 minutes to the new house to get another set of keys and my car.  Matt dug out the hole he had filled in before realizing the keys were missing and shifted through the dirt and mulch... no keys.  The key I brought with me would not start the van, Matt thought it might be the battery so we tried to jump the van.  Still no luck.  So at 3PM, I had had it.  I had not eaten breakfasted and I was hungry.  I went off to Chick-fil-a and left Matt with the big van brick.  While I was gone our neighbor's son started mowing the lawn.  He walked up to Matt with the van keys in his hand and asked if they were what he was looking for.  He had found them in the middle of the back yard.  So 2 hours of work took us all day.  But at least we got to spend some time with the neighbors that we love and are going to miss terribly.  The good news is that a couple stopped by and we let them see the house since we were there anyways.