Two Feet Left

I spent a lot of Saturday sitting on the couch sewing the binding of the Colorado Quilt.

It's always gratifying to turn the fourth corner.

Should get this done soon!

The Box and The Shirt

The Box from my brother and sister-in-law, not surprisingly, arrived in a bigger box.

Removing the crushed paper and extra cardboard, I uncovered this. The box was wrapped in one of my brother's old corduroy shirts.

 Really. Notice the buttons on the shirt are all buttoned up!

I actually had to unbutton the shirt to get the box out. I texted my brother "You are too funny by half."

His reply? "You can keep the shirt."

I DON'T THINK SO!

Like I told one of my colleagues later, "I'm going to send the quilt to them wrapped in his shirt."

"Oh no," she replied. "You send it to them wrapped in one of YOUR shirts."

"Oooo... what a good idea!" I told her, "That's EVEN BETTER!!!" (Gee, I hope I have a shirt big enough to wrap around the quilt...)




Oh, you want to see pictures of the box itself? Sorry, gonna have to wait on that. I have some binding to sew.

Why Green?

You're probably wondering... Why did I choose GREEN for the binding of the Colorado Quilt? After all, the background of the quilt is white, and the backing is a light brown with gold.  So why choose a dark binding?

It's a good question, and perfectly valid.

Sometimes the reasoning for things is less visual and more emotional. Such it is with the backing and binding choices for the Colorado Quilt. P & J are very quiet, very reserved, very private people. They live where they live because it is beautiful and they live as one with the landscape that surrounds them. The colors for the backing and binding simply had to be earthy tones.

The fabric for the backing was a beautiful, yet subdued, organic design in earth tones - browns and golds. The flowers were a nod to J's work with flowers, and to the tones of the wood that my brother uses to build his furniture pieces.

Sure I could have used white, but the design needed to be contained somehow. Blue would have been too bright, as were Yellow, Orange, Red, and Purple. Gray would have been too dull and dreary, and the tertiary shades of the so-called "Civil War Prints" would not have worked well either. Plus I hate them. To me they are dull and dead.

Brown would have been OK, but we had brown on the back, and wanted J to be a part of the choice for the binding. Things that grow are green. While the high desert of Colorado is not as lush and green as summer in New Hampshire, my feeling of the area was GREEN, so green it simply had to be.

And yes, the binding is sewn on all four sides and attached to the front with at least six million pins spaced probably about three-quarters of an inch apart. I use a lot of pins. So what?

So... How Did You Two Meet?

Janet-Lee and I have a rather unique "how we met" story. In the middle of 2016 I was "kinda sorta" looking for a local long arm quilter because shipping quilts halfway across the country was getting expensive, and since I was starting to make lots of quilts because I wanted to use up some fabric, the shipping costs were increasing.

I'd seen the work of other long arm quilters at various quilt shops and at some of the guilds I spoke to, but I was looking for somebody who wouldn't be intimidated by the unusual quilts that I make. So I was "kinda sorta" looking, but the reality was that I wasn't looking very hard.

In late August of 2016, while on an airplane at 35,000 feet, on my way to visit my new granddaughter for the first time, I was waiting in line for the rest room when I got to talking to one of the stewardesses. Somehow we got to the "I make quilts," and "Yeah, my mother does too," stage of the conversation. The stewardess (Ariana?) told me her mother did long arm quilting, and believe it or not, lived in New Hampshire. I gave her a couple of postcards of my work and didn't think much about it.

Close up of quilting on the Fruit Loops quilt

Two months later, Ariana finally gave her mother the cards, and Janet-Lee wrote to me, and we went back and forth about what I like and what I didn't like in quilting. She wrote that she quilts about 300 quilts a year, and knew what she was doing. We exchanged contact information and there it sat for about five months. During this time I started making the Scrap Slab triangle quilts, and finished up the Digital Pinwheels. I had six quilts that needed quilting, and the stack was growing. I needed a local quilter.

Digital Pinwheels

At some point it dawned on me that Janet-Lee was one of the owners of the MQX shows, and there was an MQX show in Manchester in April 2017, which was like two days away. I bundled up the Fruit Loops and Digital Pinwheels quilts and went to see the show and meet Janet-Lee. We hit it off and I left the quilts with her. I told her to do whatever she felt was best.

The quilting on Treasure Trove.

 Now Janet Lee is no dummy. She knew perfectly well the quilts I had left with her were only "couch quilts" and that I wanted to see how good she was.

Well, she didn't disappoint. Janet-Lee certainly knows what she is doing, and when I went to pick up my quilts, I left her Treasure Trove, Snow Day and the Tumblers quilts.

