swoon and the bqf

Don't you love the Bloggers Quilt Festival?  It's such a great way to learn about quilt makers and their stories, which I've come to realize, is really my favorite part.  So welcome to my lil' ol' blog!

How could I not be inspired to make a Swoon quilt after seeing so many beautiful examples?

like this one

or this one

or how about this one

i do really love this one

and of course, this one

A little research into my emails and I've learned that I bought the Thimble Blossoms PDF pattern on 6/8/2011.

The idea simmered about 8-9 months until I was ready to start in the spring of 2012; seriously how does time go by so quickly?

Maybe you know, or maybe you don't know, that in April of 2012  my husband and I divorced.  I'll spare you the details but as it does for most people, divorce sucks.  My brother wisely advised me to keep busy and more than once told me to make a divorce quilt and be done with it and move on.  I think it was good advice and while I probably won't ever refer to this quilt as the "divorce quilt" I might be comfortable calling it a healing one.

I originally wanted to make a linen and voile quilt, but after making a linen Single Girl quilt, I knew it would be too heavy for my liking. I decided on a neutral cotton for the back ground and whatever Anna Maria Little Folks voile I had left in my stash.  I love that no matter what is going on in my life I have a hobby that is so fulfilling, keeps me busy, and feels so therapeutic.  All those jokes about quilting being cheaper than therapy - hmm...maybe based in truth?

The St. Louis Modern Quilt Guild had a Sew-In on April 28th and there I organized my fabric pieces and started piecing the blocks.  It was a memorable Sew-In - tornado sirens, huge hail...I will never forget it.  Sew-ins are a great way to bond with your fellow quilters, but a sew-in with severe weather REALLY takes it up a notch.  Would it be weird to say I highly recommend it?

June saw the completion of the 9 over sized blocks and excited as I was to see them together, I just wasn't ready to finish the top.  So it sat.  I'm usually not one to let things sit unfinished but I had a lot going on that summer and maybe I needed the time to really absorb everything that was happening and didn't want to have all those not so great memories sewn up in my quilt? 

Everything in life started calming down in the Fall of 2012, and thankfully so.  The house sold, we said goodbye to some old memories and started a new interim chapter.  Pretty soon, 2013 arrived and with it, a new sewing machine!  What to sew first...hmm...you guessed it, Swoon!  The new machine was just the motivation I needed to finish the quilt top.  I chose to back the quilt with voile and the batting is Mountain Mist Cream Rose from Joanns - my Mom and I basted it with every pin we had between us to minimize shifting - it's a slippery soft drapey quilt (in the best way!).

I'm a lucky lady and my Mom agreed to hand quilt it; I purchased two spools of Aurifil 12 wt, one for neutral areas and one for the print and my Mom got to work.  She finished it just three days ago and just when I thought I couldn't love it more - I love it more.  Mom reports that the combination of the batting, voile, and Aurifil made this an easy project, with the needle just happily gliding along.

It is the most snugly soft, light and airy, cozy quilt I've ever touched and the best part is it that it's part of my journey and part of my story; a little souvenir of life.  It never ceases to amaze me how healing hobbies can be.  Between the actual act of sewing, the inspiration of the online communities, and the support and love of  friends and family- I have made it through some of my worst times - while still managing to have some of the best times, and I have a pretty sweet quilt to boot!
I'm truly thankful.

Thank you for reading; enjoy the rest of the festival!

modern patchwork spring 2013

Last year I was inspired by these flex frame bags at Pink Penguin, and you know how it goes...I overbought on supplies because I was THAT excited!
So, tap tap tap, finger on the table...what to make? 

If you guessed flex frame pouches...you are correct!

My first try was for the Midwest 12 Day's gift exchange I participate in.

I made seventeen or so of these linen pouches with a doily stamped on the front.  I drafted the pattern and it took a few tries to get the size and boxed corners to look the way I wanted, but overall they were quick and easy to put together.

