progress, or lack thereof…

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I wish I could say there’s been some progress here, but really… um, no. I made up all these blocks, put them up on the wall, and have been staring at them ever since. I’ve auditioned a bunch of background fabrics, but nothing seems quite right. All along I’ve been thinking of an Essex yarn dyed, but so far I haven’t found the perfect one. I’ve also considered a low volume/barely a print, but again, haven’t found quite the right one.

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I got a lot of great suggestions on Instagram yesterday, so maybe I’ll finally figure something out? I’m still open to ideas, so do leave a comment if you have an idea for a great background fabric!

(oh, and yes, these do remind me of nautical flags, though that wasn’t actually my inspiration. If I ever get this one made up into a quilt top I’ll fill you in on my original inspiration!)

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all signs point…

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It was inevitable. With extra Cotton + Steel prints sitting on my sewing table, I could only resist so long before cutting them up for a second quilt. This time I paired many of Alexia’s Hatbox prints along with many of the C+S basics and a print or two from Melody’s Mustang and Rashida’s Moonlit lines (I love how all these collections mix and match!)

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I decided to go for something a little faster this time (faster than my previous Cotton+Steel quilt, that is) – I love triangles (though I don’t really love sewing them together!), and thought it would be fun to play around with something other than an equilateral triangle. I wanted a pointier triangle, so drew up this isosceles triangle.

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My inspiration for this one was from products from Ferm Living. I’d seen many of their fun products that feature triangles, and in my mind, I remembered them as being pointy triangles with a lot of white space that allowed the colors to really shine. I made this quilt without looking back at their products – thinking it was better to go with what I remembered I liked of their design rather than being influenced by having just seen their products. When I looked back at them just now to link, I like that my memory of their design wasn’t quite exact – I think it gives the feel of their design without being a replica.

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I’m really pleased with how this one came out (for a while I was worried that my hand drawn triangles would come together in a crazy mess that would never line up correctly!) I love these colors together, especially since navy isn’t a color I typically use in quilts.

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I’ve really had fun playing around with these great new prints – July will certainly be a fun fabric month! Tiger cats? Who can resist?!

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flying mustangs

flyingmustangs

I haven’t been able to get this quilt idea out of my head since seeing this vintage quilt on Pinterest. I started one with Liberty and solids a while back, but I wasn’t feeling the exact translation of the design, and it’s been sitting on the design wall ever since. When I was thinking about a design using my new Cotton + Steel fabrics, I returned to this design, thinking that it might be a good one to show off those fun mustang fabrics.

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This time though I decided to adjust the design a bit – I decided to feature four of the Cotton + Steel prints (the mustang from Melody’s Mustang line, butterflies from Rashida’s Moonlit, and the turquoise and gold print from the Basics collection) and then I used a number of coordinating prints (many shown here, along with a generous addition of C+S basics thanks to Melody). I cut all the triangles for the flying geese by hand so they’d be a bit wonky, and added in some solids in places so it wasn’t so predictable.

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One would think that with my stash of solids I’d be able to find coordinating solids for this quilt, but no. Nothing was quite right, except for these double gauze solids (blue gray, indigo, light gray and light mustard). I didn’t have enough of any one of them, so I decided to use them all. I love double gauze fabrics in a quilt, but didn’t quite think through how many tiny pieces would be involved here, and consequently how much shifting and trickiness I’d encounter (I definitely put my new Flatter to use on this quilt top!). I think (er, hope!) it will be worth it in the end, but next time I’d probably stick with quilting cottons in this type of design.

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I laid this one out on the floor to take photos this morning, and as expected, Hazel just couldn’t resist — back and forth across the quilt. A brief stop in the center, then back again. Cute, for sure, but it does make for a challenge in photographing quilts!

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