My Brown Quilt (WIP)
05-27-2011, 03:34 PM
#1
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Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: currently central new jersey
Posts: 8,623
about this time last year, my neighbor, a wonderful older lady, told me she was moving away to be closer to her daughter. i asked her over for coffee to say goodbye. when she came over she brought over a bag with some fabric she found who-knows-where from who-knows-when. when i looked inside and saw that it was olive green my heart danced. i love olive green. we had a nice coffee-time.
as soon as she was gone i ran down to the basement where i work and where the washer is. i yanked the fabric out of the bag and checked it out. yard and yards. great. no holes or other damages. i held it to the light and it was a little thinner than i like, but still usable. the color, also, was lighter than i like, but the price was right. all things considered, it was a go.
i washed it in hot water, dried it in hot cycle, 2 times. if she doesn't know where it came from, then i don't know where it was either. when it was done, the weave had tightened up some, so it was a little better. not as good as LQS, but still better than it was. but it was limp as a rag.
i spray-starched and ironed every square inch of that fabric to get some body back into it.
now, since i wasn't really crazy about the shade of olive or the quality, i decided that i should only choose a fast and easy pattern. i chose a quilters chache houndstooth
http://quilterscache.com/H/HoundstoothBlock.html
my husband cut the pattern out of acrylic for me and off i went. i started cutting all the green. ooops! some of the green was facing the wrong way. they all have to face up. oh, well. there's plenty more. cut, cut, cut! i cut all the green and i ended up with stacks of cut shapes, this time all the right way. now i needed to choose another color.
this is where things get tricky for me. i didn't pay anything for that green. i know i have so many left-over pieces from other projects that i don't have to buy anything for the other color (i had already decided on 2 colors). i also know that somewhere in the mountains of fabric in my shop, there is fabric from a commissioned job that was paid for by a customer, and then she changed her mind and didn't want it back. so it's a leftover that i'll never use for anything (i don't like it). now the question is: what works with the olive?
yellow looked like poison. orange frightened me. blue was drab, as was brown, black and purple. green clashed. the only thing that looked decent to me was ..... red. understand, i don't use my red scraps easily. i love them. i save them just to look at them. there isn't a shade of red that i don't like. and i really didn't want to use them on a quilt that i thought was only going to be so-so. so i wasted a lot of time pretending to keep looking for color.
finally i started cutting the reds. i had to acknowledge that there was no color that i overlooked. i just counted up the green and cut an equal amount of red. first, though, i did the same thing that i did with the green. yep! face-up, face-down. i was able to save some of the red by flipping them over and using the backs. the rest went back into the red bin.
now, we're into the summer. i'm working in a basement sewing room off a laundry room. i'm in new jersey. all together it's so humid, you can drink the air. even though i run a very efficient dehumidifier, you cannot win in new jersey. we have no a/c in the basement (but after this, we will have). each day i could only work for a few hours before i had to run away from there and catch my breath. between the humidity and the heat from the lamps, which i have a lot of, i became delusional. every day i put that day's work on the design wall. each day i attached one red piece to one green piece, slowly, slowly. up on the wall. finally i had all the blocks laid out in rows. now i needed the rows laid out. and i could see ..... it was so SMALL. i couldn't believe it. what looked like yards and yards before washing had become only yards after the sizing was gone. that sizing really bulked up that fabric and tricked me into thinking there was much more than there really was. NOW WHAT???
i had to push on. let the future take care of itself. i brought all the blocks to the t.v. room and sat with my husband while we watched. i pinned block to block. i said "isn't this a weird shade of olive?". he bent over and looked at it an said, "that's not olive. that's brown." i felt like crying. i hate brown. if i had known it was brown i would have given the filthy stuff away. i ran outside with it, hoping that if i looked at it in real light, he would be wrong. wrong! he was right! i sewed the rows and it went back to the wall. where it sat for months. everyone here got a good laugh except me. i hated that thing. first, using my precious reds. second, cutting the wrong way. third, too small, now, BROWN. i was determined to finish this somehow, but i couldn't get past hating it. weeks would go by and i wouldn't sew a stitch. even if i wanted to complete it, it would be too small. i had a million reasons to not do it. but i can't throw anything out, so it stayed there, staring at me.
