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Saturday, March 31, 2012

back!


I've finally got a completed back for my quilt! Like I mentioned in a previous post, instead of making the back out of one kind of fabric, I decided to be a little more creative and add some of the fabrics I used on the front to create a horizontal stripe across the back. Since the fabrics are from the same collection, they coordinate perfectly and I couldn't be more pleased with how this turned out. 


Everyone who sees the butterfly fabric can't believe why I'd use it for the back, since it obviously won't be seen as much as the front of the quilt. Why wouldn't you show off such an awesome print on the front? Believe me, in retrospect I wish I'd done just that. But with all the design issues I've had in this project, I'm happy to be able to include a fabric I really, truly love--if only on the back. 


Here's a picture of the completed quilt top as well. Taking them both outside for a photoshoot against the chain link fence made me very happy. It's such a beautiful day! So though I'd like to take the next step and actually lay down the quilt sandwich, I'm afraid I'm going to enjoy the sunshine this weekend. Happy April, everyone! 

Sunday, March 25, 2012

spidey spring break

After classes ended last Friday, I decided to swing by JoAnn's to waste time and obviously tempt myself with buying more fabric. I'd been thinking of the blue Spiderman flannel I bought my nephew a year ago and realized his birthday was coming up in a few weeks. He's turning 7, so I figured I need to actually make something out of the fabric before he grows out of Spiderman. (As if anyone ever gets too old for Spiderman!) I got solid blue and red flannel fabrics for $2.50/yard and found a coordinating red Spiderman print! And then I splurged on a fuzzy solid red fabric for the back. I don't even want to disclose the cost of that fabric, but I think it was well worth it.

When I got home, I immediately went to YouTube to find a rag quilt tutorial. They seemed easy enough to make, just a matter of sewing a bunch of squares together, but I was unsure about how to make the quilt "raggedy." Here's the video I watched before I made my own:



Though the music is terrible and I didn't follow the directions word for word, I did gain a clear understanding about how to proceed. So Iwith the help of my dog, I cut all of my squares (120!) and then layed them out to arrange some sort of pattern.




After laying out all the squares, it was simply a matter of sewing them all together, flattening the quilt top onto the back fabric, and sewing that together as well. I won't bore you with the details, but the cutting and sewing took just one day, while messing with the back took another two.

The fun part about rag quilts is cutting up the flannel, washing it, and seeing how the agitation of the washer and dryer creates the "ragged" edges. When the weather finally got nicer, I took the finished quilt outside for a better photo shoot. (I also found my good camera this week, yay!)



It measures about 5' x 7', large enough for my nephew's twin-sized bed. I wasn't expecting it to be a hit at his birthday party yesterday, but he went absolutely crazy over it. He and his friends used it first as a "tent" to play under at the park. Later that night, after playing on it with baby brother, he decided to fold up the green Hulk comforter on his bed, put it in the closet, and replace it with the Spiderman rag quilt. I guess it's nice to have a change in superheroes once in a while! Definitely a successful sewing spring break.

Sunday, March 11, 2012

'nother border & more fabric

I finished the quilt top! Really finished, for real this time. This week I added my second border (the green outer one) which completes the top. Now it measures about 57.5" x 68.5".


So a quilt is basically a sandwich. The top is the patchwork, in the middle is the batting, which is a thin layer of cotton. Batting is what makes a quilt thick and cozy. Then there's the back layer of fabric. Here's a picture of a quilt sandwich:

(Picture from http://buttontreelane.blogspot.com/2008/04/tutorial-brooch-keeper_574.html)

A lot of traditional quilters use one solid fabric for the back, but I've recently been inspired by Elizabeth Hartman's book The Practical Guide to Patchwork. Elizabeth sees the back of the quilt as another opportunity to be creative. Why have a solid back when you can make a coordinating back? I'm currently sketching out ideas for the back of my quilt, but I do know that I won't be buying any more fabric. None. Absolutely no more money goes into this project. As of this week, I have everything I need to complete it. The white fabric with black butterflies & various designs is the main fabric I bought for the back of my quilt. However, I'm playing around with designs that would include more solid black strips as well as my leftover green fabric. More on that when I settle on a design!



I decided on a black fabric with tiny polka dots to be the binding for my quilt. Binding is basically fabric that closes up the raw edges of the quilt sandwich, as you can see here:

(Picture from http://www.diaryofaquilter.com/2009/05/finishing-quilt-tutorial.html)

The binding is the last chance quilters have to add another fabric or another color to the finished quilt. I think my small printed polka dots will coordinate quite nicely with the white butterfly fabric of the back as well as the green fabric bordering the top. I can't wait to get going on the next steps! My outlook on this project has become increasingly more positive with the introduction of more fabrics that I like and more opportunity for creativity. Knowing that I won't have to spend any more money makes me happy too!

Sunday, March 4, 2012

where art thou, rotary cutter?


Unfortunately most of my Saturday was spent looking for this little contraption called a rotary cutter. It's an essential tool for cutting fabric. But with the luck I've had in creating my quilt, I shouldn't have been surprised to discover my tools disappearing and another frustration added onto this project.

My sewing room (which used to be a living/dining room but now doubles for crafts and my 5- and 1-year-old nephews' toy storage room) isn't as cluttered as one might think. At least not to me. But I was paranoid that one of the boys would find my cutter before I did and have fun flipping up the sharp handheld circular blade. After hours of going through every stack of crap in the house, my mom finally found it in a drawer that was hidden by a tablecloth covering it. I'd forgotten that piece of furniture even had a drawer.


So then I got to cutting! The gray mat beneath the black fabric is the rotary mat, a padded plastic mat with a grid to help measuring, also ensuring that nothing such as a table gets damaged by the blade. The clear ruler also has a grid for measuring, and by placing it on top of fabric and running the rotary cutter alongside the edge, you get a straighter cut with less effort and in less time than you would cutting with regular scissors. My idea for a black satin border also didn't work. (Surprise, surprise.) Satin is just too slippery to keep a straight line, much less to sew. So I switched to black cotton that I thankfully already had in my stash.


After cutting 2.5" wide strips, I sewed them around my quilt top and ironed down the seams. Ta da! One border done. And I'm actually really starting to like the way it looks. Never underestimate how an outline can bring a design together. I think this is all I will have time for this week since so much time and stress was spent recovering my rotary cutter from the dungeons of dark and forgotten drawers, but at least now I know where it is, so when I have a moment to cut my outer green border it should be easy going.


Here's a close-up of the quilt's two fabrics since I know they're hard to see in the pictures. All in all, a succesful weekend of sewing.