Pie class offered and Wave Project quilting lines

Marny here...

First an announcement! We will be teaching Pie, Sweet or Savory on Saturday, June 27th in Ames, Iowa at the Quilting Connection. 

The Quilting Connection website class listing is under construction, so here is the info Kelly emailed:

New Class!  We are very excited to welcome Jill Guffy and Marny Buck of MODERN QUILT RELISH as guest instructors!  They have just released a new pattern, simply called, "Pie."  Join them both on Saturday, June 27th from 10am-4pm to make this marvelously modern quilt.  To see a picture of their recent booth at International Quilt Market, which features this quilt pattern, go to http://www.iaquilts.com/uploads/5/1/9/9/51991953/1433344773.png.  There are several design options that give many different looks,  and we have these very quilts displayed in our store!   It is a privilege to host these nationally-known authors in their home shop.  Space is limited and will fill quickly!  Class fee is $65 for the day, including a light lunch.  Call or email to reserve your space!
515-233-3048
info@iaquilts.com 

We are looking forward to familiar faces and to new faces! Please join in!!! Pie is an easy to piece block (I promise) and we'll get you a long ways towards completion in the six hour class! 

On the subject of classes, we taught a workshop in Cedar Falls, Iowa last June. We just received photos from Chris of her completed "Singing the Blues" using our Leftovers pattern. I remember the lovely fabrics. Thank you for sharing Chris!

And now for my UFO - Wave Project.
How to quilt? Rather than continue to be overwhelmed I decided to reduce the scale, literally. I printed out photos of the entire quilt and mocked up potential quilting lines with a pencil.

Here I used my original little drawing of wave action seen in the previous post. The top and bottom of the quilt are mirror images of one another. This is a white quilt, and the stitching will be white too.

The 'islands' are further removed from one another and the wave swells are mostly parallel lines. These mock ups are very useful. Time to forge ahead.

 Till Tuesday...

Quilt UFO seeking attention

Marny here...the time has come. (I hope)

Does this happen to you? You finish a top and then the quilting decisions stymie you? Fresh fabric wants to be cut and pieced and you move on? It happens over and over to me.

I can date this Wave Project UFO to June 2011. Read about it here. It was set aside because the quilting decisions overwhelmed me. You can imagine that over a period of four years it got totally buried in a basket with other ideas/projects stacked on top. When I wanted to see it again a couple of years ago I couldn't find it anywhere. Magically it reappeared earlier this spring.

The Monk Upstairs brought the whole project back on my radar this week. Tim Farrington's imagery made me long for warm Hawaiian sand and the beauty of ocean waves arriving on shore. The memories of sand and surf lingering in my mind will help me get through the quilting! I hope.

Vertical or horizontal?

Wave patterns are fascinating. A 9th grade oceanography field trip to watch incoming waves encounter wharfs, reefs, shallow depths, wind, etc. has come back to me too! I'm trying to capture a bit of my history in this Wave Project. 
We'll see...

Decisions need to be made concerning the final orientation of the quilt and whether to use straight or curved quilting lines or both. And then I better dive right in!

Till Tuesday...

Quilting Line Forms Here

Marny's turn...It started innocently enough.  I was choosing thread for the circular quilting lines I planned for my ongoing Wave project.  (The straight lines I had originally envisioned were pushed aside by the concentric circles that result when you drop a pebble in water.)

These four all have potential crossing the Kona snow background and the pieced lines.

It is a good idea to spread your thread choices across the surface to allow you to make a decision with some basis.

But then a new idea popped into my head and I tried it out on a sheet of paper.

Cool wave opportunities rev up the imagination.

So I tried it out on a plain quilt sandwich.  All along I am thinking too much thread and too many lines for my current project.  But the inspiration moves me forward.

It starts out simply enough, and I stay on track at first.

The intersecting lines and spaces are intriguing.

But then I lose my concept and stray from what I learned in the drawing.
 The crossover point is important to keep consistent.

The wave is kind of lost, but it is a learning experience.

