quiltology...

Sometimes we learn more from our mistakes than our successes.  And sometimes we can turn one of those mistakes into a big success.  That’s what Alice did with her recent attempt at the Urban Amish quilt pattern.  

Here’s the back story…Alice took the Intro to Patchwork class a few months ago and made a fun little boogie woogie quilt for the baby she’s expecting this winter.  Bitten by the quilting bug, she decided to try her hand at the Urban Amish quilt.  One bad cutting mistake later…and her pieces didn’t line up correctly for the original pattern. 

But that didn’t stop Alice!  No way.  In fact that simple little mistake led to another and then yet another.  And guess what?  A whole new design strategy emerged.  

Of course cutting rules are important to achieve the original design pattern.  So if that’s important to you, fix it.  Start over and recut.  Or you can think about using your “mistake” as a jumping off point for a whole new design direction and have some fun with it.  Afterall, spontaneity and improvisation may make things much more interesting! 

Katherine Hepburn once said, “If you obey all the rules, you’ll miss all the fun.”  

Alice’s quilt is definitely lots of fun!

We're coming up on my favorite time of the month--the last week of our intro to patchwork class--this is when the magic happens! 

After a little bit of rotary cutting and some time spent sewing the strip sets later--and then we get to the really fun part--playing with layout and color.  There's nothing like having a design wall because it gives you some much needed perspective.  Step back--does your eye move around?  It should--because the goal here is to achieve balance.  What you don't want is for your eye to go straight to a cluster of dark blues or light pinks.   

No worries--these projects evolve--you move something here--add something else over there--and then almost magically--viola--you've got it.  You nailed it and it feels great!

Hey--for all of you  who've been asking me for a weekend Urban Amish class--you got it.

We'll be offering the Intro to Patchwork class on Sunday afternoons in October--the 5th, 12th & 19th @ 1p to 4p.

We've also added in a session of the Sewing Machine Basics this coming Tuesday night (9/30 @ 6:30p to 8p) for all of you who need a little sewing tutorial. 

Feel free to call or email me for more info.

cu soon,

Colette 

Hey everybody—look what Sarah has been up to! 

She’s been busy making baby quilts for her girlfriends’ new little ones. Thank goodness she’s had some time to post the pictures to her blog.

Check them out…here’s a sneak peek.

Baby Posh—a new pattern from our friends at the Blue Underground Studios--is a modern interpretation of patchwork.  Sarah selected Kaffe Fassett’s classic paperweight print as her focus fabric—and then splurged for our super soft turquoise minkee as the backing.  Our friend Sally did the quilting on her long-arm machine, using a new retro pattern she downloaded from an Australian designer.  Simple--yet sophisticated.  What a lucky little baby!

And if you’ve been looking for way to use up those bits and pieces leftover from other projects, just take a look at what Sarah did with her scraps.  I spy Amy Butler, Heather Bailey and Chic Blooms from Art Gallery Quilts.  No piece goes unused here in Amy Butler’s classic wallpaper design quilt. The pattern is a free download—the piecing easy—and the result—fabulous! 

Don't be afraid to mix both small and large scale prints and then pop it with lots of color.  You can keep it all harmonous by playing the color value game.  When all your colors have the same intensity of color--they'll play nice together!

cu soon,

Every quilt has a story to tell—and Mary Ann’s Modern Thinking is no exception.

Would you believe that this blazing beauty once started out as a pile of beige fabrics? Oh sure, there were some other colors thrown in there—like taupe, ivory and tan—but basically we’re talking a whole lot of BORING! Even Mary Ann would concede this point. But that’s just the point—she took Amy Walsh’s class because she wanted to learn how to work with color. Enter Amy. Now I’m not exactly sure what happened here because I was busy upfront cutting fabric, but by the time Amy was done “adding” in a few colors, Mary Ann had a dazzling new color palette for her quilt.

Here’s the thing with color—you’ve got to go for it—just jump in the deep end. And then step back. Put it up on the design wall, move some stuff around, maybe add an element to unify it, like Mary Ann did with the center bars, and make it happen.

Modern Thinking -- a Blue Underground Studio pattern

Pieced by Mary Ann Manley with a little help from her friends at Quiltology.

Perfect, isn’t it?