2 Wishes in QUILTS AND MORE (Spring 2013)

Hello Friends, you have seen my Watercolor Sketches quilt in the Spring 2013 issue of Quilts and More.  Click on quilt name to view more pictures of the quilt.

Today I am sharing with you the other project that is featured in the same magazine issue – my 2 Wishes pillows.

[image source: Meredith Corporation]

These pillows are quite different from my usual endeavors… and they had been most fun for me to make.  Here are a few more shots in different angles.  A sort of “ying yang” effect is achieve by using contrasting yellow on gray, and vice versa.

The 2 Wishes stitchery mimics dandelions that Miss Baby loves to pick whenever she is outside this time of year.

The fabrics are from Robert Kaufman’s Kona Solid collection, and the threads are DMC cotton embroidery threads.  The stitching on 2 Wishes was hand done by yours truly using only straight stitches and occasional lazy daisies to keep the project simple and straightforward.

I am not fond of stitching with a hoop.  So, to get around that, I lined my main fabric with a piece of thin batting and another piece of fabric — the stitching also turns out looking a bit more dimensional, as seen from the slight “poof”.

I hope you have enjoyed my “perfect for Spring” 2 Wishes pillows.

I am curious to know if you have 2 wishes this Spring.  I can tell you one of Miss Baby’s 2 wishes would be “I wish to be outside playing…”

Have a great day!

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My 2013 lineup thus far besides “2 Wishes” – click on the links for more information:

Annie’s Love Those Precuts Book (January 2013):  Apple of My Eye

Annie’s Sweet Layer Cakes (April 2013): Sunburst Melody, to be posted

Fons and Porter Easy Quilts (Spring 2013): Baubles, Baubles

Fons and Porter Easy Quilts (Summer 2013): Curious Cats

Fons and Porter Easy Quilts (Summer 2013): Fabrique Foursome, to be posted

Fons and Porter’s Love of Quilting (March/April 2013):  Now I know my ABC’s

Machine Quilting Unlimited (March/April 2013): Quilting Curvy Feathers

Quilt Trends (Winter 2013, Cover Quilt): Tango

Quilts and More (Spring 2013):  Watercolor Sketches

Quilter’s World (February 2013): New Life

Quilter’s World (April 2013): Monkey Around

Quilter’s World (Summer 2013): Garden Mist, to be posted

Quilter’s World QUICK & EASY QUILTS (Spring 2013): In & Out

Quilter’s World QUICK & EASY QUILTS (Spring 2013): Garden Maze

Simple Quilts & Sewing (Spring 2013):  Stained Glass

The Quilter (December 2012/January 2013): Not Too Square

The Quilter (April/May 2013):  In the Meadow

Benartex Free Pattern (March 2013): Pumpkin Patch/Autumn Fauna

Benartex Free Pattern (March 2013): Flora Linda/Catalina

Quilting Treasures Free Pattern (January 2013): Mediterranean Dream

Quilting Treasures Free Pattern (February 2013): Butterfly Kisses

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Stained Glass in SIMPLE QUILTS & SEWING (Spring 2013)

Hello Friends!  I hope your week is shaping up well.  Mine got off with a busy start.  My little family took the day off yesterday and headed to the Federal City to see the cherry blossoms.

Nonetheless, work wasn’t too far off my mind.  Despite the crowds that flocked to the Tidal Basin, I was able to take a few styled shots of my Stained Glass quilt that is featured in the latest Simple Quilts and Sewing issue (Spring 2013).  Stained Glass is another quilt I felt that needs to be photographed outdoors, and the National Cherry Blossom Festival provided the perfect backdrop.

This modifiled 4-patch quilt design is simple, but made to have a more sophisticated look with the use of many fabrics!   One’s eye is drawn to the different sections of the quilt because of the colors incorporated in this quilt.  The fabrics I used for this quilt are from Benartex‘s Triple-dyed Naturescape Bali fabrics.  Thread Bear Fabrics (phone: 770-781-0001) is offering the kits to make this quilt for $49.99.  Click here to purchase the kit, or here to purchase the kit consisting twice the fabrics to make a larger quilt.

I added another design element to the overall design by using quilting motifs that were different from the geometric makeup of the block – and thus creating a secondary design using the quilting, instead of the block layout.

