Hip, Hip, Hurrah

Hi Nancy here,
My Amish Abstractions book came today and I think it is wonderful so glad I decided to buy it.
Now to pick a quilt and get started.
All the quilts this group has done are fantastic. Hope I can meet the challenge.

Back nearly done

This is the pieced backing for my quilt (here)

(DH isn't very good at holding up quilts.  He gets arm ache!)

There was a lot of huffing and puffing about the layout and what colour to use as the background, but DH had a rummage through the solids bin and came up with this.  He then swapped strings and stripes round (yes Tonya - he did!) et voila!

It needs to be about 4/5 inches bigger all the way round and then I'm ready to baste and hand quilt - woo hoo!

Amish Pyramids

Have been beavering away to finish the Pyramids, needed some more Orange so a quick trip to Ikea was on the menu. Managed to finish the machine quilting the day before last, thankfully I didnt run out of sewing thread - this free motion quilting surely eats it up. All I have to do it put on the binding - then I have to introduce my words - have an idea just hope it works. Have enjoyed the challenge with this Tonya.
Irene V.

finished top

Hi, Heidi here,
the top is finished and I'm quite happy with it. It's grown bigger than I planned, but that's the problem with liberated triangles. They try to escape :-))
The two colours I showed in my previous post were the only alternatives, they were the only ones in my stash of which I had enough.
The colours in the phote aren't very good, the blue is much more richer and the light reds do sparkle ( as you some of you predicted ).
It will be basted and quilted later this year, but I already see some quilted triangles in the blue background :-)
Tonya, thank you so much for setting up this challenge and thank you all for the help with the colour.

Befreite Dreiecke ( liberated triangles ) 44x37"
Oh, and probably I'll shorten it a bit



Heidi

Ready for letters

The center panel is finished. Tomorrow I will attach the 3 inner borders and start on the letters. I want it to say "Faith", "Hope" and "Charity" on a wide border. I've never made letters before, so it may end up as just "Faith". We'll see.

Liberated String Quilt

(Pattern by Gwen Marston from Liberated String Quilts; color inspiration from Cherri House's City Park Quilt)

I absolutely adore it!  

Blogged: Part One & Part Two.

Joan :)

Decisions

Hi from Heidi :-)
Erin is not the only one, who's late.
I've started with some triangles and hope to finish the center the next few days. It will be a small quilt...Now, what colour to use for the border ?
Red or blue ? At the moment I think it's red, but this can change tomorrow :-)
I will let the triangles wander into the border fabric like above, no straight lines and the words probably will be 'befreite Dreiecke' or 'Dreiecke mit vier Ecken' which means 'liberated triangles' or 'triangles with four corners'.
So, can you help me with the border colour ?
Thanks Heidi

Getting a late start

Hi, Erin here. When I last posted, I was getting ready to order my fabrics while I was house sitting; but I didn't have an internet connection so I never did order my fabrics. It's just as well because I changed my mind on my inspirational quilt. I was thinking of using #070 as my inspiration, but while I was looking at some quilt photos in my inspiration file, I noticed that #070 looked too much like a Kaffe Fassett quilt that I like. I decided on #094 for my inspiration instead.

It took me a while to narrow down my color choices. I kept wanting to add in more and more colors. I'm using the Krystal line from Michael Miller Fabrics. I finally decided to add only those fabrics named for fruits to my shopping cart and see what I ended up with.


I thought it looked like a pleasing combo. So I have fun color names like mango, pomegranate, papaya, blueberry, raspberry, and citron. That influenced my word choices. I'm going to call my quilt "Tutti Frutti." Unfortunately I'm house sitting [again] and my camera battery is dead so I can't show you any more than that right now.

Quilt Top Finished

My liberated Amish quilt became a Chinese Coins design, even though I meant it to be a liberated version of Bricks in Bars in the Brown Collection. I had decided to put my initials or words on the back of the quilt, because I wasn't pleased with my initials on the front. Today when I was cutting the outer borders, I cut one too short, with not enough fabric remaining to recut.

This could have led to interesting and colorful liberated solutions, but the strip with my initials was sitting nearby. It was just the right length, so I stitched it onto the border. The quilt top is 30" x 32". I may try freehand Baptist fans on this quilt; I am practicing them on a square of fabric with borders attached. Thanks to Tonya and Clare for tips on doing freehand fans.
Kathleen C.

