Spinning Stripes v2.0

Last year I went to a class with Shirley Mooney of Don't Wait to Create blog, and learnt how to cut a striped fabric to make new patterns. This is the result.

I finished the first quilt quite soon after the class and I was really pleased with it. You can read more about it here.

Back in March I pulled out the second quilt I had started at the class.  It had remained pinned to a sheet for about 9 months.

I played around with it and ended up changing the layout until it was similar to Shirley's original design.  You can read more about that process here.

Now I've finished my second mini quilt and I love it too.

It's hard to believe I made these two quilts out of this single piece of fabric.  It's all to do with the cutting and the layout of the triangles.

and the quilting:

Both of the quilts are 22" wide.

Thank you Shirley for a fun class and teaching me a new technique.

More WIPs - when will it end?

I finished the hand stitching on the first Sue Spargo Instastitch block.  I'm happy with it, but next time I'm not going to use Perle 5 on cotton fabrics.  It's just too thick to pull through easily.

After saying I was making it all from my stash, I did just purchase another 2 reels of Sue's variegated Perle 8 for future blocks.


I've dug out my second Spinning Stripes quilt which has remained untouched since my class with Shirley Mooney back in June 2015.

I started to assemble it as we had laid it out in the class, but I was really struggling to make sense of the pattern - see next photo below:

So I decided to ditch that idea, and instead make it similar to Shirley's original design - see below:

It meant I had to cut more triangles, but I still had enough fabric left, and I don't have any other special plans for that fabric.  I'm feeling better about it now.

Below is my first Spinning Stripes which I completed last year. You can read about it over here. 

Spinning Stripes v1.0 - finished in 2015

I've also finally started on my peacock tapestry cushion.  I've had this pack for over a year now, but I kept trying to finish other things first.

I used the excuse of going to Rotorua for starting this tapestry.  Hotel rooms always have bad lighting, so I need something with big holes so I can see what I am doing.  I don't know if I'll get any of it done, but I'm taking it with me when we go to Rotorua tomorrow.

Just a small start to test it out

I'm using tent stitch (continental) for those who are interested.

I'll be back next week with some tourist snaps from geyser land.  Yes, there is a quilt shop in Rotorua, and I have looked it up on google maps, but I am going to Rotorua for work, so I may not have time for fabric shopping.

Online Bloggers' Quilt Festival - Spinning Stripes

It's time for the Bloggers' Quilt Festival again, and once again I'm entering two quilts.

The first is my Spinning Stripes, which I finished in September.  I'm entering this quilt in the Mini Quilt section.

I learnt to make this quilt in a class run by my friend, Shirley Mooney.  She showed us how to turn this single piece of fabric into a stunning mini quilt.

I machine quilted this mini myself.  I spread the quilting over two weeks because there were so many ends to bury.

I'm really pleased with how this quilt turned out. It's my favourite greens and blues, and it's a very interesting design.  I have another version already cut and ready to piece soon.

This mini quilt measures 22" across.  Thank you for visiting.

Spinning Stripes is finished

The final item on my Q3 Finish A Long list was my Spinning Stripes mini quilt. I'm really pleased with how it turned out.  You can see my original post about this quilt here, but suffice to say, I made this lovely quilt:

 from this single piece of fabric.

Siren Song by Michael Miller fabrics

I'd been wanting to make a quilt like this ever since I saw this striking orange mini quilt at our national Symposium in January 2015.

by Shirley Mooney

It was made by Shirley Mooney, a very talented local quilter and tutor. Fortunately Shirley was running classes to learn to make this quilt, so I went along in June.  You can read about the class in this earlier blog post, and you can see more of Shirley's work here on her blog.

It's taken a few months to finish my quilt, mainly due to all the machine quilting required. Here's the back view:

I used three different colours of thread to quilt this, sometimes matching the fabric and sometimes contrasting. It's hard to show in a photo, but it is there, as the back proves.

So another mini quilt is finished, and once again, I really like it.  I still have another version of this quilt pinned to a sheet, waiting to be assembled.  That's what happens when you buy too much fabric - you just make another version.

Finished size is 22" high.

Spinning Stripes

Two weeks ago I attended a class with a very talented local quilter, Shirley Mooney.  We started with a single length of a stripey fabric, and a 60 degree triangle ruler. Through out the day we turned the fabric into something completely different.  

Siren Song by Michael Miller Fabrics

Shirley encouraged us to take photos on our phones and study how our arrangements looked on a smaller screen.  This was my first attempt:

Then it grew to look like this:

 Then I swapped out 3 of the centres and made all the centres dark, and that looked better:

Someone else in the class had the same fabric, but in pink and purple. She went for a different approach:
 

Another student had something completely different:

We spent the whole day cutting triangles and playing with the layout. Once we were happy with our layouts we pinned them to sheets and took them home to sew up.  The knack is in matching the stripes perfectly, as shown below.

Due to the care and attention needed to get the stripes matching correctly, I only got 2 columns sewn together the next day, and even they aren't 100% perfect, but I'll settle for 97.5% perfect in this case.

The rest is still pinned to the sheet, waiting to be joined up. Because I'd purchased plenty of fabric, I had enough to do 2 different designs, so I've got 2 designs pinned onto my sheet.  It's carefully strewn across my sewing table - I need to be careful that it doesn't accidentally get bundled into the washing machine. Imagine all those pins and triangles floating around in the washing machine.

I'll be certain to post more photos as this progress, but it's the start of our winter school holidays now, and my kids are off for 3 weeks. We've got a couple of trips planned so I don't expect to get a lot of sewing done in July.

Shirley has a blog called Don't Wait to Create, and is on Instagram with the same name. I recommend you take a look.