Stones-from commercial fabric

In between the painstaking work of piecing the black tier of Shelter, I've worked on this simple quilt top, made from the pile of stone-looking commercial fabric I bought a couple of years ago, when I thought I would be using it for appliqued stones. In a previous post, I described what I eventually did with all the background fabric I had cut up for that project (along with some images of the trial applique blocks that I abandoned). And now this was a way to use the "stone" fabric. (The top is 56 x 73", with each block the size of a brick.) I'm not sure if the stripey black/gray blocks are a mistake, or if they liven it up a bit.

After I thought of doing blocks the size/shape of bricks, I had fun looking up "brick patterns" in a Google image search--certainly many other possibilities adaptable to quilting.

A compromise solution

Three commenters on the last post told me that the value range in the turquoise looked fine to them--very helpful to have this feedback, which leads me to a compromise plan. I've pinned turquoise strips up over some of the darker teal/green strips, but not over all of them. This looks like the right direction to me. A big relief. This gives me the energy to finish up the piecing and sewing of the black tier, and then I'll go back to re-work the turquoise a bit.

A new problem with Shelter

I've strip-pieced most of the black strata needed, and stuck them up on the design wall, pinning the other tiers in place so I could get a glimpse of the whole. The little tags on the turquoise are marking spots I was planning on altering. But now I see a larger problem. The turquoise tier has a much wider range of value than any of the others, and I don't think that works. I think I'll need to revise more deeply, taking out/covering up the dark teals. Of course I could go the other direction--add more value range in the other tiers. But I think a smaller range is more in keeping with my vision of the piece--and adding a wider range for black isn't possible in any case.

I want to feel closer to the finish line with this piece. . . Instead of getting easier as I go, the challenges keep adding up. I have to keep the mantra of "persistence" in mind.

Curved piecing two ways

I'll be teaching a workshop for my guild in June on curved piecing, and spent today finishing up the samples--placemats made using two different methods. The first one, above, is done in a "quilt-as-you-go" method, using thin straight strips that are manipulated into curves as you sew. I learned this method from my friend Mary Beth; I think it must be the same method used by Ann Brauer, whose gorgeous work I saw in a show a few years ago. The fabric above is an assortment of Japanese Daiwabo fabric. The second placemat was done by laying wider strips of fabric on top of the other, right sides up, overlapping a bit, and cutting the curve one wants. This way one can get deeper "waves."

I've collected instructions for this second method from several sources. Brenda Gael Smith's instructions are especially clear--see any of her patterns that include curved piecing, available on her web site.

More snow

We've had more snow in the midwest this week, so I took advantage of it to continue with snowdyeing. I'd like to build up a reserve of pieces that I can use as backs for baby quilts. Above is a detail of a piece done with coral and teal dye, plus a little dusty lavendar/rose. The coral and teal are complementary colors, so there's also brown where they mix. I wondered if it would all turn a muddy color, but it didn't. Below is the beginning of the process, the dye squirted onto about 5" of snow, which is sitting on top of the fabric, which is on a cooling rack, which is sitting in my basement sink.

Here's the whole piece of fabric, about 42x46". More white than I wanted, and big blotches of coral. Well, maybe this one will get cut up instead of being a back.

A second piece was done with just two dyes, blue and yellow. The green you see is from the dyes immediately mixing together.

They mixed so much that the piece is a definite study in green, with only one spot towards the bottom where the yellow remains on its own. I think this one will make a nice backing.
And a couple of more details from the first piece:

Time for Black

I've finished piecing and basting the orange-red tier of "Shelter" (photo at end of post), and am now moving on to the final tier of black. Each tier has posed new challenges--up to this point all issues of construction and piecing. For the black tier, the challenge is in color/value. The blue, turquoise, and orange-red tiers have used variation in value (and to some extent in color) for contrast within the piecing. But lighter values of black would bring in gray, and I don't think that belongs. So I'm going to try variations in texture, variations in color (blue/black, brown/black), and a very little bit of variation in value to dark gray. The very dark black in the photo above is velvet, which I got for texture, but it also does value. In the photo below, you can see a bit of the brownish and bluish batiks as well; for some reason everything except the thin bit of velvet looks gray here, but they are black in real life.

And here's a shot of the orange-red tier, with one strata of blacks up against it for a glimpse of what is to come:

Solids

I decided to try the zig-zag pattern with solids; another baby quilt, 36x39. I have a large stash of solids and I thought I'd be able to pretty randomly pick 12 colors, but it wasn't so easy. I'm happy with the mix I chose. Amy Walsh has a great pattern with all solids ("Color Cues") in the April 2010 issue of American Patchwork & Quilting, and she comments in the article that "there's no substitute" for working with solids "when it comes to practicing your color expertise.

Then I decided to play with the scraps that I got when trimming the edges of the quilt. I had to make up a couple of blocks new to go into the piece, and I would have had to make a few more to get enough choice to be 100% satisfied. But I decided that 85% satisfied was good enough for this one below, which is 12x12. (The chalk marks are left over from marking the quilt--they'll come out easily.)

Since I started dyeing my own fabric, I've been less drawn to commercial solids. The colors seem somewhat harsh to me (because of the total uniformity of color), and the most readily available solids for the retail buyer are Kona cotton, which is heavier than I like to use. But it was good to come back to them for these projects. For brights and contrast, they're a great choice.

Another option for solids is shot cotton, which is a much thinner fabric (works even for applique), and which has a softer, more complex look than the solid Kona cottons because most pieces have a different color for the vertical and horizontal threads. This is the fabric I used in the "Spectrum" quilt. My sister was interested in a wall-hanging similar to this quilt, so she bought me a great collection of 60 different Kaffe Fassett shot cottons, 1/4 yd each, and I get to make quilts! Thanks, Cookie.

You can see the shot cottons, along with other beautiful fabric at the "Glorious Color" website.

And then there's the option of using fabric I dye myself, but I've got to do a lot more dyeing before that happens. . .