Bloggers’ Quilt Festival :: Spring 2011

I'm so excited to join the Bloggers' Quilt Festival. What a great idea! Thank you, Amy, for bringing us together.



I decided to share the Sunshine and Candy quilt I finished recently. I'm a new quilter, and this is only my second full size quilt. I made it for my lovely 2 years old grandson.

I got the inspiration of the quilt from a tutorial by Kathie of Sew Kathie Did (thank you, Kathie, for this great tutorial!), and I fell in love with the endless possibilities of play with value and color.

I got introduced to quilting back in the 90s in Los Angeles. I loved the fabrics, color and creativity, but managed to do very little, and abandoned quilting entirely when we went back to Israel in 1994. Since I started quilting seriously a few months ago I saw all these bright beautiful fabrics, so different from my old stash, and decided that this quilt will be colorful and bright as well. I tried to used many boys' fabrics, some new and some from my old stash.



I pulled out many fabrics, divided them to light, medium and dark, and made half triangles. Arranging the blocks on the design wall was great fun, I enjoyed it immenesly.

The back is also pieced. I used “Marbleous” by Robert Kaufman for the background, and added some of the leftover blocks. I used cotton batting, very soft and supple, gives the quilt a wonderful drape. I kept the quilting minimal, just straight lines along the big dark and light diamonds.




The binding is "its a hoot" eggs in marshmallow cherry by MoMo for Moda.
All together I used more than 40 different fabrics.

My grandson loves the quilt. He plays "I spy" with the different pictures on the fabrics, great fun for all.

It was a great pleasure working on this quilt. I loved organizing the HTS on the design wall, it really gave me joy seeing the quilt taking shape, just looking at my work made me happy. I love this quilt. Thanks to you wonderful quilters sharing your work and giving me so much inspiration, and sepacial thanks again to Kathie. Thank you Amy for the opportunity to share my quilt with this great community, here is the link:

Noga

WIP Wednesday

I decided to join the Work-In-Progress Wednesday link-up of Lee from Freshly Pieced. I think it's a great idea to stop and review my projects - what's progressing, what is stuck, what needs to "lie low" for a while. At the moment I have two projects going:

1. This one is almost finished. It is a pillow case of Somerset patchwork (folded star). I started it as a study at my quilting group. It's not really my style and way out my comfort zone, but I decided to do it as a creative exercise. At the moment I'm struggling with the zipper - also a good exercise!

I have to decide how to finish this block, should I add some strips of color, or not? What do you think?




2. Quilt for my son - here I'm really stuck. I chose the fabrics, started cutting, and that's it. Holidays, family, many excuses... I will start again seriously now that all distractions are gone.



Here's another link to Lee's Freshly Pieced - great idea!

Noga

Meet an old friend

In the last couple of weeks I was so busy - Pesach! It's a beautiful holiday celebrating freedom and spring. Somehow it evolved into a crazy obsession of cleaning and more cleaning. It even involves changing all your dishes, don't ask... total madness. So no time for sewing, quilting or blogging.

During spring cleaning I came across this lovely quillow (quilt in a pillow, an old favorite of the 90's, lots of tutorials in the web). I made it for my teenage son in 1994 and (except for a bag) it was the only work I finished back then. The cover is a traditional log cabin, and I think that even after all these years, battered and faded, it's still quite pretty.


The back is printed black fabric as is the border.

I really like fresh and modern quilts now, and this is so very traditional, but still nice.



Enjoy the spring!

Noga

Sunshine & Candy value quilt - finished

Remember this quilt? It's finished at last, and I'm very happy with the result. I named it "Sunshine & Candy" because it looks bright, sunny and colorful.


The quilt is for my lovely two years old grandson, who really enjoys finding all kind of surprises in the fabrics.



I used lots of different fabrics in this quilt (about 50), about half were from my stash, mainly fabrics bought in the 90's, and half are new fabrics.

The backing is Marbleous by Robert Kaufman (Blue batik). On the back I pieced some of the leftover blocks.

The binding is Its a Hoot Eggs in Marshmallow Cherry by MoMo for moda.

Batting is Legacy 100% cotton. It's low loft and soft and gives the quilt a wonderful drape, a pleasure to cuddle with.

The finished quilt measures: 49 inches x 77 inches (124 cm x196 cm)

I quilted the quilt with straight lines along the big diamonds, about 1/4 inch from the stitch. I bought a walking foot for my Bernina (quite expensive, about $120), and it made the quilting so much easier.

It was a real pleasure working on this quilt, all this bright colorful fabrics! I hope my grandson and his family will use it with joy and happiness!