Desperate Housewife’s Quilt: Block Forty Six

After another unproductive day off, I felt the urge to do something well, you know, productive. I decided to sew.

I’ve taken quite the hiatus from the Desperate Housewife’s Quilt as of late (http://quiltjane.blogspot.com) and decided to check which blocks I still need to do. There are a lot of them. However, I found a block pattern, picked out the fabrics, and started cutting. Within the hour I had a complete block, albeit with some obvious mistakes. Mistakes, as in, I mixed up a few of the pieces. Oh well. I long ago decided that these blocks were not all going to be the same size since they don’t all end up being the same size while doing them. I even left the ironing board in case the urge strikes again today after work.

Quilt Designing

When I think about a quilt, I think of a few different criteria: Is it easy to make; does it fit the recipient’s style; how am I going to pay for it? Once those are met, it’s time to start.

After making my sister-in-law’s quilted pillow for her birthday as a preview of her Christmas present, it got me rethinking how I wanted to do her quilt. I’d never done wonky 8-point stars before, but figured it couldn’t be too difficult. Sure enough, it was super simple and the finished block turned out even better than I imagined. With my original four and nine patch sketch now looking like a turd by comparison, I decided to go with the larger star pattern for the whole quilt. Because the finished quilt blocks are eighteen and a half inches square, I figure I can get away with making twelve of these blocks for a lap quilt. Of course, I could make twenty for a bed sized, but I’m not even sure she’d use it on her bed as she has so many comforters and would diminish the first criteria of easy.

Quilting on the Mind

With autumn just around the corner, my brain is ready to switch back over to quilt-mode. The internet doesn’t help.

Figuring I needed some inspiration, I scoured the internet for quilts and blocks to start sewing again, however, after going over all of the Desperate Housewife’s Quilt blocks on Want it, Need it, Quilt! (http://quiltjane.blogspot.com) Jane hosted over the past year, I realized most of those blocks are challenges I’d like to do for myself without feeling rushed. Then, of course, is the creativity killer, Pinterest. I love looking at the pictures, but then I find myself simply wanting to look rather than do. It appears it is time to grab a pen and paper and sketch out what I want to do.

Desperate Housewife’s Quilt: Block Nine

Curved piecing is difficult. Glue can help with that.

When I first saw block nine in the Desperate Housewife’s Quilt (http://quiltjane.blogspot.com) I was intrigued. Here Jane was going to show us how to make a block with curves without sewing any curved seams. Brilliant! Instead of sewing the seams together and risk distortion, the block is assembled with a little glue and topstitched into place. Well, I didn’t have any glue so I put this block off for a very long time until I just couldn’t hold off any longer and decided to just make due with materials I had on hand. Instead of interfacing I used freezer paper (seriously, amazing stuff for any quilter to have in their arsenal) and instead of glue I mixed up a little cornstarch in water and used my fingers to dab along the folded edges before ironing the pieces together. For the topstitching, I decided on a gradient Aurifil thread in blues to go with the blues in the block. My only regret was that I used a much smaller stitch than I intended to, which doesn’t show off the beautiful colors in the thread. Oh well, live and learn.

Desperate Housewife’s Quilt: Block Sixteen

I’m sorry if my random back-and-forth between blocks in this quilt is confusing. Who am I kidding, no I’m not!

Block sixteen in the Desperate Housewife’s Quilt hosted by Jane over at Want it, Need it, Quilt! (http://quiltjane.blogspot.com) is like a spider web, and for this particular web I needed a forty-five-degree kaleidoscope ruler, which I don’t have. Instead I made a template using cardstock, made my first cut, and then used my square ruler on the forty-five-degree mark to cut out the triangles. The cutting was a breeze, even without the proper equipment. Sewing the block went together pretty quickly too. I decided to embellish the block a bit with some wavy lines using the Aurifil thread I won in a giveaway and have to say, I really like this thread and already have plans to use it for quilting in upcoming projects.

