Playing with Scale: done and dusted

I may be (still) behind with a lot of things, but my quilting is going just fine and as a result I have my second finish of the year, which makes me feel a whole lot better about everything else.

It's quilted with wonky concentric diamonds, largely following the shapes in the piecing. 

As usual you get a better idea from the back.

The binding is a black and white print - random letters, I think it's an old Cloud 9 print.

And the details.

Finished sized 65" square.

Pieced from a pile of shirts (you can see where I started here) and fabrics from stash.  The wadding is an organic cotton, new-to-me option.  There's been a wee bit of bearding showing on the black fabrics as I quilted, but it's pretty much settled down already so that wouldn't put me off using it again.  The quilting is done with perle no. 8 - I just pulled out everything in greens, browns, black, white, that I had in the box and got on with it. 

This was started on 30th January 2018 and the piecing was finished on 13th March that year.

I started quilting on 3rd February this year, finished on 9th March.

I feel like I met the challenge, to play around with scale pretty well, since I worked with much bigger units than I normally would and also used that large-scale black and green print.  And I made my first string quilt into the bargain, so all round I'm pretty happy with things.

New quilt in the hoop and a lesson

The next quilt up is the one I tend to refer to as "Playing with Scale" though really that's about as dull as a quilt name could be. I think it's jumped the queue, but it came to hand and I couldn't be bothered to overthink, so just got on with sandwiching instead.

I was keen to maintain momentum this year.  That's just a fancy way of saying that I wasted a lot of time in 2018, just fiddling and faffing and browsing online, with no one to blame but myself but this year I want to do less of all those and more quilting again.  Well it didn't work quite like that.  I found a new-to-me batting that I fancied trying out and ordered some as I was binding the Hourglasses. Ten days later and I was twiddling my thumbs and feeling rather grumpy, so I rang to check the status of my order.  It had gone out the previous day and was with me 24 hours later.  

Now, I am not telling you this to complain about slow service.  Rather it gave me pause for thought.  We get so used to things happening so fast nowadays that it becomes an expectation.  But lots of things I need come from small, independent shops rather than huge concerns and it's not always possible for them to be as quick.  One pair of hands can only do so much in a day, after all.  I shall try to be more patient next time, or plan further ahead!

The batting, by the way, is lovely and soft, slightly flatter than the others I have used but none the worse for that.

Linking up with Kathy for Slow Sunday Stitching

Bigger, smaller, quieter

Today I decided that I'd make some blocks with less contrast.

And here's what they looked like mixed in with my first batch

I'm not making big decisions, but I like to lay stuff out when I've been sewing for a bit and have a play - sooner or later I'll like something enough to keep it.  This version seemed a bit too regular, so I had another go.

I wanted to make one or two bigger blocks, but haven't for the entirely mundane reason that the phone book I am using for backing papers has really narrow pages and I couldn't find anything else. So I made a few smaller ones, just for the heck of it.

And just like that...

Playing with Scale is done. 

Of course it wasn't really 'just like that' - in fact I don't remember the last time a quilt caused me quite so many headaches.  I have stopped and started, tried lots of things that didn't work, but hopefully I've learned some useful lessons.

Here's a shot that reminds you roughly where I got to last time.

I knew I was close to the wire with my fabric at this point - for instance I didn't have enough of any single fabric to cut another big triangle - and for quite a long time I thought I was going to use that Coin strip in the top right hand corner to fill in a gap.  They were one of the various things I had tried and rejected at various points along the way; of course if I hadn't tried so many things that didn't work, I would still have had plenty of fabric, but that's the way of it.

But the Coins still weren't working for me.  I think if I'd incorporated some elsewhere in the quilt I'd have been okay to use these ones,  or if they had covered a bigger area (maybe two squares wide rather than just the one) so it's not the Coins in themselves I rejected; it was more a question of scale, which seems appropriate, though that doesn't make it any less annoying. 

At this point I was really scratching my head, and could have gone back to my fabric boxes to find an extra piece of something or other, but I finally concluded that if I pulled the Coin strips to pieces I could use those bits of fabric to piece enough strips to make four more string blocks.  If you look closely at the finished top you might be able to spot those last four.

So I ended up here.

Having really struggled with lots of aspects of this make, including the colour scheme, I have ended up with something I like a lot, even if it's by the skin of my teeth.

It's sunny and I'm feeling fine

It finally feels like I am settling into this and I don't think it's just that it was a sunny day, though that always helps.  It may be partly that I have enough blocks now to get a better sense of the bigger picture, and to be able to tweak away at any given section until I find exactly what I want.  

Of course this is not the finished article; I'm a shed-load of blocks short of where I need to be, for starters.  There's a spare circle block which may or may not make it in and two of the four you can  see here may be moved, though only a tiny bit.  However, I am happy enough with the bottom part to start stitching things together into bigger chunks - no photos of this because, for utterly boring reasons, I am working in the tiniest space ever, but it is happening. And I'm still making those strings.

Linking up today with Sew, Stitch, Snap, SHARE.

Chopping circles, piecing scraps

One of the things I like least about my way of working is knowing exactly what I want to do, but not having enough fabric to do it.  Perversely this is also one of the things I like best - being forced to find creative solutions, work my way around a problem.  This week there has been a lot of that. With the benefit of hindsight I could have done with one extra fabric/shirt in the mix for this quilt.  Several of my choices were fat quarters (like the map fabric) or scraps left over from other things (like the brown plaid shirt) and life would be easy now if there was more of them.  For instance, I thought I would like circle blocks if the circles were slightly larger, but there was no way that was going to be an option.  Then I thought about returning to the idea of quarter circles - you will see what I've done in the photo below.  I didn't need new fabric for these, as I just chopped up the circles I already had and then added an extra round or two.

I still need to work out what goes around them, but I have been saving a couple of biggish pieces so hopefully that will not pose too many problems.

Practicalities are also driving the string blocks now, so I am making more of the smaller ones -piecing scraps together where I have to.  This scraping a finish when you half think you can't make it gets quite exciting!

AHIQ - share your improv #30

You would think, wouldn't you, that if I was setting a task for other people it might be one I found straightforward myself.  But no; this is causing me all sorts of headaches, though I'm not disputing that it may be good for me.

I've gone through countless iterations so far.  Some I like, some I don't.  I've added circles, taken them away, added them again, taken them away again.  I've made some coin strips but don't know if they get to stay either.  Since there's no rhyme or reason to all this yet I will punctuate the rest of this post with photos, but without commenting on them.

What I have been musing on though, as I crawled around the floor shuffling things about were some more general issues.  

The first thought that has occurred to me is that size really does matter.  I like the idea of circles, didn't mind making them, but was distinctly underwhelmed when I added them in.  Now that I've tried this repeatedly I have come to the conclusion that they are the wrong size rather than the wrong shape.  I think if they were just a tad bigger I would like them better.  Can't do that, though - nowhere near enough fabric.  Or maybe if they were small, but that would be extremely fiddly and is therefore most unlikely to happen!

Then I moved on to thinking about negative space.  I know it's got its uses and that every quilt needs little places for the eye to rest, but even when I can see it might be a good idea I just don't have it in me to leave well alone.  So this leads me to look for alternative ways of achieving this; the circles might have been one, now I am trying to mix in a few more triangles that are a single fabric rather than pieced.  More black would be another thing to try, I think.

I wonder whether negative space is better suited to modern trends in machine quilting?  I know people do/have always done wonderful whole cloth work by hand but most negative space I see is taken up by machining.  I can't quite imagine those very precise, clear lines on top of my wonky piecing rather than the more organic feel of hand quilting but have started to wonder about ways I would fill big areas of space if I had them.  For now though, I guess I'll just keep adding stuff in.  

