Red Sky at Night

Red sky at night - Sailors delight,

Red sky in morning - Sailors take warning!

 I finally finished it, and it's in the mail! 

I saw this panel in a quilt shop in Ketchikan, and I thought of our friends whose son attends the Coast Guard Academy, so I bought it for them. Then I got the idea that I could make it into a quilted wall hanging before I gave it to them. 

This project turned out to be a lot more complicated than I was expecting, because I had no directions for it. Ultimately, I decided to include three "Storm at Sea" blocks. Then I saw a quilt on Pinterest that had the "Starry Night" blocks, and I loved how they fit in with the theme of the quilt.

Just about every step presented a challenge. The panel was an odd size, so I had to figure out what size to make the blocks and the sashing pieces. Fortunately, I have a set of templates by Marti Michell called "Long Skinny Sashing Stars." I also used Marti's "Set A, The 3" Square Basic Set." My troubles and travails are detailed in my May 15, 2019 post, So Much to Wilt About. Let's just say I learned many important lessons before I was able to get all the moving parts synchronized.

I had to put in a dark red border around the panel. It was narrower on the top and bottom than on the sides, but that's the only way I could get the panel to fit.

My quilt buddy, Susan, came with me to The Quilt Tree to help me pick out the fabric, after I had the basic plan sketched out. The nice lady at The Quilt Tree helped me figure out how much of each fabric I needed. I think we did a good job! I still like the fabric a lot, despite all my frustrations with this unruly project.

This photo of the back gives a you a better idea of what the black batik on the outermost border on the front really looks like.

On the photo of the back you can also see the dark red binding (hand sewn), the hanging sleeve (made out of the blue-violet batik I used on the front), and the label.

 

If you squint, you can see some of the machine-quilting I did. I used a variegated blue thread. In retrospect, that turned out to be a poor choice. I went through so many quilting scenarios in my head. Most of them turned out to be too difficult for someone like me, so I ended up with something fairly simple.  I eventually realized that I did not need to be overly concerned with stabilizing the batting, since this will be a wall hanging. After much debating with myself, I determined that it would be best to leave the panel unquilted. It has a rubbery coating that would be very difficult to work with, and I couldn't settle on a good quilting plan for the panel (Outline the pictures? Geometric pattern?).

I ended up stitching-in-the-ditch around the blocks and the sashing. Then I did a free-hand serrated line of stitching in the outer black border to echo the serrated edge of the stamp in the panel. I wish it were visible in the photos.

Even the label was tricky. I had to think very carefully about the cleaning instructions. I was going to say "Dry Clean Only,"but the rubbery coating on the panel gave me pause. I think some of the ink/paint started to come off when I ironed it. I also had reason to think the yellow fabric might run. And I really didn't want the batting to shrink on this piece.

Lesson Learned: Don't do this again.

 

So Much to Wilt About

It is REALLY HARD to make a quilt without a pattern or directions. I have had so many problems. I have done a lot of work, but I am less far along than I was last time I posted.

The quilt has three kinds of pieces: Blocks, Sashing Strips, and Cornerstones. I made them all, not without difficulty, and even started sewing them together. Now I am facing the prospect of doing most of them over.

Here are the Blocks:

These are the only pieces that worked out well. I made them to finish at 6". The blue inner square finished at 3".  

I happen to have a number of sets of Marti Michell templates from Saturday Sampler classes I have taken. It turns out that Set A had all the templates I needed to make these 6 " blocks.  Yay! Set A is called The 3" Basic Square Set. The set has more than three pieces, but I only needed these three:

I put little silicone circles on them. It makes them more stable when you are using them. Otherwise, they tend to slide around on the fabric.

Here are some of my Sashing Strips:

The arrows show some of the worst areas of buckling

The Sashing Strips are supposed to finish at 6" x 2". These were the hardest pieces. They were hard to cut and hard to sew. They ended up being too long, crooked, poorly aligned, buckled, cock-eyed . . .  you name it. I thought I was being careful, but these pieces call for the very highest level of attention.

