Fractured View

Saturday was our March VCQ meeting (Virginia Consortium of Quilters).  We had a great day in Culpeper with about 75 members attending.  I took a class called Fractured View taught by Deb Schupp, which involves building a background of strips and then inserting wedge shaped pieces at various angles. .  We had lots of fun and produced some interesting pieces.

The one above is mine.  It still needs another border, and maybe some other additions.  Stay tuned!

Quick Project

Today I finished a quick project, a fall table runner from a Quilting Daily email. It's made from 5" squares and goes together very quickly. Straight line machine quilting and a folded over backing to bind the edges made for an easy finish. It looks good with my felted pumpkins and acorns!

Secret Projects Revealed

A few weeks ago I shared a sneak peak at some projects I was working on.  They were teacher gifts for our VCQ Celebration retreat weekend.  Since that weekend has just passed, I can show the whole pictures now. 

These are 'mug rugs", about 9 x 12.  My friend Elizabeth stitched the machine embroidered pineapples.  I added the strips and quilted the 9 mini quilts. This was good practice quilting on the new Baby Lock machine.  I also tried a fusible binding technique I learned from Cynthia St. Charles' blog,

This is one of the "Pockets to Go" from a Terry Atkinson pattern.  Three of us each made 3 of the cubes, which we filled with various treats for the teachers. Now I need to find time to make myself one!

It was a great weekend, wonderful classes and teachers, and lots of fun activities.  More later.. 

Block Lotto

Celebration, our bi-annual quilting retreat for Virginia Consortium of Quilters, is coming up in a couple of weeks.  There is usually a block lotto, where people make blocks according to a selected pattern/fabric, and for each block contributed, get a chance to win a set of blocks for a quilt top.  I finally made my 2 blocks yesterday; this year's block is a traditional design.  The blue is the focus fabric selected by the committee; everyone adds their own white and gold.  Should make a striking quilt.

Previously I posted  a picture of blocks I won 2 years ago.  They are still awaiting borders, hoping to get those done in the next 2 weeks to take along for show & tell!

Going Dotty - Finished!

Back on Jan. 2, I posted pictures of the Dotty challenge in my local guild.  This past weekend I quilted it, and added the binding, label, and hanging sleeve.  Tonight I finished the hand stitching.  Here is the finished piece, ready for the unveiling at Wednesday's guild meeting.

My Blue Heaven

Every 2 years my Virginia state quilt guild (VCQ) has a Celebration retreat with classes by national teachers.  Another fun aspect of the weekend is a 'block lotto' where particpants contribute blocks in hopes of winning a set.  I won these blocks in 2010, and finally pulled them out to try to have a finished quilt to take along this year for show and tell.  This weekend, I squared up the blocks, remade 2 that were a bit too small, and sewed the blocks and rows together.  I'm pleased with the layout, as there was quite a range of color in the blues.  I found a couple of great batiks for borders that should further pull all the colors together.  Stay tuned to see if I get this finished by late April!

Dotty Challenge

My local quilt guild received some fabric samples (5 " squares) from Timeless Treasures and decided to issue a challenge.  The fabric is a collection called "Dotty" and consists of 18 colors with irregular dots.  The challenge was to use at least 6 colors in a small quilt between 18 & 36" square, and use curves in some way.  I've wanted to do a piece with fractured circles for a while, so thought this was a good opportunity.  I used all the colors - one is very pale and the dots are barly visible, so that only appears in one circle, but otherwise they're all there.  I started by layering 3 circles on top of each square, cutting out the bottom layer of the circle each time to reduce bulk.

Then I layed out all the squares on the design wall.

I liked this, and considered stopping at this point, but decided to follow through on the original plan and ended up with this.

I think it turned out well.  The black and white stripe border and blue outer border help give the eye a place to rest with all the dotty riot of color.