I'm getting ready to go back to work again in a few weeks, and after spending a couple hours the other day going through all the projects that I had planned to finish this summer (haha) something in my brain kicked into gear and told me to get sewing.

I started cutting triangles for this project back at the beginning of my time off. Whenever I had fabric out for something else that I was working on, I'd just hack off a triangle and stash it in my pile. It had been sitting on my desk with all of the other things I was working on for the show, and at that point was itching to start something with it. I held off, and then forgot about it for a few weeks.

As with all projects that I seem to start though, I've got dilemmas. I do love how it looks so far, but I'm just not sure that I'm up to par with the sewing skill to pull this one off. I'm going to have to be so precise with piecing, and I've already noticed that it's nearly impossible for me to make the edges line up completely. Where I could normally fudge it with squares, the edges of the triangles won't be perfect points if I don't line up my seams absolutely perfectly. Does that make sense?

I nearly threw in the towel after the first row. I seam ripped several pieces (several of those pieces were ripped more than once) and it still just didn't line up like I wanted them to. My argument to myself to keep going is that I LOVE the colors. And if I can squeak this out, I think it will look amazing. I'm just not so sure it's going to look amazing in the end. We'll see.

posted by Sarah | August 20, 2010 | Quilting | 4 comments | link

Oh nine patch quilt....you seemed to simple to make and yet you've given me such a bad headache. What to do with you?

I think the best thing for me to do is to be content where I'm at now. I spent another day today making blocks, and I think I've been able to achieve a better balance of color and pattern with some of my original blocks. That's a very good thing to me. There's still something though that I can't put my finger on that bugs me about it, but I can't really figure it out. That's why I'm going to call it good. At least, I think that's the plan right now. We'll see what happens in the next few days when I move onto sewing the top together.

And, to report--I ended up going to the Modern Quilt Guild meeting last night and was so glad to have gone. I had a really good time and I'm looking forward to going back next month! They're a really nice group of people and I don't think my awkwardness scared too many people away. (Although I won't know that until next month.)

posted by Sarah | June 29, 2010 | Quilting | 7 comments | link

Dang, my blog readers are hard core about giving opinions! I've really enjoyed reading everyone's thoughts and I've been seriously considering what you all have to say about the both colors. Honestly though, I still haven't decided what I'm doing.

Here's what's new though:

I spent today making new blocks. I added pinks, grays and blacks and I think it's been helpful to see more colors added in. At first I wasn't thinking a whole lot about how they'd blend with the other blocks--instead I was just on a mission to make as many new ones as possible and edit from there.

This is what I had made by mid-afternoon. I put everything smooshed together on my cutting table and stood above, and just let the blocks sink in my brain for a while. I realized that there's some blocks that I really love....and there's some blocks that I really can't stand. I started by separating those into piles. Then I added what I thought would still look good with the "like" pile. I feel a lot better about the blocks now, but was depressed to see that instead of having at least what I started with this week when I first showed you this project (30 blocks) and then sewing more blocks today (20 blocks) I am now down to 25 blocks.

I hope no one is disappointed that I don't have a real answer yet. I'll be back with more progress on Tuesday.

Oh! One other thing. I'm thinking about stepping out of my comfort zone a little (Hi! I'm totally socially awkward! Yay!) tomorrow to go to a meeting of my (sort of) local Modern Quilt Guild in Brighton, Michigan. I'm very excited about it. Has anyone else joined up with a Modern Quilt Guild? I'm interested to hear how people like them.

posted by Sarah | June 27, 2010 | Quilting | 11 comments | link

Okay, I need opinions once again. I thought about the ideas that you all had from yesterday (thank you for pulling me out of my mini-meltdown with good ideas!), and decided to lay the blocks out again on Kona White and Charcoal. I also liked the idea of Navy as well, but I noticed that too many of the blocks have dark blue in them and it blended in too much. I thought the Charcoal provided a dark color with enough of a difference from the dark blues.

But, which to choose now? (Pretend you're at the eye doctor.)

Better A?

Better B?

Here's some important thoughts:

1. I'm not sold on the placement of the blocks. I'm not even sold on keeping all of these blocks in. Heck, I might add more blocks and turn it into a bigger quilt. I just kept them in the same placement as yesterday for consistency.

2. I'm still thinking about adding single 2 inch squares in the corner of the sashing. (Take a look at the picture in the Hip To Piece Squares banner--that's what I'm describing.) I'm thinking about this, but not completely sold yet.