Quilting was done with Aurifil Mako 50 threads over Hobbs Tuscany Silk Batting.  Even though this is a quilt without borders, and normally I would be hesitant to do any sort of fancy quilting on border-less quilts other than straight lines… these Bali fabrics (seem to have a tighter weave) held up really well from being handled in all possible fashions when I was quilting it, and the quilt suffered almost no shape distortion after the quilting part was completed.

I used different colored threads to quilt Stained Glass to match the scrappy look of the quilt top.  So there are some interesting visual effects.

What would I do without my little lovely assistant?!  Miss Baby was most concerned my quilt would fall into the Tidal Basin when draped on the safety rail!!  You might remember me smocking that dress eons ago — it’s finally finished and worn, with help from my dear friend, Annelle!

Thanks for stopping by, Dear Friends.  I hope you liked my Stained Glass quilt.  Do tell me what you think of the quilt, and what you would do differently on a quilt like this.  I am always ready to learn from you.

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My 2013 lineup thus far besides “Stained Glass” – click on the links for more information:

Annie’s Love Those Precuts Book (January 2013):  Apple of My Eye

Annie’s Sweet Layer Cakes (April 2013): Sunburst Melody, to be posted

Fons and Porter Easy Quilts (Spring 2013): Baubles, Baubles

Fons and Porter Easy Quilts (Summer 2013): Curious Cats

Fons and Porter Easy Quilts (Summer 2013): Fabrique Foursome, to be posted

Fons and Porter’s Love of Quilting (March/April 2013):  Now I know my ABC’s

Machine Quilting Unlimited (March/April 2013): Quilting Curvy Feathers

Quilt Trends (Winter 2013, Cover Quilt): Tango

Quilts and More (Spring 2013):  Watercolor Sketches

Quilts and More (Spring 2013):  2 Wishes, to be posted

Quilter’s World (February 2013): New Life

Quilter’s World (April 2013): Monkey Around

Quilter’s World QUICK & EASY QUILTS (Spring 2013): In & Out

Quilter’s World QUICK & EASY QUILTS (Spring 2013): Garden Maze

The Quilter (December 2012/January 2013): Not Too Square

The Quilter (April/May 2013):  In the Meadow

Benartex Free Pattern (March 2013): Pumpkin Patch/Autumn Fauna

Benartex Free Pattern (March 2013): Flora Linda/Catalina

Quilting Treasures Free Pattern (January 2013): Mediterranean Dream

Quilting Treasures Free Pattern (February 2013): Butterfly Kisses

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A bit of sappiness on 1,000,000 views!

Dear Friends, I hope you have had a good week.  This week has been an exciting week at Ivory Spring in that we passed the 1,000,000 mark in page views on this blog!  I want to thank you all for your visits and comments, and more importantly, your encouragement over the years!

I have enjoyed meeting all of you, and having you as friends!  So many of you have become fixtures in my life.  I start worrying about you if I don’t hear from you for a few days.

Many of you write me in the middle of the night just to share a word of encouragement – words cannot express how much I appreciate those middle of the night emails when I am up alone working away.  Many of you write to share prayer requests – I feel honored that you entrust me with your prayer requests.  Many of you just write and share with me your life story – I love reading your stories!  Many of you send pictures of your work – you know I just absolutely love to see what you are working on.

So many things have happened since I started my blog.  I became a mother, and on top of that, I became a full-fledged quilt designer.  Many of you have been so dear and sweet toward me almost from the very beginning, and have seen my life morph into a chaotically busy mess.   My “bloggy” inner circle continues to expand as I got to know more and more of you.  I want to thank all of you for being a part of my life!  I count you as God’s blessings in my life!  Again, THANK YOU!

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#1 To celebrate Ivory Spring’s 1,000,000,  Annie’s agreed to offer a free class for my Learn to Machine Quilt class as a giveaway prize!  So, if you haven’t signed up for my class, and are still thinking about it — here is your chance to maybe win a free class.  If you are not familiar with the class, click here and here to find out more.  Comments are accepted between now and 4/5/2013.

To be entered in the giveaway:  Please share about what online quilting classes you would like Annie’s to offer in the future.

#2.  Now, if you have already signed up for my class, you have a chance to win a Throw Size (60″ x 60″) Hobbs Tuscany Silk Batting!  If you have followed me for a while, you know I almost exclusively quilt with Hobbs Tuscany Silk Batting for all my magazine projects.  Comments are accepted between now and 4/5/2013.

To be entered in the giveaway:  Please share about what you think of my online Learn to Machine Quilt class.