After making this block and realizing just how easy it is to do, I can’t wait to make blocks using the Dresden plate and sixty-degree rulers I got for my birthday. I was nearly tempted to make the block using my sixty-degree ruler instead, but fought the urge. I wonder what it would have looked like had I not?

Desperate Housewife’s Quilt: Block Seventeen

With my To Do List from yesterday completed (well mostly, I didn’t vacuum) I decided it was time to sew. And sew I did.

Perusing the list of yet-to-be-done quilt blocks in The Desperate Housewife’s Quilt being hosted by Jane over at Want it, Need it, Quilt! (quiltjane.blogspot.com), I decided on block seventeen also titled Swing Me Around on the Hills Hoist. This was another foundation pieced block and while I’m not that big of a fan of perfection, seeing those tight points and perfectly aligned corners did give me a thrill. Perhaps this foundation piecing technique is growing on me!

In case you are unfamiliar, foundation piecing is using a printed paper design to aid in creating the block. All of your lines and angles are on the paper and you simply place your fabric where you need to sew and sew along the lines. It’s pretty simple and straight forward. Also, it’s super easy because you don’t have any exact pieces to cut out, you just have to use a piece of fabric that will fit within the design and trim after it is stitched together.

For my block, I chose two colorful batiks and made the Hills hoist itself from black and white fabrics that I’ve been using in various other blocks in this series. I was going to try to make it with a variation on a color, but couldn’t decide which one would work, so to make it easy went with black and white. The result is a block that is super fun and was super easy to make.

New Quilt Project

My goal of not starting another quilting project until I finish the top for That 70s Quilt has been crushed by Pinterest. Thanks.

After seeing a picture on Pinterest of a quilt block that looked like a bunch of Polaroid pictures scattered across the floor, I thought this would be a super cute way to showcase fabrics that I love. It also would mean fussy-cutting and a lot of waste, something I don’t love. However, I decided to grab a stack and start cutting. I would have clicked on the picture on Pinterest, which probably would have led me to a tutorial or something, but instead decided to wing it. Sometimes the less information I have the more informed my decisions are… when it comes to quilting that is!

For the Polaroids themselves, I decided to fussy-cut a three by three inch image with one by three inch strips of white on either side, a one by four-and-a-half inch white strip on top and a one-and-a-half inch by four-and-a-half inch white strip on the bottom. This creates a four by four-and-a-half inch Polaroid. I then gathered various shades of grey and started cutting out strips to create the outer edges. At first I was cutting them out on angles and sewing them together to create the wonkiness and scattered look, but then I figured that if I simply cut rectangles and chose my direction afterwards it was less of a headache. I highly suggest the latter approach if you plan to make these yourself. To further the scattered look, I threw in a blank grey square and plan to have anywhere from one to three of these in future blocks.

I highly suggest that if you love this block as much as I do, you visit the blog Stitched in Color (http://www.stitchedincolor.com/2012/04/polaroids-on-cloudy-day.html) and read about her approach.

Wonky Blocked Out

Twelve more blocks down. That means only about nine more to go.

Okay, so as much as I love making these wonky 9-patch blocks for That 70s Quilt, I’m ready for them to be done. Perhaps my patience is wearing a little thin. Or perhaps I simply need to work on something else in between to avoid the monotonous droll of cutting and piecing the same type of block over and over and over…

NO!

FOCUS!

It wouldn’t take much of an effort to finish making the blocks tonight after work. I still need to make the Brady Bunch surprise block, which I can either go all out on or make simple. I’m leaning towards simple to not detract from the overall look of the quilt.

Desperate Housewife's Quilt: Block Twenty Five

Okay, so I did a little skipping around. You’ll see why.

After church and lunch with my husband’s dad and stepmom who were in town from Idaho, I was in the mood to sew something. The daunting task of cutting into my prized Alexander Henry fabrics was unbearable even though it is equally as painful to simply see them sitting on the shelf folded and unused. The same goes for everything on the top shelf of the bookcase I keep my fabric that already has a purpose for a quilt or project.

