Easy Street Medallion

Easy Street Medallion, a photo by Misha Misha Misha on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
It seems that my quilt wants to go in a different direction than Bonnie intended it to go :)

It's hard to tell, but there are lilac-lavender squares where it looks rather plain (they look much prettier in person). Will probably repeat the lilac color for the setting triangles, but that will only bring the top to around 50" square. I will then play around with adding some more borders to bring it to 60-65" square. I also changed out the 4 corners after i took this pic, repeating the star pattern, as I had 16 of the double flying geese left over. (edit: see below)



None of the components are sewn together yet in these photos, so many of the geese look strange.

Easy Street - Playing Around!

Well, Bonnie wrapped up the Easy Street Mystery, and I've seen lots and lots of pretty quilts both with her colorway and with others. Lots of eye candy on the Yahoo group (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/quiltvillechat)

 I, however, have to admit that the green squares are just not speaking to me. I do like the lime green with the purple but somehow I just feel the need to go in a different direction this time. Hey, we're quilters, it's our prerogative, right?! :) So first, here are my components in Bonnie's given colors and layout.

Cute, right?

 

Back before we knew what the parts were going to be for, I started playing around with the bits and pieces and came up with some potential blocks:

 

But once I saw the final (official) layout I felt there's just a bit too much green for my personal liking, and I really thought all those geese were going to make stars...so I had to start playing around again…so here’s my potential layout, once in green and once in lavender/lilac.



I really like the lighter/softer color. What do you think??



and here's some eye candy for you! http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2013/01/mystery-monday-link-up-jan-7th.html

Easy Street Step 5

Ahhh, it's almost Christmas. I have presents to wrap and gift cards to label and candy to bag up...but I have my priorities. It's time for another step in Bonnie Hunter's Easy Street Mystery!!!



There's been some discussion about what these units are called...since they're not Flying Geese per se, Bonnie suggested perhaps they're Sitting (or Squatting) Turkeys. Personally I think they look like little houses!!

Smokey is not interested today, for whatever reason. She did watch me briefly but then decided she had a better shot at seeing something “interesting” if she faced the window.




And last but not least, here is the Mystery Monday Linky to see the other participants' blog posts!!!

Easy Street Step 4

More geese! I'm actually almost enjoying making flying geese now that I have my fancy new rulers :)



Right on schedule, Smokey showed up to help. What a gal! She never fails to keep me company when I'm sewing.

Here is the link to the Monday Linky http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2012/12/mystery-monday-link-up-part-4.html and here's the link back to Bonnie's blog, should you want to play along and/or save the steps and make your own Easy Street quilt...http://quiltville.blogspot.com/p/easy-street-mystery.html (editing from my phone, sorry for the inelegant links!)

Easy Street Step 3

 

Here's the latest step in Bonnie Hunter's Easy Street Mystery! These little guys finish at 3" and were surprisingly easy to make with the Easy Angle ruler. I need to make 16 more but need to cut more black & white strips first. Just thought that 16 of them made for a nice sized photo op!

Here's the Mystery Monday Link Up so you can see the work of others participating in the mystery!



Above is an updated photo showing the other 4 aqua fabrics. I made a total of 4 units for each of the 8 colors. Below is Smokey inspecting the units. She says you have to get VERY close to inspect the seam allowances!

Easy Lane - Step 2

 

I'm so excited with how easy this step is going! I had read Bonnie's suggestions last year when doing her Orca Bay Mystery to buy the Easy Angle and Companion Angle rulers but I didn't buy them until recently. They are so nifty! I also like how versatile they are, as each one can be used to make several different sizes (unlike another Flying Geese ruler set I bought that only makes 2 different sizes). She also made a killer video on how to use them properly!!

So here are the first few geese I've made for my Easy Street (or in my case LANE) mystery quilt. I will be making about 50 more but wanted to at least knock a few out and get them posted so I'm "keeping up" as best as possible. To see other participants' posts for this mystery please visit http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2012/12/mystery-monday-link-up-part-2.html



I had practiced with the rulers over the weekend and made even SMALLER geese (finishing at 1x2") for a Farmer's Wife Sampler swap that I'm participating in. I got ahead of myself and made the geese dark and the sky light in the first set before I realized that the Cups and Saucers block is the other way around. Whoops! Bonus block for me, I guess :)




I then made another block using different fabrics...I liked the look of the 2 blue ones but the lighter one was thicker than the other and it made the seams very bulky. Unfortunately the pattern in the dark purple is conflicting with the angles of the block so it kind of makes one a little dizzy looking at it, LOL. Good thing I only made one of this one too...but I like it enough I think I'll keep it for my own quilt.

Easy Street...or Maybe Easy Lane?