Thank you, Dear Friends!  I wish you a lovely weekend.  I will come by on Monday with another 1,000,000 giveaway.  Stay tuned.

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“Quilting Curvy Feathers” in MACHINE QUILTING UNLIMITED (March/April 2013)

Hello Friends!  Before I even saw my copy, some of you had written to me with kind words about my “Quilting Curvy Feathers” article in the latest March/April 2013 issue of Machine Quilting Unlimited!  I really appreciate the positive feedback on the article.

This is my first time ever being published in Machine Quilting Unlimited.  If you are unfamiliar with that magazine, it is an amazing publication that features works of HUGE HUGE names in machine quilting.  [I am a HUGE fan of Sandra Leichner!] Click here to subscribe.

As I often share with you, I am just a wee fish in the vast ocean of quilting, and oftentimes swimming upstream. I am learning and experimenting like everyone else, with LOTS more to learn and experiment.  To have something featured in Machine Quilting Unlimited seems unreal to me, even after seeing the article in print.

I say all that to encourage you to take the plunge to machine quilt — you might really enjoy yourself along the way and end up one of the HUGE HUGE names I talked about!  I also want to take the opportunity to thank you all for being my friends, sharing with me my machine quilting journey – albeit a rather wee journey!  Quilt on, my quilting friends — and hugs to you all, even if you don’t quilt.

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My 2013 lineup thus far besides “Quilting Curvy Feathers” – click on links for more information:

Fons and Porter Easy Quilts (Spring 2013): Baubles, Baubles

The Quilter (December 2012/January 2013): Not Too Square

Quilt Trends (Winter 2013, Cover Quilt): Tango

Quilter’s World (February 2013): New Life

Quilter’s World (April 2013): Monkey Around

Quilter’s World QUICK & EASY QUILTS (Spring 2013): In & Out

Quilter’s World QUICK & EASY QUILTS (Spring 2013): Garden Maze

Annie’s Love Those Precuts Book (January 2013):  Apple of My Eye

Fons and Porter’s Love of Quilting (March/April 2013):  Now I know my ABC’s

Quilts and More (Spring 2013):  2 Wishes, to be posted

Quilts and More (Spring 2013):  Watercolor Sketches, to be posted

The Quilter (April/May 2013):  In the Meadow, to be posted

Quilting Treasures Free Pattern (January 2013): Mediterranean Dream

Quilting Treasures Free Pattern (February 2013): Butterfly Kisses

Benartex Free Pattern (March 2013): Pumpkin Patch/Autumn Fauna

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Thread Talk from My Sewing Machine #45

Hi Friends, I hope you are well.

From my experience as a domestic machine quilter, it is easier to tackle quilting motifs in small scale when quilting using a domestic sewing machine.  The workable quilting area around the needle of the machine is generally no larger than 6″ or so – that’s why, I find quilting dense quilting much more manageable than trying to quilt “longarm style” on my domestic machine.  But sometimes, certain quilts just require longarm style quilting with the quilting motifs being quilted in a much larger scale and further apart…

I thought I would share with you a few thoughts on how I did the embellished swirly vine “longarm style” on this quilt I recently completed…

#1.  I made sure I mastered the basics first in small scale before moving up.  The “basics” in this case is my swirly vine.  I made sure I was able to quilt the motif well with all the curves being quilted without any jaggedness before moving up the scale.  You can read more about the swirly vine in a Thread Talk post here, or you can see it done in my “Learn to Machine Quilt” online class here.

[image source:  Swirly Vine from my Annie's "Learn to Machine Quilt" class]

#2.  I made sure I also mastered totally free-handing the motif and am able to quilt the motif comfortably all over the quilt before attempting to add any fancy strokes.  If you aren’t comfortable in quilting free-hand, you might consider doodling on paper first.  I place great value in doodling on paper in my “Learn to Machine Quilt” online class.

Now, if you are past #1 and #2, and are ready to dress up the swirly vine motif and make a totally quilting motif out of it, here are the schematics.

These are the swirly vines drawn in a much larger scale.  The starting swirl at the top right corner is about 2 1/2″ in length just so you get an idea about the scaling.

2.  If you are comfortable quilting these swirls with no major hiccups, you can add some petal lobes at the base of the swirl before you head off again to start another swirl.  See if the following schematic makes sense to you.