finally, i took a row off the wall and went to joann to see if a could match it. hah. then i saw some real olive there, on sale half off. i knew it wasn't enough, but i took it all. i figured i would work something out. by this time i was flying by the seat of my pants. got home and washed and dried and ironed. starched. the whole 9 yards. and reeeeeally taking my time, too. then i started cutting the real olive and kept cutting until it was gone. then i cut an equal amount of *gasp* red. by now, i was hyperventilating, both from the effects of using all that red for a brown quilt and from the weather in the basement. by the turn of the year i could not even look at it. i had promised myself that i wouldn't start anything until i finished this thing.
i got it on the frame and my sweetie thought it would be terrific if i followed the shape of each and every piece on the inside of that piece. after trying it without the proper tools, i bought an extension table for the LA and a straightedge that's made to run the foot along to do straight line work. that's a brand-new skill set and i'm still not happy with the end result but i am happy that i'm getting to any end result.
and i still look for excuses to avoid working on it. the only thing i'm happy about is that i didn't spend money on it. i made the batting by putting pieces together. as soon as i saw that it was brown i stopped using anything good for it. oh, it will be fine. it just won't be first-class first-choice.
oh, my husband, who didn't like it at all on the wall, likes it now with the real olive green. and my son has his hand out, also.
EDIT: the colors in the center pic are pretty much true. and the finished size will be a little smaller than i like. it will finish at about 92 x 85 with 2 narrow borders. i like around 96 x 96.
as soon as she was gone i ran down to the basement where i work and where the washer is. i yanked the fabric out of the bag and checked it out. yard and yards. great. no holes or other damages. i held it to the light and it was a little thinner than i like, but still usable. the color, also, was lighter than i like, but the price was right. all things considered, it was a go.
i washed it in hot water, dried it in hot cycle, 2 times. if she doesn't know where it came from, then i don't know where it was either. when it was done, the weave had tightened up some, so it was a little better. not as good as LQS, but still better than it was. but it was limp as a rag.
i spray-starched and ironed every square inch of that fabric to get some body back into it.
now, since i wasn't really crazy about the shade of olive or the quality, i decided that i should only choose a fast and easy pattern. i chose a quilters chache houndstooth
http://quilterscache.com/H/HoundstoothBlock.html
my husband cut the pattern out of acrylic for me and off i went. i started cutting all the green. ooops! some of the green was facing the wrong way. they all have to face up. oh, well. there's plenty more. cut, cut, cut! i cut all the green and i ended up with stacks of cut shapes, this time all the right way. now i needed to choose another color.
this is where things get tricky for me. i didn't pay anything for that green. i know i have so many left-over pieces from other projects that i don't have to buy anything for the other color (i had already decided on 2 colors). i also know that somewhere in the mountains of fabric in my shop, there is fabric from a commissioned job that was paid for by a customer, and then she changed her mind and didn't want it back. so it's a leftover that i'll never use for anything (i don't like it). now the question is: what works with the olive?
yellow looked like poison. orange frightened me. blue was drab, as was brown, black and purple. green clashed. the only thing that looked decent to me was ..... red. understand, i don't use my red scraps easily. i love them. i save them just to look at them. there isn't a shade of red that i don't like. and i really didn't want to use them on a quilt that i thought was only going to be so-so. so i wasted a lot of time pretending to keep looking for color.
finally i started cutting the reds. i had to acknowledge that there was no color that i overlooked. i just counted up the green and cut an equal amount of red. first, though, i did the same thing that i did with the green. yep! face-up, face-down. i was able to save some of the red by flipping them over and using the backs. the rest went back into the red bin.
