Triangle Pair

I finished the Triangles quilts I made for my brothers. One is already flying across the country, the other needs to have beauty shots taken.

Wanda always says there's no magic quite like a quilt made with one block, and she's right.

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The quilt was made from stash, and so was the back.

Here it is laid out flat. Although this quilt is made from blocks that are half black and half white, notice how the quilt "reads" as mostly black.

One of the things I find interesting about quilts is how often the binding tells the quilt what color it is.  Triangle Twirl has just as much black as white in the quilt, yet because the quilt has light edges and a light binding, the quilt "reads" as white.

Here's the from stash made backing of Triangle Twirl. After its beauty shots and a trip through the washing machine, it will take a trip to its new home in Colorado.

Here's a closeup of Triangle Twirl's quilting.

Triangles!

What's better than getting one quilt back from the longarm quilter?

Getting TWO.

This is Triangle Dance, on the left, and Triangle Twirl, on the right. I'll be giving one to each of my brothers, and don't these two look like different people sitting there?

Triangle Twirl looked like it needed a light binding, so I dug through my scraps and put together a mixture of three fabrics, made and attached the binding. Now it just needs to be sewn down.

This quilt is 55 x 70" (140 x 178 cm).

Twirling Dervish - Got Backing!

Making backings is my least favorite thing to do about making quilts. It's not that I mind designing them, it's that working with really big pieces of fabric is more like quilt wrangling than sewing.

So whenever I finish a quilt lately, I want to get the backing done as soon as possible, to get it out of the way.  Now that the Twirling Dervish flimsy is finished, I looked through my stash to find some options. Since I rarely buy fabric in chunks larger than a yard, I have to find multiple fabrics that I think can have some fun together.

I had a little over two yards of this multi colored dotted fabric. I added a bit of green to make it long enough, but I needed to add some width. The reddish paisley was OK, but I still needed a bit more. I studied my stash, and then I saw the flying pigs. Since this quilt is going to somebody with a barn and farm animals, the pigs were perfect!

Here's as much as I could get of the whole thing.

Yup, that's gonna work.

Cross this one off the list.

Twirling Dervish Flimsy Complete

I finished sewing the flimsy together on Friday. It's 56" x 72" tall (142 x 148 cm). I have to figure out if it needs a border.

Right now I'm too tired after the festivities here yesterday to know yet.

Twirling Dervish - blocks complete

I'm trying to get this flimsy done before Thanksgiving. It needs another row of blocks to make it taller, because right now it's only 66" tall, but that's an easy fix.

I'm definitely going to play with these blocks in a different way in another project, because look at these sideways - all kinds of fun layout possibilities!

Twirling Dervish

This is about half the Twirling Triangles flimsy. Because sewing blocks on a severe curve like some of these distorts them a bit, I had to trim them down to 4.5" x 6" to get them "square" (four 90 degree corners), which reduces the effect of the curve somewhat. The seam allowance also contributes.

You can see it most clearly in the untrimmed (and unsewn) blocks on the left compared to the trimmed and sewn blocks on the right.  Had I known I would have made the original blocks larger, but hey, that's the way the cookie crumbles (or shall I say, that's the way the triangles twirl...)

This is probably NOT the last time I'll play with triangles like this.

And yeah, this quilt will need another horizontal row to make up the difference. Here in New England, where winters get as cold as minus 20 F (-29 C) outside, a "lap quilt" won't cut it on cold nights. I make all my "couch" quilts at least 72" long for that reason.

Triangle Twirling

I had hoped that alternating concave and convex blocks of  the curved triangles (like this, above) would create the movement I wanted.

Alas, they did not. While this is moderately pleasing, it isn't exciting enough to float my boat. As my pal the Selvage Fairy said to me once, "It's interesting you think the worst [your design] could possibly be is nice."

But it was the Selvage Fairy who set me on this path of curves in triangles in the first place. She wanted to know what would happen with these blocks if I rearranged them. Dear Selvage Fairy, your request is my command...

So I started tinkering, but this did not float my boat either. This was boring boring boring. Too much been there done that.

However, there was one shape in this photo that I DID like very much.

THIS ONE! I thought THIS had distinct possibilities, so I moved the pieces around again...

By the time I was halfway down, I knew this was THE ONE!

I still have to rearrange the blocks to distribute the colors and patterns a bit better, and I need another vertical column over on the left to complete those dark shapes over there, but this overall layout is it.

I love the optical illusions it creates, the movement, and the sheer unexpectedness of it.

For those of you wondering how it works, this should explain it.

Break Schmeak

Yeah, ok. I know what I said.

But I had this stack of wacky triangles on my work table, and another stack of paired ones sitting there.

So I arranged them in stacks of 10, figuring I'd need at least 150 to make a flimsy.  I had 64.

 So last night after I threw dinner in the oven, I went into the sewing studio and sewed pairs together.

I had dinner, read my email, the New York Times, did the dishes. Then I pressed the seams and continued stacking and sewing until I had 16 stacks.

At this point, I should really have gone to bed, but NOooo.... I had to stick them up on the design wall, "just to see." I was kinda hoping it would look like hell so I could move on to something else.

Fat chance.

Suggestions Welcome!

While I was working on the Triangle Dance quilt, my pal the Selvage Fairy wondered what would happen if I sliced up the rectangles using a gentle curve instead of a straight line.

 I thought it was a great suggestion, and decided to try it out.
 

Well Hot Diggity! I like it a LOT!!

So I sewed a couple of pairs together, and WOW, the next quilt is going to be called "Triangle Twirl".

I can't wait to get started...


It just goes to show that sometimes an innocent question from somebody else can be a wonderful way to get you going on something new. So when a friend, coworker, family member or passerby makes an offhand comment, pay attention. Sometimes good things can happen!

Yes, I think this definitely has potential. I just sewed a bunch of blocks and threw them up on the design wall. I can already see some things I should avoid, and some things I want to emphasize a bit more, but I think this is going to be fun to play with.

Thank you Selvage Fairy, I am happy to say this is entirely your fault.