{quilt} while you're ahead

there are no shortcuts

Quilting is a lot like life.

For example, the old adagio: 'measure twice, cut once' ... what it basically means is think before you act. Agreed?  Good.

Now reflect on this for a second and admire the only remaining branch of my beloved Japanese maple (victim of an anonymous stray rugby ball... the case is still open)

So today, when I found myself with some precious time to spare I sat down at my desk and started cutting fabric and sewing fabric and .... aaaarrrrrrrrrgggggggggghhhhhhhh

In my haste to tackle the UFO - now upgraded to WIP - of my previous post I completely ignored any measurement and elementary mathematical functions and basically made a huge/enormous/gigantic mess.

Take a moment, like I did, to mourn the loss of precious fabric and the temporary and hormonal loss of any rational mental faculty with a delicious (and posthumously regretted) chocolate biscuit

 

This brings me to my next point of simili:  there are no shortcut.  I wanted to finish this project quickly and what I did achieve instead is a big fat juicy waste of time.  Doh.  I wanted to ignore the little voice in my head pointing me to the right direction because it meant slow progress and fiddly sewing.

How many times has this happened in real life too?

So, no shortcuts is my new mantra.

Even if this means endless rows of little borders... 

I'll get there in the end. 

 

And I'll smell the flowers

 
 

mariner's compass

This is not a UFO... it's more like a fossil.  It precedes any grey hair I might have.  It is older than two of my children.  A relict from the days when I had only one child to look after and thought I had no free time at all - the charming ignorance of youth...

Anyway, I 've been trying to de-clutter.  And honestly, is there anything more poisoning than a great big pile of UFOs staring at you with their mean/sad/why-don't-you-love-me-anymore beady eyes?  Right, we all know the answer to that one.

So I exhumed the oldest and probably the biggest of these monsters and tried to re-kindle the old flame.

 

I must have been mad, this quilt was most likely designed in a daze of sleep depravation and baby love (do you remember those days... when you spent all night awake with a screaming baby and all day awake looking adoringly at your sleeping baby?... doh.)

Anyway, it's not my style really... but I can't just let it languish in a box forever so I'm thinking perhaps if I can ignore the fact that not all the point touch the outer circle (it's painful) I might be able to make a medallion quilt out of thise one? Help?

I don't have much in terms of the original fabric (mostly Kaffe Fasset)  but I do have four badly assembled blocks called, according to my notes, 'Martha Washington's squares'.  But that is not necessarily the correct name...

 

Should I use them? how? where? in the corners? in the middle of the sides?

(And yes, I'm standing on the table... don't tell the boys)
 

Birmingham Festival of Quilts - part 3

   oh yes, there's more.

The quilts I'm going to show you today were part of special exhibition.  Made by 'professional' as No 2 would say - his favourite to describe high level of proficiency and skills in any field whatsoever.

Right here are the 'professional' quilts then:

first up is Chiunghie Lee

Ingrid Press

Janice Gunner

And my completely absolutely totally undisputably favourite the amazing Yoshiko Jinzenji.

I had a brief chat with her and she's so nice and helpful and encouraging.  Taking on of her workshops would be simply amazing.  The photos do not do justice to the beauty of her work.

Amazing.  And nothing was 'appliqued'.  Just an inspired use of fabrics and patterns.

Amazing.

Birmingham Festival of Quilts - part 2

  Today we're going to enter the world of art quilts.

Scary subject I know, but I might have to eat my previous opinions about them because I was completely bowled over by some and intriguid by others (and in all honesty worried about the mental health of some 'creators' too... but I won't show you those)... and I'll let you make up your mind. 

ah the colours; wouldn' this make a most stunning rug?

This one was made by an Italian quilter.  Doesn't it make you think of those old villages clinging to the top of a mountain?  I love it.

I don't usually go for dark colours... but who would have thought there were so many shades of black?

or so many shades of red either?

I would love this one on my wall... sigh...

 

This is made entirely of shopping labels (and handles...)

It's happy.  And I like the 'make do' ethos... use what you have type philosophy.

all those quilted stiches... I really really like heavily quilted items.

how amazing would this look against a white wall?  I'm sure I could even convinced Mr M about it.

part fabric part paper.  Genius.

this... I don't know how to explain it... can you even call it a quilt? But I absolutely love it.

log cabin love.

the colours... the heavy quilting... the  funky logcabins...

Isn't this the most beautiful use of photographs?

looks like graffiti, eh?

this island of Manhattan one was one of three and I thought the choice of fabric was great

 

does anybody know what fabric it is?  It's just gorgeous!!

Ok, that's it for today folks...

'Toodles'... (name that film)

Birmingham Festival of Quilts - part 1

Brilliant.  What a beautiful show.  Ok admittedly my last visit had been 4 years ago, two weeks after a c-section and my memory of that day it's clouded in paracetamol, but I heard so many people saying how good it was, so it's not just me.

Today I was fit and healthy; giddy at the sight of so many quilts and fabric.

Anyway, I've taken more than 100 photos, but before you groan in despair don't worry, I won't show them all at once...

Let's start with the show winner, shall we?  I believe it comes from Japan, but I was too tight to buy the show guide so I don't have any more details than that. (shabby, I know)

Ok, quite eye-catching you might say... but wait till I get closer...

See those lines? No, not quilting lines.... seams.  Oh yes baby this quilt is made of thousands of tiny tiny pieces.  Check this out:

Tiny. small. pieces. perfectly joined.

