Back to the Barn

I had a great afternoon working on my barn quilt today.  I added a few background trees and started stitching.  While I enjoyed figuring out where to put the pieces of fabric, the stitching is way more fun.  Already the quilt is beginning to take shape and each new section of stitching adds dimension and detail.

   
Although the fabrics are fused, moving the top around tends to loosen them a bit, so I started off by going around every fabric piece that matches the thread. Since I try to overlap my fabrics, that alone helped quite a bit because it means that I caught two fabrics at one time.  Adding a few lines on the "boards" also helped.

This is the right side of the barn, under the eave.  There's a tree trunk showing from behind the barn and lots of stuff either under the eave or on the side of the tree.  In the photo (and at the real barn) the tree is so close that the trunk touches the roof.  I'm not sure I got it right, but I'm hopeful.

This photo shows the left side also under the eave.  I wanted this side to look like it has wood and other items that have been piled up and sitting there for a long time.  It is also darker than the right side because it's enclosed, so I have more shadow and darkness in the background.

The roof would seem to be the easiest part, right?  It's just a squashed rectangle, but it has been a real fit-inducing section.  First there was the problem of finding the right fabric with enough rust. Then I couldn't figure out how to handle the split in the center.  I finally decided to put the lines that show where each sheet of tin begins and ends so that the top and bottom sections don't match perfectly.  My idea is that if we're looking at the barn from an angle, they would not line up.  Of course, I could be wrong.  I can't see these lines in the photo and I didn't think to look at the barn roof the last time we were there.

The last section I worked on is the section in the corridor.  This is just a big opening in the center of the barn.  There were doors on the back at one time and a gate on the front, but none of those exist today. That means you can see into the corridor, and I had to figure out how to show the detail and the angle.  While I think I have the details, I'm very sure that the half open corn crib door is not correct.  I can't figure out if it looks closed or if the corn crib and the door look like they are part of the front of the barn.  Tell me what you see when you look at the corridor.  Do I need to add some angles?  I can do that.  It's just a matter of figuring out where and which way the angle should lean.  Of course, some stitches would have to come out, but that's a little issue.

 

 

Please feel free to leave a comment.  I love suggestions, especially if they will help me figure out what and where the problems are!

Daddy's Barn and Sunday Quilt Inspiration

Remember this quilt that I wrote about yesterday?  I'd just started it after picking up a few brown fabrics in the morning.  I am really pumped, so much that I woke up an hour early, got dressed for mass and spent the extra time in the studio.  Yeah, I know, amazing right? One hour early?!?  How'd I do that?


Still, I'm not done.  Well, I won't be done for several days and that depends on my working on the quilt after work.  Hmmm, more lost sleep, since it means no after school nap.....

I added some more detail to the right side, then added a tree. Because this is a winter scene, the trees have no leaves but I'll have to add grass or something.

 
Here's a close-up of today's details.  Since there really is (and always was) a pile of stuff under the eaves, I thought I'd fill it with things that my dad would store there, a piece of rusted tin, pieces of wood, a stack of bricks and so on. 

 On the other side, I included a bicycle wheel, some wood, and the side wall of the stall.  Then I added a tree in front of the barn.  It really is on the side but the details that show the third dimension won't appear until it's quilted.  

I need to figure out what to do about the front of the quilt, and I have to decide whether I want to add sky or clouds.  I'm worried about introducing more color, but it looks unfinished as it is.  I guess I'll have to let it stew a bit. 

 

 



For today's Sunday Quilt Inspiration I'd like to share advice rather than photos of great quilts, although that is what I generally do.  My advice is to quilt what you know and love.  Take or find a photo of a place or thing that has some meaning to you and build a quilt around that photo.  It's not difficult and, if this quilt is any indication, it really doesn't take much time.  In two afternoons of play I managed to get this far into the barn quilt. 

 

Almost any photo will do, so long as there aren't too many details for your first quilt.  Of course, if you're comfortable with details or have some great fabric that you can use for the details, go for it and have fun!  Let what you love be your inspiration.

