Ocean quilt {Finished}

Thank you for all the congratulations!

Way back, what seems like a million years ago, I got a custom quilt inquery.  There was a pair of little boys, who share a room, and needed coordinating ocean quilts.

I had a ton of fun picking out wonderful ocean-colored fabrics.  (Maybe a bit too much fun, adding in some of that 'while the cart if open fabric', and I had 55(!!!) yards of fabric arrive at my house from 6 online shops.)



Whirlygiggles in two sizes, with a special paper-pieced dolphin block for Luke's quilt.

And no photo of the other one at all - boo!!  But both finished at about the same size - 81" x 88"



Look at how well I used a bunch of the extra yardage on the pieced back.

I did both quilt backs like this.



The paper pieced dolphins were a labor of love.  From the start, as I hunted high and low for the perfect pattern.  To the final debate over how to quilt them.

I didn't want to include them in my overall stipple.  So I outlined the frame (which is my favorite Kona blue, Glacier), then did a seaweed kind of wavy thing in the water, and sketchy echo quilting in the dolphins.



Now, this was super cool.  Luke's mom wanted to include some of his artwork in the quilt.  I didn't want it to fade over time, and also know how hard it can be to draw on fabric.

I had her send me a picture on a regular piece of paper, and made sure that he signed it.  Originally, I intended to hand embroider a representation of his art.  But then I started working at the Bernina store, and met some girls that are really into machine embroidery.  With the 830 and fancy digitizing software, they are able to take any jpg and turn it into a fabric sketch.  Marcy made this awesome quilt label - it's about 5x7" - and is almost an exact replica of Luke's drawing.  I didn't want to quilt over it, so I hand stitched it to the back after everything was done.



One final picture, with the Kona glacier binding and a touch of mustard added in.  It picked up the couple bits of mustard in prints throughout the quilt.

They were sent off to be loved (priority, insured UPS, with signature confirmation - I didn't want to chance them getting lost!).

2012 Catch-up

I'm still here!  Making all kinds of stuff, but way too tired to actually edit and post photos of any of it.  Much to my woe, I don't have pictures of two of my finished quilts (!?!)

But here's a photo-heavy super fast summary of the last three months.

I was freezing in late October, so I made myself a SUPER soft scarf - AMH voile and flannel.  I also picked up a little knitting again, as I'm teaching a home school girl how to knit.  I used Lorana's laces worsted and made some fingerless mitts.

And you may not be able to tell from the photo, but I sure can - the reason I was totally lazy - I'm also busy making a baby!  Little one due June 22nd.  (Every one of my bathroom self-photos look a little psycho.  Not one of my skills!)



In October I finished up Bernina technical training.  I took an 830 apart into a million pieces.



And then actually got it back together and working properly!  Also did a couple other machines and a serger.  I've been having fun at the shop, cleaning and repairing both very old and current Berninas.



This is the year of the quilt for my close group of friends.  Our boys were tiger scouts in 1st grade, and we bonded over the cub scout years of crazy.  With those same boys HS sophomores at this point, the 5 of us get together for birthday breakfasts, at the least, throughout the year.  I always do something hand made, and was running out of ideas.  So I went the easy route and decided I would do a special lap quilt for each of them this year.

The first birthday is Larua's, in August.  She is a pink person, and I had a blast pulling all my pinks for a sparkle punch.  I gifted the quilt top and then took it back to finish :)  It turned out awesome, and I for some reason have only this one picture!



Maureen was next, with her December birthday.  I love this bow tie pattern and went with it in huge blocks to show off my favorite blues and greens.  She's a gnome lover, like me.  She's totally Heather Ross Gnome-worthy, and I used a big hunk of it.



All the bow tie corner extras were stitched at the same time into HSTs, and I did a random block of them on the back.  With one more little gnome in a special spot by my birthday wish for her.



Finished up my bee blocks - horribly late and some without even taking photos.

Lee's solids were wonderful.



And I loved doing my own hexagon improv, using the pink dandelion fabric as inspiration.



Finally got to see my quilt in print, after completing and sending it off a year ago November.



I'm one of the contributors in this new book, with my large lap quilt called Starflower.  I was having fun looking at the idea of negative space that we all talk about, and actually reversing it - swapping the prints/solid neutral, within modern quilt designs.  This is the one they accepted for the book.



I've made this pattern by Amy Smart three times now, and I love it every time!  This was a baby shower gift, and I actually have several more photos.  So I'll talk about it more in another post.



Same for the custom ocean quilts I did.  I so love how they turned out, but I don't have a single picture of the second one!  WTF?



Let's call it a wrap on 2012!

Ocean Whirligiggles - Top done!

I'm moving along on the pair of ocean-theme full quilts I'm working on. And I finished up the top of my dolphin whirlygiggles.



It feels huge! About 84"x92" right now.

I had to push the legos aside and layer the blocks a bit when I planed the layout in my family room.



But the big blocks are so awesome for showing off the graphic prints. And even in the small sets of four I randomly placed around, there's plenty of fabric room.

This Heather Ross print is so perfect for the dolphin-loving little boy!



I placed the paper pieced dolphin block so that it will not be covered by pillows at the top of his bed, nor hanging over the edge.

Smack top and center for him to enjoy! Plus his most favorite print is right below it. I waited for the organic Storyboek 2 line to ship for these wonderful bubbles, turtles, and octopi.



Another print in that Storyboek 2 line has a larger scale underwater kelp forest that is super cool.

All the fabrics in this quilt were so fun to work with. Glad I'm using them all again in a coordinating improv-pieced quilt for their other little boy.

All the boys are in school now! The two older ones started on the 15th, and Becket's first day of 1st grade was Tuesday.

Hurray ;)