Thursday, March 25, 2021

Salt and Sand Blog Hop - Day Four - My STOP!!!

Welcome!!  Ocean colors.  What's not to love?  Since I've had a project in mind, I'm hoping this might be just the push I need to get it from the design phase to the quilt phase.

What ARE you talking about, Joyful???



In her announcement, Carol from Just Let Me Quilt writes:

I will be hosting the "Salt and Sand" blog hop March 22- 26. The challenge is to sew something in ocean/sand colors and/or ocean creatures. This one should be fun, too...well, I think they are all fun!

Here is my fabric pull...

... Which sat on my "design board" for several weeks before I began:


This is my plan:

I was inspired by Karen Echmeier's work in her Accidental Landscapes book and associated videos.

My process...

Last week, with my toes in the sand I began by doing free cut curves, but no folded seam allowances for finished applique.  That's how I roll:


Then, I waded into the surf...


... Before fixing my eyes on the horizon and the sky beyond:


Once the pieces were situated...


...  I pinned everything in place:


Prior to going to the machine, I added (and removed) a couple of "blender" waves, as I wasn't convinced they worked:


Monday was the day that I finally worked up the courage to stitch it all down (which is good since the Hop has started)...


... With the help of the beachiest threads on the rack:


Again, I walked out on the sand...


Inching my way into the waves required a plan...


... And SEW many thread changes...


... As the waves crashed into the shore:


With the horizon sewn down, it was time to stitch my way across the sky:


The two shades of blue that I chose required reinforcements and more thread was added after seeing the puckers in the photo below:


That was followed by squaring up the piece:


Thanks to Needleb, you don't need to feel seasick, as she reminded me that the horizon should be level:


When it came time for finishing the piece, I decided to attempt color matching the binding...


... Which was just as challenging as I remembered it to be:



As I always say...

DONE is better than perfect:




What's THIS, Joyful???




That is the beginning of my PRIZE giveaway!!!

Because, as you may or may not know, EVERY Blog Hop is reason for a giveaway, in my book. As the winner, YOU will get to choose if you would like me to transform these scraps into a pin cushion, a mug rug, or a small framed quilt art piece.

DISCLAIMER:  The fabrics shown above will be used (possibly in combination with other color-appropriate scraps) in the making of said prize.  That prize may or may not end up looking anything like the layout shown above.

How do I qualify to win the prize, Joyful???

In order to get your name in the prize drawing, you MUST tell me the name or location of your favorite beach.  The winner will be chosen on Wednesday, March 31st @ 9 PM (EDT) from your qualifying comments.

Sorry!!  The drawing is CLOSED!!!

Be sure to visit the other Hop participants listed below:


I'm joining in some of my favorite Link Parties:

Sharing with Alycia
for

and

Whooping it Up with Sarah
at

Until next time...
SEW relaxing!!!

52 comments:

  1. Awesome seascape! Love it! Can't believe you color-matched the binding! I have lots of favorite beaches, but they're my fave because of who I was with at the time. I love all beaches. Let's say, Temple Beach, Laie, Oahu, Hawaii.

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  2. Gorgeous quilt. My favorite beach area is Panama City, Florida, along the Gulf of Mexico.

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  3. It's an absolute beautiful quilt. It's certainly going to add a beachy vibe to your wall. My favourite beach has to be my local at Port Kembla, Australia. Local legend has it that they transported a whole bunch of sand from Port Kembla to build up Waikiki beach in Hawaii.

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  4. Your quilt is beautiful! I love the technique you used. My favorite beach is Carillion Beach on the gulf shores of Florida. It is just west of Panama City Beach but is quiet. My family goes to that beach every other year. We started as a group of 6 (my parents and siblings) back in 2004 and we have grown over the years. This year will be our 8th time back and our total going is 18! So many memories.

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  5. I love your seascape and that binding looks perfect to me!

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  6. Wow. Great landscape. The colour choices and layout are great. I've thought about colour matching a binding, but never done it - your comments aren't nudging me in that direction 😋. My favorite beach is Providence Bay on Manitoulin Island. It's small and quiet and has the best ice cream!

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  7. Nice job. Thanks for sharing the detail steps to achieving the finished beach. I like how the binding matches. My favorite beach is Pompano beach in Florida.

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  8. You've nailed it! Great job on the horizon! lol

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  9. What a beautiful piece, and that sky is perfect and genius. I loved how you planned it out - thank you for sharing!

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  10. Oh my goodness, Joy, what an amazing process for this beauty. Adding the matching border was awesome! All the details were so interesting...thank you for all of it! I'm so glad you hopped with us for some beachy fun.

