Wednesday, October 31, 2018

I've got the Color Wheel Blues...

I didn't want to give you the impression my sewing room is without blues! I have a few!! But they tend to run kind of muddy and muted.

 The first place I looked was my smallish tote of solids. Nope!
Then I have a little bit bigger tote of my bright, clear fabrics. I only found a few small pieces of blue. That was where I stopped on Monday's post. 

I took my "Color Wheel" fabrics outside today so you could get a better look. I found two blues that I thought would work. I also wanted you to see that I have a violet red in there too. 

Sally (a blog reader) who going to Houston has generously offered me some solid blues from her stash! Aren't quilters the best?? Thank you Sally!! Check out her blog HERE to see what quilt she made with her solids. Such a fun quilt!!

Friday is the last linky party for Cheri's Sweet land of Liberty quilt.  
I hope you all are having a great week. 


Monday, October 29, 2018

Color Wheel Conundrum

 I'm preparing for my class with Maria Shell. We are supposed to bring twelve to twenty-four or more FQs or similarly sized pcs representing the color wheel.
Because she works with solids I thought I'd start there first. Unfortunately I do not have one blue solid! 
So, I started digging around my sewing room and found these little swatches by Clothworks "American Made Brand" (here you go if you are looking for truly American made goods!) 
This seemed like a pretty good representation of swatches for the color wheel.

So, I dug a little more and used the swatches to gather a few fabs. I'm still missing blue, but will have to go to my blue drawer to try and fill in. The class is, "Color; its Relative" 
Color is one of the most important components to quiltmaking. This short and intense workshop is based on a series of mini-lectures and exercises designed to take your color usage to the next level.

What are your thoughts about what I have so far?  This is harder than I thought it would be! 

Friday, October 26, 2018

Sajou Linky Party! Share Your quilt!



 Thank you all for sewing along! It's been a blast for me to see all the variations. I plan on a French General giveaway for everyone who posts their quilt here.
If you don't have a blog or Instagram account feel free to send me a photo to post. I will be gone until Friday afternoon so be patient.




Wednesday, October 24, 2018

Parlez-Vouz Francais? And hand Quilting!

I speak very little French, but had a ball in Italy because it was very similar to Spanish. 
Most people in the city (Paris)  spoke English, but not in the countryside. My daughter and I went to the European Patchwork Meeting in Alsace and she did most of the translating if we needed it. 
So, it was a few years ago and I thought since AI made my little Sajou quilt I'd make a little one for her. 



Here's a little bit of a start. 

 I finished hand quilting this block and moved on the next....
I'm not a fan of hand quilting because I am slow, but I am enjoying working on this.

Friday is our Sajou link up!!

I hope you are having a wonderful week!

Monday, October 22, 2018

Taboo Topic- Period Poverty and More

If you have been following my blog for any length of time it should not surprise you that I am on our church mission board.  This past weekend I had the privilege to help coordinate a World Evangelism weekend event. I'd be lying if I said I didn't lose any sleep over it! LOL As far as church goes I don't go overboard introducing myself to special speakers or missionaries. 
But I was involved in this in a big way and I'm so glad I was. 

I got to know Angelika better. Her and her husband are working in the Ivory Coast and she shared her heart with us on Saturday about her ministry with women. Did you know that girls miss a lot of a school because of their menstrual cycle? Looks at these astonishing statistics from 2015!Quiltworks, that does the monthly exhibit was having sew days called "Days for Girls" so I have heard about how we can help.

What Angelika has found to be the best for their situation and area is this:

And they fold up small so she can take a lot back with her. 
She has already sent me the sewing instructions and gave me info about the fabric. We are trying to avoid synthetics that have chemicals.  If you have any experience with this, please fill me in!

I am waiting to hear back from https://www.naturesfabrics.com/3d-chevron-1-mil-pul.html about the PUL they use. It is a smooth resistant fabric. 
and for the pad portion I am waiting to hear from https://www.diapersewingsupplies.com/bamboo-fleece-fabric/.

