Latitude

I got a half a day of "my life" back today. My kids are ALL in school on Fridays as of two weeks ago. But some of these I am a parent chaperone for field trips so they don't count. In fact, I consider it "negative" time because even when it's over you are still exhausted. And if we balance the equation it means even less gets done. But I thought my down time could be used up this morning sharing a quilt I finished a while ago. I don't even know when - probably a few months but if it's been longer, please don't mention it, haha. The fabric strips of Latitude were sent to me by the fabulous Kate Spain. And gosh they are luscious.

This one wound up at 52" x 52" and is in the shop (because, let's face it, I'm nearly drowning in my quilting at this point - don't tell the husband, ha). 

A Very Colorful Quilt

Summer is HERE!!! 

Pretty much only pool days are in our foreseeable future. 

Houston got more than its fair share of the water in this country for the last month and a half. 

It's made life just that much crazier with four little kids that get SERIOUS cabin fever. 

And it just keeps raining and raining and raining. 

Even more showers are expected today. 

But you know what happens to a quilter that can't leave home? 

They sew and sew and sew some more.

Quilting makes such a great hobby. 

But all us quilters already know that. :) 

The mushrooms are popping out everywhere from all the moisture. 
The orange ones are my favorite. 
Or course. 

And my little project during the last few weeks of storms was this half square triangle quilt in about an hundred kona cotton colors. 

I used an orange striped binding.
Because if you can pick any color, it should be orange. :)
The backing circles fabric I found was a perfect geometric juxtaposition and compliment to the front - Juggling Summer by Zen Chic for Moda. 

To give this quilt the right balance of all the crazy colors, I actually laid out half of the blocks to my liking, then used rotational symmetry to make the second half feel balanced but not mirrored. 
And I'd be surprised if anyone even notices it.
I mean, I can't and I made it.

I'm calling it my "Stairway to HST (Half Square Triangle) Heaven" and it finished at 64.5" x 64.5." 

This one's going in the shop.

New year, old projects.

It seems that each new year we take stock of life and evaluate our accomplishments and failures. Some decide to try to make changes with lists of resolutions. And the crafters? We have piles of unfinished projects that we look around at and realize it's been another YEAR and we still haven't gotten them out of the UFO pile. STILL!

Well, that list seems to be ever evolving but some of my projects have been on it for multiple years. Don't worry, I won't list them for you. Or even show them to you. That would take a LOT of photos.

So I'll start this year's blogging by sharing one project that I've been working on for the better part of a year already that hopefully will see a completion in the next few months. 

Hopefully. 

At this point in life you'd think I'd know better than to be hopeful about quilting projects getting finished. 

But I thought it deserved a share at the completion of over 200 blocks. 201 to be exact. Just need 41 more and I'll have enough for a king size quilt. It's all scrappy and happy and is the "rainbow rows" from the #apqquiltalong2015 pattern. So close to finishing. 

So close. So far. Still a lot of work before this one is ON MY BED! Can you imagine? I've never made myself a bed quilt. My kids all have quilts. But a king still seemed like a lot of work and time and commitment. Good thing I picked a super quick project. HA! not. 

Wish me luck finding some time to finish this one! 
I love it even from this picture. :) 

"Figuring" it out as I went.

I'm convinced I'm not the only quilter that purchases precuts without a plan. 

Case in point: I picked up a charm pack of "Figures" by Zen Chic for Moda at Quilt Festival.

And I would love to know how many start the quilt without an end game. 

I did this time. 

I made nine-patch blocks with white centers.

Then I stared at them on the floor all lined up in a grid (I like to create obstacle courses for people trying to get in and out of the room... ha.).

And I stared. It just didn't do anything for me. 

I kept staring for weeks. 

And weeks.

And I found something else to work on. (Lots of other things.)

And then after a while it just smacked me. 

Set it around a hexagon in a squares and equilateral triangles layout.

Easier said than done. 

I'd never calculated anything like this. 

And I've not done much with Y-seams in general. 

They are a bit time consuming and little more tedious than lining up the usual points in a quilt, but it was exciting to try something that stretched me a bit. 

 And the centered "medallion" aspect makes it particularly pleasant to me. 

I didn't want the middle to be a "boring piece" with too large a gap in the design and no focal point so I re-engineered a star into it. 

The center star actually required me to rip apart two of the nine-patch blocks, but the whole thing required 40 charm squares and some background yardage. 

And to further accent the medallion aspect, I did irregularly spaced concentric circles for the quilting. 

Pretty sure I traced every circular object in my house... to get it started in the right direction. All of the lines past the first circle of blocks had to be echoed around the inner circle using the markings on the walking foot because I couldn't find any larger circles to trace. 

And of course I chose a large scale print for the back like I always do... well, almost always. 

No absolutes here. 

It finished at about 39" x 39". 

Comma Baby Quilt

Another little baby quilt. 

In Comma by Zen Chic for Moda.

I set aside many of the golds and greys in the line to create this concoction. 

 

In the shop.

The half square triangles in this quilt are the left overs from making the shared baby quilt for the twins. 

It only got a picture with Parker since he decided to mark his territory during this photo shoot.

Oddly enough (as seems to happen with most things I make) it's now being used by my older boy in place of his quilt that is still under construction.

Farmer's Wife in Reunion

SERIOUSLY!?!?

I last posted at the end of August... I'll bet everyone who reads this knows exactly what happened.
Yep.
The HOLIDAYS with four kids.
Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years, two birthdays (hubs and son) and Valentine's Day.

Sometimes I think we should get rid of half the holidays just because of the chaos they introduce in my life... but really, I do love them all.

Well, quilts.

There have been some made during this last HUGE absence of blog entries... so I'll slowly start sharing them, or quickly. I never really know.

Up first... the project that made me feel productive while I was tied up with twin babies of the leeching variety - the Farmer's Wife!

Every little block felt like I had completed a whole quilt.

And eventually I did actually complete a whole quilt. :)

In the shop.

Dresden Flowers

Remember this project ??

Ya know, the one I started and then entered the "mmm, what should I do now?" phase of my quilting process and then let it sit... 

My husband called it "bench curing" in dental school. 

You just leave your lab work alone on the bench and then "resubmit" it for a better grade a few days later.

Let's just say this one is fully "bench cured" and now 2 finished 42" x 42" quilts.

The biggest problem was deciding if and how to split them. 

They could easily have ended up as runners, a lap quilt, pillow...

Well, just about anything you can do with a dresden plate... 

Someone wanted to help this morning... :)

I actually didn't fully appreciate how pretty the backing fabrics were until I saw the bolts.

Jelly roll strips that have been chopped up into little pieces always lose something on the larger scale prints.

Which version do you like better? 

Tangerine or violet? 

For a girl obsessed with orange, it's amazing that I'm having a hard time deciding!

In good use :)

I just saw this on my friend's blog...

Always makes you feel good when your present (especially a quilt) is getting good use. :) 

Happy day!
Now back to sewing.