Dancing Butterfly #3 and #4

Two more butterflies done (there are 12 total).  Sorry about the weirdly rotated pictures. There is no way to fix them in

Butterfly number 3 features Echo Shell and Zigzag Path. 

I really like both of these designs and I am getting a lot better at keeping consistent spacing. It is fun to see how much I've grown in my ability to quilt over the past few years.


 Butterfly #4 features sharp stippling and bamboo forest.  I found the sharp stippling to be really challenging. I'm not sure mine really looks like what the design was set up to be, which is more flame like.  I'm so used to either all curves, or sharp zig-zags, that trying to make curves with points was really though. 

A final photo

This is my final post in the BBQA series- use the tags at the bottom to see the posts about the individual blocks.

This quilt was a GREAT experience for me. I almost didn't do it, because I'm not a beginner. But everyone can use practice.  I did learn some new piecing methods (curved seams, which aren't really part of the pattern; paper piecing, the house blocks, and the handle for the basket). I also got to practice my precision on well known blocks.  None of the quilting was new to me, but much of it (especially circles) needed practice. I'd never done marked quilting either.  I think my favorite thing about this was that it gave me something to quilt that was a small time commitment, just a weekend of quilting every month.  It certainly isn't perfect, and I'm not sure I grew as a quilter, but I got to quilt- and that's what I wanted.  But if you are a new quilter- the skills covered by Leah in this pattern are just phenomenal. The video support especially is great.

The quilt is put together with quilt-as-you-go sashing. This is the third time I've done this, and the third method I've tried.  This I think is my favorite.  A few don't line up well, but that was when I was using pins. When I switched the magic clips, they got much closer to lining up (nothing I do is perfect).  The last few rows were tough to wrestle through the machine, but overall, I really liked the method. You could hand sew for invisible sashing, but there was no way I was doing that.

I did hand sew the binding to the back, so it does not have a line.  Here is what it looks like altogether! You should be able to click to see this photo larger. (And thankfully the dark marks on the basket blocks did wash out...)

The quilt is now hanging in our front entry way.  I used a blind-hem method of putting the hanging strip on and you cannot see it AT ALL.  Very impressed with this idea, and so thankful I ran across the tutorial.
http://weallsew.com/2014/08/26/easy-diy-quilt-hanging-sleeve-almost-entirely-by-machine/

Block 12: Sawtooth Star

Excuse the formatting on this post: the photos would NOT go where I wanted them!

And the final block of the quilt-a-long (which I guess I didn't quilt along very well, since I started late and ended early...)  This was a really neat exercise in learning to piece new blocks while getting to focus on what I really like- quilting.

I really like how these blocks turned out. I did well piecing the star, but then when I put on the border I lost a lot of points :(  Guess I need some more practice.

 

Block 11: Wonky Stars

This was a fun block to do- you laid out four 12 inch squares then slash cut 5 lines into them in the shape of a star. Then you rearranged the two colors and pieced them back together again.  Very cool technique.

Not much else to say, so enjoy the photos. Again, I modified Leah's quilting designs a bit.

 

Block 10: Baskets

The part of the basket that was a challenge was making the handle. It was turned against a piece of freezer paper, and was difficult to get to really curve.

I used a gluestick to hold it down while machine appliqueing in place, and despite using these gluesticks many times before, it looks like after I rinsed the blocks the glue came through and caused dark marks.  I hope when I wash the quilt in the washing machine it just washes out all the way. I haven't had that happen before, and really dislike the dark marks!  You can't really tell from far away, so I'm not too worried about it.

I did three sets of blocks this weekend, and got a bit tired of marking, so I just did a few lines to give me a sense of the pattern and did the rest freehand. I also changed the designs a bit on these blocks and the next two sets. I was ready to be done- and some of them were just too tedious to mark or quilt.

I had all these baskets rotated so that they were point to the bottom left, and none uploaded that way.  Oh well, you still get the idea.

This weekend I also did all the sashing!  The quilt is 90% done- just have to hand stitch the binding now (which will take forever...) 

