Avignon by Emily Taylor for Riley Blake Designs

This collection is new in the shop, and it is just lovely.  There's a nice blend of crisp blues, yellows, greens, reds, and oranges -- my favorite is probably the houndstooth.  You can find all 18 prints in the shop.
The folks at Riley Blake also created this very pretty churndash pattern to highlight the Avignon collection. Again -- churndashes -- my favorite! The pattern is free, and you can download your own copy here.

 

Giant Vintage Modern Churdash - A Finished Quilt!

Oh, how I love this quilt. It feels so crisp, looks so clean. It's just as well we are still in the midst of late summer hot weather, lest I give into temptation to snuggle up in it. 


 
Here it is, all rolled up and ready to be shipped off to a new home.  Like I've mentioned before, it's like having the best of both worlds, stripes and polka dots in one print!

 

You can find the tutorials for this quilt here and here.  Drop me a note if you decide to make the quilt -- I'd love to see pictures when you are done!

On to my next project, a quick (hopefully) baby quilt for #2's teacher who is expecting her first baby in December.

WIP Wednesday - Of Bindings, Bee Blocks, and More

Is it nerdy to gush about FMQ goddess Angela Walters and how awesome she is?   Her book, Free-Motion Quilting with Angela Walters, was the source of inspiration for the quilting on my Giant Vintage Modern Churndash Quilt.



Angela's philosophy struck well with me -- it seemed to be that you should go with the organic rhythm of the quilting and not stress so much about reaching perfection.  Despite repeating that mantra to myself, I did experience moments when I despaired that I could ever make a circle -- it's actually kinda tough to make a round circle.  At times, my circles/swirls felt more like squares with rounded corners.



Nevertheless, Angela was right.  At the end of the day, after I trimmed the excess backing and batting, I was immensely pleased with how this quilt turned out.

All this quilt needs now is the binding.  I was thinking that I would send it to my cousin who lives in Berlin, as a thank you gift for hosting us this summer.  I have to admit, however, that I'm so loving this top right now that it might be difficult to part with it.

I will post the finished quilt with binding later this week, hopefully.  I chose a cream and red striped binding WITH POLKA DOTS.  How awesome is that, stripes and polka dots in one print?  Pure genius, I think.

The next piece of news I have is that I finally joined a sewing bee, called the Stash Bee!  This is my first foray into any type of sewing bee.  This one happens to be virtual and seems to be relatively low key.  Each person is assigned a month where they are "Queen Bee."  The Queen Bee posts a tutorial of a block she wants the rest of the hive (20 participants in each hive) to make for her, using personal stash fabric.

This block is for Anneliese, who lives in Galway, Ireland. You can find her tutorial for this block called "converging corners" here.  The fabric is from a collection called "Just Wing It," by MoMa for Moda Fabrics.  Although the block looks relatively simple, it can be a little tricky.  I wasted some fabric and did some ripping until I finally figured out the dimensions.



Finally, here is my latest crush. This is Chicopee, by Denyse Schmidt. I love the mixture of modern and retro that is evoked by the prints and colors in this collection. You can get the entire collection (26 prints, 2 colorways) here.

I'm linking up to these blogs today! Have fun sewing, everyone!
 

WIP Wednesday and Giant Churndash Tutorial (Part 2)

I don't think I've ever done this before, but I already have my binding prepped!  For not just one, but two quilts!  Are worlds colliding yet?

Vintage Modern binding for Giant Churdash

Basic Gray binding for Scrappy Hunter's Stars

That said, here are the rest of the instructions for the Giant Churndash blocks.  Click on this link to view the original post.

CUTTING INSTRUCTIONS - SOLID FABRIC
You will need approximately 3 yards of a contrasting solid -- for this quilt I used Kona in white.

Cut (7) strips 8.5" x WOF; keeping the strip in two layers, subcut as follows:
a. (2) strips - 8.5"; 8.5"; 4.5" - you should end up with (8) 8.5" square and (4) 8.5" x 4.5" rectangle;
b. (1) strip - 8.5"; 4.5", 4.5" - You should end up with (2) 8.5" square and (4) 8.5" x 4.5" rectangle
c. (4) strips - 4.5" rectangles - cut a total of 28 rectangles - there should be some left over fabric

Cut (5) strips 9" x WOF - subcut each strip into 9" squares for a total of 18 squares.

Make the half square triangles (HST)



Using one 9" square of the solid, draw a diagonal line through the center. Layer with one 9" print square like so.

  Using a 1/4" seam, sew a line on either side of the center line just drawn. Iron to set the stitch lines, and then cut along the drawn line. Fold out and press. You should end up with two squares that look like this. Now, trim down to 8 1/2" -- I like to make my HSTs oversized so I can trim them down to the exact size.  BUT, if you are an HST pro, if you start with 8 7/8" blocks, you should end up with an 8.5" square when your triangles are complete -- without any trimming!  Repeat with another solid 9" square and the 9" square of the same print.

Put all your various pieces together like so, sewing one row at a time.  Once all the blocks were complete, I used a 3 x3 setting  to end up with a 72" x 72" top with no borders. Last, but not least, I finished the seventh block of the Mystery Designer's BOM from 2011. I am WAY behind on this.  Of course, I'm linking up to WIP Wednesday hosted by Freshly Pieced!

Giant Churndash Quilt - A Tutorial (Part 1)

Just before we left for vacation in July, I started these giant churn dash blocks.  Here are the goals I accomplished with this one: I wanted (1) to do a churn dash quilt; (2) a quick, easy project; and (3) a large block to showcase some pretty prints (Vintage Modern by Bonnie & Camille).

Each block measures 24 inches -- awesome!  When you put three together, that's automatically a 72-inch quilt.  The best part?  You only need 9 fat quarters of various prints, and there is very little waste of those fat quarters with the cutting lay-out.



I thought it would be fun to share how easily these blocks came together.  I put together some initial notes -- I will post the actual sewing tomorrow, but I thought I'd start with the supply list and cutting instructions for the fat quarters.

SUPPLY LIST:

Blocks:
9 fat quarters of coordinating prints - blocks
3 yards solid - blocks

Backing  - 2 1/4 yards
Binding - 1/2 yard


Finished Quilt 72" x 72"
Finished Block 24 x 24

CUTTING INSTRUCTIONS:

From each print fat quarter, cut according to this diagram:

Fat Quarter (20" x 18") - cut carefully, as you can see there's very little wasted fabric!

Last, I'm linking up to: