#45 Fuzzy Fish

#45: Fuzzy Fish
Finished: 11/11/12
Techniques: Chenille Effect
Size: 16 1/2" x 13"

Description: The chenille effect is created by stacking several layers of fabric having the same design, then stitching on the diagonal and cutting on the bias. For this mini-quilt, I used five layers with the bottom-most layer cut a little longer and wider than the others. Because I needed five pieces of the same design, I relied on my ever-present fish fabric. Once I stitched on the diagonal, it was relatively easy to cut the fabric by having the lowest layer a little bigger than the other layers. It assured that I wouldn't accidentally cut through all the layers.

The sewing, then, was fast and the cutting was simple. The final stage is to wash the mini-quilt to make the chenille "bloom". This proved to be the most frustrating part. I have a front loading washer, which is designed to be gentler on clothes than a top loading machine. Hence, there wasn't enough agitation to  really make the chenille bloom. It did bloom somewhat, but even after several washings and dryings, it hasn't bloomed as much as I'd hoped. I even tried brushing the chenille and agitating it further by hand. I suppose if I keep trying, it may improve.  If it does, I'll re-post and let you know.

#44 Stained Glass Iris

#44: Stained Glass Iris
Finished: 11/4/12
Techniques: Stained Glass Effect, Satin Stitch, Machine Stitches, Appliqué, Bias Binding, Oval, Batiks
Size: 12" x 15"

A Stained Glass effect mini-quilt has been on my list of projects for a while now, so it was time to give it a try. Many years ago, I took a class and learned how to create stained glass designs. It was fun, but I don't think my sense of color or design was as developed as it is today. But I have seen quilts done in a stained glass style and thought they looked pretty good.

Batiks, hand-dyed, and mottled fabrics work very well, as they emulate the subtle differences and imperfections in stained glass. Originally, I was going to use bias binding tape to simulate the lead lines holding the pieces of "glass" together. I was going to make the bias tape myself, but found it too difficult to get the narrow size I needed for the mini-quilt. So I figured a good satin stitch would work just as well.

I created the design for this iris, chose the fabrics, starched them heavily, let them dry and ironed them flat. When they're starched like that, cutting with a rotary cutter is pretty easy. I could cut the pieces from my design without regard to seam allowances, since this was basically an appliqué process. I laid them onto the sky blue fabric and used a glue stick to keep them in place.

Before actually starting the satin stitching, I used my failed narrow bias binding to lay out where I wanted the lead lines. Thinking back to the stained glass class, I knew what curves and intersections would work with glass, so I tried several permutations until I found one that was pleasing to the eye (although I think I could have done better with a few more tries). I then marked the lines with a marker that disappears when ironed, and working with batting and a heavy stabilizer, proceeded with the satin stitching.

Quilting was simple. I used a straight stitch for the sky and some machine stitches for the grassy areas. But since I had already done the satin stitching, I had to "jump" over places in the sky part of the quilt. I have to remember that stopping and starting quilting stitches in the middle of a quilt doesn't work very well, unless you leave long enough tails to tie them off in the back. I also thought about adding stitches to the iris itself, but then thought it would detract from the stained glass effect. In hindsight, I don't think I should have used the machine stitches in the grassy area either; some straight stitching probably would have sufficed. Oh well.

I had also intended on making this a rectangular piece, just as all my other mini-quilts have been. But something about the stained glass design just cried out for an oval shape. But how could I make a perfect oval? I knew that eye-balling it wasn't going to work. So I used the poster function of Microsoft Publisher and inserted an oval shape with specified dimensions, printed it off and cut out the inside of the oval. I was left with a template to frame the mini-quilt, upon which I traced the cutting line. Then I cut the black fabric on the bias to make the binding. It wrapped around the piece very nicely.

I do like the way this one turned out.

#43: Halloween

#43: Halloween
Finished: 10/25/12
Techniques: Ruth McDowell technique, freezer paper, machine stitches, curved piecing
Size: 20" x 19"

Description: I've always liked the combination of the Halloween colors of lime green, orange, purple, and black. So I pulled those colors from my stash and created this pumpkin using Ruth McDowell's technique of using freezer paper to piece the design.

The process went pretty well, but the curved pieces gave me a little trouble, probably because I was cutting a few corners in a hurry to get done.  Still, it came out pretty well.

The mini-quilt looks better in person, but one thing that shows up well is the fact that the lime green fabric with purple rectangles almost looks fluorescent!

#42 Grandpa Robbins

#42: Grandpa Robbins
Finished: 10/21/12
Techniques: Photo fabric, Applique, Echo quilting, Machine embroidery
Size: 17" x 18"

Description: My grandfather, Leroy V. Robbins, was inducted today into the National 4-H Hall of Fame for his 50 years of service as a 4-H volunteer and leader. I'm glad to honor him with this mini-quilt. He helped organize the first 4-H program in Louisiana, in East Baton Rouge Parish. One of the 4-H projects he was involved in was raising champion Southdown sheep. As a child, I remember the sheep he raised on his property, which we affectionately refer to as "Robbins Roost."

