Country Roads

A couple weeks ago I told you about the class I took on counterintuitive quilting, taught by Patricia Belyea.  It was very outside the box and I had a lot of fun.  We're having a follow-up class at the end of this month and I wanted to have something to show for myself, so I decided to take the parts and pieces with me up to Guemes Island this past weekend to make some progress.

When I had brought the blocks home from the initial class and laid them out for Andrew that evening, he said it reminded him of the countryside and some of the blocks looked like roads, so I took that as my inspiration and titled my quilt Country Roads.  This, however, did not come without consequences; throughout the entire weekend I had the image of Andy and Dwight from The Office singing "Country Roads" in the break room running on a continuous loop in my head.

Saturday afternoon and evening the wind was blowing hard and the rain was so heavy I was a little nervous it was going to uproot our house and carry it away, Wizard of Oz style.  To combat the dreary weather Abby baked a couple loaves of challah, which we had with Diane's home made freezer jam, and we opened a bottle of wine.  The hurricane-like gales were also a great motivator to get some sewing done, since we couldn't really even go outside, much less walk on the beach.

Currently it's about 55 inches square.  I'm not done with the top quite yet, but it will be a relatively small quilt. Some changes I'd like to make will address the bottom left corner. I will have a cohesive border around it with a little more green on one corner to balance out where it got a little green-heavy in this piece.

Overall, I'm pretty happy about this quilt and I'm excited to see it taking shape.  Stay tuned for more on this in a few weeks!

Quilting!

Okay, so I haven't actually sewn a stitch, but I did get all my pieces cut out for my patriotic / nautical quilt(s).  Hundreds and hundreds of half-square triangles.  I usually gravitate toward a quilting style that evolves as I go, but I'm trying something new: traditional planned quilting!  I actually cut everything out ahead of time and (loosely) counted my pieces.

See?

I love the navy/white stripe fabric best.  It is actually an old sheet I bought at Good Will during Katie's visit.

Then, I auditioned various layouts before sewing.
1)

 alternating red and blue

 (the rest were taken with the camera phone to text to abby in real-time brainstorming. Please excuse the graininess and coloring.)

2) 

thick diagonal stripes of three, alternating

3)

red and blue horizontal layout

4) winner #1:

red with a random smattering of blue

5) winner # 2 (my personal favorite):

blue with a random smattering of red

I'm pretty sure I have enough for two coordinating twin bed sized quilts.I'm really liking the freshness of the blue and white with little red surprises.

DBC Weekend

What a weekend!  It was DBC-tastic.  Kate, our San Francisco outfit, was in town Thurs night through Sunday evening for some quilty fun, but we didn't limit it to just sewing.  We spent all day Saturday up in the Skagit Valley with the Seattle moms enjoying the annual Tulip Festival.  I thought I'd take you on a little floral parade through the highlights...

...and of course a group photo of the DBC members.  Poor Kate and Abby were trying to stay as dry as possible. I, on the other hand, felt invincible in my rain jacket and boots.

What DBC reunion would be complete without a fabric store excursion.  We visited The Quilting Loft and Fabric Crush where we picked up some beauts.  Here's my loot:

Sunday was absolutely gorgeous, so we spent the morning photographing our finished quilts to be uploaded onto our etsy shop.  We still have to edit down, but here's a sneak preview of our hard work:

That's Kate looking positively nautical on our dock.  She's such a great quilt model.  A couple of hours later we relaxed on that same dock with barbecued chicken and a few Mexican bottled beers.  The sunburn on my shoulders was totally worth it.

More Quilting (2 Projects)

I just wanted to show you a little more of my progress.  I got this sucker quilted...

I got the binding attached....

...and I started to finish it.  The fabric for this binding makes me so happy.  I just love it.  But that's not all I've  been working on.

I've listed them here from most favorite (at the top) to least favorite, but I think they'll all look fabulous together in a quilt.

My idea is to make blocks like these where I inverse the fabrics, so the thinner part will be a printed fabric and the thicker ones will be white.

I hope to have it done before DBC gets together mid-month.  That's a pretty lofty goal, though, considering how slowly I move on quilts.

I'm loving it so far!

Quilt Inspiration

So my inspiration for the quilt I've been scheming is in the Kona Cotton solid color line.  I definitely want to include (clockwise from top left) Pacific, Medium Grey, Cyan, and Coal.  I'm trying to decide if I want to include Natural or White, or either.  What do you think?

A Girl and Her Shoes

sources: shirt, skirt, belt, shoes, jewelry

Over the weekend Abby and I had a DBC Quilts booth at the Fremont Sunday Market.  Because it was our first time participating in an outdoor market of any kind, it took all of Saturday to prepare, including a late-afternoon trip up to Sports Authority to secure a set of walls for our pop-up canopy.  Our booth looked great, even if our sales on Sunday weren't.  More on that later.  

What I want to talk about is the side trip that led to a fashion find that brought joy to my wardrobe.  Sports Authority is in the same complex as Ross and Target, so our intention was to take a little side excursion to these other fine establishments as well to check out any possibilities for display gadgets.  I ended up with no sales gadgets but two pairs of fabulous shoes.

Now there are some people who buy something, hang it in their closet, and then pull the tags off a month later when they decide to wear it.  Not me.  If I purchase something, I have to wear it as soon as possible.  Part of it is due to my chronic (and sometimes debilitating) case of impatience.  Another reason is I decided about a year or two ago to only buy things I truly love.  This makes the morning after a purchase like Christmas to me; I can't wait to get dressed for work.

This morning was no exception.  I found some purple platform pumps (say that five times fast!) at Ross on Saturday that I simply couldn't live with out, so this morning I coordinated some basics around my footwear to really showcase how fantastic they are.  I wish I had a picture of the real thing, but as usual, I'm just able to give you the fashion equivalent of my ensemble.  The actual pair of shoes is closed-toed and has a more conservative embellishment, but they are purple snakeskin platform stilettos.  How could I say no??  I'm having a wonderful time prancing around today.  It also doesn't hurt that these shoes make me about almost six feet tall.  Yep.