(I wrote this post on Monday.  Last night Mr Sew Slowly felt the need to get up and make toast in the middle of the night.  This is not on the whole a habit to be encouraged, but as I lay there trying to get back to sleep I had a bright idea about my circles - maybe there's something I can do here).

I'm looking forward to seeing how other people have approached this, but of course you are welcome to link up any project you are working on.

An InLinkz Link-up

Stops and starts

Hmm, this is clearly not going to be straightforward.

I am still quite happy with my wonky string blocks, but am already oh so bored of making them.    Here's one step on from where I was last time.

So I thought I'd make some circles, as some of you suggested.  They would provide some variety in the making and, in theory, might provide some little spots of calm in what is a very busy quilt.  I could have gone about this in a number of ways but thought I'd try something I haven't done before, so they are inset (following this tutorial).  Occasionally I like to have a go at something that requires precision, just to prove to myself that I can do it (or not) and this time it worked out fine.  

 I made three then had a play.  I've deliberately not made them exactly the same size as the existing squares and you can see the different ways I thought about making them larger: plain black strips, black with the green insets or using a string style edging.  

And after all that work I wasn't convinced they added anything.  I've not absolutely decided yet, but for now I've stuck them in a corner and gone back to playing with just the two elements (you can ignore the little coin strip on the right hand side). 

Nothing for it, then, but to make more strings.

PS Since I'm only a day late I'll link up with Sew Stitch Snap SHARE too.

Persistence pays

I don't think I've ever had as many interesting/useful suggestions in response to a blog post as I got to my last one.  Thanks to everyone who took the time to comment; you have definitely moved my thinking on.  It is well within the bounds of possibility that I may throw the kitchen sink at this quilt now, and that in the fullness of time you will see Chinese Coin strips and circle-y blocks alongside my triangles.  

The one thing I did like about that formal-looking string block was the colour balance.  It was the first time I had looked at those fabrics and felt like they were really working for me, so I decided not to give up on my strings, went back and tried again, working  at overriding my newly-discovered tendency to be straight and tidy (and there's a sentence I never thought I would write!)

So, newer string blocks, much more me, I think.

Consequently they work better with my triangles, though you will notice I've replaced some solid pieces with extra strings.

I've got a couple more of these on the go, then I might switch things up a bit.  Wild seems quite appealing right now, if I can make it work.

Not the smoothest of starts

This is taking a while to get going.

Following on from last time, I cut the rest of my big print into triangles, but that didn't seem to amount to much, so I made some more using my black and green grunge fabrics, and now have nine pairs.

Now these weren't doing it for me at all when they were all laid out on the kitchen floor, but looking at them on the computer screen I am revising my opinion so they may survive as they are.

Clearly this doesn't amount to a whole quilt, and my first thought was some smaller flying geese (you can see one lurking below the two orange-y blocks).  My second thought was that I might go a wee bit mad if I went back to fiddly little triangles, albeit it rectangular rather than square. 

Now I'm wondering about simple string blocks.  I made one, to see what I thought.  The strips were cut freehand, some with a rotary cutter, some with scissors, but it is irritatingly orderly.  Never mind.  I'm going to look at it for a while and then decided whether to make more.

Not what I was expecting

When I decided I was going to  work with this group of fabrics I had a vague notion of what I might try.  Using the black and green print ticks the 'scale' box for me in terms of the AHIQ challenge, but I also wanted to stick with bigger pieces than usual, and to keep it fairly simple.  I had in mind something pared back, maybe just rectangle pieces.  

I cut myself a rectangle.  I started with that print, because that's the hardest fabric to work with (for me).  And I stuck my rectangle on the floor and started off just putting other things next to it and seeing what worked and what didn't.  Here's an example.

Did I come up with anything that floated my boat?  Nope.  Not even remotely.  Looked like this would be trickier than I thought. Then, as I grabbed my rectangle I somehow managed this

which I did rather like.  So I tried cutting triangles and joining them back together with a strip of something different.  I got this

 and then this.

Like I said, not at all what I was expecting, but I like it enough to keep going.