Some Setting Ideas from the Austin Quilt Guild

Unfortunately, I missed Monday night's quilt guild meeting because when I went rushing out the door tat the last minute, I  encountered a car that wouldn't start :-(

Fortunately, the guild published photos from Show and Tell and of some of the speaker's quilts, who this month was Becky Goldsmith of Piece 'o Cake–she was talking about color,  I am really unhappy that I missed it.  A couple of the images were good examples of a couple things you could do with this months' block  . . .  if you are lucky enough to win.

This is Monica's Show and Tell quilt.  The rectangular blocks are set in the way I tried to emulate with my block photo. 

 Here's a closer look.  Her blocks are 4-patches, not 3-patches (an interesting idea for the future, maybe?)  She added strips to the long sides of the 4-patches to make them square, then sewed them together, rotating every other block.

The next two blocks are photos of Piece 'o Cake quilts that Becky Goldsmith brought with her (and the actual designs are copyrighted by them).  They are great examples of pretty simple large scale applique on a pieced background . . . another idea that I have already mentioned too many times ;-)

Tree Everlasting - Inspirational Quilt

This quilt, Tree Everlasting,  was made by Nancie Voegele and was part of my inspiration for this month.

Although I had seen photos of this quilt on the Liberated Quilters Yahoo list, I got to see it alive and in person at the Austin Area Quilt Guild Show earlier this year.  It's really wonderful.

And here's a closer look at some of Nancie's trees and the quilting design.

Itty Bitty Variable Stars

At the bottom of Sharon's post on her blog Quilt Granny's Shoe,  are photos from her retreat with Gwen Marston, including this detail photo of her favorite of Gwen's quilts.

The star blocks are only THREE INCHES.  Five of the star blocks are combined with plain squares to make a 9-patch, then the 9-patch blocks are sashed with three inch strips and more star blocks for the corner stones.  Follow the link to see more photos of this quilt and the liberated projects that everyone made at the retreat.

Another House & Stars Quilt

I had to share another quilt made from houses and stars.  This one is made from Thimbleberries' pattern and fabrics and is anything but liberated . . . but when I saw it on Stephanie's Loft Creations blog this morning, I immediately thought of re-making it liberated style.

Yes, the list of quilts-in-my-head is endless ;-)

Some Design Ideas from a Traditional House Quilt

This detail photo is from a group quilt I saw at the Austin Area Quilt Guild show yesterday. It was made by Lorraine Mossman, Jill Bacon, Eugenia Brix, Ann Byrd, Betty Novak, Carol Hassell, Andi Horton, Marcia Kaylakie, Kathleen McCrady, Ericka Rogala, Rebecca Salinger, Marianner Schmitz, Sue Laurent and Karen White; and quilted by Kyra Thomas-Moore.

I loved the larger-than-life kitty peering out of this window ... and thought it might inspire those of us that have not yet made their house blocks this month to think about how scale can contribute to the overall impression of the block. When I noticed this block, I immediately imagined my great big tom cat squeezing himself into a doll house and getting stuck there ;-)

I also thought that the classic setting on this quilt could easily be liberated for an interesting setting with our liberated house blocks–just imagine that all the triangle corners on the sashings (and even that outer border) being added in a free-style fashion, in an assortment of sizes. 



(I apologize for the quality of the photos–I forgot my camera and took these with my phone.)

Abstractions of Roses in Art, Fashion and Quilts

This is a detail photo from a friend's guest room. I stayed there a few weeks ago, when I was visiting Austin and looking for a place to live.  I couldn't help but notice how these seemingly simple smudges of paint effectively convey the idea of roses.

You can see a (rather poor) photo of the entire painting in my Flickr photostream here.

Flowers were a design theme in fashion this Spring  . . .  here is one example from design Olesia Makhonko, which I noticed on Outi's Outsapop blog last summer.

Follow the link above to Outi's blog post for more examples of roses made from leather, ribbon and fabric and links to tutorials for making 2-D and 3-D roses from fabric.

Of course, roses as a design motif appear in both antique and modern quilts.  This is a detail photo from Susan McCord's Harrison Rose Urn quilt, made circa 1860.  I like how she represents the rose from bud to full blown flower.

I wasn't able to photograph the entire quilt, which has a different style vine appliqued on each of the borders, but you can see more of Susan's quilts and some other incredible quilts from the Henry Ford Museum's collection in my Quilt Genius photo set.

Fast forward to modern times and you'll find a lot of examples of roses that look a lot like ours . . . though not necessarily constructed of square blocks.  Sarah shared this photo of her quilt, made as part of a Quilt-A-Long.  Her quilt has 30 roses and was a gift for her sister for her 30th birthday.

