Rose Star re-started

About a month ago I mentioned that I had restarted my Rose Star quilt in a new fabric range.

I am pleased to report that I am very very happy with how my new version is coming along. It's made in Flora by Lauren and Jessi Lung for Moda. The colours are so pretty and sunshiney - not too heavy and not too light - they really cheer me up.

I've made 12 blocks so far and I have about 24 to go. (They're approx 12" by 11" each.) I am determined to complete a block per night over the next few weeks, because I really don't want this quilt to end up on the UFO pile. 

I decided to use a light buttercup yellow for the in-between bits, but now that I look at the fabric again it looks stronger and darker, more like an egg-yolk yellow. Hopefully it will grow on me.

I think that once I stitch in the centre hexagons, the background yellow will tone down a little. The centre hexagons are also from the Flora range and have a tone-on-tone pattern, which makes a welcome change from plain centres.

My photos don't do the colours or patterns of these fabric justice. It's a bit grey outside today, which is a good excuse to get back to stitching another block of sunshine. Bye for now!

Swap catchup

I have mastered the trick of hand-sewing hexagons while lying flat on my back with my legs in the air.

So I have been getting busy as well as getting better and have caught up on some overdue swaps.

These flowers will be posted today to my April, May and June swap partners.

 Here are some lovely flowers I received from Sandy and Robynne recently. Thanks!

 And these came all the way from Marie in Denmark. Great prints!

Nearly finished? I spoke too soon

I spoke too soon. I thought I had nearly finished this quilt. I just had to finish quilting around half-a-dozen flowers, put the border on and voila.

I finished the flowers but it just didn't look complete. Maybe I stitched too close to the flowers? Maybe I should have used a dark purple all over to match the borders, instead of using coordinating colours to match the flowers?

(Why are my photos fuzzy? Click to enlarge to make them look clearer.)

Maybe I needed some more hand-quilting to fill in the white spaces a bit?

I tried out one idea - a large hexagon around each flower - but luckily I had the good sense to baste it first in large temporary stitches instead of actually quilting it, because it turned out that I really did not like the honeycomb design.

Here is the next idea I tried out. Again, just in large temporary stitches.

I liked it! So far I have filled in the white bits around five flowers, using a mid-purple thread. I wasn't sure about the design when I started, but the more I do the better it looks.

I think you may be a little bored looking at this project by now, so I promise you that the next photo I show will be of the completed quilt.

Lots of hexie flowers done

I have caught up on my hexie flower swaps: Bek (Feb Inchy Swap), Maggie (Mar Inchy Swap), Suzzie (Feb/Mar Forum Swap) and Jeanette (Mar/Apr Forum Swap).

Coincidentally, everyone wanted either red, aqua or lime green so I opened one of my few remaining packs of pre-cut Ruby hexagons. Such a gorgeous fabric range! I should have hoarded some more.

Sorry I didn't take any photos before I sealed the envelopes.

Back to the drawing board - Rose Star quilt

It's back to the drawing board for me to rethink my Rose Star quilt. I've pieced 8 blocks so far and I love them all. Here are my favourites ...

Each block looks great on it's own (perfect for cushions) but when you put them together there is just too much going on. Too much colour, too much pattern, and not enough space in between to give your eyes a rest.

It's missing ... I don't know ... balance, cohesion, identity. What are the words I'm looking for ... it just doesn't make sense. So it's back to square one with this quilt to find a way to bring it all together. I do have an idea about how I might make this happen, but I want to try it out before I tell you about it.

It all comes down to how to use colour. I don't think I've found my feet with it yet. I look back at the quilts I've made over the years, and they've mostly ended up quite blahh because I've been unadventurous with colour.

But last year, when I found Lily's Quilts blog  and joined in her Hexalong doing the Candied Hexagons quilt, I went colour-mad and decided to go bright and bold with each block. It did not work. It definitely did not look like this GORGEOUS quilt by Lizzie Broderie.

My Candied Hexagons are still in pieces. Same problem as with the Rose Star quilt, I jump into making the blocks without a clear idea of where I'm going and what the whole quilt will look like when completed.

So it's back to the drawing board to find the right balance between not enough colour (blahh) and too much (aarrgh). And I think I need to include some more plain fabrics in my mix. I'm going to start by looking again at some great tutorials by Lily's quilts all about colour ...

http://lilysquilts.blogspot.com.au/2011/08/interested-in-dead-simple-qal.html
http://lilysquilts.blogspot.com.au/2011/09/resistance-is-futile.html
http://lilysquilts.blogspot.com.au/2011/03/choosing-fabrics-qal-guest-post.html

And if you can suggest any great tutorials for me to look at, I'd love to hear from you. Help me find my quilting style, my colour, my quilting mojo!

Rose Star Quilt - die-cut papers now available

All my plans for the weekend flew out the window as soon as I picked up my latest custom-made die a few days ago. This one will die-cut all the little kites and hats for the Rose Start quilt (my latest hand-piecing obsession).

I wanted to get some packs of kites/hats/hexs cut up for you this weekend, but of course I first had to do a proper scientific test to see if the papers turned out fine. (That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.) Here's the first block I made ...

 ... and my second, just to make sure the results of my first test were accurate LOL. (They look a little skewed, but that's because I'm missing the photography gene.)

 

I've just listed the die-cut papers in my store in a mixed pack called the Rose Star Pack. You can choose from paper or card and choose from a pack of 350 pieces (175 kites, 175 hats and 25 hexagons) or 800 pieces (350 kites, 350 hats and 100 hexagons). 

The centre hexagons have 2" sides and the finished blocks are 12" wide by 10" high.The product descriptions will give you more info about measurements and quantities.

I would love to pre-cut the fabric for you as well but I definitely think fussy-cutting is essential for the Rose Star quilt. The fabric range I am using for mine is Prince Charming by Tula Pink for Free Spirit. 

P.S. Thanks to CG who first told me about this block. I was instantly smitten. There's a tutorial about the "Rose Star" block here and more inspiration in the Flickr group here. I've just found out it has also been published as the Jazz Hands block in Material Obsessions 2, although that one is completely pieced with the little kites. (Thanks Suz for the info.)

Tempted? - Rose Star Quilt block party

Has anyone come across the Rose Star Quilt block party? I am soooo tempted to join. (Thanks to Carey for telling me about it.)

It's english paper piecing (EPP) and at first sight it looks complicated but it's not really. It actually only uses three shapes: hexagons, kites, and some 5-sided shapes that I'm going to call squashed pentagons.

Start with a 1 1/2" hexagon in the centre, add a row squashed pentagons, add a row of kites, then another row of each. The white in-between blocks are just a hexagon and three squashed pentagons. Each rose star ends up at roughly 8 inches by 8 inches. (This one by Summerfete is a mini quilt.)

Good colour-choice and fabric-choice will be absolutely essential for this quilt so I'm going to wait until inspiration strikes me. But in the meantime, I think I'm going to get some dies custom-made so that I can die-cut all the papers. (Yes, they'll end up in my store too.)

You can find Summerfete's Rose Star tutorial here and the Flickr group here.  (Looks like over 100 people have joined already.) Anyone tempted?

P.S. This quilt block somehow took me to another great tutorial on how to do EPP without stitching through your papers. There's a photo for every single step of the process. For those of you who haven't tried EPP before, you'll find the tutorial here.

In progress - Rough Terrain

I don't have much to say at the best of times, but when my job gets hectic (that is, even more hectic than usual) I do tend to shut down. My Forum friends will agree with that, they haven't heard from me for ages. Sorry!

And some sad memories have been on my mind lately, I've been missing what could have been. But let's not talk about that, I do appreciate that I'm very fortunate in many parts of my life. I'm single so I can indulge my need for a lot of quiet time, and I get a good paycheck so I can indulge my craft addiction.

So here's a peak at what I've been doing with all my time over the past couple of weeks. I tried and tried to resist starting another quilt (because I am so close to the end of piecing this quilt) but I obviously didn't resist hard enough.

I gave in to temptation the Tuesday before last and cracked open a pack of pre-cut hexagons. I couldn't resist the Terrain. It was like opening a little gift box of mixed chocolates! You're not quite sure what's in there, but it's fun finding out.

I glue-penned the pre-cuts to my templates in no time at all. Here's a picture of some of them ready to stitch.


I have since stitched up all the hexie-flowers and am half-way through piecing them together. I'm not entirely convinced that white is a good in-betweener, but the deep purple centres are absolutely perfect.

Here's where I'm up to. I'm pleased to say that it looks fantastic in real life. I'm so thrilled with it.


I am racing through this project as fast as I can (because I have a feeling that once I've put these hexie-flowers together, I might be tempted to crack open another pack and turn this small quilt into a large one).

So bye for now, I've got to get stuck into Row 5.

P.S. There's still time to enter the giveaway below. Did I mention that I'm drawing it on my birthday, Saturday 5 November?

Pentagons and Puzzle Balls

It's been a while since I last used my wonderful electronic cutter, so when Doris (who organises the Hexagon Flower Swap on Our Craft Forum) asked me to make some pentagon templates for her, I was more than happy to oblige.

I cut out a pack of card pentagons in no time at all, and while I was at it I thought why not cut some for myself too. A change from sewing hexies could be nice, so I also cut out some fabric penties. Oh, I don't think I should call them that. Fabric pentagons it is.


When Doris mentioned that she was making pentagons, I was reminded of my first ever patchwork project, made when I was about 12 years old. It was a ball made from felt pentagons in baby colours, blanket-stitched together, made for my guitar teacher's pregnant wife. Thanks for teaching me Mum!

I was also reminded of a FANTASTIC book by Jinny Beyer called Patchwork Puzzle Balls. I don't know what happened to my copy, but I remember that as well as having great piecing projects - from simple to complex - it had some really smart patterns to help you assemble the different balls.

It's getting late so I'll have to wait till tomorrow night to have a go at stitching this pentagon ball.

And I am tempted to try making this one too. It looks like a mix of pentagons and triangles, but I think I might need a pattern for assembling this one. I'm glad this book is still available as I think I might have to buy another copy.

Ooh, I just discovered the Free Patterns section on jinnybeyer.com so I'm going to rush off now. Bye.