Design Floor Friday - The Flip Side

Welcome to another edition of Design Floor Friday!!  This week, I'm here to share the OTHER side of my niece's baby quilt.  It's been in the works for several months, but I've made great strides during the past week.

The bulk of the large center section was finished over the weekend:

The mother-to-be (thankfully) approved of the fabric:

With the focus done, that left the upper accent section to piece for a completed quilt top.  I've chosen to include these fabrics:

Ready to begin the stitching:

Here is the top section in progress.  I'm sewing love and care into every part of this special quilt...

... All that remains is attaching the sashing strips...

... Once that was done, I was able to put the top together:

Then, my thoughts turned to the quilt's back.  I had decided to use the fabric that I had originally selected for the background of the front.  There's plenty, but...

... I really like the ZZZ's shown on the cover of the PATTERN:

What could I do, but figure out a way to make that work on the back?!  You KNOW there was NO WAY to ignore this desire.  That meant choosing MORE fabrics:

Some of those didn't feel yellow enough to fit my niece's request for yellow.  Ultimately, I decided on this range of scraps with a few new pieces thrown in for good measure:

Catching some ZZZ's...

... Has never been SEW easy!!  The panel is now ready to be sewn into the backing to create a reversible quilt:

These fabrics have been reserved for the quilt's binding:

Now, all I need to do is piece that backing and finish the client quilt on the longarm (so that I can load this one.)  I may even get it completed BEFORE the baby arrives!  :o))

Sharing with Sarah

@

Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Until next time...
QUILT to give!!!

Quarantine Chronicles - Corona Style - Week 5

Welcome to another edition of Quarantine Chronicles!!  This is my response to our current global health crisis.  Anxiety, action, or ostrich??  What is you coronatude?  You know, your corona attitude.  I'm doing my best impression of an ostrich!  Keeping my head buried, in one quilting project after another, STILL hoping the pandemic thing will just go away.  This is my record of the Lockdown Life.  Knowing that I couldn't cope with a daily post...

Corona-cation.  Week Five.

This series began on as Thursday, March 19th.  It's hard to believe that a month has gone by.  And yet another is hot on its heels!  Thanks for staying with me to see how the time unfolded.

On Day TWENTY-NINE, Thursday, April 16th...

This morning, I enjoyed this week's ZoomBEE  meeting of my Weekly Quilt Group.  Seeing each of these smiling faces brings me SEW much joy:

The meeting was followed by a number of quilting tasks, but the REAL highlight of the day came just after lunch when I had a visitor:

She came bearing gifts:

Thanks, Ella!!  It was great seeing you:

The evening arrived on a sad note.  Our level of knowing just came one step closer...

DS1 texted that his friend's father passed away due to corona today.  He was at a local hospital.

Day THIRTY, Friday, April 17th...

This is morning, I joined in our ZoomKnit meet-up with the following Knit Group's members in attendance...

Cindy, showing the true essence of our meetings!  Tea in one hand, knitting project in the other, and a laughter on her lips:

I caught Tracy mid-giggle, also:

Beth knit a sneaker sock with decreases at the cuff to keep it from sliding down into the shoe:

Linda knit through a good chunk of the meeting, but all I could see was her (Pfaff) sewing machine across the room:

Nicole visited with us from New York, this morning:

I can't see myself on the screen, so I took a selfie of what the others would be able to see on their electronic devices:

Thank you to Cindy for arranging our meetings:

I enjoyed seeing everyone, but forced myself to leave a little early due to a time-sensitive quilt project that needed my attention.

After lunch, "paperwork" and several blog posts were my focus.

Also on this afternoon's agenda, DH had a grocery pick-up scheduled (which meant 11 days between shopping trips.)  The entire process went fairly well and saved him a TON of time!

Here was the sum total of my quilt progress for the evening:

I managed to get all the background pieces cut out for my niece's baby quilt.  This work was part of Friday Night Sew-In with my friend Kathy @ Kathy's Quiltng Blog, who asked, "Are you busy Friday night?" and I was SEW thrilled to be asked that I responded with the following comment:

Thanks for the invite, Kathy! I don't normally join, but my monthly (LIVE) Friday Night Sew-In has been canceled for the second month in a row and I miss that time with friends. Want a sewing buddy? I'm your girl!! :o))

Before bed, I decided to do a little work on my Monday Mini:

You will be able to see the BIG reveal on Monday, if you happen by my blog or I'll provide a link in that entry.  Until then, this is secret sewing, not to be revealed.

Speaking of a reveal...

I've got a confession.  In all the excitement, I forgot to link-up with Wendy @ Sugarlane Designs for Lockdown FNSI.  Whoops! Sorry, Kathy!  I still had fun working on a couple of projects.  That might not have happened without your invitation to the Friday Night Sew-In.