The only problem was that I was also feeling rather lazy, meaning I wanted to accomplish something that would take a matter of minutes rather than hours. What can I say, I’m a guy. This is about the time I remembered a Desperate Housewife’s Quilt block using an embroidered center image. I just happened to have one of those I let expire from my Etsy shop laying around.

So I took the little bug out of the embroidery hoop, ironed out the wrinkles, and cut it down to a workable size to not leave too much white space. After figuring out the measurements (since I cut it down to a different size than the instructions call for) I sewed the strips around the image, pressing my seams open as I went. Within just a few minutes I had an adorable framed block! Of course, if I hadn’t already had the embroidered center it would have taken much longer.

Desperate Housewife's Quilt: Block Fourteen

I feared this block. After making it in about an hour, I now have no idea why.

With a bit of time yesterday afternoon after getting most stuff ready for a Super Bowl party we’re attending today and before going to a hockey game last night, I decided I wanted to sew. Looking at the Desperate Housewife’s Quilt Blocks I had printed off, Block Fourteen has been staring at me for months to just cut out the pieces and sew it together. I decided it was time. Perusing my stash from a distance, I decided on using a rather colorful batik for the background since I had already made up my mind about using black and white for the ‘peepers’ as they’re called. I’ve already been using black and white as color balances with the jewel tones of the batiks, but I could have used two of the more solid batiks instead had I wanted to. I didn’t.

With all the pieces cut, it was time to start sewing them all together. I will have to admit that the hardest part was the 1/8” seam for the peepers. If I was a thinking person, I probably would have switched over to a zipper foot, but alas, my brains were obviously intent on finishing just one block and not working properly. It went together rather quickly since I chain stitched each section. Well, by quickly, I only ripped the stitches out of one of the four sections before realizing that yes, I had indeed sewed it correctly and now had to redo it. With only one GRRR… moment, I’m pinning this block as a success. Paying attention, however, is a malfunction I’ll have to work on.

Desperate Housewife's Quilt: Block Fifteen

Yes, I realized Block 31 was posted today. So I’m a little behind.

Yesterday I was hoping to knock out two blocks before my husband got home from work, but for some odd reason I felt it was more important to figure out why our network disappeared. The internet is crazy like that. It’s like a drug you can’t quit. When it suddenly vanishes without reason (and not paying your bill doesn’t count) like a junkie you keep going until you can get your next hit. At first I thought the wireless aspect of the router was kaput, so I reset everything and changed it to an unsecure network and all of our devices were able to connect so that wasn’t the problem. I’m sure a geek would’ve solved the issue in a matter of minutes, but alas, I’ve never attempted such an endeavor. Anyway, I spent the better part of the day basically rebuilding the network and I’m happy to report that all internet connected devices in the house are fully operational once again.

So, instead of at least two blocks and possibly starting to cut out fabric for That 70s Quilt I made one block in The Desperate Housewife’s Quilt series from Want it, Need it, Quilt! (http://quiltjane.blogspot.com). I will have to admit that piecing goes by much faster when you pay attention to what you are doing. Block Fifteen was the simplest of the blocks I printed out, and had the perfect place to put two little pieces of the batik Jane sent me. I can’t wait to continue making these blocks, especially since I’m so far behind on the ones I plan on doing!

Sunday Sewing

Sometimes you just need to tell yourself you are going to do something no matter what. Especially if you have been unconsciously abstaining from it.

After church yesterday I had one goal, sewing. I didn’t get all that I set out to do, but got pretty far. Between plotting out a coworkers birthday cake and making butternut squash soup I sewed and sewed, finishing up the final three blocks for The Fall Quilt (I thought I only had two, but alas, there were three) and putting the border on the Frog and Fairy Baby Quilt. All in all I’m pretty happy with the results. That being said, I wish I had changed a few things.

The Fall Quilt I started using a jelly roll of Sandy Gervais’s Mix & Mingle from Moda Fabrics. I also mixed in some of Sandy’s Solids from various charm packs to create the four feature panels. While I’ve already sewed the rows together, part of me wants to rip the stitches out and frame them before adding them to the quilt using the Walnut solid I picked out for the sides of the quilt. The other part says screw it, just finish the damn thing already!