A new project

I've been meaning to work on a new quilt idea that's been cooking in my head for quite a long while.  This morning Richard and I ran to town for a minute and I picked up several 1/4 yard pieces of brown fabrics for my new project. 

printed photograph

 So what is this new project, you ask?  I'm making a barn quilt.  My niece took a photograph of my parents' old barn, and I'm using it to create a quilt. 

I haven't gotten very far, but I'll share what I do have and my process.  I started with the photograph, of course.  I printed it on a regular 8 1/2 by 10 sheet of copy paper in black and white. 

transparency

I traced the most important elements onto a sheet of transparency plastic.  I have an overhead projector at home from teaching years ago.  It's obsolete at Bunkie New Tech High School, which has a SMART board in every classroom, but at Fleur de Lis Quilts, it's a wonderful piece of equipment.  I like to tape the transparency down to the projector so it doesn't move.



paper pattern

From there, it's just a matter of using painter's tape to tape a large sheet of paper to the wall and trace the pattern.  Then do the same thing with a piece of muslin.  Remember that the muslin needs to be at least 8-10 inches longer and wider than the highest and widest part of the picture to be able to load the quilt on the long arm.

On the paper I traced many of the details.  Then I labeled the parts so that when I cut the pattern apart, I could easily put it back together.
 


close-up of pattern

On the muslin I only blocked out the larger elements of the barn--not the trees or the details.  This is so that I can put the fabric pieces in the correct places.  The muslin is the background of the quilt picture and gives me something to press the applique pieces to. 


muslin backing

I use iron-on fusible web and keep a couple of different brands.  I do not like the heavy plastic-like stuff that comes pre-packaged.  It holds forever, but sewing over it is almost impossible.  Heat n Bond lite works well for me, but I've used other brands that worked well.


close-up of muslin

I put the muslin on my ironing board and cut my pattern pieces there also.  Once I have a couple of pieces cut--and sometimes I have to cut the same piece a couple of times--I press them in place. 


 

It's a slow process because I have to audition fabrics as I go.  I pulled all the solid browns that I have in the stash, but I started with the roof and that needed a mottled rust/brown.  I finally settled on this for the tin roof, but that was after eliminating at least 10 pieces first.  Everything felt too dark or too light or not rusty enough.  I'm not even sure about this piece but I'm hopeful. 

I'm fairly pleased with my progress so far.  There's still much left to do: finish the barn, add grass, trees, and sky and, of course, quilting.  I have plans for thread painting the entire piece to add dimension, color and detail.  It will be a while before that comes. Please tell me what you think and drop a suggestion or two if you have any.  I'd love to get some feedback on this one. 

Pin It Wedne....oops! #18

I'm sorry about not pinning yesterday.  Life got in the way.  That would be a good thing though, since we got end-of-course test results and our students did very well.  I'm so proud of them and decided to treat them to an impromptu party today.  That meant going to the grocery store for party foods for almost 50 kiddos.  I also made a peach cobbler and took a bit of time to disaggregate some of the scores so that I could answer student questions today.  They did especially well on the writing portion of the test.  YAY!

So, back to pinning for Wednesday's non-post.  I have a new board, called "craft, fairs" that has pins of great ideas for craft fair displays.  Many of the bloggers I follow attend craft fairs to sell the items they produce, so I thought they might appreciate this board. 

You know how I love bags and totes!  Most of us do, so I thought I'd add a few new ones I've found recently.  You can see the "bagged, totes" board here.

And finally, some new pins of modern quilts.  Many of these come from the Robert Kaufman site which I discovered while reading a new blog on the Quilters' Festival Linky Party on Geta's Quilting Studio.  (My post is here.)  The first quilt is one I found on Pinterest, but it originates from the same Geta.  How cool?  Very.

Last bit....I'm wondering how this post idea is working.  Please participate in the survey on the right (below the Followers list) to let  me know whether you enjoy these Pinterest oriented posts.  It's just one click!  I really want to know your thoughts about this idea. 

Tea Party Anyone?

Oh, I should begin by saying this is a real tea party, with cups and plates and goodies and dolls and a sweet little doll quilt.  All manner of political hits or misses aside, please.  This blog is about anything but politics.  Back to the tea party and the sweet little quilt.