It's time for a mystery!!! Here's my Step One for the latest Bonnie Hunter mystery: Easy Street. The finished size if you do the entire quilt is 84" square and I just want more of a couch quilt/throw so I'm doing half of the steps to make something closer to 60" square. Therefore the working title for MY quilt is Easy Lane ;)

Here are 98 three inch finished 4 patches...the grey is our "constant" and is a batik. The other parts are black on white prints. The colors in the quilt are purple, aqua and apple green. Below is a photo of the fabrics I pulled, except I changed the grey to a darker one. I also pulled out a few of the other colors that I thought weren't quite right and set them aside for later...we'll see if they feel right later on.

http://quiltville.blogspot.com/2012/11/easy-street-monday-link-up-1.html

Tulip Mini Quilt for ALQS7

It's been a long time since I've had a chance to work on many personal projects as I've been very busy the last 2 months with the Taylor Bridge project, but I had to take time out to participate in Kate's ALQS7 as I absolutely love how her swaps work!

For those not familiar, usually you're assigned a partner in a swap like this, and there's always worry and strife about whether the recipient will love your final product. There's also the stress about meeting the deadline, or what to do if someone gets sick and has to drop out. Not so with Kate's swap! There is a deadline to get the photo to her, and as long as you make that deadline you're in. If you can't make it, no worries, you just won't participate in that round. She then lets all the participants send her a list of their favorite quilts among those submitted, and she has the difficult task of divvying them all up...but she does a fabulous job and we appreciate all her hard work!

So here is my little quilt. The challenge this round was to make a 12" mini quilt. Yikes! I started on a tiny little Hawaiian Applique piece but abandoned it as I decided my design wasn't good enough (self designed, first attempt). Maybe another time....then I had an idea to use some of my collection of Australian fabrics, but before I had a chance to do anything with them I got a Craftsy email with a free pattern for a 10" Paper Pieced Tulip block. Hmm...10" block + 1" border = 12" mini quilt. Score!

The batiks proved to be difficult to photograph, and in editing the colors to make the tulips, leaves and borders look right I ended up washing out the aquas. Here I've added some extra photos to show how the background looks.

I also wanted to give a shout out to my friend Shelley (aka Pirate) for her great Freezer Paper Piecing tutorial. I love it, and refer to it every time I need to paper piece something like this!

Sadly, Blogger ate half of my original post so I may have to come back later and add some forgotten details, but here are the rest of the photos in the meanwhile...

Smokey Inspects My Taylor Bridge Fire Quilt

Smokey just *has* to inspect everything I'm quilting! Here she admires the color changes in the variegated thread I chose to quilt the Jewel Box top.

It's made up of primary colors and is a discontinued color from Connecting Threads.

I think she's partial to the swirly pattern, as she seems to be more interested in the quilts on which I use this design!

I made binding for it this morning but then had to go to work. I'm having a friend over Wednesday to sew and I plan to get that binding attached so we can call this one DONE!!!

In case you don't follow my other activities, please come see the Taylor Bridge Fire Quilts blog

Great Grandmothers' Quilts

No, I didn't put the apostrophe in the wrong place, I have quilts to show from TWO of my great grandmothers!

Mum had been telling me ever since I started quilting 4 years ago that she had a couple of her grandmothers' quilts. It took all this time to figure out where they were, as she would alternate between saying they were in the cedar chest (which has a huge TV on top of it) and telling me they were in the linen closet (which is packed). But finally last week they surfaced, and are now in my possession for safekeeping!! 

This first one is believed to be by her paternal grandmother. Mum's memory is a little rusty (cough) and of course there's no label and no one else to ask, so we're going to assume that is the case! It is hand pieced and hand quilted, and approximately 60 x 80".

 

You'll see that a lot of the blue fabrics faded to nearly white over the years, but many of the baskets are still quite vibrant. It has some stains and the single layer of binding is shredded in areas. I will probably hand baste those areas for now, just so they don't get worse.



Here is a close up of some of the fabrics. If anyone has an idea of what decade this might date to I'd love to hear your thoughts!





Below is a gorgeous Double Wedding Ring hand  pieced and hand quilted by my mom's maternal grandmother, Zeal. It is 74 x 81"



She's the one who also made the baby quilt I posted previously. Some of the fabric dyes have transferred to other areas, not by bleeding but by crocking (contact/rubbing onto the others). The binding is double fold and is in very good shape. I only found one part that was frayed. I took a few close ups of this one too. I recognize the fabrics as being feedsack/30's but am not sure when it was actually made.

 Enjoy!!!

Taylor Bridge Fire Quilts

Hey all! I'm taking a break from my regular quilting to work on a very special project. That project has its own blog: http://taylorbridgefirequilts.blogspot.com/

My friends and I are making quilts for the victims of the Taylor Bridge fire in Cle Elum Washington. It's a terrible fire that consumed 48 homes and more than a dozen other structures in a matter of hours a week ago today. In fact, the fire is still burning but at last word it was about 47% contained and they hope to soon make an announcement of 100% containment if the weather would just cooperate. They're having trouble with the wind :(

If you are interested in seeing what I'm up to, please visit the other blog. And if you'd like to help...just drop me a note on either blog!!!

-Misha