Now the Frog and Fairy Baby Quilt I was hoping to get the border, backing and batting all sandwiched together, but alas I only… please excuse my train of thought, the cat just decided to jump into the fish tank and knock out half the power in the kitchen… got so far as to put the border on and that’s it. Hopefully tonight between baking cake I’ll be able to finish this and figure out what I’m going to do with The Fall Quilt.

Weekend Sewing

It isn’t impossible to accomplish great things when there are a million other things to do. Just make sure there is plenty of chocolate at the end of the tunnel.

Even with gift fairs and bazaars and birthday parties and dessert baking for the church auction on the docket for this weekend, I managed to get in some sewing. Another block down for the Fall Quilt, which means only three left, and I finished the top of the commission quilt I’m working on using greens and browns. Trying to figure out a design for this quilt proved to be just as nerve racking as limiting my color choices. I knew that with the small fussy-cut images I created and printed out that I’d have to fit those into a larger block, but was unsure if I wanted to do simple frames or pieced blocks.

I decided on log cabin blocks and started piecing the two smaller images. After those two, and realizing I had goofed on my second one and the only way to fix it was to either rip the whole thing and start over or create the other two blocks in the same fashion which, unfortunately thanks to the Nazi party, would create a swastika. Probably not the best baby blanket design, even if the original symbol was quite benign before the Nazi’s hijacked it. Grrr… So I figured the other two could be simply framed using the two large prints I had picked out and I’d somehow make the whole thing work. Hopefully it did.

More Fall Quilt Blocks

Four more blocks done. That means only four more to go.

After watching more episodes of The Vampire Diaries, my latest Netflix Instant View addiction, I cleaned up the kitchen, did a little laundry, then started working on the next quilt block for the Fall Quilt. I probably could have gotten all of the blocks done if I hadn’t been watching television, but alas, I seem to be a sucker for something part Smallville, part Dawson’s Creek with a touch of Anne Rice thrown in for good measure. I’m not sure if it was all the blood viewing that made me do this, but I decided to use a little solid red for a couple of the blocks to add a pop of color and for use as filler as I will barely have enough of my chosen fabric collection to finish the top.

Once I finished a couple blocks, I decided it would probably be a good idea to plan out the remaining to make sure there would be enough color variation. Sure enough, there was going to be a slight issue… or so I thought at first. Each block consists of five different fabrics, but some of the pieces are small and only use a portion of the Jelly Roll. Alas, after my first cut on the next block I’d already made up for one of the remaining block’s missing pieces. Basically, from what I’ve gathered, I’ll be able to make the quilt top using half as much fabric as it calls for in the book, Material Obsessions. Of course, I’m thrifty and cut with very little waste.

Desperate Housewife's Quilt: Block Thirteen

When the rain comes you’ll need an umbrella. What perfect time to make a quilt block to represent this.

I’ve been looking forward to making the thirteenth block in The Desperate Housewife’s Quilt series being hosted by Jane over at Want it, Need it, Quilt! (http://quiltjane.blogspot.com) since I first saw it. Needless to say, I was not disappointed. One thing I’ve enjoyed is being pushed to learn new techniques, and the one employed in this block utilizes something I bought years ago with this purpose in mind, along with a few others, and that is freezer paper. Building appliqué shapes and piecing them together before actually appliquéing them onto the quilt is quite easy with the use of freezer paper cut to size and lightly ironed onto the wrong side of the fabric.

Another thing about this block is that there is a lot of hand stitching, something I’ve gotten away from in the last decade or so. I’m not sure if it was just laziness or me feeling more confident with the sewing machine to piece my appliqué work, but there is something quite meditative about hand stitching something. Albeit, there is also the frustration of the block not wanting to stay in place because you are sitting on the sofa and watching television at the same time rather than using a table to keep the block composed correctly for stitching. Alas, it all worked out in the end.

