New Project

The first quilt I'm working on is 'Woodland Winter':

The fabrics I'm using are these:

Isn't selecting the fabric one of the best parts of quilting?  It doesn't take long, and one has a big stash!  The grouping above actually uses fabrics from different collections, like a "real" quilter.  Usually I buy groups from my favorite designers  - how about you?  Do you have favorite designers?  I have several  - I can identify their fabric without ever having seen it before and I am always going to love whatever they design.  I know their groups better than anyone working in the stores  - that's terrible, right?  How about you?  Some of my favorites are 3 Sisters, French General, Basic Grey, Sue Zipkin, Blackbird Designs and Tula Pink.  And that's just the beginning....
 

On Vacation

I'm in Ohio celebrating my Mom's 80th birthday.  We had a big party for her yesterday and we all had a lot of fun.   And ate a lot.  Oh woe!  Can't tell my trainer what I ate; it wasn't horrible, but it wasn't lite and totally healthy either!

I'll be back in Texas this week.  Breaks are great, aren't they?

Fabric Preparation

 

How to prepare the fabric before quilting is really controversial.  Wow!    To prewash or not to pre-wash.  To simply trim the precut fabric or to straighten it.  I have innocently been the cause of a storm of reaction all because I tore my fabric in public.  Horrors!

 

When I read Harriet's (and Sharyn Craig's) book, The Art of Classic Quiltmaking, and Harriet said she didn't prewash her fabric, I thought, "Great, that will really save some time."  I grew up sewing clothing and you always have to prewash your fabric or your blouse or dress or pants won't fit after the first wash.  It wasn't until I took Quilter's Academy I that I learned that prewashing or not depends on your preferences and work styles.  (It's not that Harriet didn't say this in the The Art of Classic Quiltmaking book; I was in a hurry to get started and didn't read any further).  It depends on what kind of quilt you are making or how you like to handle the fabric.  Once I found out that incorrect prewashing can lead to fading or bleeding fabrics, and that it's easier to handle fabric that has not been prewashed, that settled it for me.

 

OK, so most people don't want to chop someone's head off bcs that person doesn't prewash her/his fabric.  That part comes with the next step:  straightening fabric.

 

A lot of fabric produced today is not straight because the fabric is not wrapped onto the bolt evenly.  Also, fabric can be printed off-grain.  If you use unstraightened and off-grain fabric right from the store, you may have distortion and stretching in your quilt top.  So you need to straighten your fabric.  It 's not hard, but does take a bit of time.  So far in my quilting journey, I'm finding that using straightened fabric is a good thing.  I haven't had any of my fabric "act up" or distort out of place yet.  You'll need to buy up to 1/4 yd. additional fabric for each fabric in the quilt for the straightening unless you use fat quarters (FQ).  For fat quarters, you straighten each FQ, so you won't be able to use the entire FQ.

 

For some people, the idea of straightening fabric makes them crazy.  They argue about the cost - which is true -at $12/ yd. if you have to buy 1/4 yd, more, it is expensive.  Yet if you spend $200 - $300 on fabric for your quilt and then spend $200 - $400 to have it quilted, and it doesn't hang straight and is all distorted, what have you gained in saving an extra $10 - $20 or so?

 

Tip:  After 5 years of taking Harriet's classes, I have found out what she says works, works.  She says try it out, and see for yourself.  And I have.  So far, the extra time and trouble of straightening fabric is working for me.  Be sure when you do this that you tear both ends of the fabric.  It really is easier to work with 1/2  lengths, like Harriet says.  I have done 1 yd. lengths, but 1/2 yard increments are easier and faster to work with.  And starch the heck out of the fabric - it needs to be stiff - not like cardboard, but stiff enough that it is easy to sew.

 

And, wouldn't you know, I had fabric printed off-grain for my class project for the Quilter's Academy I class, the Town Square quilt.  I had to use it on-print, off grain, because when I straightened the fabric it was on-grain, off-print:

For now, I will continue to straighten my fabric, but mostly in the privacy of my own home. 

Really Learning How to Quilt

I am a beginning quilter who has been a beginner for a few years and haven't really progressed very far.  I've started projects with enthusiasm only to find that my seams haven't matched or my points have been cut off.  I feel like I've been on a quest to find that magical formula to make the perfect scant 1/4" seam all the time.  What this blog will do is document my quest to make good quilts by working through Harriet Hargrave's and Carrie Hargrave's "Quilter's Academy" books.  Volume 1 - Freshman Year, Vol 2 - Sophomore Year, Vol 3 - Junior Year and Vol 4 - Senior Year are out now and I'll start with Vol 1.

For the past five years, I have been able to take classes with Harriet.  In 2008, Laura Kay Houser, owner of the Happiness is Quilting store in McKinney, TX, brought Harriet to teach machine quilting.  Laura Kay's shop (fabulous place) is about a 25 minute drive from my home in Plano, TX; I was visiting the quilting stores in the area one Saturday and signed up for the class on the spot.  The class was on machine quilting.  I had found Harriet's book on "Heirloom Machine Quilting" in Half Price books in early 2006 when I was looking for suggestions on how to set up my sewing space.  The quilts were so beautiful in the book, I decided I had to learn how to quilt.  When I took Harriet's class in 2008 and again in 2009, I wasn't ready to learn how to quilt as I hadn't yet perfected my skills on piecing the quilt top.  Tip:  You really can't "quilt it out" when your piecing is really bad.  :)

Also in 2009, Harriet taught a piecing class from Vol One of the Quilter's Academy book and it was great.  In 2010, I took her second class from Vol Two.  In 2011, I took a third class from Vol Three and last week I took the fourth class from Vol Four.  However, taking four classes from a Master Quilter does not make you a great quilter.  You need to work at it and sew all the projects!  Harriet is a born teacher and gave us so much good information.  You will "hear" it here and it is also in her books.  I plan to sew all the projects and document my progress.  Harriet says that if we work through all 6 of the books, sewing all the projects, we should also become Master Quilters.  That is my goal!

I plan to write and show everything - the good, the bad, the ugly - no matter how embarrassing.  Why am I doing this in public?  First of all, it will keep me focused and accountable and second, I've found it's really freeing to share my mistakes and warts.  Hiding things or keeping secrets uses a lot of energy, leaving less energy for living, while releasing things releases that pent up energy making it available for living.  If that made sense.  I will share what I do and what I have learned.


Harriet Hargrave and me at Quilter's Academy class at Happiness is Quilting