A dilemma --

Don't you hate it when you get on a roll and keep sewing long past the point where you should have quit?  I haven't worked on one of our quilts in several months but when I finally cleared the deck to finish the pattern and repetition quilt, I hauled out my work board (a piece of foam core that can stand next to my sewing machine so I don't have to get up and walk to the design wall) and found that it had a shape marked on it with yarn.  Sure enough, it was 40 cm wide, so I figured it was left from the last time I worked on one of our series.

Then I started sewing, and figured I had to make enough to fill the space on the board.  Got everything sewed together and decided I really liked the composition!  Great!  I can start quilting Monday morning!

At which point I went to the design wall, which also had a marked off space the right size for our project, but it had been hidden by a larger quilt pinned up.   When I took down the big quilt to reveal the space, and went to pin the new top up, I realized that oops, I had made the quilt way too long.  Notice the quilt pinned up at the left, which was our large/small challenge.  Notice the space on the wall marked off with selvages.

So what to do now?

I could leave the quilt 20 cm too long and it wouldn't match anybody else's quilts in the display.

I could crop off the top of the quilt and it would be approximately 5 cm too long.

I could crop off at the bottom of the quilt and it would be approximately 4 cm too long.

I really like the bottom of the quilt, the way the small squarish pieces at the top elongated into much bigger rectangles, making it a lot airier.  I hate to lose this part because that was my experiment -- the rest was the same design I have been making for several years.

So I guess my question is, how much variation in size can we get away with?  How close have the rest of you been keeping to the 40 x 80 size?

What should I do?

Sketch progress

 I've been having a productive time over the festive season, working on my 'sketch' challenge piece ( you can read more about it on my blog here)
It's based on a watercolour sketch I did in Greece in 1998.

 I have a question about whether to include the scaffolding pole to the left. It wasn't  in my original  drawing but when I visited again in 2006, the poles  in position added something to the composition. Then it's deciding how to quilt it .

Update on assignments

Marylou and Kathy asked for an update:

• Margaret set the assignment 'Lines', which she announced early, strictly speaking it is due just before Prague.
• 'Blue' is a suggestion I made for an extra-assignment, only if you have time and inspiration, to fill a bit more of the wall space in Prague.
• Gillian's assignment 'sketch' was announced here, and is 'due' by the end of the month.
• Barbara's assignment 'repetition' is even further back, and I was really late finishing...

Hope that gets everybody up to date.

Blue

I am going to be away for a few weeks in January and February and in between have loads of teaching so have been worrying about when I was going to find the time to make the quilts that I needed to. So the only way was to stop worrying and just get on and make them.

Here is the Blue Quilt.

This one is inspired by my trips to Scandinavian countries. I have always loved the jumpers that many people wear and have a few that I love to wear.

I dyed the 100% wool felt using acid dyes and then with an innovative way of piecing or counterchange I put the jumpers together.

The stitching in done using some thicker white thread using automatic patterns and the rest is done using lana thread

Here is a detail

For the last couple of years I have been teaching a residential course in the NWest of the UK at a lovely centre at Grange over sands. It is on an estuary and we always go over the estuary on the viaduct to a small town Arnside. 

We take photos, do some drawings etc and I have a fabulous collection of photos and I have never done anything with. I have meaning to make this quilt for a while so i was thrilled when Margaret announced her challenge. I had a few thermofax screens made from my drawings and printed some hand dyed fabrics.

This quilt is not my usual style of working but that's part of the group challenge

So now I only have the Sketch challenge to do for April. I can go away now feeling relieved

Gillian

Repetition and Pattern - Uta

I finally got to a point where I can show you what I have been doing for Barbara's assignment, Repetition and Pattern. As I have started playing around with text, this is not a pieced quilt. (I even made a little sketch - but since this is not the assignment where I have to prove that I was sketching...)

After marking a grid on the piece of snow-dyed fabric I had chosen (a remnant from my sales with exactly the right width - can't let anything go to waste!) I auditioned different sizes of font before taping up the letters for increased stability:

A first stitching around the edges, to get past the stage where I still had to fiddle with the letters. In honor of the name of the group, of course - very thready it was!

