You have got to be kidding!

This is one of my pet peeves: copyright gone stupid! I think if you manufacture fabric you have got to expect some people will make things out of said fabric and may even sell a few. what is next copyright on blank paper do paper manufacturers need to get a cut out of the novel you have written or give you permission? what about the thread we use, or the sewing machine we produced it on?

City Harbour done!

 working on binding!

 nice neat corners!

all done!!!

Joseph Low, meet Jessica Hogarth

I picked up some fabrics by Jessica Hogarth on a recent shopping trip just because it reminded me of animation and illustration from my childhood years, in particular this one:

I bought a few matching fabrics and this one from the same line with these cute birds:

I played with my fabrics and came up with a sort of slash and sew design:

but I was stuck at the green border where to go from here? but in my internet search for cool album covers I came across this one by Joseph Low:

Omg! everything old is new again! the style of drawing is so similar to Jessica Hogarth, don't you think....and do you recognize the art style? Apparently Joseph Low is a Caldecott winner for a children's book called Mice Twice and was a frequent cover artist for The New Yorker magazine between 1940-1980.
....but I digresss! this album cover inspired me to play with a black and white background, from this:

to this! The converging lines remind me of the opening credits to North by Northwest (Saul Bass) and the added touch of The Birds fabric make this the perfect Alfred Hitchcock tribute don't you think?

 

Now I have to figure out how to quilt it!

Homage to the square

My husband collects vinyl. Records, that is. We have been spend a lot of time at used record shops when we go on vacation. I like to check out fabric and quilt shops and he likes the used record stores. I have found a new way to enjoy my time in the record shop, checking out the album covers! Many of them are quite inspirational from a quilting perspetive! I have come across quite a few artists that I like and want to collect.

It started with Saul Bass:

 He designed everything in the 1960's, really. ok exaggeration! He was a graphic designer famous for such iconic logos as Kleenex, Quaker Oats, United Way,  and Dixie cups. He did title sequences and posters for movies such as North by Northwest, It's a Mad,Mad World, Man with the Golden Arm, and Anatomy of a Murder. I think he is one of the most copied designers ever.

 

This stuff makes me want to run to the sewing machine and make bright bold colourful quilts!

Then I discovered S. Neil Fujita, another designer, best known for the cover to the novel The Godfather.

I soon discovered jazz is where it is at for inspirational album covers!
Jim Flora:

(is it just me or do I see a future Laurel Burch here)


 Then I discovered Command Records and Josef Albers

see previous post, I already made that quilt!

does this not remind you of one of blogger's early templates?

broken nine-patches?!

I am now reading Josef Albers A Retrospective. It turns out he is known for Homage to the Square.

There is nothing more quilty than that!

Whoa!

Did you ever get a whoa moment?  That's what happened when I found this album cover on the internet!

Sewing Day!

I finally got together with some friends and spend the day sewing! I have not had many chances to participate in any guild activities, either, I have been so busy at work lately. Gail hosted and the three C's (Christine, Cathy and Carol) supplied some potluck food for lunch.

Remember these luscious reds? I finally got a chance to work on them!

I had all those fat quarters cut into rectangles 4.75 x6.75 and sorted into pairs. I would take a pair and then make 4 random slices through them and then alternate the colours and then sew them together. Then I would trim them down to 4.5 inches square. I completed 40 of them and still have about 14 more to go. I am thinking of making a table runner out of it....we shall see.

The year of the big quilt!

 It still needs binding, but here is a photo of my City Harbour Quilt. I had to hang it from the curtain rod in my living room it was the only space big enough for me to take a photo.

 Here is a close up of the straight line quilting:

I also hung the Hawaiian Punch quilt in the window to get a better photo, of course the light is shining through the window giving it a bit of a stained glass look. Hopefully it will go off to the machine quilter in the next couple of weeks.

Barn Quilt

Was driving to Zurich and found this barn quilt off of hwy 4 between Exeter and Hensell...a nice splash of colour on a dreary day!

I have not been blogging but I have been quilting. I have been working each month on a nine patch swap for guild. I am enjoying that, looking forward to the end result.

I picked up my City Harbour Quilt from Diane Carson who machine quilted it for me, it looks awesome but the thing is so big I have no place to hang it so I can take a picture of it...plus I would like to wait until I have the binding on, anyway. Here is a photo of the top finished at a retreat a year ago:

Speaking of large quilts I have finished the top to Dan's Hawaiian Punch quilt, now I have to get material for the back and have that quilted as well, it also is too big for me to take a decent photo of it.

