Traditional Sampler

I quilted this sampler back in October. It, too, fell into the vacuum of blog posts whose time never quite came around... until now!

I just love the antique-looking color palette of blues, browns, golds and reds in this traditional quilt. Thread was So Fine Straw top and bottom, and batting was Hobbs 80/20. Being a sampler, each block got its own custom treatment. I used continuous curves throughout the star points, piano keys along the outer borders, and a unifying motif in each of the quarter-square triangles. (Excuse the chalk markings in some of the photos.)

Lisa Sipes trunk show

 

Last week, the Missour Kansas Machine Quilters Guild (MKMQG) hosted quilter Lisa Sipes who had a trunk show and shared much quilty goodness. The fuchsia hair, piercing and tattaoos may have been an eye opener for some of our more seasoned quilters, but she was very entertaining and brought some stunning quilting to share. The quilt below won a blue ribbon at MQS 2011 in the embroidery category and features some incredible micro-quilting. This was also the first quilt Lisa entered in a show (and had been quilting for only two years at that point!) WOW! The purple photo below this one is the back side of this quilt. The gold is the quilting.

 

I love the ruler work on these. Those three little lines are only an eighth inch apart. I would have loved to have seen first hand how the heck she did this.

 

I had seen many of these quilts online, but they were just incredible in person. Thanks, Lisa, for sharing your amazing work!

Learning the hard way

"Careful. We don't want to learn from this!"

I should heed this advice from Calvin and Hobbs. Unfortunately, I've been learning a lot lately.

Last week I loaded a customer quilt at the shop and started quilting. It wasn't until several passes later when I advanced the quilt that I discovered this: eyelashes.

Eyelashes are great for a night on the town. Not so much on the back of a quilt. Eyelashes mean tension issues. Ugly. So then I had to do this: frog.

Frogs are cute in the garden. But for machine quilters, it just means spending some extra quality time with your seam ripper. Rip it! Rip it! Rip it!

Smooth sailing after that.

I hate when I have to learn things the hard way! But now I check my tension and check it often.

Over the hump!

Up until now, I have been doing a little longarming on practice panels and scrap fabric, but with a little coaxing from my quilting buddies, I finally got the nerve to put a "real" quilt on the frame and just go for it! So I guess it is official, I have my first paying customer! WooHoo! (Even if it is my mother.)

This cute as a bug ladybug quilt was pieced by Diana (Hi, Mom!), and the pattern is a disappearing nine patch. I used a variegated turquoise thread in the turquoise and purple fabrics and a light yellow in the yellow fabric.

In the narrow border I wrote, "ladybug, ladybug, fly away home."

Here is the view from the back.

Don't look too close at my wobbles and jitters. And I want to say a big thank you to the South Mini Group girls who helped me pick out thread colors and pushed me out of my comfort zone!

No looking back now, I already have quilt number two loaded and in progress!

Trunk show with Sheryl Schleicher

Today my longarm quilting guild had a trunk show by quilter Sheryl Schleicher (in the green and black). She shared with us some really great quilts and her techniques for straight line quilting. She spent years as an engineer before becoming a quilter, and drafting and quilting geometric shapes was what came naturally to her.

It was interesting to see how others approach quilting, especially when it is so different from what you are used to. She showed several that had text incorporated into the design which were very striking.

The more I see these modern quilts, the more I like them. I may have to add these to my "someday projects" list.

We're live!

Welcome to Back Porch Quiltworks! I'm so excited to launch this new blog where I hope to share my passion for quilting and all those other messes projects I seem to get into. I have been a quilt piecer for quite a while, but have recently found myself involved with longarm quilting. Although I don't have a machine yet, I hope to in the future. Yesterday I got to spend a few hours learning on an actual machine. LOVED IT! It was so much fun. It kind of felt like that first day of learning to write cursive. You don't quite know how to hold your pencil or stay exactly between the lines, but you're excited about this new-found means of creative expression. My grandma used to sit and doodle, writing names over and over. And not just boring everyday handwriting, she had swirlies and fancy flourishes. I could hardly wait for third grade to write in cursive (even though Mrs. Saunders didn't quite appreciate all my "added character.") And ever since then, I've been fascinated with flowing lines, patterns and fancy details. I've always doodled on paper (and even in my head), and today I got to put it on fabric. Award winning quilter right out of the shoot, no. But I am hooked and eager for more. Don't be too critical. Remember, I am the equivalent of a third grade quilter.