I'm hoping if I can get the right kind of materials I'd organize a sew day at my church. I think we could make a lot of them in just a few hours.


And here are some amazing dresses Janet made for my next mission trip!
I did find out that MSI, who I usually go with, will not be going with a team until 2020! Yikes!!


One of our other missionaries brought a Pastor from Uganda with them and they'd love for me to come in June! BTW, His shirt felt very stiff, like a wax resist. Isn't it awesome!!? At this time I am not planning on any trips to Africa. 

Make it a fantastic week!



Friday, October 19, 2018

Aurora Quilt Show "Seeing Stars"

This years theme was "Seeing Stars". Someone left a comment that they were beautiful star quilts- yes they sure were!

 This one was actually one of my favorite newly made quilts. Please read the label next to see how she made the best of an "accident"


 This was made for Windham fabrics using one line. Thats always hard to do, but this quilter pulled it off pretty well.
What a super fun star pattern!!

 I was working on Sajou with my French General fabric and this sampler caught my eye. 

This  one was a little disturbing, funky, and cool all at the same time!




 Chrome yellow, poison green and turkey red! What's not to love?? 

I wouldn't call it Shoofly, but what do I know?

I've always been enamored with the 7 sisters block. This was lovely.


 AMAZING!

Loved the star sashing!! And the stars in the center of the blocks pulls it all together.

 Anybody else think this quilt looks antique? It isn't!
Then I came around the corner and saw the block below.
I had to catch my breath. Seeing this makes my heart hurt all over again. 
I spent some time looking at the blocks and remembering. 




I didn't get a photo of the complete quilt, but what a quilt so obviously sewn with love and honor, even this many years later. We will never forget.

Love to you all. Have an amazing weekend!

Wednesday, October 17, 2018

Sajou QAL- Part 3 and Finale

 Here is my finished Sajou. I apologize to those who don't want their center on point. I seriously never gave it a thought until someone on Facebook mentioned it. My little quilts don't always hang on walls, so if you don't like your center on point you can easily use it on a side table or in the center of your dining table and you won't even know your center is a little sideways.  There is a couple of different ways you can do this last border.
 I considered paper piecing it, but wasn't quite sure I'd be able to give you the pattern and have it the same size as you need it. If you'd like to do this, measure YOUR quilt so far and use adding machine tape or paper 2 " wide x the width of your quilt, fold in half so you have a center line, then using your ruler draw equal triangles. (they are actually isosceles triangles- 2 sides the same , one longer side)
 Then use this as a paper piece pattern. Do the same for the opposite sides adding a square at each end. Really, it isn't as difficult as this sounds. But I thought my directions would be muddy...... LOL 

Or, you can do it another way...

 Cut 5 dark squares and 6 light squares  4 1/2" then cut twice on the diagonal for a total of 20 dark triangles and 24 light triangles. Piece 4 borders as shown above and below.
 Mark the center of your pieced border and the center of of your quilt so far. Line them up and attach the upper and lower border.
Trim even with your side borders.


Line up the center of your border and the center of your quilt, pin. 
I used my hera marker to mark my center. 
We still need to fix our corners. Lay it down across the border, fold it back and finger press  DON'T CUT it yet! Add 1/4" to the length, then trim. Add a 2" square to each end.
 Then sew your final 2 borders. Ta-da! Admire your little quilt
I machine quilted in the ditch for a few lines and hopefully you can click on this to see how I quilted the rest.
 The center strip is from the Beauville factory in France. 
We talked about label pens on the Facebook group. I used a pigma micron 5 but still think its too thin. 
Here is the inspiration quilt. As far as I can tell it is/was owned by Penny McMorris. 

I wanted to keep this year's quiltalong small, but you can continue to enlarge it if you want!

If my directions are not clear please let me know and I'll try to walk you through it. 

Thank you all who sewed along! I loved seeing all the versions! I also look forward to seeing them complete. We'll have a linky party in a couple of weeks.