Improv Sampler - Building Blocks

If I wasn't so anxious to get to quilting while both the little ones are done I would figure out how to get all four of these photos as one image.  Oh, and I could have cropped them a little. No big whoop.  The truth is that I forgot to take photos of these blocks before I put the quilt top together. They are now in with the others, awaiting the border.  

And yes, I am adding borders to this quilt.  It's not normal for me and it isn't normal for most improvisational style quilts.  But I am using this quilt as a teaching sample.  Going in to traditional shops I thought I should try to pay homage to more traditional quilt construction. Perhaps that will make it less scary for people?  Change is often feared, and improv style construction is new and different.  But I'm hoping the sunny colours will draw people in and curiosity, at least, will get the better of most!

These blocks are true improvisations.  I started with the scraps from the other blocks and just started sewing pieces together.  As I got going I could see some different opportunities, so you see 4 very different blocks.  All of them were made at the same time, with the same scraps.   And such different results.  I love them all.  I'm really tempted to do an all strippy quilt now. Nothing but rows and rows of scrappy stripes.  Hmm, this whole process is giving me so many more ideas.  

Either I have to give up sleep or I need the girls to sleep a heck of a lot more!  That being said, we are having a gorgeous day and we've already been to the park.  A soccer game in front of the house is on the agenda for later.  As long as I keep them away from my nose.  Oh, did I mention I broke my nose last week?  Fun times.  Yeah, I'm off to sew and ignore everything else!

Improv Sampler - Free-Piecing

Welcome to free piecing.  This technique is definitely about the process.  And sometimes you win and sometimes you lose.  In other words, don't look too closely at that 'sun' block in the photo.

It does help to plan when you are doing free piecing, or at least have an idea of the general shape you want to finish with - a house, a flower, a star.  Quite often I actually make a sketch if my brain is baby addled and I can't figure out how the pieces should go together.  (I should share my sketches one day - if a quilt block could be a stick figure then I am an expert at drawing that!)

Free piecing in this context is about the process of cutting and piecing.  There are no templates and often no rulers when cutting.  Sewing is just one piece to the next.  You often start from the inside of the block and work out.  You have the be creative and improvise along the way.  For example, in the house block above I didn't cut a piece long enough to encompass the angle of the roof.  That means the roof doesn't overhang the house that much and the roof is smaller than intended.  Oh well.  I compensated by adding another strip of the background fabric to make the block big enough.  Problem solved.

This technique also works well in combination with freely cut applique pieces, like this artist.

This basket has been and will become some more improvised blocks.  In my bid for teaching supremacy - okay, just one teaching job to start - I've been putting together class notes and a class sample.  After all, you can't pitch a class without showing what you'll do.

Generally I don't like samplers, but I did want to be able to demonstrate a few different improvisational  techniques.  By no means are they the only ways to tackle improv quilting, but they are a good way to break free from patterns.  These techniques are also about the process, not necessarily a final design result.  There is design and then there is improv.  One step at a time for breaking the pattern addiction.

Over the next week I'll share with you the finished blocks and ultimately the finished quilt top. That is, if I can find the time to finish all of it.  I've got 12 of the 16 blocks finished, but the last few days haven't been very productive with a sick Hubby and our anniversary.  And now the baby is sick so I'm not sure what naptime will bring.  We do what we can.

Happy Anniversary

Some days you just need to stay in bed.  Preferably snuggled under a quilt not attacked by a dog.  Today is one of those days.  Hubby was up all night in the bathroom, thus keeping me up. But gone are the days when we could just wallow in sickness and tiredness - toddlers and babies just don't get that.  So Hubby is wallowing in bed, trying to sip ginger ale and the girls and I are having a pajama day.  Oh, did I mention that it was our wedding anniversary?

Thankfully the damage on the quilt was not also done today.  It was actually attacked by one of the dogs a little over 5 years ago, on a day far worse.  I'd been reamed out at work, we were awaiting word from Hubby's parents about his dad's cancer surgery, it was the coldest day of the year, and the desk we picked up for my brother was damaged.  You know, one of those days where just one more thing going wrong will make you cry tears that you fear will never end?

We were pulling up to the house and I asked Hubby where the dogs were.  At the time they were generally outside dogs and couldn't fully be trusted in the house for long periods of time alone.  He assured me that he cleaned our room, closed the closets, and left them on their beds sleeping.  But I knew, I just knew, as I asked him, "But what about the quilt?"  I raced in the house and at first glance everything seemed fine - dogs were spazzing at our arrival and everything appeared intact.  Then Hubby found a crumple of wet batting in the dog bed, the intact dog bed.  Sure enough, a quick investigation found a chunk missing from our quilt. Commence Cheryl losing it.  I screamed, I punched the walls, I cried, and it took a few shots of vodka to settle my nerves.

When we arrived at the hospital the next morning we had a few more misadventures to share with my father-in-law.  He was more than an optimist, he always chose to not let things get to him and he had the ability to get everyone around him do the same thing.  Here we were whining about our ridiculous string of bad luck to a man diagnosed with terminal cancer and he was making us laugh.  And then he told me to just make the chewed section part of the quilt's history.  It wasn't ruined, this is just what happened one crappy day.

It's taken me over 5 years to fix this quilt, partially out of laziness, partially out of uncertainty on just how to do it, and partially because it serves as a vivid reminder of those precious days five years ago.  Our anniversary was looming and the quilt was in desperate need of a wash, so it seemed time to tackle it.  

Thankfully it was only this one section along the edge of the quilt that was chewed.  I decided that it was small enough (about 8 inches total) that it wouldn't wreck the remaining edge of the quilt (it's a king-size).  So I merely cut around the total chewed section in a relatively gradual curve, cut some bias binding, ripped out stitches of the old binding, and did my best to attach it all together.  I don't generally use bias bindings, and never continuous bindings, so it was quite the challenge for me.   It came out okay.  I'm not proud of the final connection of the new and existing binding, but overall it looks decent.

The next step is to actually put another label on the quilt, identifying the history.  This quilt was pieced together with blocks I got in a block shower from a whole bunch of on-line friends. At the time of our wedding I was heavily involved with the World Wide Quilting Page.  They got together and sent us blocks to make a wedding quilt.  Even Morgan enjoyed receiving all the blocks.  And this quilt has always been our summer quilt ever since.  One of these days the weather will warm up and we can retire the duvet for the summer and snuggle under this quilt again.  Happy Anniversary.