Luscious Reds

I redeemed a gift certificate for these luscious Oakshott cottons! Just a fun side project to do in February! stay tuned!

Cat Approved!

Yay! I have most of the top pieced, but am running out of white for the outside sashing. My bed is not big enough, I need to check out my dimensions on the king-size bed it will be laying on, I think, before I add the last bit of sashing.

Progress Report

I would post some photos, but the the "insert image" task will not let me upload from my computer, only from my blog, picasa web, my phone, a webcam, and a URL, the browse button is gone....if this continues, then I am finished with blogging, if I can't post photos from my computer what good is it?

Update: I switched to the Firefox browser and the browse function came back and photos added! yay!

Hawaiian Punch progress report:

I have finished my 16 blocks! Yay! I have sewn them into 4 large strips...

 

 
now my question is do I buy white fabric in the length I need for sashing or should I piece them into the length I need?

Making progress

 



 Well, I have fallen short of my goal of this quilt top being done by Christmas, but I have made progress. I need 16 of these blocks I have now completed 8 (6 are shown as there is no room on this design wall for a king size bed quilt!)

All the strips are made so it is just a matter of having the time to sew! I should be able to finish the blocks at least this weekend, as long as I don't have to go to work!

Homemade Pillowcases for Gifts

I love making these pillowcases for Christmas! They are simple to make and always look so good when they are done, but each year I always have to relearn the sausage trick to make the cuff (is that the word?). So I decided to make myself a photo reference and post it here so I can refer to it anytime.

Fabric requirements:

WOF 2 inch strip, 9 inch strip and 27 inch strip

Press 2 inch strip in half lengthwise.

Lay out 9 inch fabric right side up, lay pressed 2 inch fabric along top, pin together at top.



Lay out 27 inch fabric on top wrong side up, pin together at top.

Roll up the 27 inch piece.

Fold up the 9 inch piece so that everything is inside and pin together.

ta da!

Sew quarter inch seam along pinned side. Turn it all inside out and press.

With wrong sides together sew side and bottom with scant quarter inch seam, turn inside out. With right sides together sew 3/8 inch seam on same side and bottom, and turn inside out again. Press! Done!

Quilts for twins! and for Dan's

I have been very busy lately! I finished these two baby quilts for friends of mine (Danielle and Dan) who are having twins, a boy and a girl sometime in December! It was quite a struggle to do the machine quilting. I hardly ever use a seam ripper except when I am machine quilting. First I didn't like the pattern, rip it out! then I didn't like the colour of thread, rip it out! then I had tension problems, eek rip it out!! but in the end it worked out, I am still learning and it's practice and practice and practice! It's a good thing babies do not have a critical eye when it comes to quilts!

How's about a nice Hawaiian Punch?
So now that I have that done, I have to work on my next big project.  A friend of mine, another Dan, asked me to make him a quilt made from some of his Hawaiian shirts. Oh that should be fun I said! King size, he said. eek King size? and most of the shirts are made of rayon! He has a huge collection of shirts! He brought me about 20 different shirts, I sorted them by colour and rejected the polyester ones, I figured I only want one kind of fabric to sew, and only one headache to deal with! and the headache is that it is slippery and wonky. Even after you cut the fabric it gets all distorted. I am continuously experimenting with spray-on starch. In the end I picked out 8 different shirts to use.

This also made it hard to figure out a design. I was going to use cotton fabric for sashing the blocks to stablize it. I found a pattern in my Sew to Swap book by Chrissie Grace, that I thought might work with so many busy fabrics, the only problem was that it was square and I had to make it bigger. I got out my graph paper and started drawing.  I also thought I would use white as my solid instead of brown.

My squares will be 2 inches instead of 1 inch and I added a flying geese border for the pillow rest and to make it rectangular instead of square.

Below are my 2 1/2 inch squares waiting to be chain pieced.  I needed to make 16x 16-patch blocks! I got those done at the BIQR.

Below is one completed block, I need 16 of these. I am currently chain-piecing the outer borders. 30x strips of 8 squares, and 30x strips of 6 squares. Chain piecing can be monotonous work at best, so I do a bunch as leaders and enders and in between projects. My goal is to get most of the top pieced by Christmas!