Still alive in NYC

 Signature Blocks are arriving! 

You can read more about this or contribute see here

Here's what I have so far, laying on the fabrics I will use... 

THEY LOOK GOOD!!!!

Did you all think I disappeared this week?

I posted only ONCE! haha! I'm still  here alive and well, had TWO quits that have

to be done in basically two and half weeks so I went into online hibernation

to get them done...

One nearly done, one more to go...

THANK YOU TO:

Beatrice,Margaret, Helen, LeeAnn, Shannon, Gail.

Cathy, Judy, Megan, Alexis and Carolyn

Carolyn stopped by this week to say hi as she was in town from the UK...

So nice to meet you Carolyn!

I have had a bunch of emails about whether I used a pattern for this jumbled up Kaffe quilt...

NOPE.

I have never used a pattern to make a quilt,  I have nothing against patterns,

 I just enjoy the process of creating something from scratch.

If you look at the OLD posts about that KAFFE quilt, 

You will see how it emerged and changed, 

and grew, and then went into a box for hiding... haha

Basically I had those layer cakes laying here and just wanted to use them up

  because I couldn't think of anything better to do with them... 

I cut and sewn, and cut some more...I tried 9 patches, and didn't like them and cut 

them up, sew stuff back together... cut again... turn on point, add borders...etc etc...

that's kind of how I work...

Taking it out of that BOX and cutting a few simple shapes has really transformed the quilt...

Do I think It's a gem?  Maybe not, but it "ain't half bad!"

Process is the most  exciting part for me. I like the adventure of not knowing 

what will become of a pile of fabrics.

As a child learning hand piecing, I did use patterns to make pillows...

But I won't say I never will!  You never know, I have a few Friends books 

laying around here, that I feel compelled to give the a whirl...

I still have Kim's CHALLENGE of do my OWN thing to one of her QUILTS..

Does that count as using a pattern? 

I won't follow it exactly, But I can find inspiration from them...

 I have finished tops and cut backs for SIX of my own OLD quilts in the last 10 days...

So soon I will have some more oldies to share with you!
like this one click here : Anguillan Sunrise
or this one click here : Intuition Quilt

I'll be scarce again for the next week, My show is installed Tuesday, 

then I have my friend Shelly here next Friday...

and get that other quilt I need to get done...

The clock is ticking!

GIVEAWAY!!!!

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By the way. Don't forget to leave a comment on the LAST post... Scroll down.

and also visit the other bloggers on the tour to win a signed book from PAT!

Winners drawn APRIL 27th

or buy one for 15% off!

Tuesday – 4/19/11
LaVieEnRosie- ALL ABOARD QUILT 

PAT SLOAN

Wednesday – 4/20/11

BUMBLE BEANS INC– CUPCAKES & CONFECTIONS QUILT

 

MY CREATIVE SIDE – A PAIR OF WINNERS, VERSION 1, QUILT

Thursday – 4/21/11
The Quilted Fish– ISLAND DREAMS QUILT

Me and My Sister – MONKEY BUSINESS QUILT

Friday – 4/22/11
Gudrun’s World – LET’S GO CAMPING QUILT

The patchworkunderground – DOGGIE ADORATION QUILT

   

One more Novelty:

I had to dig out this piece of novelty fabric.  

I snatched it back at the retreat from the scrap bin.

Thought it needed to live in my kitchen somewhere...

hmm, what will it become...

Have a lovely weekend!

Happy Easter!

weekend project

Resurrecting yet another OLDIE Quilt top! (old posts here)

This was a quilt I put together from two stacks of layer cakes of Kaffe prints... 

when I originally did it, i thought... Who on earth made this quilt, it's so not me!

Well, I did, and I ran out of black, so into the BOX of forgotten quilt tops 

waiting for more black to arrive...

I think I've gone through 8 yards of black in the meantime...

 

I was still not happy with this quilt, and thought long and hard about 

what I could do to make it ZINGY!  I finally put the outer 6 inch border
of black around, and once I did that I knew what had to be done. 

There was plenty of MEDIUM tones, and the nice bright yellow to pop,
and it just needed a DARKEST DARK amongst the patterns to make it all POP.

Do you know what people mean when they say LIGHT MEDIUMS AND DARKS?

Look at this quilt in Black and white...

Lights mediums and darks does not mean, 

WHITE = BRIGHT or BLACK = DARK

Your LIGHTS can be a BRIGHT YELLOW A SOFT YELLOW,
PINKS, lighter tones of color.

And DARKS can be anything that has a strong VALUE of color.
It might be a red, or blue or purple or brown or orange...
it always totally depends on what fabrics you are using..

Do you see how all the red, purple, and even the black floral prints,

when you turn the image black and white, all those colors go gray?

I thought it was a big muddy mess when I looked at it before
I even looked at it in black and white.

Even though I had BLACK in it, it wasn't enough.

By adding a SOLID black, and more of it,
it now reads as the darkest VALUE of the quilt. 

The PINKS AND YELLOWS are reading as the whites...
and all of the other colors, red, orange, green, purple pink etc all read as mediums...

VALUE = is how light or dark a color is

Does this make sense?  I get asked questions about this quite a lot...

