Showing posts with label TGIFF. Show all posts
Showing posts with label TGIFF. Show all posts

January 23, 2015

New valance for my studio

By    11:11 AM // 13 comments
After painting my studio a pale shade of Yellow right before I brought Penelope my longarm home I needed to put up some curtains so I used the old white sheers with embroidered edge detail that used to hang in our master bedroom at our old house. They worked because the studio window is double wide and couldn't be used in our current master bedroom since we have 4 windows there now.
 Here you can see the pretty edge detail a little bit better (sort of) along with my flying frog made of Jackfruit wood that is a good luck symbol in Bali and the other bits of fun I have hanging in the window.
But lately seeing them I've been itching for a change up plus the long panel in the center keeps getting in my way when stitching together big pieces. I didn't want to spend a lot of money so I considered what I already had in my stash and came upon the Bonjour Mon Ami by Amanda Murphy FQ bundle that I had purchased from The Intrepid Thread.
The pale Yellow goes well with the wall color and the rest of the pallet works well with the other colors in the room without being too wild.  I hunted on the internet for ideas and finally came across one that was not just a bunch of squares sewn together and that suited my style a better.  Luckily I was able to hunt down the tad bit more that I needed to make my plan work (at $3.99 a yard too) and as soon as it arrived, I set to work.

I cut each of the fat quarters into 3" x 21" strips.
Then I put them together in a pleasing layout.  The belly bar of my longarm frame really is great for this.
Then it was just a bit of really quick stitching together of the strips to do.
Pairs of two became sets of eight and before long they were all sewn together.
All told, it took me 1 1/4 hours last Saturday evening to get to this point. It was late and I was tired so I called it a day.
Now when I walk into the room, this is what I see. Sooooo much prettier!
The 2nd additional fabric that I ordered didn't arrive so I had to make due with the 1 yard of the red print that I received.  I added a 3" strip across the top and the bottom, hemmed both sides and the bottom and then sewed a curtain rod pocket at the top.
I'm really happy with the way this turned out though if that other fabric had come home too, I would have had more of the red available and would have made the top border wider.  Oh well, I still like it as is.
It adds just the right amount of color and is sheer enough to still let the brilliant sunshine still come through.
I've been contemplating what curtains I want to put up in our dining room.  After making this one, I just might make some for there too instead of purchasing premade ones.  The hunt for just the right fabric just commenced!

Oh, and I think I'll link up to a few parties today. Check them out.  There is bound to be lots of great quilt eye candy to see.

Fort Worth Fabric Studio

September 9, 2014

Our Own Art - the kids' art quilt

By    11:04 AM // 24 comments
Whew! I finally have a chance to write the post about the kids' art quilt that I recently finished for Sunshine's school. I'm happy to tell you that I delivered it a week and a half ago, a few hours before they had their back to school bash, and they were beyond thrilled.  The art teacher who requested this quilt actually cried when she saw it so I believe that counts a "Mission Accomplished".  Therefore I'm happy to reveal to all of you....

Our Own Art
I am totally thrilled with the way this one turned out and I love it even more than the kids art quilt that I made last year. It is just so bright and colorful and fun.
The school's name was appliqued using their actual letterhead font in the school's colors.
Although it is really hard to see in this picture, I straight stitched around the edge of each letter in matching thread.
The school's letterhead has a daisy as the dot for the i so that is what I did too.
As I was trying to quilt this I shared with you my struggles to come up with the right quilting design in the right color. In the end and as a total surprise to me, after testing out all of your thread color suggestions, I ended up liking the most the Glide 10GC3 Cool Gray. If you look at the color on their website, it looks a lot darker than it is in reality and I think it works perfectly on this quilt. It shows up just enough without competing with any of the sashing colors too much.
The right quilting design was my other angst besides the thread color choice and while drawing out many of your suggestions on a photo printout of the top, I had an epiphany that totally changed my complete way of thinking about the quilting design for this one.

