teaching sewing confidence, tip by tip

Sunday 13 January 2013

A Year Long Quilt? Well I'm Very Excited About It!


Not a lot of sewing this week; I've been too busy planning, selecting and ordering fabrics ready to join in with the free

Skill Builder Block Of The Month 
organised by Alyssa Lichner at Pile O'Fabric


It's a 20 block quilt, and Alyssa will provide us with instructions for 2 blocks each month which we'll 'Quilt As You Go' starting Thursday, 17 January and ending in October.  Then in November, we'll add borders, and by December, we'll be ready to piece the whole quilt together and bind it.  Each block will introduce another technique that we may or may not have attempted before:
  • Basic Patchwork Piecing
  • Improv Piecing
  • Strip Piecing
  • Foundation Paper Piecing
  • English Paper Piecing
  • Curve Piecing
  • Applique
  • Pixel Piecing
  • Log Cabin Piecing

I'm not doing it particularly to learn the skills; I've done them all before (apart from, ironically, English Paper Piecing and I'm booked on a course at my LQS in Manhattan in February for that and 'Quilt As You Go') but there's nothing wrong with maybe being shown new ways to do things we already know and to pick up tips along the way.  I also thought this would be a great way to have something on the calendar to look forward to and motivate me throughout the year. I wanted to be involved again in a group activity with all the new quilternet friends, community, shared knowledge, and fun.

Here's a look at a graphic that Alyssa has created for how the finished quilt might look:


Alyssa has created some great instructions for fabric/colour choices, so I decided to make the sampler quilt top in Kona Solids.  I've chosen 5 colour groups and 5 hues within each, along with Ash as a background fabric.  I've poured over my Kona Colour Card for hours and hours, and I'm really pleased with my choices.  I've put the colours together in the chart below, taking the images from the Kona website, but they aren't represented on the screen 'exactly' as they appear on my Kona Colour Card!

My Kona Solid Colour choices for the quilt top
  I thought this was my opportunity to make a patchwork of Kaffe Fassett fabrics for the quilt back.  Someone once told me that you don't have to worry about which Kaffe Fassett fabrics work well together and just go for it because they're all so stunning that it'll work no matter what.  I'm not 100% sure about that, but I've put a selection together and ordered them, and I'll rethink it if necessary once I've got the actual fabric in front of me.

Kaffe Fassett fabrics for the Quilt As You Go quilt backing

I'll be sharing my progress with you all along the way, and I hope some of you will join in too!  I think I'll be a little late starting as there's not much hope of my fabric arriving by Thursday, but I've got my fingers crossed.  There's no pressure and hurry, though, as Alyssa will post the instructions for the first two blocks on Thursday this week and then we've got 2 weeks until she talks to us about quilting them.

I'm really quite excited!!!



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16 comments:

  1. Yay! I'm doing this too. :) Haven't seen too many others on my blog feed signed up for it, so I'm looking forward to seeing your progress!

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    1. Oh that's great and I see from your post that Julie and Lisa are also doing the BOM. Have you joined the Flickr group, I've just posted my fabric choices and introduced myself? Have you chosen your fabrics yet? :)

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  2. Wow this does look like a real skill builder quilt - you will be an expert after all those blocks! Love your Kona colours - I have got to get myself a card as they never look the same on screen - I have a Kona quilt on my Finish-a-Long and I can hardly bear to chop up the fabric, it's so pretty! I'm sure the Kaffe will look great on the back x

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    1. Hi Gertie, the colour card was my best investment ever and now I can order online wherever I find Kona the cheapest and know just what I'll be getting - it paid for itself very, very quickly. I'm off to check out your FAL right now :)

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  3. Hi Chrissie. I did it. I took the plunge. I'm IN!

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    1. Ahhhh, brilliant! I've still got the C&G course in the back of my mind too but I've already covered a lot of it so can't really justify it. I just need to motivate myself into doing some more mixed media art textiles if I could only stop quilting! :)

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  4. I'm hoping to join in too as I've done almost non of these skills! I don't have any money for new fabrics though so I'm hoping to piecing it from scraps and bits of fabric I already have... there will be NO planning!

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    1. Go for it Wendy, scrappy quilts always look so great and with it being a sampler quilt it really won't matter. Alyssa sold it to me with it being 'Quilt As You Go', haven't tried that yet and really want to and maybe that's the way forward to stop all my shoulder aches when I'm quilting large quilts?

      There's no pressure either and Alyssa says that she'll be leaving all the instructions up on her blog for as long as her blog continues to exist, so you can't go wrong really! :)

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  5. Wow it looks like a great quilt along! I love the Kaffee fabrics, and the purple one, second up on the right is the one that I have used for *that* quilt. Can't wait to see your progess on this one. As for EPP lessons, hey come to Jersey, I'll teach you!! It's great fun and I love it. Best of all you can sew at chat at without having to think too much ;-)

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    1. Hi Sarah, KF, drool, drool - I thought maybe using lots of KF in one quilt might cure me of my obsession! When I saw your finished photos last night I realised one of the fabrics was the same, there we go again! I'll email you in a bit about *that* quilt, very exciting!!! :)

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  6. Hello Chrissie - it sounds like a great idea and although I am tempted to join in I think I already have too many plans for this year!! However, I shall enjoy following your progress.

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    1. I think it's quite a commitment really isn't it, a whole year? Alyssa is keeping it all available for as long as she has her blog so if you wanted to do it later then you could work completely at your own pace. I'll keep you posted anyway! :)

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  7. I'm excited you are doing this block of the month as well. I don't have time to do the other one you recently posted about, but I look forward to seeing what you come up with!

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    1. Have you started yet? All my fabrics (apart from one) have arrived now so I've picked my colours out for the first two blocks but haven't started them yet, maybe tomorrow. I had to make myself finish off all my other commitments first! :)

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  8. Hi, luv your fabric choice for backing the Skill Builder Block of the Month. :)

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    1. So do I! You can't go wrong with a bit of Kaffe Fassett can you! :)

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Chris Dodsley


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