I will say this, and that is with all of the hand stitching this and other blocks required, along with the feature panels I’m working on for the Fall Quilt, I think I may just be ready to tackle a full sized hand quilted quilt. For the Fall Quilt I want a simple design anyway to not detract from all of the embroidery work I’m putting into those four feature panels. I hope I know what I’m getting myself into!

Desperate Housewife's Quilt: Block Twelve

When there is so much to do, sometimes a little me time is in order. After finishing up some chores I decided to quilt.

My week’s list is, well, stalled for the moment. I decided not to clean out the garden boxes just yet, which in turn means I didn’t clean out the coop, which because of that I didn’t bother cleaning the bathrooms. Please don’t ask how that last one falls into place. Okay, fine ask, and I’ll tell you I just didn’t want to. Instead I rescrubbed the outdoor cushions for about an hour, did laundry, managed to bathe the dog and deodorize and vacuum the carpet, sofa and chair-and-a-half. I also researched what classes I still need to take for college and found out it will cost twenty bucks to replace the financial aid debit card I didn’t get. Shoot.

So anyway, after all the hullabaloo I received from bathing the dog from the dog, I decided to spend a little time quilting while waiting for the sofa quilts and pet bed to dry before letting her back out into the living room. I didn’t. Instead I opted to try figuring out how best to make our church’s stewardship campaign letters we’ll be sending out look like scrapbook pages. Of course the program I was planning on using doesn’t have that section loaded onto the computer and the disc is nowhere to be found, which means somewhere in the garage, so I tried another one and was barely satisfied with the look. Okay, it sucked, but I sent it off anyway to our pastor. He agreed, it wasn’t anything like what we wanted. If I can’t find the disc, I suppose I could always either dig out my scrapbook stuff or use Photoshop to cut and paste shapes and textures to recreate the look of a traditional scrapbook page.

And so that leads me to after I had dinner... alone… because my husband was going to a workshop with the Ridgefield High School theater kids. I pulled out the Jelly Roll of Sandy Gervais’s Mix & Mingle I’m going to use for the Fall Quilt and grabbed the book Material Obsession to find out the measurements of all the cuts that are needed to make the blocks I’m using for the quilt. Then my eye caught my stack of Desperate Housewife’s Quilt blocks sitting next to my sewing machine and I decided to put the Jelly Roll away and grab the next block in the series. I then put it aside and grabbed the one after and started cutting, piecing and in no time at all had the block done. So I started block thirteen, which is a beautiful design that I can see using for an entire quilt. However, about halfway through it was time for my Wednesday night television lineup, so it will have to wait until tonight after work.

Desperate Housewife's Quilt: Block Ten

Your eyes aren’t fooling you. I skipped Block Nine… for now.

After looking over the instructions for the ninth block in the Desperate Housewife’s Quilt series, I decided to skip it for the time being. For one, I didn’t feel like searching through the garage for my fabric glue and two, I had no idea if the glue was still any good as it is pushing a decade. I just don’t use it. So when I saw that the block called for gluing before stitching I simply set it aside for later.

Block Ten was also a little different in that it called for making two blocks then cutting them in half and sewing them together to form a completely different look. So while making Cheese Zombies and Tomato Soup (all from scratch, mind you) I cut and pieced and ripped seams and restitched correctly. I’m not very good at stopping and picking up where I left off, it is a recipe for disaster. My Cheese Zombies and even my Tomato Soup were not, so apparently this doesn’t apply to my cooking, just everything else. Maybe it is because I’m used to working on other stuff while cooking, whereas not so much when crafting.

Anyway, after making the two smaller blocks I decided I really like the look of it and may have to make it for another quilt in the future. But, I will say that once cut on the diagonal and pieced back together, I really like the look of the finished block. Maybe that means I should search the garage for that glue sometime tonight after work. Ugh.

Desperate Housewife's Quilt: Block Eight

When life gives you choices such as being outside while big floppy rain drops pound on you or staying inside and sewing, the decision can be difficult. I chose sewing.