 In the back of my mind, I knew I wanted to make little coin purses with the 10 smaller frames I had purchased and it just so happened that my little project coincided with an opportunity to submit to the next edition of Modern Patchwork by Interweave.

I am really proud to be a part of this publication for the second time.  The first edition of Modern Patchwork is a favorite of mine, and I've seen the second issue - it's just as good! 

I bought my frames here and they came in the mail with really cool stamps and markings from Hong Kong (in case you geek out about that stuff like I do).  

The Spring edition of Modern Patchwork hits newsstands today!

dashed

 May 2012 was my month to pick a pattern for the Lou Bee, a small group of friends that formed out of the St. Louis Modern Quilt Guild.  These lovely and talented ladies have made some beautiful quilt blocks and one of our quilts won a ribbon at Quilt Con!

  The Thimble Blossoms - Swoon pattern was on my mind at the time and still as popular as ever back in Spring '12.  Swoon is a fabulous over sized traditional block and it inspired me to try to put my own spin on a favorite old school quilt block, churndash.  A little log cabin action...toss in some string piecing...make it all bigger...and you have Dashed.

After I'd written up a little pattern, tested it, and handed fabric bundles out to my Lou Bee friends I decided it wouldn't hurt to try and get it published since most of the work was already done. Happily, it was accepted for publication in the Winter issue of Modern Quilts Unlimited.

The backing is Moda's Pezzy Print.

The quilting is free motion, in a sort of aboriginal inspired stipple? 

I totally made that up, but that's what it looks like to me; 

though I'm pretty sure aborigines didn't stipple quilts.

It's almost been a year since this journey started and I have finally finished my original Lou Bee quilt, which is why I'm writing this post and why I'm torturing you with the all the recap nonsense! 

The string piecing section of the original quilt is less structured than the magazine version and it does make a difference in the way the quilt looks; maybe a little more kaleidoscope-ish?  

The patterned fabric changes it up too (Denyse Schmidt Flea Market Fancy).

My Lou Bee friends did such a great job piecing; despite 8 of us sewing, the seams lined up well!  

Since my Mom is currently hand quilting my Swoon quilt (oh yeah, I didn't miss that train) I couldn't very well ask her to quilt this one too...but I'd be lying if the lure of those Aurifil 12 wt hand stitches weren't what I had in mind for this quilt.  I tried, unsuccessfully, to use Aurifil 12 wt cotton thread in my machine to try and give the quilt more of a homespun quilted look while still matching quilting it - but my machine just wasn't having it.  It started well, but quickly turned into broken thread, seam ripper, expletive land. (I am going to try again on a different quilt though, cause it looked pretty awesome.)  So Auriful 50 wt it was to be.

I recently had the pleasure of listing to Cindy talk about Free Motion Quilting at a St. Louis Modern Quilt Guild Sew-In and I was inspired!  This is the first quilt I've quilted since her class and I definitely stepped outside my comfort zone a little and tried some new things.  

Yay for new things and if you ever get the chance to learn from Cindy, don't hesitate.

Oh!  I also want to note that I used Quilters Dream Cotton Request batting for the first time with this quilt.  Hello?  Super soft, super light, actually - a dream.  It was so smooth, easy to baste, easy to quilt  - and has a lovely drape to it.  Will most definitely use it again!

everyone else is doing it

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So it would seem with the eminent death of our beloved Google Reader that many a folk, including me, are moving to the cutely named Blog Lovin'.  {anyone else want to poke a little doughy cartoon in the belly right now?  hooo hooooo!}.  Blog Lovin' lets you track some stat's on your blogdom if you "claim" your blog; I feel like a settler in Nebraska claiming my 40...clever Blog Lovin'...verrrrry clever.  I'm sure there's something in if for them too, and had I actually read the terms of service, I might know what that is.

Until the next post - which hopefully will be about my Lou Bee quilt, if I ever actually get it quilted.