How I did it

Thanks so much for your comments on my quilt--the one with "perfect" written on it in free-pieced letters.  I thought that I ought to post an answer to the questions in your comments.  First, Kim wanted to know what was my inspiration--and the answer is more than one of the quilts in the "Amish Abstractions" book, such as the Bricks in Bars, Roman Stripes, Chinese coins, and Joseph's Coat.
Secondly, I was asked my method of assembling the various blocks.  I don't have a design wall.  I set the blocks out on my bed, and arranged them.  I figured out that I needed to make a couple more blocks to balance the quilt. Then I took a photo or two.  I used the camera to refer to as I sewed the blocks together.  First I assembled the letters, then I made the square-in-a-square block and after that, it was fairly easy to figure out where everything went.  Then I added the borders.

Starting over

...with the borders. We had good weather this weekend, so while the kids were outside playing I took advantage of the good light and sat outside and ripped and ripped and ripped. I am now back to this, but of course with the blocks sewn together. So now I'm seeking advice. I think the words will be on the back of the quilt, or the very outermost border, depending on size constraints. So, I'm leaning towards a narrow inner border and then a wide outer border. Thoughts?

I haven't chosen my official project yet for this group/challenge yet, but I decided to play around with some ideas from Gwen Marston's Liberated String Quilts, and I thought the group might enjoy seeing some of the fun.  

Unfortunately, after making gorgeous pieces of fabric with liberated strips, I cut them into 5" blocks.

I say "unfortunately" because I really loved the look of those strips all sewn together.  We'll see....

Ocean Waves

I began laying in the Ocean Waves blocks into the background (black won, btw, but it'll have a burgandy border as a compromise). Got the center square done.

Pin Basted

Some progress, I have pin-basted the quilt. I want to hand quilt this, even though it is rather large (about 50 by 60 inches). The reason is that Amish quilts are usually hand quilted. Although I read an article recently that said that Amish women send their quilts out to be hand quilted by Hmong women who live nearby! So wow. However, if my arthritis starts bothering me, I may end up doing some machine quilting--so, knock on wood for luck, or whatever. It's been fun sewing this quilt so far. I will be slow with the sewing this week, as I was sick last month and got behind in my housework, and it's Spring cleaning time. Recently, I have littered my sewing room floor with little tiny snippets of cloth. Did you ever watch Eleanor Burns on TV, she throws little bits of fabric over her shoulder while she sews? I think that she might have sneaked in here while I wasn't looking. I have a special magnet that I got at the hardware store. It's on the end of a stick. I use it to go over the floor by the sewing machine and pick up any pins before I bring in the vacuum cleaner. Now, I've spent more time explaining that it would take me to clean, I guess. As soon as I have taken enough pins out of this quilt, I still have to finish the tea cup quilt and pin baste it!

Gwen Marston blog posts

Just a quick note to say my blog posts from the Gwen Marston classes are all up on my blog:

http://www.knitonequilttoo.typepad.com/

Inspired by Rene'

A small 37" square made from inspiration of Rene's quilt...( posted earlier).  This one I will probably hand quilt in black.  I feel one more quilt coming from this get together........the triangle quilt from the cover of the book.
I wonder if I can capture the sparkle of it?

"True Love"

this top grew much bigger than I intended  so I probably will not hand quilt it but I love all the colors.

We are now on Flickr

Clare here.

I've created a group on Flickr.  Click on this link to get to the group page.  If you are not on Flickr yet, or don't know how it works, just shout.

I'm also working on adding another album to the Liberated Quilters group on Facebook.  If you are on FB and haven't yet joined the Liberated Quilters group, the link is here.  If you are not registered on Facebook you will not be able to access the group.

Houses?

Not sure my border is going to stick with these quilt blocks. Not even sure how many quilts I'm going to end up with, not to mention orphans.

             

I made a wonky house block to show someone how to make them. (that first one is middle bottom in this next photo). Thought the block was incredibly dull, and was then amazed how much I liked it with the components I was working on. So I made a couple more houses, this time incorporating some of the strippy bits I'd already made

     

I took my blocks home and when I put them on my design wall, I was no longer sure I should include the X blocks. I'm not always sure where the line is between fun busy and too busy.

Taking out almost all the X blocks and the triangles:

I have a few more houses to finish up. And I want more components that have wider strips, bigger pieces. Then I'll play some more.

What do you guys think?

It's a Flimsy!

Waste Not Want Not is now a flimsy!! (48" x 68")

I wish the photo did a better job of showing the deep, wonderful purple of the 6" outer border ~ maybe once I take it outside in the sunshine the true colors will photograph. Unlike my first LAGT project (No Words Needed), this one has words on the front. (photo will enlarge)

Okay, I confess, I did use fusible and machine applique instead of free-piecing (I've been home with a horrible cold/ear infection & my brain just couldn't handle free-pieced letters).

