Y2K Quilt - My Oldest Quilt Under Construction

Back when I was cleaning my garage a few summers ago I came across a few boxes of quilting items. I was pretty lucky no mice made their homes in there. Two round robins project quilts that belonged to someone else (one returned at least) and my Y2K charms.

What are the Y2K charms?

Back in 1999 - when we thought the world was going to end with a massive computer crash - quilters did their best to move on by swapping charms. Precisely, swapping packs of 25 charms with 80 people. Resulting in 2000 charms for a quilt!

After discovering the box again I played with the charms, sorting them by value. They then became a thing I brought out to be leaders and enders as I worked on other projects. That is, sewing pairs or rows together at the beginning or ending of a seam. Progress gets made, but it is slow progress. 

Let me tell you, these are some interesting fabrics. Definitely not what we would consider modern now. There are, however, some gems in here. I must also admit, that I am kind of falling for the little calico prints. They are so tiny. The colours may not be what I like, but the scale is lovely. 

Right now I am up to 25 rows sewn together. That's half. 2000 charms makes 50 rows of 40 for an 80'' by 100'' quilt. Nothing is pressed, none of those rows are sewn to each other. But that is progress with minimal effort. I just might have it done by the next millennium. Well, at least the next century.

Inception Pillow - Mighty Luck Quilting Club Finish

Inception Pillow

19'' x 19''

Do you remember the movie Inception? Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gorden-Levitt, and Ellen Page doing some majorly weird mind work. And visually, some crazy things happening. As soon as I saw this fabric last spring I knew it would be perfect for the Mighty Lucky Quilting Club Challenge that I hosted in July. Originally, I was just going to play with directionality, but that changed. As you can see, the pattern is still very visible on the wrong side of the fabric. Yes, that hexagon is the wrong side of the fabric!

This was a fun little finish. I got inspired to tackle it this week after a student of mine in Montreal recently used the same fabric. Beyond being inspired by their creativity, my students sometimes give me just the kick in the butt I need!

And for fun, here is a pig standing on the pillow.

In case you didn't know, the Mighty Lucky Quilting Club is a monthly challenge to your quilting creativity. Each month, or only on the months you sign up for, a PDF arrives in your inbox encouraging creative action. Challenges have ranged from using text in your quilting to leather in your quilts, from only a single fabric to new ways to think of basic techniques. Check it out here!

First Time English Paper Piecing

I've been quilting for 18 years. I know this because the first quilt I ever made was for my nephew and he turned 18 last week. In all that time I have never, not even once, tried English Paper Piecing. Long a technique I've admired but never touched. Part of the reason is that the time, the perceived tedium, the end result of the projects made from it.

Until the last few years I was not down with slowing down when it came to sewing. Any kind of handwork is not fast. That's rather the point. And the reason I turned and walked in the opposite direction of anything but hand finishing a binding. Now that I've converted to hand work - applique and stitching - I am ready to face the time it takes to tackle an EPP project.

It's a good thing I can face that now because it is tedious. Well, the prep is. Once you have your pattern pieces and your fabric cut it moves swiftly. That is, it feels like you make progress swiftly. It took me longer to prep 4 blocks than it did to make 1.

And frankly, I had never come across an EPP project I was dying to make. There are absolutely gorgeous projects out there. Stunning examples of workmanship, fabric love, and detail. I am happy to look at those quilts all day long. It doesn't mean I want to make them though. I was waiting until the right quilt idea grabbed me. 

Then it did.

It is a bit of a cliche to be inspired by a tile floor when you are a quilter, but there it is. On the threshold of a tiny natural foods cafe in a tiny Australian country town. The second I saw it I fell in love. Snapped a pic, and yes, posted it to IG. As we sat - three quilters - for breakfast and debated whether this would be better as an EPP, a foundation paper pieced, or even just a pieced with templates pattern a beautiful crafter back home felt so inspired and made an EPP block. By the time I'd found WiFi again she'd already posted it! That answered the debate for me. 

Fast forward a few months and I decided to tackle it for myself. The idea had never left my head, constantly egging me on. Try it, I double dog dare you! It appealed, beyond the graphic nature, because it wasn't the predictable. I felt like I could improvise with the fabric, having fun while still slowing down. 

So I pulled out Diane Gilleland's incredible book, All Points Patchwork. It is the ultimate resource on EPP. She focuses on technique, answering why you do something a certain way, and setting you up to really do any kind of EPP pattern. I'd read it before and remembered most of the advice, but it was a great resource to pull out to help me prep.

Two blocks down. I've made some mistakes, for sure. The obvious one is that I didn't reverse the pattern. I drew it out in Illustrator so I could print out the pieces on scrap paper (leftover turkey crafts in this case). Somewhere in Diane's book, because it is there, I missed the note about reversing the pattern. In this case that isn't a big deal, but still. Although, I will probably reverse it if I decide to make an actual quilt. That's just the way I see it in my head.

My first block is quite loose in the whip stitch. Now I know. 

It also won't lay all that flat. I wonder if I stretched things out or if that is normal?

Finally, these are 3'' finished blocks. I chose this size to maximize the number I could fit on a sheet. But oy, that's a bit small. It is going to take a lot to get to where I probably want to go. So I think I will size them up to 4''. Just enough to make a bit of a difference.

Now, I just wonder how I will fit this in to the handwork rotation between needleturn applique and stitching?

Park Quilt Progress

Here is where I currently stand with my Park Quilt blocks. I have a 16th already on the go. 

If I stopped now the finished quilt would come in at about 70'' x 70'', once I press and square up the blocks. That's a pretty good size quilt. Definitely large enough to snuggle under, even with a guest. But it doesn't fit a bed. And frankly, I have a lot of quilts I can snuggle under. This might yet become a gift and I like the idea of gifting a bed quilt better. 

But that means 9 more blocks. Said that way it doesn't seem like that many. Truth be told, I think it could use a few more pop of orange too. Really, if I were to sit down and make a block from start to finish it takes me a couple of hours. So for maybe 20-25 hours of work I could have all the blocks done. Add another hour or so to get the top together and it doesn't seem like that big of a deal, right?

Right?