3.  You only have to echo around the lobes to get out to start another swirl.  See what I mean?

4.  Repeat until the quilting area is quilted.

5.  Here, you see the quilted reality.

I hope this gives you an idea on dressing up the basic quilting motifs you have been using.Thanks for stopping by.  Hugs to you all!

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FREE PATTERN: Mediterranean Dream

Happy Friday, Friends!  I am excited to share with you another free downloadable pattern.   This 88″ x 88″ quilt is designed using Quilting Treasures’ newly released fabric line Mediterranean Dream.  Click here to see the full fabric range.  You might recall I just completed a quilt using fabrics from the same line, posted here.

This quilt is both pieced and appliqued.

It was fun to see the quilt design making appearances in…

an ad in The Quilter (Feb/March 2013),

and in Hancock’s of Paducah’s early 2013 catalog.  You can also purchase the kit by clicking here.

All that to say — I would love to see you make this quilt!!!  Click here to download the pattern for free.

Have a great weekend, dear Friends.  I will show you my “Iron Man” quilt next week – that’s what I have been working on all this week.

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Jean’s Quilt made from Annie’s “Learn to Machine Quilt” Class

Miss Baby:  Mom, when I grow bigger, you can teach me how to push the quilt under the machine.

My commentary:  I think that’s Miss Baby’s perception of “free-motion quilting” – where I “push” the quilt under my sewing machine.  I just love how a four-year-old defines free-motion quilting, don’t you?

Well, maybe when Miss Baby is bigger, she can take my “Learn to Machine Quilt” class – because the techniques featured in the class are selected to help quilters master the skill of “pushing” moving their quilt sandwiches underneath the oftentimes small and limited throat space of their domestic machines. HA!

Jean of Arkansas made my day when she sent me pictures of her quilt made from the “Learn to Machine Quilt” class.  Jean has also graciously allowed me to share those pictures with you.

You can see that center square of Jean’s quilt is a replica of my class project.  She added borders made with fabrics she had picked up in France to make the class project into a very attractive table topper!  Very creatively done, Jean!

You can see Jean’s “Double Echoing” and Jester’s Hat” motifs in the following close-up shot…

… as well as her cross-hatching, pebbles and stippling.

Very nice work, Jean!  Thank you for sharing the pictures with us.  Please tell Jean she did a great job, would you?

[In case you are new to Ivory Spring, my "Learn to Machine Quilt" is an online class offered by Annie's.  It is designed with flexibility in mind - you can sign up anytime, watch, learn, and work on your class project at your leisure.  The class is yours to keep forever once you purchase the class.  Quite a few Ivory Spring readers have written to tell me they have signed up and on their way to experiencing the joy of machine quilting.  I hope you will let me come alongside and help you jumpstart your machine quilting journey as well.  Click here to watch a free preview, and sign up for the class.  Maybe I will see in "class"?]

Thanks for stopping by, Friends.  Come back tomorrow as I will be sharing yet another free pattern!

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Stars of Hope in Fons and Porter’s LOVE OF QUILTING (November/December 2012)

Hello Friends, I thought I would share with you another magazine feature today.  My Stars of Hope quilt made it in Fons and Porter‘s Love of Quilting November/December 2012 issue!

[image source: Fons and Porter]

This is offered as a free downloadable pattern by Fons and Porter.  Click here to download pattern instructions.

Here are a few shots of the individual blocks:

The fabrics I used for this table topper are from Benartex’s Star of Hope collection.  The fabrics are really rich in colors.  Click here to view the full range of fabrics.  You may recall I have actually designed another quilt (“Wintertide”) with the same fabric collection.  Click here to download the free pattern instructions for Wintertide.

Quilting was done with Aurifil Mako 50 Cotton threads over Hobbs Tuscany Silk batting.  I just quilted “ringlets” (aka circles) to add a bit of texture to the already busy look of the quilt.

I am reminded of the chorus in “We Three Kings of Orient Are”…

“O Star of wonder, star of night
Star with royal beauty bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to Thy perfect light”

I do hope you are blessed by the Star of wonder as you go about your Christmas preparations.  Thanks for stopping by.

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Thread Talk from my Sewing Machine #43

Hello Friends, I hope you are doing well.  I am sharing with you a quilting trick I fortuitously discovered when I was quilting my Home Sweet Home quilt.  [I love that word "fortuitous" -- it was a word taught to me by a dear Chemical Engineering professor in college when I would go see him in his office.  More often than not, he would give me the "word of the day" after he was done teaching me engineering stuff.]