I'm pretty sure Waste Not Want Not will end up with Baptist Fan quilting (I'd love to do freehand fans, but my wrist/thumb will not tolerate that kind of handwork) and the binding will be red. Woo Hoo!

There is another liberated log cabin quilt in the works, but it will not be done by June. Once No Words Needed and Waste Not Want Not come back quilted from Chris and I get the bindings done, I'll share "finished" photos.

Wouldn't it be awesome to have all the amazing quilts from this challenge in one place ~ that would be visually incredible! There are so many amazing quilters participating in this challenge . . .

Quiltdivajulie

Roz's liberated Amish quilt

Here's the quilt that I have sewn. Yahoo! I love you Tonya, what a fun challenge! And now I can let myself look through the blog to see all the other quilter's creations. I didn't want to look before I finished sewing, in case another quilter influenced me, or I might have gotten discouraged when I saw all the great ideas of others. Of course, this quilt will require a lot of quilting. I must say that I became obsessed with sewing the quilt today. I'm even late for supper. And behind on my spring cleaning.

Liberty quilt ready

My "Liberty" quilt is ready.
http://malinaplass.blogspot.com/

finished top

After having added to my stash of Cherrywood fabrics, and received a nice donation from Librarygal Pam, I was finally ready to make some letters and words. I used 1.5" and 1" strings for the letters - so they are quite big!

Some of you will know that Quilt it is the name of my blog - could not resist integrating that phrase. Reading the book, I noticed how "making do" was a central value of the Amish. So these two phrases kind of stuck in my head, and I love how they sound together. I was planning on using them in the opposite order - make do, quilt it. But then I made a little mistake in choosing the colors for the letters (yellow letters on purple background) so I had to switch the two around. Or to make do - you could say....

It's a bit hard to get a true picture of the dark purple colors - still winter...

I am considering hand quilting this in big baptist fans or machine quilt a diagonal grid. Not sure yet, but my hands are saying they need a rest from hand quilting...

Loved making the letters, have started planning another all letters quilt. And there is so many pretty Amish quilts to be inspired by....

My second!!

Hi!! Anne, Oslo, Norway here!!  At last, my second top is ready for quilting!!  I think I`m going to machinequilt it myself. I have had a lot of fun with this one too!!  I realy enjoy this way to saw.....Not need to think 1/8 inch measurement. And to play with the colors.... Love it!!

The Project

This is Wendy.  My DH has termed this "The Project", so the name has stuck. Here's my crystal blocks I've been L&E for the past few weeks. My quandry (much to my DH's amusement) has been which background to use. In case you can't see the colors well, we have dark green, black, burgandy and navy. The burgandy is about a half step darker in real life. That's the one I'm leaning toward, but the black is nice, too. So is the navy. Of course I just like the color green. See my problem? I need impartial judges, please.

Wendy

ZigZag

Knit One Quilt Too Kristin here. I decided to finish these blocks while at my class with Gwen Marston. I will let you know when I get that blog post up! However, I didn't know what setting to use. The one above was the first one I tried- it would be big and would need those setting triangles.

The second one I tried was the one above. I kind of like the asymmetrical setting now as I look at it, but at the time I thought I'd need to make 4 more blocks and I didn't want to do that.

So, this is what I ended up with (like #94). I love it! The gals in the class liked it so when it came time for show & tell I told everyone about the challenge. Tonya's info got bandied about and everyone's excited to see her book come out. I showed several of my word quilts. I still hadn't come up with a word, but one of my classmates suggested ZigZag and that's what I'm going to use! I would love to do a red & black border similar to the original, but I have no more of this black. I'm still trying to figure out which brand it is. I think it might be the Moda solid black. Anyway, that's where I am!

Maybe Not

Just more playing. When I first looked at the Ocean Waves quilt, one thing I noticed was how the blocks formed X's and O's. I decided to play with that aspect of the quilt by making my kind of X's and O's. Learned one thing for sure - these do NOT go all together like this. Will most definitely need plain border separation.

I like the X's though. I had fun making them a bit more scrappy than usual.

How are you all doing? Been seeing some FABULOUS quilts. If anyone is still stuck trying to decide what quilt to do or what colors, please post about it, maybe we can all help.

take care, ton

Be well craziness

I've finished the crazy patch border on this (with lots of red) and I'm really liking it. (For some reason, the words are fuzzy here. sorry). It's measuring about 46 inches square and I'm planning to make it into a rectangle with a top and bottom border, and then putting blue borders all around. Here it is again with blue fabric--the only yardage purchased for this project, lying on the couch underneath the design wall. I'm toying with the idea of another dark narrow border to stop the crazy patches, then red top and bottom, and then the royal.