We searched through her quilt designs and chose patterns for those three quilts, but as I left I told her that if she got to one quilt and she didn't think the design we picked out was right for the quilt, to go ahead and do what she felt was best.
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detail of the Jewel Box quilt

On at least one quilt, she did just that, and I was thrilled with her choice. I left the Jewel Box quilt and Terrazzo, the black and white Slashed Squares quilt.

Terrazzo Quilt

 So by the time it came to quilt the Colorado Quilt, I had no qualms. Janet-Lee knew just what to do and I let her do it.

detail of the Colorado Quilt

So the next time you meet somebody in an airplane, 35,000 feet above sea level, somewhere over the US, don't underestimate the connection.

You never know.

Not only do I have a great long arm quilter, I have a good friend, and next year I'm going to teach at the MQX show in Manchester.

Who'da thought?

Beginning Binding

Last night I sewed the binding to the Colorado Quilt. You know I sew it to the back of the quilt,

and then fold it over to the front, where I will sew it down with a blindstitch. You can read about how I do it here and here. And if you want to know WHY I sew my binding down on the front of my quilts by hand, (even though that's the way I was taught to do it - make the binding lie flat, make it even and make your stitches invisible) you can read this story that makes me smile to this day, some thirty plus years later.

I find the whole discussion so amusing. All my students freak out when I tell them. Even the vaunted Gerald Roy popped up out of his chair like a jack-in-the-box when I told him I did my binding on the front of my quilts, and that I did it by hand! Later, I asked my pal Julie why he did that?  "Because he missed it," she said. "He's an expert. He's supposed to be able to NOTICE things like that."

Heh!

So anyway, I've got a week's worth of tv watching to do while I sew the binding down on this quilt. I've been planning another scrap slab triangle quilt for when this quilt is finished. I will teach another Barns class at Quilted Threads on January 27th, and another Birds class on February 10. If you want to attend, you better sign up now. Apparently my classes fill up fast, which both surprises and pleases me. 

Colorado Quilt, Quilted

That's me (on the right) with Janet Lee Santeusanio of Woodland Manor Quilting, who quilted the Colorado Quilt. It is all hand guided free motion, and she did an outstanding job. Janet Lee brought it to me at Quilted Threads so my students could see it. This photo also shows just how big the quilt is.

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Here is a closeup of the quilting on the barn block. It's really spectacular. I particularly love the pebble quilting on the ground in front of the barn.

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Here some of my students check out the signature panel on the back of the quilt.

Here's a detail shot of the quilting. You ought to be able to click on this photo to see a larger detail of the quilting.

I've chosen this warm grunge green as the binding for the Colorado Quilt.




If you would like to make your own free pieced birds, you can get my bird tutorial here. Each bird represents something I saw in Colorado when I visited in June. (Scroll back through my blog to see each one in detail and what inspired it.)  I also have a tutorial to make the free pieced butterflies. I modified the flowers from the Old MacDonald Mystery Sampler Block Lotto and interpreted my brother's post and beam barn in Colorado into fabric using Julie Sefton's Build a Barn book as inspiration. As usual, the quilt is completely original and designed by me, Lynne Tyler, without the use of patterns, templates or paper piecing. There will  NOT be pattern for this quilt available, EVER. I am much more interested that you make your OWN quilts.

It's not that scary! Happy Halloween!

Barn Builders

These were the lovely ladies in the barn building class at Quilted Threads on Saturday. They worked hard and had a great time. (That's Julie Sefton's quilt, See Rock City, behind them. One student remarked. "You know, I have the book, and looking at the pictures in the book, I thought the quilt was okay, but in real life, oh my god, that quilt is AMAZING!"  Yeah, that's why I think everybody in the area should make an effort to come by and see it.)

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I love teaching. I hear the best things. One student said, at the end of the class. "I don't like my barn. It's not what I want." She looked at me and grinned. "Of course, this morning I didn't know what I wanted, and I didn't know how to do any of this, couldn't work without a pattern and didn't think I'd be able to finish. Now I know what I want and I know how to do it."

"So I guess that means it was a good day," I asked?

"Yeah, It was frustrating, but I learned a lot. It was a good class."

Bear in mind, all these students came in with photos of REAL barns they wanted to interpret in fabric, a task MUCH harder than simply building a generic barn.

After I demonstrated how to sew a 1/8" line one student looked at me and said, "Now that's a takeaway that was worth the cost of the whole class. And that's the SECOND one I've got so far." I felt pretty good hearing that, because it wasn't even noon.

It was also nice to have one student tell me, "You are a REALLY good teacher, and that's rare."

Yup. It was a good day for me too.