I think that one of the biggest problems with what I had been trying, besides the fact that this was only 1 inch wide sashing and I'm not an expert at this yet, is that I was trying to quilt it as an adult would quilt it, all neat and perfectly spaced. Then during the doodling session, I remembered that when the art teacher and I were talking during the planning stages we talked about wanting to make this quilt look like the kids did it, or at least as much of it as possible. So that was my epiphany! I needed to quilt it as if my kids were doing it instead of me. Once I tried that and completed the 1st row, I knew I was on the right track.  I quilted it with ribbons as if the kids were trying really hard to make it look good but also knowing that it would be a little wonky.  To me this approach totally worked. It truly mimicked the "all over the place" look and feel of the kids' blocks and does look like kids work.
The art teacher provided the border fabric and this helped to reinforce the quilting design since the print is of kids' drawings. I did simple loopy quilting in that area.
The binding is a mix of one half WOF strips from all the solid colors used in the sashing.
As usual, I sewed the first side of the binding as normal but when it came time to sew down the back side, I kept the same epiphany in mind.  The kids would not have sewn it down by hand as I had been planning to do, so instead I did a decorative elongated serpentine line, just a little unevenly spaced in areas, that again I think blends well with the rest of the stitching.
The school's director and all the teachers were so happy with the final result.  I was a bit worried that they wouldn't understand my quilting design idea but they totally "got" it and agreed with my take on it. To do anything else for the quilting wouldn't have made it look like the kids themselves did it, which is what they wanted.
The quilt is now hanging in the school's front lobby for all to see as they enter and I keep hearing back every day how the kids from last year continue to look for their own blocks and the new kids at the school this year love checking out all of them too. And the new kids are asking if they get to make a quilt block too.
Overall this quilt was a joy to make and I'm so happy that they love it so. It definitely taught me a lesson about how sometimes I need to think outside the box to find the perfect solution.
Today I'm going to join up with a few linky parties.

Fresh Poppy Design
 
IMG_6373
Fort Worth Fabric Studio

June 27, 2014

Teacher gifts 2014

By    10:31 AM // 11 comments
Although I would have liked to again make full size quilts for the kidlets teachers this year, I knew that there was no way that I could ever get them done in time plus since both kids moved to different schools this year it was a good time to not do that so there wasn't any expectation from future teachers for quilts too.

But I do like to still give the teachers a handmade gift, something useful and pretty. For this year I chose to make tote bags and I used my Boho charms. I modeled my versions after the one made by TeresaDownUnder. First I laid out the charms how I wanted them and sewed them together (the 2 rows in the very middle are actually the bottom of the bag and the row at the bottom of the picture is the top of the opposite side.)
 Then I added the Bella Sienna strip.
 I quilted it with the Honeycomb design with my domestic machine Lucy. I love that this is so fast and easy, 45 minutes from start to finish for both panels.
 I added handles in the same solid fabric.
 Here is the finished result. I'm really pleased with the way it turned out.
 I didn't want to over quilt it but I think this is just the right amount. I used Cocoa Essentials thread from Connecting Threads.
 I used one of the prints from the line for the lining and added a small pocket on each side using leftover charms.
 This tote is a great size for being on the go, big enough for books or to use as a purse but not so huge like a beach bag.
 Jammer picked that one for his teacher and Sunshine chose this other version for her teacher. I used the other colorways of the Boho line, the Pink and the Yellow prints, for this one. Here is the Pink side.
 And here is the Yellow side. I used Bella Paper Bag for the solid strip and handles.
 This time I quilted a line 1st going down the middle of the panels corner to corner. Then I added 2 more lines on either side of the 1st one. Then I moved over 1 inch and quilted 3 more lines diagonal across the panel. I continued on that way until I got to the end and then flipped it around to do from the middle to the other corner. Again this was fast and easy and I like the look. I originally thought that I'd do the same in the other direction but once I finished the 1st direction, I decided that I didn't want to add any more. I used the Taupe Essentials thread from Connecting Threads.
This one also got a couple of pockets, made with leftover charms. They are just big enough for a cell phone and a set of keys.
 The evening before they were being gifted I quickly ran outside to grab these photos.
 The wind was picking up good because of the incoming thunderstorms so getting some good shots was a challenge.
 I love how colorful and cheery they both are and the teachers were pleased as punch to receive them along with the gift cards that I tucked into the pocket.
I will definitely make these totes again though I'll tweak the instructions a bit the next time.
Whew! Teacher gifts done this year speedy quick and I wasn't as stressed out. That is a good thing. I'm linking up today with a few parties!
Fort Worth Fabric Studio Blog
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