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  11. What a wonderful beach scape. You nailed it with the matching binding. My favorite beach is Casey Key in Nokomis, near Venice, FL.
    Pat

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  12. Great job!!! I have always wanted to do a beach landscape but was afraid to dip my toes on. My favourite beach is Mead bay in Anguilla. Soooo beautiful and it seems like years since we have been there. Covid does that to time as it was 2019 we were last there.

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  13. Antiqua is said to have 365 beaches, one for every day. My husband and I traveled there many years ago. Every time I hear Antiqua or think about that trip, I sigh, smile and relax. Great job executing your project! Thanks for sharing it is such clearly written detail.
    Connie
    c_s_wolfe@yahoo.com

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  14. Your pretty little quilt is perfect for feeling like you can gaze at the beach/ocean any time you want and feel a little like you are there. You’ve done a great job of it. I love the look of raw edge applique with a straight stitch and it has become my go-to applique method. It lets the eye flow through a beautiful scene like your quilt without getting caught up in clunky stitches. I’m never brave enough to try color matching the binding, so kudos to you. You’ve done a nice job of it.

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  15. My favorite beach is an easy choice for me: North Shore, Oahu Hawaii! Big gigantic waves and the best shave ice stand! I love your beach scene, Joy. You picked the perfect fabrics and did a spectacular job.

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  16. My favorite beach is Sherwood Forest, on Oahu. You've captured the colors beautifully!!

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  17. Beautiful beach scene! I used to live in Corpus Christi, TX, and enjoyed visiting Padre Island National Seashore, which has great beaches.

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  18. My favourite beach is at Candle Lake here in Sask, Canada It is named Minowuka Beach and has beautiful fine, golden sand. Thanks

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  19. I really like your little quilt and the technique you used to make it. I think I might have to get brave enough to try something similar. Being in North Carolina, we have many nice beaches on the coast. My very favorite is Wrightsville Beach. Lots of great things to do.

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  20. Our favorite beach is oddly Presque Isle in Pennsylvania. We have been camping there for the past few summers. I don't think it's the best beach in the world, it's not fancy or anything. It's my favorite because we have made so many memories there.

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  21. What a great project and I love seeing how it progressed. Favorite - probably Cocoa Beach since that is the one we tend to go to and stay right on the beach with oceanfront balcony. Hopefully later this summer we can go!

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  22. My favorite beach is Daytona Beach Shores in Florida. We are blessed to own a condo on this beach and it is perfect. Wide, sandy, white, and away from the commercial endeavors. Very little traffic, unless it's a Holiday Weekend. We pack a cooler, park our beach chairs in the sand, and stay out there all day long. A few years ago we added a pop up canopy to reduce UV exposure. It's our piece of heaven.

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  23. I love the beach in Oceanside, CA. I spent a lot of my teenage years there, and long to see it again! I love your project and seeing how it progressed. Thanks so much for sharing!

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  24. Terrific sand & surf landscape! Thanks for sharing the process of your creativity. Our favorite beach is at Surveyors Lake at Kookanusa campground in British Columbia, CANADA - very close to the Canada/USA border, which is found in the campground name (love it). Tons of great family memories there!

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  25. Thank you so much for sharing your process! That's my favorite thing to see. I don't know if I have a favorite beach, because I've not lived near many. When my son was little, we went to the Tom's River, New Jersey, white sand beach, and that was fun. My best friend loved any beach, and I went to many with her, some deserted ones in NoCal where we sat and watched the tide roll into tide pools. Dana Point is always a favorite because I love rocky spots where the waves come crashing in - there's one in Okinawa I went to many times in the two years we were there. But favorite? Hard to say. I probably haven't been there yet!

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  26. Joy, I love your beautiful sandy ocean piece! I've been wanting to try something like this, but didn't necessarily want to sew all those curved pieces together. But you stitched like layers of applique, right? Did you sew each piece directly onto the batting? And the edges are raw? The sky fabric you picked is perfect, too. Everything worked so well! I love any and all beaches, but my favorites lately have been found in Oregon. There's one there I love called Road's End, near Lincoln City.

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  27. Beautiful landscape quilt!!! Love it!

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  28. We like to go to the beach at Gulf Shores. Nancy A: SewingGranda@gmail.com

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  29. Very cool. Love the Matched binding.

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  30. I absolutely love your quilt! I don't know if I have a favorite beach, as I love all the ones I've visited. But the most beautiful one I've been at is the one at St Augustine, Florida. I had a blast there building a sand castle with a stranger who became a friend. And we were both grownups!