I pressed the seams away from the center and then realized you could see the seams through the fabric. I thought I was going to have redo all of them. I ripped out parts of the seams on one piece, and tried to press the seams toward the center until I realized that there would be an unacceptable problem with overlapping seams near the points.

I used Marti Michell's Long Skinny Sashing Star Set. I have no idea how to make the diamonds without some sort of template, but the Long Skinny Sashing Star templates are not easy to use. For example, to make the diamonds, you have to cut one side of the diamond, then flip the template around and cut the other side. You needed to make marks in two of those tiny pin-holes using a pencil, and then align the template on the pencil marks after you have flipped it.

Note the tiny holes for marking alignment.
(I used small adhesive sandpaper circles to help stabilize the templates. Maybe I need a few more?)

I didn't realize the Sashing Strips were too long until I had made all of them. A few of them might be okay. I thought maybe I could trim the ones that are too long, but I still have many that are crooked, buckled, and/or cock-eyed. How could this turn out so badly?

Do I try to re-use the pieces? Do I simply trim the ones that are too long? I don't know how much of my problem is a cutting problem, and how much is a sewing problem, so I think I had better cut out new pieces. Thank goodness I have lots of fabric.

And then there are the Cornerstones.

The Cornerstones need to finish at 2" x 2". I had to use the Pythagorean Theorem to figure out the size of the inner square. The outer square is 2" x 2" so the outer triangles have catheti of 1". That means the hypoteneuse is 1 . . . a squared + b squared = c squared . . .

the square root of two! Aha, it's 1.414! So that is going to be finished size of the inner square.  So, add 1/4" for the seam allowance and it will be 1.664. No. I think I will need to add 1/2". Right? So it will be 1.914? How am I going to measure that? Can I round it to 2?

What about these really small templates in Set A? Wouldn't they be the right size? I think the template will give me a 2" square, not a 1.914" square. But it comes with Set A. It should work, right?

So, the first time I cut out the black triangles, I had the grain the wrong way. After I realized that, I cut out another set of black triangles, and sewed ALL the Cornerstones together. Yay! Almost done.

Then I laid everything out and started sewing rows together. After I sewed the first row together I realized it was too long. And I also realized that the Cornerstones were a little wider than the rest of the Sashing Strips. I measured and I thought and I looked at the pictures and the templates and the template instructions, and I finally was forced to accept the fact that these templates were never intended for the purpose I used them for. I didn't think 0.86 inches was a big deal, but it was. I should have known that. I did know that. I just got lazy. How do you measure such a small size anyway?

I found that we had an engineering ruler that had tenths of an inch. That helped me with my measuring. I made my own templates, a tiny bit smaller than the Set A templates. I made a few new Cornerstones and sewed them to some Sashing Strips. Much better! A whole row of pieces that are off by 0.86 turns out to be off by a really significant amount.

Now, do I rip out the seams, trim all the pieces, and re-sew, or just cut new pieces?

Sigh. I am so wilted.

Lessons Learned:

• Measuring matters. It REALLY matters.
• Measure before you sew ALL your pieces. Sew before you cut ALL your pieces.
• Don't be lazy. A tiny little discrepancy isn't going to go away. It is going to multiply.
• Always check the grain before you cut.
• Don't assume that just because templates come in the same set you can use them all in the same project.

Friends with Sewing Machines

What better way to spend a snowy holiday Sunday than sewing with friends? I have a new project and I needed a little push to get started so it was the perfect time for a Sewing Day.

I am making a wall hanging as a gift for some friends. It's sort of a surprise so I'm not going to say too much about it yet. It is based on a printed panel I bought. The panel came without any pattern or suggestion or idea for what to do with it. I spent some time surfing the internet and I was able to come up with a plan.

