I have a finish to share with you today. It's a small finish, but it took me quite a time to make it and I love it. It's a name tag. I made it at a sewing meeting at my Modern Guild. All the fabric in this little project except for the Libs Elliot multi blue fabric is leftovers from other projects.
One of the members of the guild had offered to write our names with Calligraphy, but she couldn't make it to the meeting, so I decided to improv piece my short name. That was a tricky process with lots of scraps ending up in the garbage but it worked out in the end. The other tricky bit was sewing down the binding on the front. It's a pretty big name tag, 7" square. I like the grey negative space around my name. For the strap I re purposed the strap from the Quilt Con 2017 name tag.. I even kept some of the buttons I collected there.
I put a plastic pocket on the back to stash things in. Like draw tickets and things like that. It was a fun make. When I started the improv process, I thought, well if it doesn't work out I can do something different. I've been doing a lot more sewing for fun. Just showing up at the machine and working on things until I'm ready to stop.
When I started blogging the slow movements were very much in vogue. You know slow cooking , slow crafting and even slow blogging. People had buttons on their blogs that said things like "I took the process pledge". The idea was that in the fast paced world of work and the internet etc. we needed to slow down and create with our hands in order to nurture our souls. That seems to me to be disappearing a little with a focus on getting multitudes of followers and posting quickly on instagram. I've always loved reading blogs the most.
When I lost my quilting and blogging mojo recently, I found a few things helped to bring me back. The monthly newsletter from Kim Soper of Leland Avenue Studios is one of those things. Kim is very much interested in the creative process, and she is a slow quilter. Each newsletter comes with a project. This months task is to think of 5 things every day that nurture your creativity and to give gratitude for those. I haven't been doing this every day, but I have been doing it. At first I thought 5 things a day would be too much, but I've come to realize that pretty much everything has an affect upon creativity. So today I am thankful for my job which pays for my fabric, for my sewing room, for my husband who supports my craft, for my kids and grandkids who keep me happy, to the sunshine that also keeps me happy. What nurtures your creative soul?
Linking up with Michelle of From Bolt to Beauty for the Brag about your Beauties pageant.
Last Tuesday was the first guild meeting since Bee Day and I received some of the quilt tops back that guild members completed. I thought I would share some of the brighter ones here. It's remarkably sunny here today so I hauled them out to the back porch and took quick picks.
At Bee Day we hand out kits with the fabric pre cut and the pattern included. Members work on the quilts during the day and in some cases take them home to finish the top.
The fabrics in the first two quilts are batiks from my stash and Cyndy's stash. The two of us have been trying to use up our oldest fabrics and these batiks have been hanging around for a long time. We had enough fabric to make two of kit and one of each was made at bee day.
The first quilt top is made with the Reaction block pattern from Creatin in the Sticks. The key to this pattern is having contrast in the two halves of the block. Becky worked on this project and I love how she put it together. I would have put the blocks together in a more random arrangement so I was pleasantly surprised to see Becky's arrangement which creates a secondary pattern.
This second quilt is bright and fun. It's from a pattern called Batik Beauty by Angela Veek which was published in the Quilters Almanac magazine. Sorry I don't know which issue as I tore it out of my copy. Although it was designed with batiks in mind I think the pattern would look great in lots of different fabrics. This version was beautifully sewn by Ann.
The rest of the quilts I'm sharing today come from the guild stash. Some of it was purchased and some of it was from a very generous donation from Marion, a former guild member. Cyndy did a great job with this Jelly Roll Twist kit. The pattern is from the Fat Quarter shop.The fabric has a 40s vibe to it, but a little more brightness.
Dana put this lovely top together. Don't you just love those fun plaids and that colourful dachshund fabric. The pattern here is based on the Quarter Cut Baby Quilt tutorial by Debby Jeske of a Quilter's Table. We adjusted the pattern to fit our size requirements
This last quilt just might be my favourite. There was no pattern given with this kit. We always have one "Creativity required kit in the mix. The kit was made up of a variety of soccer related fabrics, balls and flags, along with co-ordinating fabrics. Brenda, who picked up this bag was free to create whatever she wanted. She made a quilt and a half. As she put it she just kept sewing until all the fabric was used up. Here's the quilt. The half will need some additions.
Now that I have these fun quilt tops and many others in my possession, it's my job to make up kits with backings and batting, to hand off to other guild members for quilting.
Because I haven't been there for a while I'm going to link up with the Main Crush Monday link up with Beth of Cooking Up Quilts and with Let's Bee Social with Lorna of Sew Fresh Quilts.
For I think the 3rd month in a row I haven't gotten my goal done and I almost didn't bother to post one this month thinking that maybe I've been jinxing myself, but I actually started working on my October goal yesterday and I realized it would be fairly easy to finish it this month. So I'm giving it one more try. I'll be working on the first month of the Sampler plus quilt along with Paige of Quilted Blooms and Cheryl of Meadow Mist Designs. Here's the proof that I've been working on it.
I've been having a hard time with quilting and blogging and even reading blogs lately. It's been a combination of a virus hanging around, burnout and grey skies. However in the past week I've noticed a lot of positive resources coming to me and my quilting mojo is coming back. Interestingly enough some of the resources have come through some newsletters I receive. Through the Scrap Basket newsletter (A Quilter's Table) I was taken to this article on Diary of a Quilter. This was a guest post written by Samantha Dorn of Aqua Paisley studio. It's a post on five ways to make you feel motivated. My main take aways from this article were to show up and to start small.
So I started small with this project. It's a left over kit from the guild Bee Day. It was an Eye Spy quilt top that was donated to us and was a little too small for our use. It needed three rows added to the side and three rows added to the bottom. I chose it partially because nobody else did, but also because I knew its bright colours and whimsy would help lift my mood.
I thought it might be difficult to match the original makers 1/4" seam but it went together with no difficulty.
It felt good to get another quilt top done for our outreach program. This one will go to one of the few younger kids that the program serves.
From there I moved on to the "ugly" fabric challenge and I'll share a sneak peak of the two quilts tops I came up with.
Keep in mind that "ugly" fabric challenge was the name given to the challenge by the quilt shop owners who gave us the fat quarter in the first place. The idea was to use a colour palette you wouldn't normally use. My "ugly" fat quarter was the fabric with the browns and golds and blacks and it's in both quilts. These are due on Thursday and I'm not sure if I will have them both quilted by then but I'll bring them along regardless.
It feels good to be back in the sewing room and I'll share more of the good things that have helped to bring me back there in future posts. I'll be off to work, once I link up with Patty of Elm Street Quilts. I hope you all have a great day and that you are open to the blessings that come your way.