I started out by printing the 4-H motto words, "Head", "Heart", "Hands", "Health", with the machine embroidery alphabet on my sewing machine. I then traced the 4-H four-leaf clover design onto some green fabric and appliquéd it between the embroidered words.

The picture of my grandpa was the most creative part of this project. I wanted to include a picture, but I had a problem: I didn't have any photo fabric. And according to my pledge for this project, I couldn't buy anything new to create the mini-quilt. So I wondered if I could make my own photo fabric using materials at hand. And this is the reason I love the Internet! Searching "make your own photo fabric" brought up several sites. 

The simplest method I found had instructions to print off a photo by ironing freezer paper onto the back of fabric and running it through an ink jet printer. And while most sites suggested using something called "Bubble Jet Set 2000" ink fixative, one site said it wasn't necessary as long as you weren't planning on washing the project. So I gave it a try. My freezer paper didn't want to stick well to the fabric so I also used a quilt basting spray to make it stick. Then I ran it through my printer and it worked like a charm! 

I made several copies of grandpa's photo to test and practice. Sure enough, you don't want to wash it. Running it under water made all the colors run except the black. And even ironing it with steam made it fade somewhat. Ironing it without steam seemed to be OK, but I didn't iron it for very long, not wanting to press my luck  (pun intended).

Quilting was done with straight stitching and echo stitching within the four-leaf clover.

We lost Grandpa in 2006, but we all feel quite proud about his induction into the 4-H Hall of Fame.

#41 Black and White and ...

#41: Black and White and ...
Finished: 10/13/12
Techniques: Black and White, Machine Stitches, Strips
Size: 24 1/2" x 18"

Description: As much as I like working with bright colors, I've always admired black and white quilts too. Those that I've seen, especially those with splashes of color, I've found to be very striking. I hadn't thought that I had enough of a variety of black and white fabrics in my stash to create a black and white mini-quilt, but once I started looking I decided I did. And then I found that I had numerous strips of black and white, and that cinched it.

When I started creating the rectangles, I didn't like the look. Even though I tried to abut "light" black-and-whites next to "dark" black-and-whites, there was not enough definite delineation between the fabrics for my liking. So I ended up buffering different fabrics with solid whites or solid blacks and that helped a lot.

Quilting was done with a machine wave stitch. I think this will make a nice wall hanging.

#40 Trapunto Sunflower

#40: Trapunto Sunflower
Finished: 10/6/12
Techniques: whole cloth, trapunto, stippling, free-motion quilting.
Size: 12 1/2" x 12 1/2"

Description: Trapunto is the technique of sewing a design onto two layers of fabric, then cutting slits into the under-layer and inserting stuffing or batting, causing a raised effect. The slits are then hand-stitched back together. I varied from the traditional as I did not do the hand-stitching part, but rather placed the two layers (plus trapunto) onto a layer of batting and backing fabric and proceeded with the quilting. Because this is a mini-quilt, I figured I could get away with this departure.

Although I could have used printed fabric and appliqué to create the sunflower, I went with the whole cloth design in white simply for its elegance. The raised effect of the trapunto was enhanced by stippling, or a very dense meandering pattern around the sunflower. When I finished stippling, I found that it didn't get close enough to the trapunto design for my satisfaction, so I straight stitched around the outer edge of the sunflower again which provided the definition I was looking for.

I found stuffing the batting into the underside of the design very tedious work. There were a total of 80 individual slits, including the 32 tiny squares in the center of the sunflower. But as tedious as it was, I like the overall effect. This mini-quilt definitely looks better in reality than in the picture. I think a large quilt done in this design would look spectacular, but someone other than me would have to do it. (But you never know).

#39 Grandpa's Sunset Roses

#39: Grandpa's Sunset Roses
Finished: 9/30/12
Techniques: Machine embroidery, machine stitches, applique
Size: 14 1/2" x 13 1/2"

I was inspired by a new book I got from the public library, Creative Uses for Decorative Stitches by Karen Linduska. I used several of the techniques listed in her book to create this mini-quilt.

I've been remembering my grandfather's rose garden back in Maryland. When we were growing up, we would visit my grandparents' home and I loved walking through the maze of roses. My favorites were the yellow, orange and pick roses he grew. I don't know the actual name of those roses, but I called them sunset roses because of their colors.

I used the machine embroidery unit on my sewing machine and the roses design that came with it. I find that I don't often use the embroidery unit, but this project was a good opportunity. I added other machine stitches in the form of leaves and greenery. The portion of the mini-quilt to the left is done with  machine stitches sewn close together, as described in the Linduska book. It represents the maze or rows of roses of my grandpa's garden. The individual portions were sewn separately and appliquéd onto the background.