Finish! The Mariner's Compass Quilt

The Mariner's Compass quilt, henceforth known as "Anacortes," is finally finished and all krinkly warm from the dryer! This is by far the heaviest quilting I have ever done and also the most custom quilting. It took several days, spread out over a couple of weeks, to finish. There was also quite a bit of trial-stitching and unpicking in this quilt, which is something new to me. I hate to admit it, but it's true: I'm usually too lazy to undo something once I've done it. My motto is: "I'll do it better the next time."

I quilted the compass medallion by stitching in the ditch around most of the elements and then quilting lines in the "shadowed" points of the compass, using my presser foot edge as a guide. I quilted curving lines in the outside triangle to try to give it more depth and I really like the way that came out.

The real star of this quilt is this beautiful fabric with a native fish motif that I picked up last summer when I was on my sailing trip in Anacortes, WA. I basically made this quilt to showcase that fabric, pulling all the rich colors from the fish to make my fabric choices. The pic above and the very top picture on this page have been color tweaked to show a more true representation of the colors in the quilt, the rest of the pictures really don't do the depth of the colors justice. They are unbelievably saturated. I quilted the fish fabric using black thread around the fish, filling in any large gaps which echo quilting, so that the fish would pop once it was washed.

The geese got a curved line across the bottom and stitch in the ditch around the point and I used a chalk pencil to mark big waves in the outer border.

That single piece of yellow in the binding on top was a happy accident. After I trimmed the backing down to size I used the scraps to turn into binding and that piece was from where the pieced yellow stripe runs across the backing. I decided to leave it in on impulse and I'm glad I did, I really like the look.

The quilting is easier to see from the back, especially since my bobbin thread was a bit too light. I like it, though. It almost makes the quilt reversible.

And of course, we had lots of help with taking the pictures from the local supervisors. That's Thor's orange tail going under the edge. He made sure to get plenty of cat hair on the bottom of the freshly laundered quilt to make it officially a Kat quilt!

Placemats and quilting progress

There isn't much to say today, just uploading these pictures of the random-pieced scrap placemats I made my mom for her birthday.

They are about 13" square, but in retrospect I wish I'd made them bigger. (Inspiration from these pictures.)

Can you guess what I'm quilting?

Old and New

Yesterday I went with a friend to a small estate sale that had advertised having fabrics and old quilts. There wasn't much fabric I was interested in but I did buy a great antique Irish Wedding Ring quilt. It's lovely, hand-pieced and hand-quilted. We do not have one of these in the quilts made by my grandmother and great aunt. I also came home with several orphan blocks. Two small carpenter's star blocks as well as an appliqued star with hearts, all hand-pieced, and a stack of hand-pieced Dresden plates. Along with the dozen finished Dresden plates there were cut pieces for at least 14 more and even one partially finished block, complete with the mystery quilter's needle still stuck in place.

 I am going to teach my friend to put the unfinished ones together and applique them so she can put them into a quilt. If anybody has any ideas about the age of these fabrics I'd love to hear them, I have no idea how old (or new) they might be.
My hands smell like my grandmother after handling all these blocks and pressing them. Kind of weird. Makes me wonder, does everyone's grandmother smell the same?

The mariner's compass quilt is still in progress. One corner is finished, but I still need to paper-piece the other 3 corner blocks.

You see where this is going? Have a great week.

A Long Day at the Sewing Machine

I work on sewing projects almost nonstop today. To show for it, the mariner's compass has gained one and a half borders. (I used needle turn applique to attach the medallion to the background last night.) With the geese border on it measures about 54" x 42" I used the speed piecing (method "B") found on this site to make the geese and it worked like a charm. I will need to get over to the quilt store for more of the blue fabric before I can finish that border, hopefully on Sunday. In the meanwhile I can work on making a pattern and paper piecing the final border's cornerstones, which are going to be quarter circle compasses with lots of little points.






I also made this little snowflake wall hanging for Christmas. I made one of these last year for a swap but don't have any pictures of that one. The one last year took a lot longer, but in the meanwhile I've finally mastered a Y-seam so this one was quick. I used my grandmother's carpenter's star quilt for a pattern, literally laying a ruler over her pieces and adding on seam allowance. I like this style of carpenter's star better than the one I usually see where not all of the squares around the inner star are the same size. I think that one is more common because it can be made with no Y-seams? Anyway, here's a close up of the snow-y quilting on the center star. This thing's going in the wash first thing tomorrow to get that nice dryer crinkle.

Wordless Wednesday

Don't look too closely at my points!

A Mariner's Compass Quilt

I went shopping today at a new-to-me quilt store to find fabrics for a mariner's compass quilt. Tonight I pieced the first 3 segments of the centerpiece, here they are pinned on the inspiration fabric. I picked the background fabric up at a quilt shop in Anacortes, WA during my trip to the Puget Sound, the figures are traditional native designs. Since my entire time up there was spent living on a boat and sailing I knew I wanted to use it in a mariner's compass. I modified the design shown on this website and drew out a paper piecing pattern on butcher paper.

I have also been quilting slow and steady on my neglected double irish chain. Maybe I'll get it done quilting before I finish this top. Who knows? It could happen. :)