Week in Review 2018 - 11/16

I take Vinyasa Flow with Mike Birmingham. Fortunately,
he doesn't make us do anything as complex as this. :) 

If you have been following my blog, you know I have attended several yoga classes a week for seven years now. Our move from Appleton, WI to Cohasset, MA, this past May meant finding a new place to practice yoga. Fortunately, there is a studio with a range of classes from Yin (holding poses for 5 - 7 minutes to allow gravity to stretch the body) to Bikram (taken in a room with the temperature jacked way up there) and many between the two extremes, just a mile from our home. In Appleton I took from one teacher. Here in Cohasset, I take classes with four different teachers. The theme this week in all my classes is gratitude. Each teacher introduces the concept in a different way. Nearly all have focused on "heart opener" poses and stretches. I am grateful to have the ability and opportunity to practice yoga with such an inspiring  group of teachers.   

Now that I think of it, piecing the
back to Cohasset Sunrise with
scraps left over from the front
could be my equivalent of an insane
yoga pose. It took years of practice
to be able to whip something like this out.

I'm also grateful to have reached the point with Cohasset Sunrise, where the back is pieced, the batting is pieced, and the quilt is sandwiched. I begin quilting it next week. Hurrah!

I am linking up with Nina Marie's Off the Wall Fridays. 

Weekly Report 2013 - 11/22

Detail from ZenBlossoms

Tips, Thoughts and Techniques:

The word for the week is gratitude. Actually, gratitude is something I start every day with. For over a decade I have risen from bed, gotten a glass of water and then sat down to write my personal combination of morning pages and gratitude journal. As I do the final work required to post ZenBlossoms on my website and submit it for a call for entry (due December 1st) I am feeling grateful for so many things that allowed this particular piece to come together. First, a special thank you to Leah Day for posting free motion quilting motifs weekly for several years. I have learned so much from trying every single one. Second, I knew I wanted to use metallic thread for the background of the quilt, but I dreaded it. Metallic thread can be fraught with shredding problems. Not this time. Yes, it did break or shredded more than the other threads, but not more than once every 30 - 45 minutes. Not bad at all for a metallic. Third, I am grateful that although my thread order was delayed by a month due to the vendor putting the wrong zip code on the label, I was able to quilt the full piece in just three weeks AND there was enough thread. Fourth, I am grateful for your comments, stories and suggestions.

Thanks to the stars aligning, here is what I was able to accomplish this week:

ZenBlossom
43" H x 33" W

1)  ZenBlossoms

Some of the motifs used in ZenBlossoms I learned
from Leah Day, while others are of my own invention.

• block - Done!
• trim to finished size - Done!
• face - I decided that ZenBlossoms would look better bound than faced, I did that!
• take formal call for entry level photos - Done!
• make and attach split sleeve - Done!
• make and attach label - Not yet.

2) Leah Day's weekly assignments


Do whatever assignments Leah comes up with next. 

a) Foundation Piecing - plan out the number of hexagons I will need and determine how I will piece them. - I did manage to create an English Paper piecing sample, but that was it.

Two samples of pieced hexagons. The one on the top
is done with English Paper Piecing. The one
on the bottom is machine pieced.

I will probably go with the English Paper Piecing for the Leah Day assignment. I found the basting relaxing. I found whip stitching the pieces together, not so relaxing. My thread has a tendency to get caught on the completed work no matter what strategy I used to hold it off to the side while I stitch the next hexagon in place. Which method I use in the future will depend upon the size of the hexagon. The larger hexagon, the more likely that I will stick to machine piecing. However, small hexagons are too fussy to do by machine. My break-even point is one inch, the size I tested both methods on. 

b) Free Motion Quilting

I was uncertain about the latest motif, Modern Weave. Leah always works out her motifs on square blocks, I prefer to create random shapes first, on a 20" square block, and then test out each motif in one of the resulting "odd" shapes. This forces me to deal with awkward spaces and bouncing off of curved or wiggly lines. How would a motif based on straight lines and triangles work? Surprisingly well. I struggled at first on how to divvy the triangles with lines, but eventually found I worked best if I was, one, always stitching towards my next end point and two, eyeballed bisecting the space with my next line. This meant a fair amount of travel stitching and therefore thread build up that actually enhances the look. This would be an excellent motif to use on a psychedelic quilt.

Free motion quilting sampler, with Leah Day's motif,
Modern Weave, front and center.

3) Visioning Project - Do the next two assignments from my Photoshop Elements class. - Done!

This is turning out to be more fun and less time consuming than I had expected. Hurrah!

4) Finish sketches for Sing the Blues, the quilt that will be my next focus. - Done!

I have a sketch that I will use as the blueprint for my next quilt. I've gone from working with piano keyboards, to saxes and I arrived at three dancers. The current working title is Trio.

Next week will be busy with non studio work. Still, I hope to spend two days, instead of my usual three in the studio. My current plan is as follows:

1)  ZenBlossoms

• make and attach label
• add to my website
• add to my FaceBook fan page

2) Leah Day's weekly assignments


Do whatever assignments Leah comes up with next. 

a) Foundation Piecing - plan out the number of hexagons I will need and start piecing.

b) Free Motion Quilting

3) Visioning Project - Do the next two assignments from my Photoshop Elements class.

4) Trio

a) Blow up my sketch for Trio.

b) Select the fabric I will use.

c) Try creating a painting of a city at night as the backdrop for the dancers.


I am now linking up to two blogs on Friday's. The first is Leah Day's Free Motion Quilting Project and the second is Nina Marie's Off the Wall Fridays.