A finish and a start

Finished project....

My version of  the Ann Randoll coverlet. 

Just to recap - I started it in January 2014 when I was lucky to attend a great workshop with Rhonda Pearce who had just drafted her own pattern. The original antique coverlet (in the V and A in England) is huge - 147 inches (3.75m) by 118 inches -  too big for me!  So I worked a few changes - made my version square, omitted the large outer pinwheel border, and drafted my own final border (the  one with hexagons and applique). My quilt finishes at 82 inches square - hand quilted. 

If you recall, I added a wide border of scrap fabric just to help in the hoop with hand quilting the edges. So that had to be unpicked and removed before trimming the batting/backing to size - easy enough (she says). 

Adding a solid brown binding to match the dog tooth edging:

...including a hanging pocket along the top at the back: 

There we are -  bound and hung (...sounds painful?)

I'm very happy with it and love the hand quilted finish but I tell you what - just for now - I need a change from brown! I actually really like brown but is it Spring and the timing seems right for something fresher and lighter. 

New project...

Shenandoah Valley Botanical Album sewalong (SVBAQ) - and no brown in sight here. For more info on this project see the SVBAQ blog

Picture from Marcus Mentions website

I've made a change in my greens selection for this quilt. There was a lot of dithering indecision last post trying to pick just the right shade of green, and I had a feeling it wasn't over! But now I am committed...out with the old and in with the new.  

So - to make a start - I am piecing my background squares (to make a 12 inch finished block). I cut background fabrics in to 7 inch squares (allowing the extra inch to play with) and machine stitched them together. 

Now I don't want a nasty big bump of seam allowance in the middle - won't be fun to applique over that! So I'm following a good tutorial "How to reduce bulky seams when piecing patchwork blocks" (thank you, thank you for this) and here is the back of the first block:

..and the front - nice and flat:

My chosen applique technique is needleturn with back basting prep. Here is the first block drawn on the back of the block : 

...and in no time I had two blocks completed. I think the idea is to complete one block a month but this is a relatively easy one, and will be repeated three times in the quilt,  so I couldn't resist making two:

They do feel like Spring don't they? Such a lovely pattern ....

I have three Dogwood trees in my garden. They don't grow fast here as the heat knocks them back a bit, but this Spring they are the best they've ever been - especially this little one. Now that is a good effort - extra mulch and water for you! 

A picture tells a thousand words...

...and what does this one tell? Well - it is Spring here and my daffodils are flowering cheerfully in the garden, and indoors. But also - the basting pin tin is full again! Every last pin is out of my Ann Randoll quilt and that is something to celebrate. 

Once that last pin was out I spread the quilt to review the quilting - checking there was enough of it. Being a medallion quilt with multiple borders the quilting needs to look balanced across each border. 

I'm happy with the centre... 

...happy with the clamshell border (just quilted in the ditch) 

..happy with the pinwheel border (quilted in squares) 

hmmm...not so happy with the two applique vine borders. Here I have a nasty case of 'Introduced Puckers'! See them?

There were no puckers or crinkles when the top was pieced but they easily get introduced when the fabric either side is quilted more densely. I was rather expecting this to happen, but hoping to get away with it. There's a bit more of it than I like, relative to the other borders. 

Solution?  Add a grid on the cream background of the applique borders. I use a large triangle ruler and a Hera marker to score the lines - very easy and quick.

The scored marking shows up beautifully in the hoop -  all ready to quilt: 

Here's some of the border before quilting the grid - complete with crinkles:

And some border after grid quilted - behaving better:

You might be thinking "What a huge bother!" but for me, it is a pleasure to hand quilt grid work around applique. You see, for years I have done it by machine - on my domestic machine - and I found it so tedious that way - all the stop/start, fixing a million threads and cutting a million threads. When hand quilting you just pass the thread between the layers from place to place - blissfully easy!

Here is an example..my Carolina Lily quilt which was quilted on my domestic machine. 

I went to a lot of trouble to give it the look of hand quilting because I just could not hand quilt ( or thought I couldn't) at that time. It took about a month to quilt on my machine but I'm guessing I could now hand quilt it in 3 months - and enjoy the process so much more. Interesting to look back in time.  