Day THIRTY-ONE, Saturday, April 18th...

Visiting all of the RSC Quilters will have to wait until later.  I've got to spend some time working on a project that I'd like to have partially done by this afternoon.

After briefly checking in with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge this morning and had released my POST, I did take a few minutes to look up the latest news on COVID-19 and CBS NEWS.com is reporting that the U.S. has more than 700,000 confirmed cases of the disease.  Across the nation, more than 37,000 people have died from the virus.  Around the world, the number is at 154,200 deaths and 2.2 million people have been infected according to data from Johns Hopkins University.

A quick check of local news revealed there are more than 6,000 confirmed cases of COVID-19 in North Carolina.  That report came from the News and Observer, which also said that the state has also had 172 coronavirus-related deaths.

The day's focus was working on a gift and getting ready for this afternoon's Baby Shower.  Not long before time get ready, I had a visitor:

A friend from my Evening Quilt Bee was in need of mask-making supplies that I was able to supply.  Back to the machine, Karen V!!

Next on today's agenda was my niece's Baby Shower ...

... and you might remember the gift that I made.  The mother-to-be shared the front...

... and the back of the wall hanging for the baby's nursery:

Baby Shower???  But, Joyful, you can't POSSIBLY attend a Baby Shower at a time like this!!  Never fear dear readers...

It was a VIRTUAL Baby Shower!!  :o))

Day THIRTY-TWO, Sunday, April 19th...

Project QUILTING Quarantine 2020 Limited Edition...  My quilt for the second prompt was revealed today.  Find the parameters for Florals Q.2 challenge HERE.

My road trip got diverted.  DH and I were headed out to my MIL's for a social distance visit, but her hot water heater died.  A slow death, over several days.  The result was a BIG mess!!  (Along with a significant amount of mold and mildew.)

I had planned to go help with the clean-up, but DS1 rescued me!

Since I'm allergic to mold and mildew, he pointed out that I should probably stay home.  The LAST thing I need in a global pandemic characterized by breathing issues...  Is an allergic reaction causing breathing trouble!

I felt hesitant about going once (I found out the extent of the damage), but I couldn't decide what was bothering me so much or put a name to it.  Allergies would be it.  Thank you, DS1, for remembering how my breathing would be affected by all that mold. 

When DH left, I ended up with an (accidental) visitor.  SCSue stopped by to pick-up something that I had left out for her...

... And noticed that I was sitting in my "reading chair", so knocked on the window and we were able to visit for a while:

I spent a good chunk of the afternoon and evening working on the project that I didn't finish yesterday:

I also worked on my Monday Mini...

... And ended up with a nearly completed mini quilt that is ready to be bound.  This is the backing, prior to quilting:

When I was too tired to quilt any more, I sat down with my laptop and perused my newsfeed.  Bloomberg.com had another report on Sweden's COVID-19 tallies.  As of today, the country has reported 1,540 deaths.  That number is considerably more than other Scandinavian countries, but far less than the likes of Italy, Spain, and the U.K.  They remain confident in the approach.

Day THIRTY-THREE, Monday, April 20th...

Today, Bonnie Hunter released the fourth step of UNITY: The Quiltville Sew-in-Place QAL and and I'm no closer to beginning my quilt!  :o((

My goal is to come up with an abbreviated version of the Sew-in-Place UNITY QAL.  The resulting quilt will be something that (vaguely) resembles this segment of Bonnie's quilt:

More to come on this in a later post.  I've still got another few projects that require my attention before beginning on this one.

I released the beginning of a new series of posts here on the blog.  Click HERE for the first installment of Mini Monday!!

The day went by in a blur of preparation for tomorrow's planned errands.  To that end, by evening this had happened:

Scrapsplosion!!!  Sorting the scraps received last week to make stacks of fabric that I will use in my own projects and stacks of fabric to donate to a local COVID-19 mask-making mission.  Thank you, Ella and Barry!  I'm hoping you both would approve.

Day THIRTY-FOUR, Tuesday, April 21st...


Drop Day!!  I dropped off a bag of fabric with my friend LindaIllustrator.  She is making masks for various healthcare facilities around the area and had run out of cotton fabric.  Joyful Quilter to the rescue!  There is a stack of fabric approximately 12" tall shoved in that Bright BLUE bag:

Then, I dropped off a bolt of fusible stabilizer at my friend Maggie's house.  Her SIL has commissioned her to make a T-Shirt Quilt, but she was unable to source any.  When I told her she could buy what I had on hand and she happily took me up on my offer:

Notice the bag in my hand?  We'll explore that later!  Maggie had two quilts for me to longarm.  One donation and one for her.  :o))

Day THIRTY-FIVE, Wednesday, April 22nd...


