Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Holiday Work

Holidays are sure nice to spend at home, doing whatever one pleases!  I puttered about all morning with some household chores, blogging, and thumbing through magazines for quilting ideas for Caramel Blues.  It was decided the quilt really deserves custom quilting for its traditional bones.  I remembered a recent post by Kathie http://inspiredbyantiquequilts.blogspot.com/2012/05/todays-quilt-to-bind.html.  I really liked those pumpkin seeds and felt they would look good in the 9 patches.

Some 2" squares drawn on a scrap of muslin and attached to the excess batting around the quilt sandwich were my practice piece.  I'm a "no mark" kind of gal so this was all by eyeball.

At first I was twisting the sandwich back and forth to stitch the same side of the pumpkin seed in each square, but then I remembered this post by Elizabeth Hartman of Oh Fransson regarding her orange peel quilting.  However, since I was using a walking foot and working on a diagonal, I decided a serpentine would work better.  And it did.

Some of the pumpkin seeds are nice and fat and others are a bit slimmer, but they turned out pretty well.  Only the center square will have crossed seeds (try to say that three times fast!).  Once all the 9 patches are completed, the framing triangles around each will receive some sort of stippled type design from the Free Motion Quilting book, alternating designs between the caramel and cream sections.  Not sure about the borders yet but that can be decided later.  Can you tell I'm not much of a pre-planner?     

11 comments:

Joyful Quilter said...

It looks great. I think figuring out the quilt design is the hardest part of quilting. And if you find the perfect design the most rewarding.

McIrish Annie said...

I love that design! you are a girl after my own heart- a quilter on the fly, no real preplan. this looks great. in fact, i'm saving a pic of your block so I will remember to use it on one of mine

Anonymous said...

HELLO! I REALLY LIKE THE FM!
A NEW DESIGN TO ME-I'LL SAVE THIS!
THANKS FOR SHARING!
HAPPY STITCHING!

msstitcher1214@yahoo.com

Quilter Kathy said...

That is exactly how I make my decisions, so I think it's awesome! Just start with what you know you want to try and keep adding ideas as the quilt tells you. I love this pumpkin seed idea!

Shay said...

Im a fly by the seat of my pants quilter too. I tried to mark something out once and it just didn't work for me either.

Love that quilting. It all looks very even to me !

Im glad you enjoyed the extra day off...we have one of those coming up in a couple of weeks. Im hanging out!

Janet O. said...

I think the "seeds" look great, Annie. I can't believe you are doing it with a walking foot! I like the serpentine idea through the 9-patch blocks. You have inspired us all today! Good job! : )

Kate said...

Looks great!

Sounds like you had wonderful holiday.

julieQ said...

I too am a no mark kind of girl! Your pumpkin seed quilting is just wonderful!

Candace said...

Not only is the quilting great, but wonderful choice of thread color, Annie! Love your basket quilt colors, too!
Cheers!

loulee said...

I'm sure in nature, some seeds are fat and some are thin too.
Your quilting looks good. :-)

Sarah said...

The orange peels are perfect for the 9patches - they are one of my fav FMQ designs. Mine are always eyeballed and never perfect :)

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