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  31. Your landscape is fantastic! I have enjoyed using the Accidental Landscape book too. The binding is awesome; I'll have to screw up the courage to try it some day... I am almost never at the beach but I'll have to say my favorite one is at Lincoln City, OR, where the D River empties into the Pacific.

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  32. Well done. I laughed when I first saw the yellow-headed pins that you used - I thought they were bubbles! lol Color matching the binding was fabulous.

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  33. I love your pretty seaside quilt! And you’ve also given a great turtorial - I will give it a try!
    There are so many beaches I love, living in New England most of my life. My absolute favorite though, is Old Silver Beach in Falmouth, Massachusetts. One of the few beaches in Cape Cod (or Massachusetts for that matter) that actually can have warm water in July and August. Another favorite is Long Beach in York, Maine. It is full of little tide pools that warm up and are perfect for precious toddlers. Where you can reach me: barbaragrantrn at gmail dot com.

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  34. That little seascape quilt is lovely. I'll pass on the giveaway but I was raised in California so I have plenty of beaches that were my favorite. I would say Malibu would be first but having visited the Hawaiian islands, no beaches could even come close to those beauties with warm water and endless sunsets. Ahhh, I'm way overdue for a vacation, as we all are. I'm definitely thinking about beaches this week!!

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  35. Well, finished may be better than perfect, but in the case of your wall hanging, it’s both finished AND perfect! I grew up in Southern California and went to the beach often all up and down the coast. In my younger days, I liked Newport Beach, Malibu and Torrey Pines. But in my adult years I came to favor (and now greatly) miss The Strand at Port Hueneme (pronounced y-ne-me), in Southern California.

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  36. What a pretty quilt. I seldom get near a beach. I've been to Florida (well over 20 years ago) to the Pacific ocean (only once, and that was over 20 years ago, too) and got to the Gulf coast a few times back when we lived in Texas (we left in 1995). We did get to the beach for our honeymoon (almost 34 years ago) in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.

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  37. This is so joyful! I enjoyed the process from start to finish. This was such a fun post to read and I love the anticipation of every step. The finish is beautiful and looks perfect to me.

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  38. Love it and great job on the binding, I'm not that brave to try that!

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  39. Holy smokes, that binding is incredible. I love your landscape quilt. What a fun way to play!

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  40. This is such a fun piece and so characteristic of a beautiful sunset! Beach sunsets are among the best! My favorite beach is Maho on St. Maarten in the Caribbean. It is a hot tourist attraction and well worth visiting as it's adjacent to an international airport. The huge planes fly directly overhead with such an experience you'll never forget!

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  41. Ohh....that is hard to choose. I love Orange Beach on the Alabama gulf coast. But I also love the beaches on Jekyll Island. But I suppose my favorite beach is in Progreso, Yucatan Mexico - mostly because I can eat fresh seafood under a palapa roof sitting on the beach and be in Mexico.

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  42. I love your piece! Anything that involves beach/sand is great in my book, but you have really captured the beachy feeling. I would hang it up and pretend it's a window. It would be amazing to win an art piece for my very own!

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  43. Love your pretty piece of artwork. Well done.

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  44. Favorite beach is the beach my daughter was married on in Grayton Beach Florida. Actually 11 years later it is way too crowded.

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  45. What a great tutorial and beach scene. I just took an evening picture at my favorite beach at Nags Head, NC. So, I think you did a tutorial that I could actually use to turn my photo into a quilt. I love what you did with your colors especially the binding. It's all terrific. PS I have an Echmeier Village waiting to be quilted. But, it's going to be a while!

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  46. That was a wonderful pictorial description of the process. I have never done or attempted anything like it so it was educational to boot. Love your finished piece and if I won I would love a framed art piece.

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  47. I kept seeing your landscapes on Instagram and knew I had to come and look. Aren’t they fun? Yours is fantastic, and I hope you will enjoy making many more. Thanks for sharing the process photos. My favorite beach is any one along Lake Michigan (the Michigan side) at sunset. I truly can’t pick one. They are all awesome, especially if you like your ocean unsalted.

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  48. That is an amazing seascape. It really makes me think of the beach and the ocean. I have several favourite beaches here in the UK but I love it when the waves are crashing in and no one else is around. The last time I visited St Agnes beach in Cornwall as the weather was turning stormy and the beach was deserted. It was amazing.

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  49. What a beautiful piece! that sky is just perfect for the beach!!! Kinda makes me want to book a vacation!

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  50. Love your beautiful seascape, all the colors are just perfect! xx

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