So with nothing to lose, I started adding lines below then
above the original set.

Lots of movement, but not believable as waves.  Twisting yes, wave action no.

Quilting lines are important in your quilts.  Their first job is to keep the layers of your quilt together through whatever use and laundering methods you have planned for it.  But they also can serve to reinforce the look you hope to achieve for your quilt.  The scale of the quilting shape, the density of the line, the geometry or organic flow of the stitching and the color of thread all need to be considered when making your quilting choice.  Quilting often makes the quilt come alive.

The Wave quilt is already about lines of waves.  The blocks are simple and there is a relatively large amount of negative space.  So I am heading back to simple lines of quilting.  I'm hopeful the experimentation today will show up somewhere else before long.  The practice and exploration has my mind hopping with ideas.

Till next Tuesday.

Waves with a nod to Modern Quilt Design Elements

Marny here...back to Hot today-Modern Quilts are Too! posted two weeks ago.  Options have been considered, a direction committed to, and the table runner top completed.

I was aiming for using lots of negative space and asymmetry.  In this case, the negative space is Kona Cotton Snow.  The layout will give the asymmetry.

The first step was to cut the "beach glass" blocks into 7 1/2" squares that will finish 7". Sets of three seemed appropriate.  They had enough repetition and enough variety to be visually interesting.

The next step was to work on layout.  I had something in mind, but it seemed a good idea to stop and test the idea.

The "verticals" off kilter were fun but not what I wanted to portray.

The "verticals" fall on the same horizontal.  Again a layout that was not that supportive of my vision.

Now we are getting somewhere!

One last decision to explore-sashing or no.  I am thinking no, but again it doesn't hurt to mock it up.

With sashing in between the columns and

without sashing.  Getting better.

Sewn together.   21" x 56" finished. 

Negative space and asymmetry abound.  These are two design elements that make this project a modern one.  I look forward to quilting it vertically.

All along the process I was dreaming of the beach.  You see, I am just back from Hawaii - a fun high school reunion and a fantastic family vacation.  Once you have lived near an ocean, waves are part of your being.  At least they are part of mine.  And it was never about beach glass but about sets of waves coming to shore.  The colors are those of the Pacific.

Bear with me and enjoy part of Hawaii's beauty.

Textures and colors

Scents of flowers

Tropical critters

The nightly ritual of the sun setting on the horizon.

 Till Tuesday then....

Hot Today - Modern Quilts are too!

Marny here...

The forecast in this morning's paper says it all.  "Be prepared to deal with hot temperatures again today.  Our highs will be in the middle 90's.  There will be a gusty south wind that may feel like a blowtorch."  For some reason that description seemed very apt to me!

So down to the sewing room I go.  The temperature is better and there is fabric to play with.  The scraps sorted on my cutting table are calling to me.  One pile in particular seems to be all about "cool."  It happens to be made up of the analogous colors:  green to blue-green to sort of blue.  There are three values of each.

They happen to be the leftovers from one of our new patterns called Supper Club.  I have a variety of little pieced units remaining.  I love the cool colors of the ocean, grass and sky.  Slicing and dicing will commence.

The little strip sets get cut into unequal portions.

Another scrap gets cut into 1 1/2" strips.  Not sure at this point why, except that it seems it might be useful down the line.

The little units are stitched to a background strip.

Cut apart and pressed.  Then sewn to another, wider strip of  background.  

Cut apart and pressed to reveal "blocks".

Playing with layout 1.

Layout 2.

Layout 3.

Lots of playing and decisions to be made.  The blocks purposefully have unequal amounts of background on either side.  I may add some to the top and/or bottom of the blocks as well.  Then they will be trimmed down.  At this point, a really asymmetric result with more negative space is what I have in mind.  But there is a lot of flexibility built into the process.  It will also need a something unexpected to add visual interest.

This process would be great for many of the pieces we are left with after finishing a quilt.  The little center "stripes" don't have to be pieced leftovers, they could be any fabric.  Just think of the baby quilts and table runners that could result.  Give it a try!

See you next Tuesday.