Hopeful Homemaker

Awake , Arise , and… what’s next?  Stand.  I’m here tonight to show you my newest pattern design, the Stand Quilt .  It’s the 3rd pattern in my Resolute Collection, which is a small collection of quilt patterns inspired by simple but powerful words.  A few favorite definitions of “stand” are “to remain upright in a moral sense, to be fixed or steady, to endure, or to maintain one’s ground”. Life offers us countless opportunities to stand, therefore, we must choose where and how we do it.

Stand is a simple design, made complex as block sizes grow and shrink.  Standing for something that matters is a lot like that.  A simple act, but we have to grow and shrink the ways we do it if we want to make a difference.  It’s simple but complex.  Easy and hard.  Consistent yet changing.   It’s a two color quilt, making fabric selection simple  (3.25 yards per color).  It also has an option to remove the borders on the left and right sides.  If it gets tedious, you can skip them.  I’ll share photos of a quilt like that soon.  With the side borders, it measures 56″ x 64″.

This pattern collection has been fun for me to work on.  In many ways, it’s me, being more “me” than ever before in my quilting.  Bringing together things I love deeply:  quilts, and words, feels very authentic.  I’ve loved words all my life.  Choosing a word, or a sequence of them, based on where I am and where I wish to go, bridging multiple facets of life, was fun.  And totally ME.  It’s probably a series I could continue forever, but I won’t.

Picking a word and then designing a quilt for what that word means to me, was challenging.  A challenge I enjoyed thoroughly.  I’m sure all of us would design something totally different if this was a group exercise.  But I’ve enjoyed the process, learned good things, and each design has surprised me in its own way.  I used my scraps to design the quilt back.

I’m learning to be  intentional and careful about what I stand for and how I do it – big and small ways, obvious and subtle, private and public.  The Stand Quilt pattern is now available here in my Etsy shop .  I hope you’ll make one with me!

Happy Sewing!

After sharing my Heather Ross Awake Quilt last week, it’s time for my Arise Quilt , take two.  This version was actually the first one I made, using fabrics from several different designers.  I really love this quilt and have been snuggling with it all week.

This version uses color differently than my Tula Pink Curiouser and Curiouser Arise Quilt , such as lighter, less dramatic fabrics at the edge and a fussy cut sashing strip.  It was a joy to make.  This pattern is a fussy-cutting dream and I took every opportunity to do it.  First up was the birds, designed by Kathy Doughty, which I bought just because I love them.  And the colors.  In fact, several fabrics in this quilt were designed by Kathy, including the fun plaid.

I also fussy cut some hymns, artwork I have long admired from Fancy That Design House. And that tiny checkered fabric was begging to be used in some clever way.  It creates subtle movement around the perimeter of the quilt and is one of those things that looks better as you get closer.  I like having that in a quilt.

The gorgeous floral design in the sashing was is also a Kathy Doughty fabric.  When I first bought it, I pictured something like this with it.  Arise gave me the perfect opportunity.

Of course there is some Kaffe, both florals and dots.  And more birds in different colors.

There are fabrics in this quilt from at least 10 different designers, and they all work together beautifully.   It’s my favorite kind of sewing.  It hit me today that when I sew from a collection, it feels like putting a puzzle together.  Where does each fabric fit?  But when I sew using any fabric in my studio, just because it feels like the right one?  That’s like painting.  It’s more exhilarating to me.  More risky, too, perhaps.  But infinitely more fun.

I keep working at my longarm quilting skills, always worried I’m about to ruin a quilt.  Somehow they all end up being quilts that are at least useful.  For this Awake Quilt take two, I quilted a wonky rainbow pattern all over it.  It was fun.

I like how it looks in the evening light.  And the backing was really fun to make.  It features three favorite prints.

That blue floral has been waiting for it’s moment to shine, and this is it.  I paired it with Heather Bailey’s gorgeous birds from True Kisses.  Wish I had a lot more of that one!  A skinny strip of a precious red floral adds just the right touch.  Oh yes, this backing makes me smile.

A blue binding finishes things off nicely, don’t you think?

So there you have it, Arise Quilt take two.  Or original.  Whatever.  It’s a fun one to make.  My next Arise quilt will feature vintage embroidery.  It’s been bumped by other deadlines, but I’m excited to get back to it.

On Thursday I’ll be back with the third quilt in my Resolute pattern collection:  Stand .  Can’t wait to show you!

Phew!  Does anyone else feel like the last quarter of the year is intense?  I hope it’s not just me!  October swept me away and now it’s November and…wow!  The year will be over before I’m ready.  In all the crazy that was October I finally sewed the binding on this Awake Quilt in Heather Ross fabrics.  It’s all kinds of cute, with bright, happy colors.

This is my second version of the Awake Quilt (you can see my original version here ).  I did a few things differently in this one, just to play with the pattern a little.  For instance, I used a different color to frame the center star instead of the same around all 5. I also made the center star points brown instead of green, and to simplify decision making I used the same green for the other four.  One goal with this Awake Quilt in Heather Ross fabrics was to make decision making simpler, demonstrating that the quilt still looks amazing with fewer fabrics.

I like the orangey red in this quilt, and the secondary design that color represents.  I used two fabrics NOT designed by Heather Ross:  the bright blue around the four stars, and the purple print on the sides.  The plan was an exclusively Heather Ross quilt, but when I started sewing I couldn’t find a blue with enough presence inside my HR stash.  So the color won out and I found a different fabric.  I’m happy with my choice.

It was really fun, though, to go through my Heather Ross fabrics and choose oranges, greens and purples for the courthouse steps blocks.  Another thing I did in this version was to plan my dresden borders.  I wanted to see how the green would look if I lined it up across the quilt.  I’m hooked, and I need to do it again.

I enjoyed making this second Heather Ross version of Awake just as much as I did the first one.  And of course, because it’s Heather Ross we’re talking about, there was fussy cutting.  I mean, how could I not put those cute moons in the dresden centers? It feels good to have so many treasured prints in a quilt instead of on the shelf.  I tend to save fabric from favorite designers and never make anything with them, but I’m trying to change.  Use the fabric!!!  It’s even prettier all sewn together.

My longarm quilting skills are a different story.  Good ideas, good intentions, and poor execution sums it up.  But if I don’t try it, I’ll never improve.  I learned good lessons about envisioning larger quilting designs on a machine with a small throat.

The lovely orange floral back is fun to look at even while the quilting is VERY wobbly.  But I tried, and it’s done, and I do love the quilt!

Today I’m smiling at these photos, taken the day before a surprise snowstorm hit.  Look at that beautiful green grass, and a very green cherry tree.

Our yard looked very different yesterday!  What a change.  I guess winter really is coming, even if the leaves on my tree aren’t close to changing.

Wherever you are, and whatever the weather, I hope you are well!  Sun or snow, if we really look, there’s a lot to smile about.  Happy sewing!