I discovered a quilt on Pinterest a few weeks back and loved the look.  In no time I'd figured out that the block is really quite easy, so I drew out a quick pattern and figured out the square sizes.  In no time I had a block completed.  But I made a discovery: while the quilt is pretty, I don't want to make one.  So there sat one little block--too big for AAQI and too small for much of anything except a baby doll.

This afternoon I had a moment to myself with no papers to grade...finally!  So I wandered around the studio looking for something to do and spied the block.  Well, why not?  Make the doll quilt and toss it into the toy basket already.

Don't you know that I had fun....then I had more fun taking pictures.  I carried out a favorite baby doll and a few tea party items since the outdoors makes for the best photo shoots and tea parties.  Dolly and I set everything up, had tea, snapped a few pics and chatted for a while.  Turns out Dolly loves the quilt so much she agreed to a nap.

 

I watched a video of Angela Walters' Quiltcon talk on her process for quilting and decided to apply some of the ideas I got to this little quilt.  Walters suggests extending the lines of a block out into the quilt--simply draw the lines out and see what happens.  I decided to test it by drawing the line from the little point that sticks out of the flower.  In the picture below that line is on the left side of the picture and separates the pebbles and the swirls. 

 

 

Another of Walters' suggestions is to treat each of the resulting areas with a different quilting motif. 

 

 Finally Walters' showed how she uses quilting to add movement to a quilt.  While she showed quilts with swirls and lots of long lines, I didn't have the space for either, so I quilted lines with different distances between them to add variety and dimension. 

 



 

By changing thread colors, I was able to quickly add in small loops on each petal.  Because I added an extra layer of batting right behind the purple flower and quilted outside of the flower with tight motifs, the flower details add the look of trapunto to the quilt.

 



 



I know it seems like lots of work for a toy quilt, but it really did not take very long and I learned a few techniques along the way and had loads of fun!  Don't you think the little granddaughters are going to love this doll quilt?  They will be allowed to play, drag, and what ever else they can think to do with it. 

 

Have you made a doll quilt before?  What do you do with orphan blocks? 

Linky Party and keeping scissors

Click here to go to
Quilter's Favorites

Oh my, this Quilter's Favorites Linky Party is turning out to be some kind of fun!  Thus far, I've read several tips and ideas, found four quilt blogs to follow, and met some of the nicest people.  

Geta has done a great job of pulling in some inspiring bloggers with useful ideas and tips. 

While reading one of those blogs, I realized that I have another tip.  I have a pair of scissors, a pin cushion, a seam ripper and a tape measure at every work station: sewing, cutting, pressing, and so on.  This way I don't have to remember to take the items with me from one station to another. 

The problem I had, for a while anyway, was remembering to leave the items in the designated station, especially the scissors.  To solve that, I tied the scissors to the area using a long string.  Once I got used to leaving them there, I removed the string.  It worked!  Now I just carry the project pieces as I move around the room.

Of course, this means duplicates and triplicates and quadruplicates of some expensive notions, so I don't imagine that it's affordable for new quilters.  But those of us who have been in the biz for a while already have many of the items we need: it's just a matter of figuring out where each particular item is best kept.

Managing my scissors was most difficult and took some trial and error.  In the end I've put the biggest, best scissors on the cutting table.  These babies cut 6-8 thicknesses of fabric at once.  I rarely cut that many, but it's nice to have them when I'm cutting many of something.

Another good pair of titanium scissors is near the Studio cutter to finish off the little threads that don't quite make the blade cut.  And since I cut lots of applique pieces, I use them for that as well.

An older pair is near the ironing board.  I sometimes need to snip or trim while pressing a block or applique pieces.  When sewing garments, I also often need to snip around arm holes and such.  These scissors are older and no longer razor sharp, but the point still snips very well.

At my sewing machines I keep little snips or scissors that will quickly cut thread or trim fabric.  My husband gave me this little pair and I love them--no problems with my fingers getting stuck in the finger holes.  

If you look back at the first photo, notice that I added a plastic hook to hold a pair of scissors on my machine.  I've done this on every machine.  It's one of my best ideas yet.  The long arm doesn't leave the scissors behind and I can always find my scissors at the serger or the Bernina. 

Now quickly, go visit Geta's blog and link up with the many quilters who have more great ideas to share.
Happy Quilting,
Mary