You can see that these roses were constructed in a similar log cabin-fashion, but were left "round" and appliquéd to a pieced background.  You can see more quilts from the Little Bouquet QAL in their group pool on Flickr.

In this little quilt, A Rose is a Rose, made for the Alzheimer's Art Quilt Initiative by Brenda Suderman of Winnipeg, Manitoba Canada, the roses are pieced together in a liberated fashion.

This little quilt (8 3/4 by 11 inches) earned $40 for AAQI.  You can read her artist statement on the quilt's page on the AAQI site.

Check out more of Brenda's creative quilting and read what she has to say about this quilt on her blog, Scraps and Strings. 

Here's one last abstracted rose design, Ann Fahl's Spiral Rose Garden. I have been in love with this concept since I took a beading workshop with Ann a few years ago and got to see some examples of her quilting and bead embellishment up close.  These spiral roses are fused, raw edge appliqué.

Visit the gallery page on AnnFahl.com for this quilt for detail photos of quilting . . . and while you're there, be sure to click around the gallery to check out some of her other  rose quilts. While these roses are quite different from those we are making, this quilt is another example of how beautiful many different colored roses can be.

So Excited!

I took my new blocks to the sewing room and they shouted that they wanted to be joined with some bright blocks I'd been sewing yesterday.  I added a border to make the 6.5 inch blocks to 6.5 x 8.5.  This is how some of them look!  I'm saving some of the more subdued ones for the other idea I had, but this is going to work.  I'm thinking some kind of black/white sashing and little red squares inbetween that--dunno for sure, but these brights are working together, I think!  There's going to be 2 quilts from these blocks--and they will be so-o-o different!  The "holes" are where I still need to make some crumb blocks.

. . . Just One More Inspiring Quilt

I wanted to post this photo of Kathleen's SPARKLERS quilt earlier, but was waiting for permission to share it.  She was part of Karen's quilt-along, but made liberated blocks instead. When she posted a photo of her quilt with the Liberated Quilters Yahoo group, I immediately asked if I could share it with you. Her Piano Key border is liberated, too.  Maybe this really isn't one more setting idea–after I said I was going to stop–but a new BORDER idea ;-)

So . . . if you were wondering how the wonky asterisks (AKA Fireworks) blocks look in a straight set with no sashing, here's a beautiful example.

One More Setting Idea ...

. . . and then, I promise that I'll stop posting today and get back to cleaning up and packing up . . .

June sent the link to Lori's Humble Quilts blog post about this quilt and I was so glad to receive it because I had seen this quilt but couldn't find it again when I went looking.  I think our fireworks blocks would be fabulous set with bright string squares (with one or two dark strings in each block).

In fact, I liked the idea so much I seriously considered having a PAIR of different blocks for July: one string block and one Fireworks one . . . but summer is too hot and busy to have to work that hard, don't you think?

Some more Ideas for Asterisks Blocks

When I saw Jewel's asterisk flowers, I followed the link on her blog, Jewel's Arm Candy to the Old Red Barn Company Quilt Along Pool on Flickr. Here are a few of the ideas that I thought were interesting and has permissions such that I could make this Mosaic image from them.  It's working clicking over the Flickr to check out the rest.  (I really love the pincushion).  The direct links to the original images on flickr of these images are:

1. Asterisks done2, 2. Midnight Blooms, 3. Detail of asterisk layout, 4. Selvage Asterisk, close-up, 5. Asterisk block, 6. asterisk quilt top

I think our blocks will require some sort of sashing or alternate block because otherwise the liberated nature of the blocks could look like "bad blocks" when the strips don't line up.  Simple skinny sashing in a fabric that blends with the background like in the upper left example would make our blocks appear to float in the night sky.  The polka-dot sashing in the photo at the bottom right adds graphic interest–notice that it doesn't surround each block.  This quilt also has solid squares added, but in a random way. The alternate squares being auditioned in the middle left photo are added in a traditional way, but all the fabrics are different.  This WIP is going to be a table runner–won't it be lovely.  The other two block photos are just interesting ideas for making this block, using selvages for the strips (middle right) and with different fabrics in the background (left bottom).

I'm loving this block because it can become a strong graphic design OR take on the personna or flowers, spiders, snowflakes, etc.  I commented on Jewel's blog that I was so happy to see her flowers because yesterday I was designing a quilt in my head with Asterisk flowers, Asterisk spiders, and Asterisk stars in the sky.  Of course it would also have a pieced Asterisk border.  I think it would be fun to play with scale and make the whimsical quilt in my head . . . and it's on my list for after the move.