 

Barns!

I'm getting ready to teach the Barns class tomorrow at Quilted Threads, so I am gathering up all my stuff. The class is full, but QT always creates a waiting list so I will teach the class again later, probably after the Holidays.

I'm very excited because I'll have the Colorado quilt with me, and it will be quilted! I can't wait to see it. The quilter, Janet Lee Santeusanio of Woodland Manor Quilting, will be delivering it to me later today or at QT tomorrow, I don't know which yet.

Janet Lee wrote "... those birds and chickens are so flipping cute..."

You can see every bird I've ever made if you just look through the history of this blog. If you want to make your own birds, you can buy my tutorial, for sale on Etsy.

The barns were inspired by my friend Julie Sefton, who literally wrote the book on building free pieced barns, Build-A-Barn.  Julie's spectacular quilt, See Rock City, is on display at Quilted Threads. It's well worth a trip to QT to see this quilt in person.

And you may have noticed a new button on my sidebar. I'll be teaching a Birds class at the MQX show in Manchester NH next April. Registration starts November 15th.

More binding

I have sewn down the binding around half the Snow Day quilt, and pinned down the rest, so I am moving right along.



This is a detail of the Snow Day quilt. I've made it from scrap slabs. You can make a scrap slab triangle quilt too. Get my tutorial here at my Etsy shop.


In other totally non quilt related stuff, yesterday I celebrated 29 years of working at the same company.  Didn't see that coming 29 years ago. 

Loup de Lou

While watching Millie's pals, the guys named Pat, last night, I finished sewing the binding all around the third Scrap Slab quilt, Snow Day.

Now I can start sewing the binding down. Regular readers know I sew mine on the front of the quilt because I like it that way, and because my blindstitching is invisible. More information about that here.




If you are interested in making a Scrap Slab quilt of your own, you can buy my tutorial here.

In The Studio

I'm adding the binding to the Snow Day quilt, the third of the Scrap Slab Quilts. I want to have it ready for the class I'm teaching at Quilted Threads on November 11. The class is almost full. I've asked QT to distribute the tutorial to the students when they sign up so they can make some slabs at home and save the class time for the really fun creative part of making these quilts.

In preparation for the class I've had several copies of the tutorial printed and bound. I like to have these available for the students to reference during class.  I'm going to have to put a very ugly sticker on the front of them though, saying "Property of Lynne Tyler, please return at the end of class," because one student put one in her bag as she was getting ready to leave. I had to tell her I was sorry, but those were for class use only, and not for the students to take home.

You can purchase a copy of the tutorial here, at my Etsy shop, if you want to make your own scrap slab quilts!

The Toy

When I visited my granddaughter in March, she threw this toy around, and I took this photo. I liked the colors.

I always thought these colors would make a great scrap slab quilt. When I was at Quilted Threads last Saturday, I chose these fabrics.
 

Yup, when the dust settles after Thanksgiving, I'll get started on the newest Scrap Slab Quilt.



If you'd like to know how these quilts are made, you can purchase my Scrap Slab Triangle Quilts tutorial here, at my Etsy shop.  Like the Birds, it is an instant download, so you can get started right away. I'll be teaching this class at Quilted Threads on Saturday November 11. There are a small number of spaces left, if you are interested in attending.

Mom's Busy

Nope, you're in the right place. This is me, Millie, and I have hijacked Mom's blog. She's been wicked busy the last few days - teaching and driving all over the place. She taught a very successful Birds class on Saturday, brought the Colorado quilt to be quilted on Sunday morning, and then she had dinner with a friend on Sunday night. Monday was crazy at work, and she's got to go to the teeth v-e-t today and there's a note on the calendar that says my teeth are being cleaned this week too. Well, we'll see about that.

Anyway, Mom's tired and she's gonna spend a few more days just chillaxing on the couch with her Kindle, and don't tell anybody, but I'll be curled up nearby getting scritches as she reads. She's been sewing the binding on the Snow Day quilt, and she bought fabric to bind the Colorado quilt when that comes back. She says she'll have it to show her Barn Building students at QT on October 28.

Colorado Quilt Backing Done

While this may not be the best photo of the finished backing for the Colorado Quilt, this is very accurate in terms of color.  The backing is done and I will bring it to the longarm quilter on Sunday.

The signature block is 21-1/2"  wide by 32" tall. The lower case letters are 3" tall.

The blue straightedge in yesterday's post can be bought at Home Depot, here. Like anything long and straight, you have to be careful not to bend it so it will stay "true." It works for me and I am happy. It's only 20 USD, so it's a heck of a deal. You will want to find a place to store it.

More ruler fun here.