Building Blocks Quilt Along: Post 6

 This month's block was a pinwheel. This was a difficult one to piece, since I am really really trying for accuracy.  Mine weren't too far off, but they also weren't perfect. 

The quilting designs this month were really fun. Two of them went really heavy through the center, which I think had a bit too much build up, and my stitch in the ditch still needs a lot of work, but overall I think these look really good.  This is the first time I've done pebbles as a pre-marked designed. I don't think I would mark them again, but I'm happy with how they look. Marking them means that I got to have a lot of different sizes, and they look really good- but it loses freedom of how to fill the space if your circle is just a bit off.  However, I love how pebbles let you travel anywhere when you get stuck. There is so much traveling anyway, that you can just go back over anything.  My favorite of this block though is the echo quilting curves. I love the movement in it.

And here is what the progress on the whole quilt it:

Building Blocks: Post #5

 This month's block was Drunkard's Path.  I had never done curved seams before, because I had heard they were really hard. The pattern is actually set up to do this as reverse applique with a raw edge (sew the two squares on top of each other, and then cut away to reveal the fabric underneath)- but that isn't really a "stretch" for me, and this pattern is about learning new things.  So I googled to learn how to make the template to sew the seams as a pieced block. (Turns out it was really easy- draw the squares twice with the seam line marked. On one square mark 1/4" inside the seam on the other mark 1/4" outside the seam, and now you have templates for the two pieces.

So is sewing curved seams hard? Well, not really- it's just like sewing in a sleeve!  I practiced a method with pins and without pins and I found using pins to be both faster and more accurate.  I am really happy with these blocks.

 

The quilting wasn't too difficult, though there was a lot of traveling involved.  On the spiral block I wobbled really badly at one point, so I'm a little annoyed about that- but I absolutely LOVE the design. It reminds me of Celtic Bubbles, that I use quite a bit.  For that block, because there is an open string end in the middle of the block, I actually had to bury my threads. Since these blocks will be cut and sewn together later, I have just been sewing right off the edge as a shortcut :)

 Someone on the Building Blocks facebook had a brilliant idea to use a computer program to put together images to share our quilt progress.  So cool! This is what I've done so far, and what is yet to come!

Building Blocks: Post #4

The next block in the building block series is a "modern" block. This block should be incredibly easy because there are no matched seams.  Well, I still managed to sew one different from the other- so one of my blocks is sewn backwards.  If it can be done wrong, I'll do it wrong!

This block was to teach about quilting on different scales.  I do a lot of small scale quilting, so it wasn't really a problem for me to do the 1/8" scale which is what a lot of people struggled with.  I still struggle with straight lines, but maybe they are getting better.  I don't think I'd do tiny cross hatching on the inside of a quilt though- the travel lines get really heavy!

I didn't take a picture of the tracing, but rest assured, it was sloppy and I quilted okay in spite of it :)

Here are the fronts:

And here are the backs:

Building Blocks: Post 3

I'm quickly catching up on this quilt-along, even only being able to sew for a short amount at any one time. (I go in Friday for new x-rays. Hopefully the bone has healed and I can remove the neck brace. And hopefully the neck brace and the weird posture it puts me in is the cause of the pain, and I feel better next weekend!)

It kinda makes me wonder if I am going to stick with 'along', or if I should just go through the blocks at my own pace. The thing is, for a few blocks, I might need the video instruction.

Anyhow- this block was super easy to piece. The outsides are wider than the inside strips because, remember, this gets trimmed to 8" squares before assembly.

As before, I found some of the tracing difficult. It is hard to do long lines because the fabric shifts. And because I am tracing the circles, they aren't that accurate. (Sorry the writing block is rotated. It isn't on my computer then turns when I upload it and I can't turn it back)

 And here is the quilting (I don't get it. Here the writing block is upside down!).  You can see my circles need a lot of work. Writing words is probably the easiest, though tracing is easier to do than free handing them (but that is because my handwriting is awful):

 

And the back of the blocks. I don't really have any issues with these. I think overall they are pretty good.