This past week, I finally finished a long neglected project that I started back in 2014. You can read about its beginnings HERE.
I had been given some corduroy and other fabric by a friend who was cleaning out her scraps. After making a little corduroy and flannel quilt, I took the left over corduroy scraps, along with some other scraps from deconstructed clothing, and started playing, improv style. I even made a video about it (see above link).
I had in mind a Gee's Bend style quilt, something like this one:
My quilt top was completed in late 2014. In 2015, I started quilting it (see HERE and HERE). First, ditch quilting to hold the layers together, then hand quilting in a few places with pearl cotton.
What bothered me a little was that I wasn't able to bury my knots in the quilt. I tried hiding them in a seam where I could, but it seemed that more often than not, they were going to be visible on the back.
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Let me digress for a minute here and tell you a funny/interesting story. It'll relate back to this quilt, I promise.
This past winter, February 2018, I went to a presentation by Heidi Parkes at the Museum of Wisconsin Art. I didn't know anything about her, just that she was a quilter, and that was enough for me. I did know that I had a serious case of cabin fever and needed to get out of the house. The weather was cooperative that day, so I hopped in the car and drove a couple counties over to where she was speaking.
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| (Heidi Parkes at MOWA) |
She talked about her process, how she came to quilting from not a sewing background, but from an art background. She used repurposed clothing, linens, etc. in her work, and she often hand quilted with pearl cotton across the entire quilt in lovely, long parallel lines.
During the Q and A, I asked her how she hid her knots.
She said she didn't.
She explained that she just started with a long, long thread (however long she needed) and quilted in one continuous
line until she reached the other end of the quilt. That blew my mind!
I realized she didn't have any particular rules ingrained in her
(like I did) about not using a super long thread when hand sewing or
quilting, because...I don't know, it might knot or otherwise be too
unwieldy?
For Heidi, having a long distance to quilt meant using a long
thread. Simple as that!
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Back to my improv quilt, my intention for finishing the quilt had initially been that I would free motion quilt the rest of it...somehow, some way, some day, no real clue as to a specific plan.
Having no real direction, and a varying sense of indifference bordering on disappointment, it was easy to let myself get distracted by shinier things.
Fast forward to last week. I picked up the quilt to move it (AGAIN), but then stopped to look at it more closely. Then, I can't say "I decided to finish it," but I decided to thread a needle and take another stab at it, literally.
I made it up as I went along. Moving around the quilt, looking at what it needed where.
Starting with some vertical lines through the center portion, which had always seemed so starkly divided looking to me.
Some cross-hatching stitches, too.
Hand quilting some single lines here, and parallel lines there.
More cross-hatching stitches.
I thought of Heidi Parkes as I stitched long parallel lines in the borders of the quilt, with several feet of thread in my needle, sufficient to make it from one end to the other without stopping. It worked just fine.
Finally, in the tan corduroy spaces inside the border, I didn't have a coordinating colored thread, so tried simply tying the quilt there in a contrasting thread. That didn't look right by itself. Anchored with buttons, though, it was better and added a little something.
And soon enough, that was that.
It measures about 40 inches square(ish). The back is a vintage thrifted piece.
It's currently on the wall in the living room. No more moving it around the sewing room, neglected and unfinished. It's officially done!
Linking to: Can I Get a Whoop-Whoop?
I woke up to find Norm's car stuck and abandoned in the driveway, with footprints leading away from it. He must have had to walk to work this morning. That can't have been fun.
We had a winter storm yesterday and into last night with snow, sleet, and wind. I ventured out this morning to put the recycle bin upright. Walking on the snow, it felt like styrofoam, dense and hard. Perfect for building a snow fort, although that's not in my plans today.
Though the weather outside was frightful, it was comfy in the sewing room yesterday. I'm piecing strips together for a new quilt. The pattern is called "Joy in the Morning" by Gayle Bong, found in her book, S is for Scraps: 18 Great Quilts.
These gorgeous fabrics were sent to me by fellow quilter Marei as part of a scrap swap last year. I finally took time to sort the 3.5-inch strips over this past weekend. Thanks again, Marei!
I put the brightly colored pieces into one pile and then started pairing them. I'd like to make a bigger quilt than the one in the book, but we'll see how it goes once I get a count after cutting the strip sets into pieces.
The big-stitch hand quilting on the improv quilt is slow going. Here's how things look so far (and you might have to look closely, lol).
I wove in and out of one of the straight stitching lines with a red thread, just for kicks. Something a little different, and my favorite part about the stitching thus far.
We spent some time at my daughter's place on Christmas. She couldn't travel because she was tending to the medical needs of her cat which had surgery a few weeks ago.
Keaky is hanging in there but is not out of the woods yet. He apparently had a fairly good day on Sunday, though, wanting belly rubs and rediscovering his favorite mermaid toy.
Later in the evening on Christmas, I attended the regular family get-together. Even Dad got into the crazy sweater spirit and wore his vintage John Deere sweater from 1971. Nita's and mine were from the thrift store. I thought about sewing some tacky garland around the neckline of my ugly-sweater vest, but that didn't happen.
My brothers provided the entertainment. It's always a treat to listen to them jam.
There was the annual Dirty Santa gift exchange as well, where stealing is allowed and encouraged. My first gift was stolen, but I kept a scrap of the paper it was wrapped in. Why?
Quilt inspiration, of course!
I started doing some big stitch quilting on a UFO from about a year ago, an improv quilt using corduroy and some clothing scraps. You can read about its creation HERE.
Hand quilting isn't something I do much (at all), so it's a different experience for me. I'm not using any kind of hoop, so it's a bit awkward. I think a hoop would crush the corduroy and leave weird marks on it. I don't know, maybe I should try it and see.
I also flicked off my thimble pretty quickly because it was just getting in the way. Although this corduroy is fairly soft and not too stiff, I need to maintain a good grip on the needle to work it through.
I'm hoping it'll grow on me as I get a bit more comfortable with it.
I've also pretty much resigned myself to not burying the knots on the back. It doesn't seem worth worrying about, since it's sort of one big experimental piece anyway. I am burying the tails, but the knot itself doesn't seem to want to pop through the fabric without a struggle, and I don't want to tear the backing, which is a vintage fabric.
I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on knots and hoops and thimbles when big stitch quilting.
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The caramel corn has been made and delivered to my coworkers as of last week Thursday. I forgot to take a picture, but the process and recipe was the same as in years past. I may make another batch this coming week to share with others, but that stuff's dangerous to have around my house, addictive as it is.
I did make a small batch of gluten-free chocolate covered pretzels yesterday. I hadn't made them before, or if I did, it was so long ago I don't remember. They made quite the Jackson Pollack-esque mess on the parchment, but they were fine once the chocolate hardened.
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While puttering in the sewing room yesterday—actually, procrastinating on starting the hand quilting mentioned above—I looked through a box of hand-crocheted vintage lace that my mother had saved. Decided to take photos to share.
They were all made by one of my dad's uncle's wives (I need to ask him which wife, as I think Hank was married twice). These pieces probably date to between the 1920s and 1940s.
Aren't they amazing?
This piece is one of my favorites. It's the top to a nightgown, I believe, or maybe a slip.
These would have been chair covers, the larger piece on the left would have gone on the chair back (behind the head) and the smaller ones on the armrests.
Love the pineapple design.
There were a few cut-work and embroidered pieces in the box as well.
I had to keep reminding myself that all that satin stitching, etc. was done by hand, not machine. It's just perfect.