Finally some progress...

I don't have any good excuses... just been  really busy lately.  Here are my first two blocks.  The A and the P are the first letters from an Amish proverb that I love. "A plump wife and a big barn never did any man harm". I figured if I wanted to keep this quilt I better just use the first letters (besides I didn't think I could do 39 letters) otherwise my husband would get embarrassed everytime anyone saw it...

I am pretty happy with my first letters ever. It will be fun to include them in the churcn dashes... then I won't have to figure out where to put them later :)

my progress

Most of my blocks are done, 7 more to complete and then I can begin to sew the rows. I love all the different quilts that everyone is working on. I plan to do some different words for the front and use the others for the backing.  I'm shooting for a piano key border. I'm using  plate 61 as my inspiration.  I hope you are all having a wonderful weekend. It's very windy and rainy here.....good weather for stitching. :)

beautiful threads

http://www.pumpkinpatchprimitives.com/catalog.php?category=129

Hi Beth,

Just wanted to share this site for thread ideas.......
Brenda is the owner of pumpkin patch primitives and leader of another
challenge group I belong to.

Your baskets are lovely.

Happy Sewing

ready.

I'm ready to quilt this!

Yeah!

My plan is big stitches with dark thread.

Maybe black. Maybe various colors.

Floss?

Quilting thread?

How about DMC floss on those little rolls?

Should I buy size 12 floss?

And where do I get it?

The shops around here have only size 8 which is kind of thick.

I even splurged and bought wool batting!!

Any hints about thread would be appreciated.

:)

Stitching the piglet

Hello everyone, Lynley here in Canberra, Australia. I've started handquilting on my little pink pig, although I don't know if I'll be finishing it any time soon! It's nothing complicated - just outline quilting in the pinwheels in a starburst style with navy thread. The pink and green blocks are getting freehand baptist fans. And I'm using a nice bright pink thread as someone suggested.

No idea about the border yet; we can wait and see how it progresses. At this stage I'm thinking something complicated and completely unrelated to the piecing of the border - like a cable, or feathers .... but I suspect I'll be getting sick of it all by that stage and it'll end up being straight lines. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

quilt ready

My wonky log cabin quilt is ready.
http://malinaplass.blogspot.com/

Half way there

Have my Chinese coins set in their strips. NOw on to the borders. Waffling about letters. Not sure I want to do that, but have another idea in mind. We shall see.

The Back Is Done!

The back is done! The center medallion (name panel) measures approximately 30" x 40" ~ and, because I had nothing on hand with enough continuous yardage, I created a pieced back fabrics that appear in the front of the quilt. [both photos will enlarge when double-clicked]

I admit to being heavily influenced by our years spent living in Indiana Amish country ~ my quilt is much more Midwestern than Lancaster-ish (summertime meant blue skies, golden sunshine, and colorful flowers).

Of course, the top is still on the design wall, not at all stitched together. But, the binding strips are cut and the back is done! Woo Hoo!!!!

To see how I used the other leftovers, please visit my blog to check out Waste Not, Want Not.

broken dishes

                                I like this one so  much better than the wedding ring quilt I tried before.......now I just have to play with the layout until it feels right.  these are good sized hst and they will finish at 4.5".

More Amish craziness

I've been making more crazy blocks, nearly enough to get around the whole quilt so far. I need to rearrange them a bit for contrast between the bigger and smaller chunks of colour, but you get the idea. I've heard calls for more red from Victoria and Julie, so I've tried putting a strip of red at the top and bottom (only top pictured here) to make it a rectangle.

What do you think? I'm thinking it needs to either go inside the navy border, or on top and bottom of the crazy patches. I want to get this to throw size (about 50 by 60, so I will need another border after the crazy patches.

2nd top

Discription on my blog. http://malinaplass.blogspot.com/

Center Square

Brenda here with another go at this challenge. I decided to combine my two previous starts (the words and the strip piecing) in a liberated version of #31, Center Square. The center square is framed with bigger and bigger strips in different values. I've done that, and then framed the wide borders with a narrow one to provide a break between the crazy piecing and the calm center borders, which lead to the words "Be Well." Sort of Amish Zen, if that makes any sense. Right now it's 36 inches square, and after the crazy border I'm going to put wide borders top and bottom to turn it into a rectangle like on the original, then another border to get it to throw size. In the inspiration quilt, the quilting motifs brings the quilt to life, so stay tuned for that.

Amish?

Well I have finally decided on "Broken Dishes" plate 25, page 74.
It has more sparkle than what I have tried to do
here.  This just looks dark and dull to me and has no zing.  I'm moving on!

Try, try again.