Book Review: Quilts With Style

I enjoyed reviewing this book for Fave Quilts  and am glad that I could keep the copy! 

 This is an excellent book by Gudrun Erla who is a fabric designer and an experienced quilt designer.  Although the book contains six quilting patterns there are two completed variations of the quilts shown, the traditional and the modern look, further increasing the number of possibilities for quilt designs are the arrangements of basic blocks in some of the designs.

All the designs have straight edges that make it extremely simple to piece together and yet produce a sophisticated completed quilt. Every pattern in the book has a modern and traditional color variation. Some of the patterns provide variations to convert to a table runner.  Every design provides measurements for the individual block sizes and for the completed quilt size making it easier to plan and choose the appropriate project size.  In addition, detailed instructions are provided for adapting every design to different bed sizes. These are very helpful instructions to avoid running out of fabric while completing the project.

The contrast in the modern and traditional look of the same quilt is dramatic and draws the attention to proper fabric color selection. In addition, the pictures capture the quilting design in the completed quilts and provide ample ideas for finishing the projects.

The Riptide is one of the coolest designs in the book.  Ideas are provided for four additional patterns by using the basic block. There are instructions for using the cut away corners from making this quilt to complete a bonus table runner.  

Just like the Riptide design the Homebound design offers multiple variations of piecing the quilt from the basic block. The simply rectangles design could be used to showcase one of a kind fabrics to make a quilt that could be used as a wall hanging. A young teenager would love to own the modern version of the Simply Rectangles quilt while the Snapshots design would make a great wedding present quilt.

An entire section in the book is devoted to general instructions on completing the quilt. The tips provided in obtaining perfect points when piecing would be helpful to any quilter. Various ways to border the quilt, including techniques to make the binding from fabric are included in this section.

This book will be a great addition to any beginner wanting to take up quilting project.  Experienced quilters will find a lot of inspiration for a new project and will be amazed to see the numerous possibilities with a simple basic block and the differences in modern and traditional variation of the same quilt. 

Read the published review here:

http://favequilts.com/Books-and-Products/Quilts-with-Style-Leisure-Arts

Asterisks Baby Quilt

One of my office mates at work was having a baby shower. I do not work with her in the same team but I got a chance to know her over the duration of working on the social committee. We organized a one day event for the office and there were several committees. We were part of social committee. My office mate is full of enthusiasm and mentioned that she sang in her church choir and hence felt at ease in leading the choir for the event.

Well, over the course of planning the event we shared in her pregnancy journey. When an invite was sent out for a baby shower, I decided to make her a baby quilt instead of donating money towards common gifts.

I had completed this  class from Crafty on  block of the month 2012. It was a free class led by Amy Gibson and I really wanted to try this asterisk pattern. She had two different versions and I opted for the non-wonky version for this quilt.

We knew it was going to be a baby boy so I decided to use blue as one of the main colors. The printed fabric had hearts in blue and yellow and so yellow was also added to the mix and white was an obvious choice to match the printed fabric which also ensured that the quilt did not end up to be a maize and blue quilt representing the Michigan Go Blue colors!

 I love how the arms of the asterisk line up when looking from a distance.

 The binding has all the three colors used for making the asterisks and reads "mummy loves me, daddy loves me, God loves me". It takes time to stitch this on the entire border and in the future I might increase the spacing between the words. The extra detail gives a very good personal touch to the finished quilt.

 I used the stitch in the ditch method for quilting and traced out all the straight lines of the asterisks. If I had more time, I might have tried some of the free motion quilting (FMQ) but did not feel confident enough to try that as yet. That is one of my goals to try FMQ on my sewing machine.

 This picture was taken on the balcony of my apartment and shows my potted herb garden collection!

It was a joy to see the expression of my friends face when she opened the package and everyone in the room gasped. It was fun creating this baby quilt - I enjoyed every part of the process of choosing the fabric, piecing and quilting. I forgot to measure the dimensions of the final completed quilt - should do that in the future for my own reference.

My Sewing Machine

I bought my sewing machine in the beginning of 2015 and this blog post has been in the draft, unpublished state until then! I will write more about the how, which and why I bought the sewing machine but for now it would suffice to say that it was a gift from my mother-in-law!

I remember using my mom's Singer sewing machine as a child. It was a mechanical sewing machine that my mom received from her own mother. There was a leather cord that had to be wound over the balance wheel and the large wheel on the side. Ever so often the cord would come off and the key in putting it back on was to begin with the pulley on top and then slide it over the large wheel. Sometimes the metal pin that held the edges of the cord would wear off and break apart. This catastrophe would cause a major disruption in the sewing project unless a spare cord was on hand. Sometimes my dad would step in and fix the cord with a metal hook.  I still have fond memories of using the sewing machine. I found it thrilling to wind the bobbin, by resting the rim of the bobbin on the balance wheel through a screwdriver or a pen. The machine had a single straight stitch but there was no limit on the number of garments and curtains that were sewn using it.

When I  moved out of home for graduate studies, I often wished to own a sewing machine. And who wouldn't want one? Especially after spending hours in mending and altering a pair of jeans, or fixing a rip in the sheets by hand stitching. Not to mention all the cool projects that could be completed in the spare time.
I put off buying the machine in an attempt to drive the focus on getting out of school faster and made excuses for not having the space to carry out my projects. Isn't it funny that sometimes when you keep telling yourself stuff that you actually begin to believe it?

Well when I graduated last year and family visited for the ceremonies, my mother-in-law expressed her desire to gift me a sewing machine for no apparent reason at all. My husband denies sharing my interest in sewing and so this affirms my belief that eventually, the Universe, the Spirit, God or whatever higher power one believes in, makes sure that your deepest desires are fulfilled. I was shocked and thrilled when she offered to buy me a brand new sewing machine of my choice.

I spent almost four months in doing my research, reading reviews and checking out demos before I finally settled on Janome memory craft 9900. During my review stage, one of the common questions asked by the sales staff was "what is your current/last machine?" After my first demo I stopped telling that the only other machine I used was my mother's mechanical Singer where I used my feet to set the pedal in motion. I realized very fast that I am taking a quantum leap across different worlds of sewing machines!

The fact that my new machine has no pedal to drive it and comes with over 200 stitches and besides, winding the bobbin can also thread the needle for me! It seemed like the world of sewing had evolved in leaps and bounds since I last used my mom's sewing machine.

My goal is use every feature on the sewing machine before settling down on my favourite. I love that I can personalize my projects using the embroidery feature. I can use the inbuilt stitches to type out text. I hope to document the many projects I create using this machine on this blog. I hope to challenge myself to take up advanced projects eventually getting to sewing garments for my wardrobe. I hope share my journey on this blog and over a period of time reflect on my evolution. 

I would love to hear about cool features of sewing machines that other folks own. Something that they discovered and found very handy to use - there is growth in knowledge sharing. My husband says that the machine is more expensive and powerful than is laptop; enough reasons for him to upgrade :-)  As for me, I am very happy with my machine and just so thankful and grateful to my MIL for her generosity!