After church yesterday the plan was to come home and work on the pond, but it was raining and neither of us wanted to work in the rain. So instead I went back inside the house and started working on the eighth block of Jane’s Desperate Housewife’s Quilt. Yes, I know I’m lagging behind, but I figure if I take my time and actually work on the blocks they might even be usable for their intended quilt.

I briefly looked over the instructions, chose my fabrics and started making cuts. I’d suggest reading the instructions all the way, as I found that simply looking at the picture with all the cutout pieces doesn’t tell the whole story. However, fortunately for me I’m not necessarily a stickler for directions and don’t mind that my four-patches are a little different. It called for eight black squares for the four-patches, the same as the background fabric, but I chose a dark blue instead. Typical of me, once I realized my mistake I’d already made my cuts and I hate waste so they stayed.

A little more than an hour after I started it was finished, which for me is a record. I also only had to rip out one stitch line because I’d decided not to pin and one of the center points wasn’t pointy, which is also a record. Besides, with me finishing the block so quickly we were able to do something else perfect for rainy days… watch Season 3 episodes of Merlin that just loaded onto Netflix’s instant view!

Desperate Housewife's Quilt: Block Seven

Paper piecing kicks my ass. I also blame not having a sixty degree ruler.

Me being me, I tried to simply use my straight ruler’s sixty degree mark to make my cuts. Honestly, I felt like I had no idea what I was doing. So then I decided to make a cardstock template for the smaller triangles in the block which made tracing and cutting those out a breeze. Now if I were a smart person I also would have made a larger sixty degree triangle for the other pieces. Instead I puzzled over the ruler until it finally hit me to just cut out a rectangle from a folded piece the correct length and width then cut across diagonally to get one full and two half triangles. Genius. Now, if only this didn’t take an hour to figure out. Of course, listening to Nirvana’s MTV Unplugged in New York album may have been more of a distraction than an inspiration.

Once all the pieces were cut I said to myself, “This is going to go together like a breeze!” I was alone in the house, but even if I wasn’t, me talking to myself out loud is nothing new. I made my first line of stitching, then my second and third then ripped the last two out because I had not actually put them in the proper place. Most people know I have a really hard time following directions, however, after I figured out proper placement (and actually using the folded lines that I spent all that time folding per the directions) the rest went together fairly smoothly. Of course my math was off on the larger pieces and I ended up cutting them about an inch and a half too big. Oh well, better to have too much than not enough in the world of quilting!

(The Desperate Housewife's Quilt can be found on Jane's blog at http://quiltjane.blogspot.com)

Desperate Housewife's Quilt: Block Five

I’m not exactly sure why, but this block seemed to really take a lot for me to complete. I am sure, however, that I overly complicated matters.

I don’t like raw edge appliqué… yet. Let me explain. Since I was a young lad, I realized that raw edges unraveled and fell apart. Ever since I have made sure to turn all raw edges of fabric in, sometimes double tucking for clothing items where the edge will still be exposed but not visible. So when I see all these quilts with raw edges, I cringe. I know that I am in the minority, as this rag-look is quite chic, but I can’t help it. I am, however, trying to overcome this phobia.

For the Desperate Housewife’s Quilt that Jane is hosting on her blog Want it, Need it, Quilt! (http://quiltjane.blogspot.com) I had quite a bit of trouble with Block Five, which called for a raw edged appliqué blanket stitched into place after being ironed on with fusible webbing. Now, in theory, the fusible webbing should hold all those threads into place, but I still don’t trust it. So instead I did what I usually do for appliqué work and hand turned it after using fusible webbing to hold it into place. I will say it was nice not needing to pin the appliqué pieces into place, but I still don’t know if I would trust it to not fray.

Perhaps it is time to let go of my fears. Perhaps I simply need to say to myself, “Get over it! It’s just fabric!” Perhaps I need to make another block using this pattern and try the technique Jane called for because I really love the look of this block. Isn’t it great?