Tag: streak of lightening quilt

Turkey Tracks/Quilting: It’s Snowing! Again!

Turkey Tracks/Quilting:  February 25, 2015

It’s Snowing!  Again!

And, for now, it has stopped, after about five hours or so…

Here’s the view from my kitchen doors and through the windows of the lots and lots of snow we have–higher than my window, higher than my height:

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Through the open door–you can get some perspective on all that white by looking at in relation to the top of the door the snow shovel, which is more than two feet off the ground:

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The paths leading off the deck–I can’t see the hot tub anymore.  The stakes on the hill (you can see their tops) are five feet plus tall.

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Meanwhile, I’ve been quilting, quilting.  It’s always fun to pull a quilt off the long arm and see how the quilting is working over the whole quilt for the first time:

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For this very traditional quilt, I used a traditional clam shell quilting pattern done with groovy boards:

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The soft green blends with the backing, which is not shown here.

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These three scrappy quilts I’ve made recently are brightening up the downstairs sitting room so much.

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I’m sewing down the binding on the streak of lightening quilt at night now–but am so drawn to the hand sewing project with the octagons.  Those scraps are on the yellow table.  And here’s what it’s looking like now.  I put in some side triangles last night:

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I think I’ll applique this piece when it’s done–to a set of borders–so this will be the center.  But, who knows?

I think I’d like the octagons better if they were SMALLER.  But, you know I love small pieces for the most part in a quilt…

 

Turkey Tracks: Streak of Lightening Quilt

February 20, 2015

Fun Fiber Projects in February

How’s that for alliteration?

And. oops, this one published before I wanted it to.  It was meant for tomorrow…

I finished Bonnie Hunter’s 2014  Mystery Quilt, “Grand Illusions,” and will show that on a separate blog post.  It’s a spectacular, exciting quilt and was so much fun to make.

Look at this big red border!  This scrappy streak of lightening quilt top is done.  It will go on the long arm later today.  Remember that this quilt top has come entirely out of my stash and from the leftovers of two other scrappy quilts that I am using in my downstairs tv/sitting room.

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I’m working on another hand-sewing quilt:  octagons.

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I am playing around with the opposites on the color wheel.  This one is blue and orange.  Remember the Lucy Boston quilt I did was two more opposites:  red and green.

Here it is again:

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Purple and yellow may be hexies…

Who knows?

This year, American Patchwork and Quilting magazine has issued a challenge to make quilts with 4-patch blocks.  Bonnie Hunter is one of the quilters–and you can go to the magazine’s web page and get the complete list.  The current magazine has all sorts of gorgeous pictures as part of this challenge.  Remember last year that their challenge involved low-contrast quilts–or, “tone it down” is how I remember them phrasing the challenge.

Anyway, Bonnie is doing something mysterious with this kind of block, put on-point, and which starts with 2-inch squares.  Here are two I have made, and I love them!

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Look at my 2-inch square box.  It definitely needs to be cleared out…

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So I will be making 4-patches of light and dark, regardless of what I do with them all.  Four-patches are endlessly useable.  So this will be a new leader/ender project.

I am also playing around with blocks for a low contrast quilt–in more of the Kaffe Fasset mold–color drenched, I hope.

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I didn’t want that central set of blocks to have any order to move your eye around…  Or to line it up–in the way alternating light/dark squares would do.

It’s a work in progress, and I am having fun playing.

You can see the backing for the streak of lightening quilt on the long arm…

 

 

Turkey Tracks: Blizzard 2 of 2015

Turkey Tracks:  February 13, 2015

Blizzard 2 of 2015

The other night on the local news I heard that Portland, Maine, has had 6 feet and 1 inch of snow–that total has climbed as it snowed more on Wednesday and Thursday.

Here in Camden, which is just under two hours further north, we’ve sometimes had more snow (much more) and sometimes a bit less.  So, it’s pretty safe to say we’ve had at least 6 feet of snow this past winter–and most of it landed in the last three weeks.

We’re all braced for the blizzard that will start tomorrow afternoon late.  Predictions are for up to 24 or so inches of light, blowing snow.  None of us has a clue about where we’ll put another two feet of snow.

I’ve had a go-round with the electricity in the chicken coop, but that’s solved now.  I have TWO lines going out there from different outside outlets.  The water heater is working again.  Our temps tonight are dropping to -14 degrees.  That’s NOT wind chill.  Or, that’s the prediction anyway.  So getting electricity back to the chicken coop was really important.

I have two more longarm passes on the Bonnie Hunter 2014 Mystery Quilt, Grand Illusion.  So, I will be binding that quilt later today.  It’s always so much fun to unwind a finished quilt and to see the whole of the quilting in it.

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I finished two knitted wool hats last night–made to go with wool scarves I made last year.  I went a little crazy with buttons.

I put pics of this cowl (infinity scarf) up last year.

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And:

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There is a good match with the hat yarn in the lighter yarn in the scarf–it just isn’t showing in this picture.

Here’s the quilt-in-progress on the design wall–a streak of lightening pattern.  This fabric is the leftover from the other two scrappy quilts I recently made from my 2 1/2 strip bin.  I was left with some shorter pieces, so I cut 2 1/2by 4 1/2-inch rectangles.

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I’ll use an inner border that’s about an 1 1/2 inches and put on a wider border of some sort–yet to be determined.  This quilt will look very traditional when I’m finished.  Simple and useful.  This quilt will join its sisters in the downstairs tv/sitting room–replacing sturdy but ugly couch dog blankets.  So far, so good in terms of looks and wear.

I wondered why the suet feeders were disappearing so fast.  Then I saw this guy yesterday:

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It’s the best picture I could get in a series.  The Pileated Woodpeckers are HUGE and very jittery and scary.  He’s been around off and on all winter, but today he treated me to quite a show.  At one point he sat in the middle of the flat green feeder and just rocked himself back and forth.  As long as I didn’t move a muscle, he stayed around.

Stephen Pennoyer has been working on more pour over coffee stands.   Here’s the most recent picture he sent me:

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I see a two-hole in this picture…

OK, bring on the blizzard.  I’m ready.