now, we're into the summer. i'm working in a basement sewing room off a laundry room. i'm in new jersey. all together it's so humid, you can drink the air. even though i run a very efficient dehumidifier, you cannot win in new jersey. we have no a/c in the basement (but after this, we will have). each day i could only work for a few hours before i had to run away from there and catch my breath. between the humidity and the heat from the lamps, which i have a lot of, i became delusional. every day i put that day's work on the design wall. each day i attached one red piece to one green piece, slowly, slowly. up on the wall. finally i had all the blocks laid out in rows. now i needed the rows laid out. and i could see ..... it was so SMALL. i couldn't believe it. what looked like yards and yards before washing had become only yards after the sizing was gone. that sizing really bulked up that fabric and tricked me into thinking there was much more than there really was. NOW WHAT???
i had to push on. let the future take care of itself. i brought all the blocks to the t.v. room and sat with my husband while we watched. i pinned block to block. i said "isn't this a weird shade of olive?". he bent over and looked at it an said, "that's not olive. that's brown." i felt like crying. i hate brown. if i had known it was brown i would have given the filthy stuff away. i ran outside with it, hoping that if i looked at it in real light, he would be wrong. wrong! he was right! i sewed the rows and it went back to the wall. where it sat for months. everyone here got a good laugh except me. i hated that thing. first, using my precious reds. second, cutting the wrong way. third, too small, now, BROWN. i was determined to finish this somehow, but i couldn't get past hating it. weeks would go by and i wouldn't sew a stitch. even if i wanted to complete it, it would be too small. i had a million reasons to not do it. but i can't throw anything out, so it stayed there, staring at me.
finally, i took a row off the wall and went to joann to see if a could match it. hah. then i saw some real olive there, on sale half off. i knew it wasn't enough, but i took it all. i figured i would work something out. by this time i was flying by the seat of my pants. got home and washed and dried and ironed. starched. the whole 9 yards. and reeeeeally taking my time, too. then i started cutting the real olive and kept cutting until it was gone. then i cut an equal amount of *gasp* red. by now, i was hyperventilating, both from the effects of using all that red for a brown quilt and from the weather in the basement. by the turn of the year i could not even look at it. i had promised myself that i wouldn't start anything until i finished this thing.
i got it on the frame and my sweetie thought it would be terrific if i followed the shape of each and every piece on the inside of that piece. after trying it without the proper tools, i bought an extension table for the LA and a straightedge that's made to run the foot along to do straight line work. that's a brand-new skill set and i'm still not happy with the end result but i am happy that i'm getting to any end result.
and i still look for excuses to avoid working on it. the only thing i'm happy about is that i didn't spend money on it. i made the batting by putting pieces together. as soon as i saw that it was brown i stopped using anything good for it. oh, it will be fine. it just won't be first-class first-choice.
oh, my husband, who didn't like it at all on the wall, likes it now with the real olive green. and my son has his hand out, also.
EDIT: the colors in the center pic are pretty much true. and the finished size will be a little smaller than i like. it will finish at about 92 x 85 with 2 narrow borders. i like around 96 x 96.
variegated thread
[ATTACH=CONFIG]203188[/ATTACH]
olive and brown comparison
[ATTACH=CONFIG]203189[/ATTACH]
overall appearance before quilting
[ATTACH=CONFIG]203190[/ATTACH]
05-27-2011, 03:49 PM
#6
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Jan 2008
Location: currently central new jersey
Posts: 8,623
thank you both.
with enclosed straight-line quilting, i couldn't find a starting and stopping place for the thread ends without obviously overlapping.
i stall have to go back and re-do the first 2 rows at the beginning, before i got that extension table.
with enclosed straight-line quilting, i couldn't find a starting and stopping place for the thread ends without obviously overlapping.
i stall have to go back and re-do the first 2 rows at the beginning, before i got that extension table.
05-27-2011, 03:52 PM
#8
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Join Date: Dec 2010
Location: Grants Pass, Oregon
Posts: 3,360
I like that quilt. Can you PLEASE PLEASE TELL ME..Is that stitching you have on each peice is that Called Stitch in the Ditch? I really can not figure out what it is and really want to know so I can use it if I have to. If not can someone put up a very close up picture of Stitch in the Ditch for me? Thanks everyone.
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