This is the piece vefore washing out the stabilizing embroidery fleece:

Here you can see what it looked like after a good wash, and a detail.

It's quilted now, it only needs the binding. But I will save that until I finish Gillian's assignment, and then do both of them together.

text messages 6

Quilt No 3 Change of scale: Mended Door

Quilt number 3 finally completed after several months marinating on the design wall.  The smaller scale area  is a photo of part of a patched, mended door with newer wood inserts among the old on Queen Charlottes Cottage in the grounds of Kew Gardens. The larger scale  shapes and colours are based on some of the sections of the photo, a mixture of African batik, hand dyed and monoprints with acrylic paint.  I  used different weight threads ( 40 and 12) in these areas to further emphasise the change of scale.
I'm not having much luck with  my measurements when cutting down for binding, This quilt is actually 40 x 79 cm as the quilting with 12wt thread drew up the fabric more than anticipated. Red Stapelia  is 39 x 80 cm as I made exactly the same mistake as I did  with grey fingerprint quilt despite writing down all the measurements!

Quilt No 1 : Red Stapelia

  My quilt for our first challenge 'Red' has been almost finished for a long time.  A wholecloth piece of Japanese silk shibori  layered over an African damask ,  it's been a labour of love, hand stitched  using a variety  of loops and other stitches  trying out techniques from Helen Parrott's book. It's accompanied  me on several train journeys, the format of 40 x 80 cm being a good travel piece to work on. This weekend I finally got round to trimming it down and applying a facing.
It looks quite sinister and plant-like  reminding me of the carrion flower so I'm calling it 'Red Stapelia' .

October Challenge - Sketch

I think it is my turn to set the challenge

Sketch!

I would love to have more time to do some proper drawing and sketching. I am sure it would make my quilts look better and design easier. I just need to make time or set myself a goal or a challenge.

So I want to set you all a challenge…

You must show some evidence of sketching

It could be from a photograph, or you could go out and sketch from real life, you could also draw an object inside, maybe from a museum or a treasured item in your home. You could also just start by doodling!

From the sketch you could carry out some design work to make an abstract design or you could paint a realistic picture and make a whole cloth quilt.

You must post a picture of your starting sketch on the blog

So Uta, you did some quilts from your son’s drawing so now you need to do one from your own drawings.

Size 40cm x 80cm

Any technique or colour

Gillian

While I have been quiet since joining the group, I have not been idle.  I completed 4 small quilts mostly using fabric that was originally made for other larger quilts.  Working in the 40 x 80 cm size was both a plus and a minus. Since I only use my own shibori dyed fabric, and I usually quilt my work quite heavily, it was a relief to work small and to actually complete a piece in a reasonable time.  I am working on 3 very large pieces for an invited show right now and the task is exhausting (but exhilarating, too).  I found the tall narrow format challenging in that it was hard for me to get proportions right, and I'm still not sure that these are the best.  Still rather than let the perfect be the enemy of the good, here they are:

                                                            Texture through repetition:

Change in Scale:

                                                   Black grey and white with a little color:

                                                                           Red:

So, there they are.  I think that I'm now caught up with the rest of the group. and I also think that I'll try to attend the show in Prague.
One last thing:  Let's all send our own Kathy Loomis a great big CONGRATULATIONS on having her work included in Quilt National 2015!  Way to go, Kathy!

Up to date

Here is my latest quilt for Barbara's challenge.
In July we cycled in France, along the Loire, then up to Chartres, across to Rouen and then along the coast from Dieppe to Le Harve - about 900kms. We had a lovely final day in Le Harve,  The centre of the town is a UNESCO World Heritage site, designed by Perret in the late 40's 50's. The architecture is fascinating and I loved the regular lines, blocks, and patterns and could see the repetition everywhere.
I was going to make a very abstract quilt but in the end went for a "conventional contemporary quilt".
As always with my quilts...Happy memories
Here are a couple of the many photos I took

This is the quilt before stitching

Gillian