What day is it? I got up thinking it was Sunday. Don't ask me why?! (I do recall we just HAD a weekend not long ago and that another will be here soon!)

Sigh...  Corona Brain!  It's a REAL thing.  :o((

While reading an article from BBC.com during lunch, it has been revealed that the first of U.S. coronavirus-related deaths occurred weeks earlier than previously thought.  This fact came as the result of a California autopsy of two individuals who passed away on February 6th and February 17th.  Prior findings set the first U.S. known deaths at February 26th in Seattle and March 4th in California.  Testing, at the time, was only being done on people with severe symptoms who had traveled outside the country.

According to Johns Hopkins University's data, there have been 825000+ confirmed cases in the U.S. and 45,000+ corona-related deaths.

Once I came up for air (after lunchtime,) I decided to prepare Carol's quilt for pick-up.  Thread tails buried and all bagged up:

I had enough time to cut the strips for more letters:

My friend/client arrived right on time...

... And was kind enough to take a photo of the center of the baby quilt that I've been working on and she texted it once she got home:

After dinner, additional letter construction began:

SEW...

There you have it.  I continue keep busy, but have noticed an interesting phenomena during this last week.  I'm still waking up fairly early (without the alarm clock's buzz.)  However, I have started having trouble winding down and have been going to bed later and later.  Fortunately, we're living under "house arrest", so it doesn't really matter that my circadian rhythm is whacked out!

All I know is that I am SEW thankful I have a hobby!! I can't imagine all of these extra hours at home WITHOUT the studio pulling me in.  Begging me to come play in the fabric scraps.  What do people DO with no hobby to occupy their time???

Until next time...
That's it for Week FIVE!

Mini Monday - 2020 Corona Quarantine Mini - #2020CQMini

Sarah's Virtual Sewing Meet-Up (Show Me the Mini)
Introducing:  A Bright Spot in "Coronaville"
(What quilting is, for me.)

Welcome to a new blog series here at The Joyful Quilter!!  I'm pretty sure that Sarah had NO IDEA that she would send me down a whole new path.  I hope you enjoy Mini Monday, a new series of posts to catalog the avalanche of creativity the following inspired.


Sarah @ Confessions of a Fabric Addict is missing quilting with her peeps.  An email from the Modern Quilt Guild got her thinking...

So - here's my idea!  Why don't we have a "virtual" sewing meet-up, and each make a fun mini this week?  Then next Monday I'll have a link-up on here so we can each share our mini!

Your mini might be a mug rug, or a pin cushion, a post card or a wall hanging - the sky's the limit!  Square, round, octagonal, free form - branch out, try something new and different.  Use a color you don't normally use, or a technique.  Add mixed media, make it three dimensional, just have fun with it!  Size is completely up to you.  Let's see what we can create as a memento of our 2020 Coronavirus Quarantine!

Are you game?  I hope so!

Sarah

*****

My head is spinning here in Joyful QuilterLand.  I just finished 2 mug rugs this week, but that was BEFORE the announcement/invitation from Sarah.  Hmm...

What shall I do???

I probably shouldn't DO anything!  But, since Sarah asked SEW nicely, I really want to participate.

It didn't take long to come up with a really cool (and original) idea, but I want to incorporate these fabric scraps from Sandy @ Sew High in my design, as I definitely don't often use the color pink:

Once that idea was in place, I thought of my friend Beth and switched gears.  She would really like a mug rug of the idea I saw earlier today.

Then...

I'm thinking I might want to do MORE letters.  Like my Q.1 challenge, only not.  This time, I'm going to fall back on my free pieced letters.  It's been a while since I've used that technique.

What to say???

Nope!  Nothing came to mind.  I guess I'll keep on thinking.

Oooorrrrr...

What about Barb's Olive tutorial?!?!  That is certainly not something I've done.  Ever!  Plus, I haven't done prepared applique in quite some time.

Think, think, think...

Oh!  I've got it!  What about an olive on a scewer with a martini glass?  I think I'll even ask Barb if I can use her Quarantini name for the little quiltlet.  Here was the email I sent:

I really want to use your technique (and the Quarantini name) in an upcoming quilt!! Would you mind if I use one and/or the other?

Joy

This was her response:

You are more than welcome to use both.  Looking forward to seeing what you create 

Thanks for asking.  

Xo

Barb 

But...

I really like the technique Sarah used while I was busy agonizing over which design plan to go with:

When I couldn't get the photo of her work in progress out of my head, I sent Sarah the following email:

Thank you for being a constant source of inspiration, Sarah! I'm hope you will answer a couple of questions about your  denim mini...

Was there a formula to your whacking?