If any of you took photography in high school and developed
prints the "old fashioned" way... with chemicals,
you know in printing a black and white photograph you look for your
brightest white and your darkest BLACK to make a good photo.  

You then have a whole long range of colors that make up the gray tones...

Same sort of idea.

Now with the Aplpique, I am singnig a new tune over this quilt. 

It finally has that 

"ZOWIE!" feel to it! 

Boy what a difference that made!

 

So I sit here now with a KING size quilt in my lap trying to applique these bits on....

 Including my BELT from MY SWEATER! LOL!

Girl needs a hoop over here!

Have a fabulous weekend!

Raggedy Ragamuffin

I have been going like a mad woman yesterday and today... and BOY DOES IT FEEL GOOD!

I felt like I lost my steam going on vacation, But now I am back!

I dug out more quilt tops to see what I could finish up and GET OUT OF HERE... 

Deciding which I want to quilt, and which I want to send out.

Can I tell you, I have so many tops that have ONE THING for them to be finished?

Example:

RAGAMUFFIN

This top has been done and the backing has been sitting here...

the ONLY thing I needed to do was applique the YEAR on it... 2010...

Today was it's lucky day...

 I put some thought into what FONT the 2010 should be...Simple, slight curves to the letters, 

and then also, I wanted the stitching to SHOW, and be slightly elementary looking...   

I have to say, trying to MAKE it look that, was as hard as getting it to NOT look that way! 

I got pretty good at the stitches by the end of the last "0"... 

It seemed fitting to have it this way.. Ragamuffin + orphan blocks+

unwanted lost blocks, all coming together coming together, it now feels complete...

It's been boxed, and shipped to LINDA, who also quilted my 

EVERYTHING BUT THE KITCHEN SINK QUILT.

With so many seams on this quilt, 

it will be good just to have an all over pattern to keep it all in place...

Applique has been a big part of the thing's I need to finish on many of my quilts... 

I go through streaks where I love it and other times when it is such a chore...

But I guess that's normal!

 Well, that's one to show you for today!  

I have 5 more done and two more nearly done! 

Next time you see this one, it will be quilted.

And soon I need to get working on my 2011 version of this quilt.

I have a start on it already. (SILK)

but it's hanging here staring at me, begging me to pay it some attention.

Added to the list...

What is the next quilt up on your 

LIST OF THINGS TO DO?

P.S. Kristin has a fantastic quilt up at her blog.... go see... It's amazing...

I am being given my friends old service uniforms to make them into a quilt for his family... 

I hope I can make something as worthy as Krisitn's!

WONKY SQUARES DONE.

 FINISHES.... I am going to be focusing on FINISHES for the next few weeks... 

I have so many tops sitting here, ( I know I've said this  before)
It's time to get them done and out of here!;-)Recently I have gotten three quilts quilted...
Did I  mention they still need to be bound?  One thing at a time!

So today I want to show you one finish, I picked up from Jackie the other day.

 This quilt started probably three years ago. I made the blocks and disliked them from the get go...
I could not figure out how to jazz them up...  I know everyone loved that Katy jump rope fabric...
I loved the blues and browns.. then when I had them all together I thought.. humpf.. very dull!

They laid in my bins for a long time, and every so often I'd pull them out and play with them.

I can find one old post here, but this was definitely not the only one!

Never finding the right solution for them...

Then one day I couldn't stand it anymore... And I pulled them out one day and

didn't think to much about it.... started sewing some favorite fabrics around each of them..
things that contained blues and reds... even a little PINK and RED to make them SING!!!!

I found a backing that I thought would make the whole thing, POP!
And then I thought, "well that wasn't so hard after all!  What took me so long?"

And just to make thing seven easier, I sent it out to be quilted.

Now let me see what other oldies I can get out of here.... and onto the binding pile...

I have four more ready to go, and A KAFFE quilt that is getting some applique added...
turning it into something I did not like into something I love!

How many tops do you think you have stored away not finished?
Are you afraid to say  how many?  I might be! 

two oldies nearly done!

 OLD POSTS for STARRY NIGHT HERE

Here are two Quilts that have been sitting here and sitting here...for over a year...
Now I know that many of you have quilts that have taken years to get finished,
but I decided to move a few out of here and I figure I can learn something also by seeing how others quilt quilts too.

Thanks Shannon, they Look great!


Neither are KING size... LOL! 
So neither fit my bed very well, But they will do perfectly on a queen size...
(fat lotta good that does me! what was I thinking??) 
haha!

The backings are just so yummy too. Jennifer Paganelli fabric on this one no doubt!

 OLD POSTS for my ON POINT quilt HERE

My On POINT quilt, which got me back into applique... I LOVE this quilt... 
I like what she did on the quilting too... Yummy texture

The flowers look all so nice and squishy!

It also has a VIBRANT purple and orange backing...

 

Now they will go into the BINDING pile!  How long will that take do you think???

First to pick a binding, then to think about actually doing it... LOL!

I have quite a stack that need to be done!  

Some I want to quilt myself...

Some I worry I will mess up, and some I have lost interest in...

Eventually I get around to them! or not...

**

The Metro MOD meeting is today (Saturday)...

I am off to play and see some fabulous

show and tell with our lovely group!

Have a lovely day!