The accuracy was amazing and the most incredible thing of all?  It was completely hand quilted in the ditch, but you only know this if you look at the back.

You can close your mouths now.  Shake your shoulder, take a deep breath and the feeling of inadequacy and failure will fade eventually.  We're all human after all... although it seems that some more than most...

On to the rest then.  What follows is just a small sample of what I liked and what caught my eye on the day.  In this post I'll show you the more 'traditional' quilts.

The 'best in show' in this category went to this one

In my humble opinion the border was the nicest part

folksy, eh?

very dear-janeish, I thought.

I liked this Hawaiian quilt... makes me think of holidays.  Even thought I've never been to Hawaii.

I would probably never make one of these, but they held a child-like fascination for me

hexagons; I'm developing an obsession, you'll see.

modern hamish?

lots of borders, I like that.

more hexagons... get used to it..

and these were quilted with round circles making them look like flowers and completely erasing the shape of the hexagons.  Mmmm, they jury is out on this one.

Brown.  I was very into brown today too.  Who knows why.

yes, our 6-sided friends again - must be the trend these days - this time interestingly fussy-cutted

see? clever and simple and the same time?  or is it too clever, over-thought out?

 Well typepad won't let me upload any more photos to this post, so I guess you've been saved the last two of the day.

Till next time...

 

 

a new table runner

The old one died of a painful death caused by red paint and a full cup of tea.  Sad, but like every cloud it has its silver lining.

Like the perfect excuse for some sewing and free motion quilting.

And the brave - in a house full of boys - placing of a white jug.

And now let's see how long this one lasts.  Don't hold your breath.

Amy and I

 Yesterday I had the pleasure to attend a talk given by Amy Butler.  It was great to meet somebody responsible for so much of my Visa bill in recent years, someone whose disegn peppers my wardrobe and my house...

And here she is

 

oh yeah, and that's me - hi, ya'll - and that is no 3 who loves having his picture taken.

I was unable to find a babysitter for the boys so I took them with me.  They say luck helps the brave (and the stupid...) and they were superb.  They sat quietly for 2 hours, colouring, playing Nintendo, sitting on the floor picking their toes...

And this is Amy talking about her new line (can't wait, looks fab) coming out in the Autumn and trying very hard not to look at what No 3 was up too just in front of her.  She's a professional, she didn't miss a slide.

and, wait a moment, what's that in the background? there on the table looking splendid and amazingly finished?

but of course, it's this little baby...

which now lies in all its Amy glory in the newly painted spare room

This room used to be a VERY bright pink but after three years I had to democratically bow to the majority and get rid of it.  Nobody liked it but me.  Seriously.  Nobody.

So now it's this soft, calm, restful powdery blue (Farrow & Ball, Parma Grey).  And everyone is happy.

Including me.

4

The boys are back in town.

And while I can't deny I missed them terribly I have to admit that in 30 minutes they have annihilated two weeks of tidying and sorting and cleaning.  It's like they never left.  Which is both delightfully good and depressingly real.

It doesn't help they walked straight into No 3's birthday.  The postmodernist cake was decorated by the two of us together

and don't you think those are enough candles... oh no.  those candles are for wimps and traditionalists... we had some special flame throwing stuff too

(no eyebrows were lost, you'll be happy to know)

And so my baby is 4.  I won't go on about how sad (and old) that makes me feel, and how I could definitively go and have another one (and Mr M walks around with his fingers in his ears because he doesn't want to hear that) and how quickly time passes, blah blah blah.  I won't.  Maybe another time.  Sigh.

Anyway, he got a new quilt.

One that has been almost a year in the making

and one that felt 'right' only recently with the addition of a lot of white.

The binding is  blue gingham (love love love it) and the reverse is an Ikea fabric I've had for ages, the rest is all scraps and stash - although there's no clear dent in my shelves, sadly I'd thought I could justify some shopping at the Festival of Quilts next week... maybe not...

He likes it.  So that's ok.

we are sorry to interrupt...

the holiday programme to bring you the latest news and weather.

Actually the least said about the weather the better

 

News then:

taking advantage of the boys' absence I picked up my Amy Butler quilt from the long-arm quilter

 

the colours are all off because of the afore mentioned crazy weather we had yesterday  but I really love the big flowers she quilted all over (They're about 6" across).  Perfect.  Now I only have to hand sew 360" of binding.  Peanuts. 

And you know what I think about sewing the binding.

I've also been painting rooms and cuboards because we have new beds for the boys coming next week.  That's right, there's no rest for the wicked.

 

And new beds mean new quilts, at least for No 3 who's moving into a 'big boy's bed' - a moment of silence and sadness... my baby!! in a big bed!!! .... ok I'm fine, really.  Deep breath, get a grip woman. Cometh the hour, cometh the (wo)man and all that.

So this will be his first big quilt. 

Oh no, I just thought about it... more binding to sew. 

 

Given the huge list of things to accomplish in the next 8 days ... gulp ... I'm convinced the best course of action is getting changed into something nice and meeting my husband for coffee in town.  Right now.  Musn't delay.

Yep, that'll do it.

and this is for my sister

who's leaving England and going back to Italy in two weeks' time

 

and will be very very missed

 

so hopeful she'll think of us

 

when she snuggles under this on those chilly (...???...) Italian summer nights....

 

or maybe she just looks at it in the 40C degree heat!!