The panel has a nautical theme, and I found that there is a traditional quilt block called "Storm at Sea." I am going to place three Storm at Sea blocks underneath the panel and then put coordinating sashing around the panel and between and around the blocks. My inspiration came from this wall hanging I found on Pinterest. I knew right away it would be perfect. I don't know who made it.

Fortunately, Susan M agreed to meet me at the fabric store to help me pick out fabric. Actually, she insisted on being there. I'm glad she came because it was so helpful to have her input. She has such a good eye for color. She also helped me figure out how to make the panel and the blocks plus sashing fit together. You will see what we came up with in a future post.

Here are the fabrics I came home with

I made an inner border around the mystery panel, and then I started sewing the sashing pieces. They are actually rather difficult to cut and to sew.

Some of the sashing pieces in bad lighting. 

As I write this blog I am taking a good look at the sashing photo and the realization is dawning on me that I have probably pressed the sashing the wrong way. I don't think I can simply press them the other way because some of the seams overlap. I will have to see how it looks next to the batting. 

This is what happens when you are talking to your friends while sewing and working without a pattern or directions. :(

It wasn't all bad.

Susan M fixed a jacket. She shortened the sleeves and embellished it with molas!

 

Marilyn started a purse. She had some gorgeous Laurel Burch fabric.

Rebecca made a couple of blankets.

Sophia made progress on an adorable Elizabeth Hartmann quilt.

Susan DL experimented with knitting a kippah. Not a smashing success, but wouldn't it make a smashing tea cozy?

Now that I have started my project, I hope there will be enough momentum to keep me going without my support group.

Reinventing the Secret Garden

In 2014 I did a BOM called The Secret Garden. I started blogging about it in 2015, and I actually haven't finished writing about the process of finishing this project. I have covered 11 of the 12 blocks. I haven't written anything - yet - about the sashing.

If you have followed my commentary on the monthly blocks you probably realize that I don't like this quilt very much. I especially didn't like it after I did the sashing. I will write about that eventually.

But I am going to skip over that part for now, and talk about Day 1 of a 3-day workshop I am attending. The instructor was Rayna Gillman, from the East Coast. The name of the workshop is Cinderella Quilts! Reinventing the UFO.  (Quilters tend to have a lot of UFO's - UnFinished Objects.) As soon as I heard about this workshop, I knew I wanted to learn how to take unfinished projects and ugly projects and turn them into gorgeous, finished pieces of art. Rayna's work is beautiful, and I would like to try to tap into my artistic side (if I have one) and see what I can come up with. As Rayna says, if you don't like it, it can't get any worse, so don't be afraid to cut it up and experiment.

Rayna shows us how she made some of her "What-was-I-thinking?" blocks into fabulous pieces

I started with three blocks from the nearly-finished Secret Garden

The first step is to fearlessly grab your rotary cutter (by the handle, please) and slice up the sacrificial blocks. There are no rules, no measuring, no using a straight edge. Just start cutting.

This wasn't a photography class, and so I did not learn how to take photos with accurate color values. What you see below is not very true to the actual colors, but you can get the idea.

The first few pieces go up on my very first "design wall."

More pieces

Starting to sew the pieces together

There are 4 strips from Secret Garden lurking in here

After sewing all of the pieces together I squared it up a little and thought about what else it needed.
















I decided to cut it into thirds. After the shock of cutting up a block I had spent time on and effectively ruining the whole Secret Garden quilt, it was not as awful to cut up the piece I just made. I  tried flipping one of the pieces but I didn't like the way that looked, so I kept them with the same orientation but shuffled the order. I think that added a LOT of interest and movement to it.

That's as far as I got. It was a long day. Tomorrow I will decide how it should be finished how I want to finish it. No rules, remember?

And I will start on a companion piece.

Rayna has all kinds of helpful tricks. I'm not going to give them all away. You'll have to take her class or buy her book. Link to Rayna's Book

So many opportunities to recycle