Did you use a wedge ruler or a regular one? I'm bad with angles, but really like the regular pattern of your first cut.

I'd like to use your process as part of the design I came up with for my Monday Mini. I plan to applique onto the first step and then (maybe) whack that to arrive at my final quilt. I won't be doing the inserts afterward, but the chopped bits fit right into my design plan.

Please advise.

Joy

SEW...

Are you getting the picture that I'm just a LITTLE lacking in the focus department here???  You MIGHT be right.  The problem is that a really want to sew ALL the things!!!

Sigh...

Let's start here, with a simple 16-Patch and see how that feels:

It feels good, but I think I want to cut it up, hence the rotary cutter:

That was fun, but I (might have) forgotten an important detail when I was planning my cutting lines:

Oh, well!!  I'm sure it will be fine.  Next, came the old switch-a-roo, just like in Sarah's quilt:

Here is my re-sewn block:

But WAIT!!  There's MORE...


Introducing the beginning of the twist that might have YOU thinking that I am out of my mind:

It wanted to play with my pretty pink (now chopped up) 16-Patch.  So I devised a way to eradicate the coronavirus!!  No.  I'm no scientist.  (I'm a teacher by trade.)  However, that didn't stop me from finding a way to (metaphorically) find a cure for that nasty bug.

Stay with me, now...

The BIG "C".  Not THAT big "C", this time.  "C" for Corona.  It was one of the LAST things that Sarah said in her invitation to a (Virtual) Mini Quilt Show.  My first design plan refused to be ignored:

The next part of my mini's journey involved a bit of drawing:

And some cutting, too:

I decided on using raw edge applique for this project...

 ... With no stabilizer:

Here is the fully appliqued letter:

If you are thinking that my mini quilt has another date with the rotary cutter, you'd be correct!  Some additional slicing and dicing is coming right up:

Next came the reorganizing:

More reassembly was required to attach the pieces into something that resembles a quilt top, or a quilt block, as the case may be:

After much spinning and turning, my mini revealed its new "right side up" orientation, but the design didn't feel complete:

The re-cut and re-assembled piece was begging for MORE!!

More what?!  That's where Barb's applique tutorial came into play.  Sort of...  I was in a hurry to try her method.  With no cardstock or circle templates at arm's length, I resorted to loose change on the counter:

Testing out my (bright) idea... I think I like it:

:

Thank you to Needleb and LindaIllustrator for confirming that I was on the right path!!


Then came the hand applique...

...  But I was a bit rusty and created a bit of a blooper on the far right of the design, that "music note" kind of shape:

That was NOT in the design plan!  Once I used my handy dandy seam ripper and the problem was rectified, quilting ensued:

With the quilting done...

Voila', the time had come for squaring up my mini:

Binding options presented my next challenge:

The colors are there, but my top two choices seem overbearing:

Thanks for pushing my creative limits, Sarah.  I had SEW much fun making this little piece and am thrilled to have another "Joy Original" for my Gallery Wire:

Not SEW bad for someone who doesn't feel that she has a creative bone in her body.  :o))

FEEDBACK from the peanut gallery...

DS1 - Cool!  (I was on the phone with him, at the time I sent the picture.)  I went on to explain the slicing and dicing, then had him guess what the chopped up bits had been.

His guess?  A "J" (for obvious reasons.)  Honestly, I was amazed that he had guessed that the remaining bits had BEEN a letter!

DS2 - Interesting!  It looks very natural despite how asymmetrical it is, and though the color scheme isn't to my taste, it has a cool effect.

Then, I went on to share the name of the piece ("Not subtle, Mom.") and my process, to which he responded:

Interesting!  I never guessed that it had started out as something else.  I just figured it was a disjointed, scattered group of stylized human figures.  Appropriate for the (coronavirus) situation.

Hmm... I never looked at it that way.

To which he replied:

It's similar to how people are often represented in more minimalist art, and the way the cut lines align with the two main subjects' "bodies" serves effectively to form invisible barriers between them, even thought the scale of the quilt suggests they're relatively close.  Then there's a third figure viewing from an entirely different space.  That's my overanalysis, anyway!

My response to that?!?!

Me:  You think too much!!  I feel fairly confident that I would NEVER have come up with all that!  :o))

DS2:  Maybe you're just a deeper artist than you realized! LOL

Me:  Right...

Both sons really took time to look at my work and give me feedback.  LOVE!!!

Garden outtakes...

Going for an artsy shot with a play of light and shadows...

... Which failed.  So I moved the mini farther into the shade:

On the way back inside, I decided to try a shot with the yellow iris:

Sharing with Alycia

for

Finished (or Not) Friday

Until next time...

S-T-R-E-T-C-H those creative muscles!!