If you look at the image below, you will see that I added little “what-nots” at the tip of some feathers to fill in the geometry of either square or triangle patches.

The reason I did that is because I was trying to fit rounded feather lobes into the geometry of a square or a triangle, and sometimes it’s just impossible to quilt a feather large or narrow enough to fit the quilting area and have the feathers still look decent.  So I came up with the “what-not-companion” approach.  See the below images to see what I mean…

You can see in the following the aforementioned “what-nots” in action.  You will need to study the images a bit to find the “what-nots” since the quilting was done tone-on-tone.

I hope the “what-nots” trick would come in handy for you when you are quilting feathers to fit quilting area of fixed geometry.  Notice this post does not deal with how to quilt feathers — that topic is already covered here.

Thanks for stopping by!  A huge quilty hug to all my friends!

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Behind the scenes… & Giveaway!

Dear Friends, I hope you have had a great start to your week!  First of all, I want to thank you all for your encouraging words on my Annie’s Learn to Machine Quilt class.  Click on the Annie’s Online Classes on my blog sidebar to access the webpage of my Learn to Machine Quilt class.

The class has generated a bit of talk within my inner circle after they viewed some of the clips.  The comments I have gotten are something like the following:

• You look chic and metropolitan!
• What?  You had a manicure, pink at that!

You see, on a decent day, I look like this – in my plain Jane self who’d rather do anything else than think about how best to apply blusher on my cheeks!  I normally leave that sort of thing to my beloved sister.  That’s why it’s a little shocking for my close friends and family to see me all decked out for the video clips, I supposed.

For the video shoot, Amy the professional stylist extraordinaire wielded her make-up brushes and transformed my look into totally chic!  How amazing is that?  I was tempted to pack Amy in my suitcase to bring her home with me after the shoot was over.  Back to the hair, it took me 3 washes to wash out the hairspray – you could probably guess-timate the amount of hairspray sprayed on my crown!  I thought to myself at one point a basketball would have no problem or whatsoever bouncing off my hair!

The video shoot took about 16 hours – two full grueling days of work for everyone involved.  Now I have no problem speaking in public, but having to speak into a camera with a teleprompter outside of a classroom setting with no real audience, that took some getting use to.  For a short while after I returned home, my mind would automatically switch to the “teleprompter” mode whenever I saw a string of words.

I did work with some really nice people though, and we settled into a nice working rhythm that almost always went like this:  “Wendy, give a big smile”, “I need you to do that with a smile”, “Could you do that again and smile?”, “Tug on your blouse, Wendy”, and “Smile!” etc.

After we were done, the very capable staff at Annie’s then threw the footage from the near 16 hour shoot into a blender, and hit the crush button, and out came this nice presentation on Learning to Machine Quilt.  How cool is that…

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Lightheartedness aside, I would like to share with you a story.

Quite a few years ago, there was a girl who didn’t dare to order something over the phone off of a catalog because she got nervous speaking English to a stranger, fearing that she wouldn’t be understood.  It’s not that she didn’t know the language.  She did, but just wasn’t comfortable speaking to strangers.  So, her husband would always have to order.

In time, she learned to be a bit bolder, and somehow stumbled herself into studying Chemical Engineering in Graduate School where she had the sole responsibility of calling about technical support on complicated equipment systems.  She was also responsible in conducting various experiments that at times totally overwhelmed her.  It was a time of personal growth where the girl learned to trust in God, and gain confidence in what she did.

That girl is me.  From one who didn’t dare to speak with strangers over the phone to one who felt extremely honored to be asked to do the class for Annie’s.  This online class has definitely been a time of personal growth spurt for me, not to mention it being another Philippians 4:13 experience as well. I am thankful to God for the opportunities to grow in various stages of my life.  And I want to take this opportunity to thank you all for your ever encouraging support.

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GIVEAWAY!

Now for the surprise I mentioned in last Friday’s post, you will be entered into a giveaway for a free “Learn to Machine Quilt” class between now and next Monday (11/12/2012) if you leave a comment about what other online quilting classes you would personally like to see – I would love to see specifics.  You can still leave comments about anything related to the post content (PLEASE DO!), but just won’t be entered into the giveaway if no suggestion about quilting classes is mentioned.

Thanks for stopping by!  Come back tomorrow if you want to catch a glimpse of a sewing machine used to make (some of) Queen Elizabeth’s outfits!

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