So I'll continue hand quilting Ann Randoll - I need to finish the two vine borders and then am thinking to add some parallel lines on the outer large hexagon border. It has only a mild case of Introduced Puckers  so not such dense quilting needed ...I hope. 

Meanwhile Wheat and Woods is growing.

A this point I decided I didn't fancy the itty bitty fractions of brown squares around the edges of the outer border applique triangles - looked too untidy somehow and the eye is drawn to them.

So I removed them - just a bit of applique unpicked. I tried a wavy strip of applique instead...

basted ready to needle turn

I think I like that better. Am keeping that unpicker on standby though! 

So that is where I am up to now -  three more corners to add to the top.

Meanwhile the garden is calling. There has been a bit of tree trimming - just a few branches trimmed and 'dead headed'. These eucalypts are beautiful but huge, and prone to drop great branches without notice . 

It's still a bit chilly to sit out for long but there is much growing and flowering happening. 

Hellebores and rhododendrons

Bluebells leafing up everywhere

Have a lovely weekend

Wheat and Woods

My new quilt is progressing quite quickly. I only showed a snippet last post as I had to sort a few  design "issues" (grrr) that I had with it. Now there is more to show. Might be a long very long post...

Here is the broderie perse centre for the quilt - all cut from Tree of Life by Mary Koval - in brown. I searched for a solid that would match the broderie perse background and found Moda Bella solid in 'natural' is pretty close. I cut a tree from the brown fabric and then added extra pieces to get the look I wanted - as marked on the photo above. 

It was a bit of a mess at first auditioning the pieces - so hard to visualise at that stage!

Once the broderie perse was done I wanted to frame the tree in a relatively subtle way, keeping a floating look. There was much research in books and sketching ideas, then sketching again..

Some drafting of patterns...

Am I making it sound simple? well I didn't find it that way! Having to resort to my very patchy memory of primary school geometry, and using a compass, some string, a calculator and a protractor it took a day to produce this...

then some needle turn applique...

That's when I thought the name 'Wheat and Woods' might suit this project - and become a theme.

I wanted the centre to be set in a square on point so I folded and pressed the piece vertically and horizontally, and used my Adjustable Square to mark the square.  

So it became this...

Adding another wavy wheat border - ready to needle turn applique..

Now for something in the corners. I toyed with more broderie perse but couldn't get it to look how I wanted so decided on applique trees. I love the look in antique quilts where large-scale fabrics are cut up and used in small-scale piecing or applique. So that was the aim and I came up with a simplified tree pattern. It has leaf shapes I plan to use in the rest of the quilt.

Can you recognise the fabrics? It took quite some 'courage' to cut up chunks of these lovely large prints but they have languished in the stash so long. I love the look of them in the applique so am glad it is done. 

So now the centre looks like this - with four applique trees between wheat borders.

Last post I showed the photo below and left you to wonder "what the heck?"

That was some experimental prep for the strips of border that will come next. 

I want to surround the centre with a very wide border of small floating brown squares and scrappy leaves. This could be achieved quite precisely by careful piecing, but I want to applique ( because I am applique-addicted and very stubborn about it!). So I know the result will not be precise - my squares are going to be 'organic'  - and I am OK with that...just so you know! 

This is the basic pattern of leaves and squares that I came up with - to be repeated in rows.

Marking strips of background fabric with my pattern

Here are the fabrics I have pulled from the stash - to use for the leaves. They're all the fabrics I could find with movement (ombres and favourite eccentric prints) and others that seemed to suit in wheaty and woody colours.

Applique in progress - this is prep for back basting which is then needle turn appliqued to the background. 

Here is a strip completed - it is organic but still looks quite structured from a distance don't you think? 

Making more of these applique strips will keep me happily busy for a while.  Meanwhile I'm thinking of a last outer border to finish off the quilt...more to come on that. 

Hand quilting of my Ann Randoll is over half way now. I've removed most of the pins which makes it a lot easier to move around on the lap. 

In the hoop at the moment

It keeps me pretty warm on these cold winter evenings. Can you see me frantically stitching faster and faster to keep even warmer? The heating thermostat is kept lower and if that's a saving on power bills then it's a 'win/win'!