I'm determined to make this thing work. I'm going to finish it.

posted by Sarah | June 25, 2010 | Quilting | 43 comments | link

I'm not sure, but I think I may have just spent the last two days on a big failure of a project.

I don't know what the deal is with it. Part of me thinks that I should have used prints and solids in each block, but I wanted it to be busy. I think it needs a sashing in between the blocks, but I'm not sold on the Kona Ash that the blocks are sitting on. Should it be white? Or cream colored? Or should I go darker?

But on the other hand, I'm wondering if I should actually add some more color to the blocks. Maybe it's too small?

I don't know. I need to put it away for the night because it's making me frustrated and angry. Any constructive criticism will be well appreciated!

posted by Sarah | June 24, 2010 | Quilting | 21 comments | link

I really like sewing on rainy days. For me, it's the perfect setting for catching up on hand sewing projects or getting new ideas started. Luckily, I've had no shortage of either over the past couple of days.

It's getting close to craft show season, so I'm starting to work on getting a stock of things made to tote around the state with me later this summer. Yesterday I finished assembling five lunchboxes, and now they need several hours of hand sewing to finish off the binding on the sides. It's a little mindless, but perfect for rainy days while Netflixing TV shows on the laptop. Perfect.

I think they're going to become a nine patch quilt--something I'm really excited about. I was pumped to finish my little quilt last week, so I hope this is something that will go equally as well. We'll see tomorrow once I get started sewing!

posted by Sarah | June 23, 2010 | Quilting | 1 comments | link

I know I talked a lot about it yesterday, but I thought I'd show you all the final version of my five (but now six, since it took me until this morning to finish the binding) day quilt.

Introducing, Scrappy Squares!

I've got to say, that I was so nervous about putting this in the wash. I'm not typically a fabric prewasher, but I've been burned before with some of the red prints in this quilt. Instead of washing before I sewed them, I rinsed them in cold water after piecing, let them air dry until they were nearly dry, and then I ironed them with a hot iron. I was still pretty worried that I'd have some running, but it turned out great. I couldn't have been happier.

(And after some thought about it, I decided to list Scrappy Squares in my Etsy shop.)

posted by Sarah | June 17, 2010 | Etsy Shop | Quilting | 5 comments | link

I'm not the type of quilter to make a quilt from start to finish in days. I take weeks, months, and fairly often years, to go through all steps of making a quilt. Even the ones that shouldn't take that long often do.

I am a changed quilter. Let me show you what's happened since Friday:

Look at that! Everything but the binding is finished! And in like 5 days! I still can't even believe it's possible. I don't think I actually did it. My dream of having elves work for me at night must be happening. Thank you, elves.

When I started it, I was hoping that I'd have enough to make something at least lap size, but I quickly realized that I was going to run out of a lot of the important scraps that I was using. I thought about axing the project or finding a new use for the blocks, but I ended up finishing the top off anyway. I really loved these blocks too much to give it up. Then, last night I found that I had a perfect fabric for the back, so I made the quilt sandwich and today I quilted it. I love it so much.

And even though I don't know what to do with it now (there are no babies here) I want to make more of them. It was a fantastic project to work on for a few days, and I did enjoy the machine quilting. It's been way too hot to do much hand quilting, and this gave me the chance to finish a project without too much commitment or sweat. I'm considering listing it in my Etsy shop, but I'm not sure if anyone buys baby quilts. Ideas?

posted by Sarah | June 16, 2010 | Quilting | 10 comments | link

I'm so happy to announce that I finally have put together a hand quilting tutorial!

Even more exciting, it's running today at the Sew, Mama, Sew blog! I'm so happy that it will reach so many quilters that might just give hand quilting a shot now. I hope that as you use the tutorial, that you will let me know how your attempts go. I'd love to see what people make by using it. Also, if anyone has any further questions, please don't hesitate to drop me a line. I'll certainly try to help as best as I can!

I hope you'll enjoy!

posted by Sarah | May 20, 2010 | Quilting | Tutorials | 7 comments | link

Time to check another quilt off the to-do list. Bright Squares is officially finished, and I'm pleased. I don't even regret at all ripping out the machine quilting on this and re-quilting it by hand. It looks leaps and bounds better than it did before. By huge bounds.

I feel like it's pretty lousy that it's taken me over five years to finish such a very simple quilt. I think I'm redeeming myself though, that in the past few months, I haven't started any new projects. I'm really committing myself to finishing the projects that I've loved...and then left...and love once again.

So, yay!! for finishing projects!

posted by Sarah | May 18, 2010 | Quilting | 9 comments | link