What I did with the leftovers...

Hey... just wanted to show you all what I did with my left over strips from the fireworks blocks....

Forgive me, Sophie, I don't know how to label this post.

Gwen's Liberated Basket Quilts

It seemed like it was time for more eye candy and inspiration . . . and maybe a setting idea, too.  I found this photo of this workshop example on Gwen Marston's blog.

These basket blocks aren't exactly like ours, but share a lot of the same charming qualities. I love the border on this quilt, too.

Follow the link above for more examples of Gwen's work, both traditional and liberated, on her site. You can also read an interview with Gwen (and see a couple more of her Liberated Basket quilts as well as other quilts) here, on the Real Women Quilt site: Featured Quilter - Gwen Marston.

Liberated Log Cabin Quilt

I just posted pictures on my blog of possible border fabrics for my quilt. Please take a look if you can, and help me decide. You all played a part in the blocks and I'd appreciate your input here too. Thanks.
Quilty hugs,
Pat from FL & MI
http://PatsPattering.blogspot.com

current fly setting

This month's Fons & Porter magazine has a setting for traditional shoo flies with watermelon blocks alternating; rather dark and drab colors, imho, but perhaps another source of inspiration to this month's winner. Even though the magazine is usually shrouded in plastic on the newsstand (to prevent free browsing), since the pattern has a "kit" there are probably views on their website. (A general observation - I'm a relatively new quilter and used to watch the F&P shows on my local pbs station, and I subscribed to the mag. , but have found recent issues to have a lot of pretty drab sample quilts - I guess I really like the brighter colors and pastels rather than the browns and blacks they seem to feature recently).

(Edited by sophie to add a photo and link to the magazine–the quilt is on the cover! Click the photo to go to the "Current Issue" page on the Fons & Porter site for more details on the May/June magazine.)

shoo fly advice anyone? (2)

Thanks to everyone who made suggestions regarding my shoo fly quilt. A couple of people thought it would be helpful to see pix of the different possible layouts. Here's what I was able to come up with. Sorry about the picture angle--I don't have much room to manuever. Your thoughts are VERY much appreciated.

What If?

What if you mixed wonky log cabin blocks like those we made in March with this month's shoo fly blocks?  It might look something like the blocks on Magpie Sue's design wall now–check it out in this post on her blog, the Magpie's Nest:

Giving In

Quick quilt

Hello everyone!  I have not been able to swap with anyone because of my schedule with the kids and my college classes...but I got spring fever today and made this month's blocks for a quilt for myself.  I thought I would post my layout as an idea for the winner!  I personally liked method three (the stack and slash method) the best when making the blocks!

Melissa

Shoo Fly Synchronicity

Look what I found in the Connecting Threads catalog that arrived in the mail today.

These Shoo Fly blocks (CT refers to them as churn dashes) are more stretched than wonky, but have those rectangular centers that I just mentioned this morning (in a comment to Kate's post) that I like so much ;-)

If you are a fan of appliqué–or wanted to give it a try–this could be a great setting idea for wonky Shoo flies, too. You could even use the easy free-form machine appliquéd posies we made for the lotto a couple years ago for the flower blocks.

FYI, Connecting Threads sells this as a Wall Hanging Kit. The finished size is 28 1/3 by 36 inches. (Click the image to go to the CT page with more details).

A Setting Idea, a Lotto-inspired Doll Quilt

I put this together today.

The top is Doll quilt-sized, only 18 by 24 inches. Almost none of the blocks are square, nor are all of them the same size, but they're all between  3 and 4 inches. You can read more about it, here: Waste Not, Want Not.

I wanted to try a strippy setting. I can imagine our much bigger blocks being set like this, probably with wider vertical panels, maybe in an interesting flower print?

Log Cabin Quilts Found on Flickr

I was looking for something else this morning and noticed a few interesting Liberated-style log cabin quilts on Flickr.

This one caught my eye because the colorway is so similar to the blocks we're making.

And I thought this strippy setting and dark sashings and border were interesting.

I found both of these in the Free-Piecing Group Pool of photos of Flickr . . . where I was actually looking at an inspiration quilt for April–which isn't much of a hint because there are over 500 photos ;-)

I have started collecting more Wonky Log Cabin quilt photos in a Flickr Gallery.  you can check it out here: Liberated Log Cabins.  Check it out for examples of quilts made with wide, narrow or no sashings and borders; and solid and print  sashings and/or borders in several colorways.