Life as a Quilter -- Julia Graber

Thursday, December 26, 2013

Sailboats III and IV

I decided to take a reader, Karen’s comment and idea and just bind Sailboat III and call it good enough. And now, I rather like it. The fellow there steering is my nephew, Scott.

Sailboat III

$65 SOLD

7 7/8” X 10 1/2”

Materials: cotton fabric and an assortment of cotton and polyester thread

Techniques: fused and heavily quilted

Finished with “Fast Finished Triangles” and ready for hanging

And here is Scott again on Sailboat IV that I started HERE.

I like the effect the two layers of black tulle over the water give the piece.

Sailboat IV

$125 SOLD
7” X 10”

Materials: commercial cotton fabric, cotton and polyester thread, black tulle

Techniques: fused, machine quilted and machine free motion quilted, hand stitched binding to back

Finished with “Fast Finished Triangles” and ready for hanging

Wednesday, December 25, 2013

Shelves for my Quilting Thread

I have a boxed in place in my sewing room where we were going to mount the ironing board when we built the house and then be able to fold it up into the wall and close a door over it. Well, it never materialized and I like my ironing board parallel to the wall instead of perpendicular to the wall. My sister Emily suggested that we put shelves into the empty space and set my pretty quilting thread there. So … we got the materials and yesterday Paul worked on the shelves.

I donned rubber gloves and stained the wood.

Paul used to be a carpenter, by trade, and build houses, so when he asked me for a carpenters square all I had to offer him was my acrylic ruler for cutting fabric. He said that would work.

Now, will this be a temptation for the grandchildren?

Tuesday, December 24, 2013

Merry Christmas

Blessings to you this Christmas.

Saturday, December 21, 2013

Celtic Solstice and Sailboat Quilts

Life …

Paul with “the boys.” “The girls” all went away for Christmas.

Quinten is glad for some meat for their freezer.

… as a Quilter

I have finished step 1 and step 3 of Bonnie Hunter’s Celtic Solstice mystery quilt. I’m afraid the lavender and green don’t contrast enough!

In the mean time I pulled out my Sailboat III that I started earlier HERE and put it on my design wall (Patchwork Times). Perhaps I need to wash it again to get the green trees and green grass to bleed some more. It just seems to have too much going on. Any suggestions?

And now I have started Sailboat IV. My idea here is to use the same fabric in the reflection as I use in the sky, grass, and sailboat. Then I want to lay black toile over the water part which you can hardly see at the dark brown fabric in the picture below. Maybe I should add another layer or two to make the water darker. What do you think? After quilting it, I’ll add the top sailboat.