Quilting & Learning - What a Combo!: Cindy Needham

Showing posts with label Cindy Needham. Show all posts

Thursday, December 05, 2019

More practice at Free Motion Mavericks

Welcome to Free Motion Mavericks (week 258). I'm doing double duty today, so here's the link to December's Throwback Thursday.

Practicing my free motion quilting (FMQ)

Free Motion Framework
by Jen Eskridge

After finishing up a big project (the Epic Neutral Bow Tie Quilt) and a DrEAMi! (the fabric basket) last week, it's now time to play. Of course, I couldn't resist the Black Friday sale at C&T Publishing last week and bought myself the digital copy of Free Motion Framework by Jen Eskridge.

This book is essentially about making whole cloth quilts to learn or advance your FMQ skills. I actually love making whole cloth quilts, but there is so much more potential to the book.

Since I'm not in the mood to embark on a project right now, I was going through the book and was intrigued to find on page 21, five ways of quilting feathers within a cat's eye shape.

Practicing feather shapes in a cat's eye shape

I just happened to have some fabric that sort of had this shape on it. I used a technique that I learned from Cindy Needham in her Craftsy course, Machine Quilting Wholecloth Quilts. It's called Large Print Wholecloth Quilt. Essentially it involves FMQ using the backing fabric as a template to create a wholecloth quilt in the front, on a solid fabric.

Here's what I mean.
This is the fabric that I quilted on, but the result is on the solid fabric.

This is the side that I quilted on,
but is the back of the piece

Practicing FMQ on the
patterned fabric

This is the back while quilting, but
the front of the piece when done.

In the two flowers above, I practiced the techniques that the author suggested for the feathers within the shape. Each shape has a different technique.

After that, I used the same technique on all of the shapes in the flower to see how it would look.

This is the shape with the feathers on the outside

The feathers are now on the inside of the shape.

These are feathers without a border around the shape.

What I learned

By the end of this practice, my feathers were actually getting worse - it was past the time to stop.
The point of the quilting was to see how the different feathers within the same shape would look. It was an interesting exercise.
I want to learn more feather techniques - and since I have a couple of books and classes on Bluprint (Craftsy), I will see what I can do. The fun part about learning new designs is that it's mostly a matter of doodling them, a lot!
I'm very impressed with Jen Eskridge's book, Free Motion Framework. I really hope to use it more like she suggests. Having a framework for FMQ on a solid fabric would certainly be easier than trying to piece a quilt. 😊 If you're interested, I highly recommend that you watch her video about her book.

Sunday, December 16, 2018

Burano Lace

The lovely island of Burano

The highlight of my trip, as it relates to textiles, was the Island of Burano, in the Venetian Lagoon. Burano is renown for its lace and its colourful houses. It's a lovely island to visit, and small enough that you don't have to plan your trip.

Burano

I got to Burano on a vaporetto (water bus) from Venice. I thought of my dad all the way - he would have loved the boat trip! 😊

When I got to Burano, I walked around the island, visiting the more residential areas first. It really was wonderful.

Great door!

I made my way to the more commercial area of the island and visited a few lace shops. Many were having sales since they were getting ready to close for a couple of weeks and would reopen just before Christmas. It sounds like their flood season, the Acqua Alta (see Related links) is often around that time.

Commercial lace - perfect for art quilts 😊

I bought a few small pieces of lace to incorporate in art quilts. These are the more commercial pieces that are apparently still hand made but on commercial looms.

Lace Museum

The lace at the museum was really stunning. I must admit though that the more modern lace were my favourites.

Here are a few pieces that were done in the 19th and 20th century.

This is my favourite piece - so delicate and intricate.

Delicate lace made in Burano

Burano lace on a table runner

Lace doily

Lace with pattern

Burano lace - isn't it stunning?

I just love this painting by Venetian artist Antonio Rotta (1828-1903). Many of his painting are scenes of every-day life.

Antonio Rotta (1828-1903)
Portrait of Lacemaker at Lace Pillow

Lace-making demonstration

The lace I bought in Burano

After visiting the museum, I walked by a very high-end lace shop, Emilia Burano, that offered lace-making demonstrations. I couldn't resist.

The most exclusive lace made in Burano has 7 different stitches. To make the best lace possible, each lace-maker masters one stitch. Once the pattern is set up and ready, each lace-maker works on the piece doing her one stitch. It can take months to make a piece.

The Emilia Burano shop has been there for 4 generations of lace-makers. Upstairs they have an area of some of the lace that has been made in their family, including an amazing wedding dress.

If you want to learn more about lace-making in Burano, see the videos listed in the Related links section below.

What I learned

Spending the day leisurely walking around Burano, talking with artists and having a great pasta lunch is my kind of travelling heaven!
There are many kinds of lace-making. I really admire the work but will leave it to others to make.
I have been wanting to make a whole-cloth quilt incorporating lace and handkerchiefs ever since I took one of my first Craftsy classes with Cindy Needham. Her work is stunning. See Related links for her courses on Craftsy and a great video on YouTube of her work in Houston

Walking along the canals of Burano

Wednesday, November 01, 2017

Learning QAL - November Goal Setting Link-up

Welcome to the fourth month of the Learning QAL.

I hope you'll join me on my learning adventure - and make it yours!

The rules are easy - post what you would like to learn this month (it doesn't have to be complicated!) and link-up your post. At the end of the month we will have a Learning Sum Up and share our learning. You don't even have to finish the project as long as you post about what you learned. There is even a prize for a lucky person who has linked up to both the Goal Setting and Sum Up!

There must be something you have to make soon that involves learning something new! So please join in the fun.

In October, Mel of Mel's Quilting Blog wanted to try out Terial Magic and see if she should use it to make a T-shirt Quilt. She used the stabilizer on a t-shirt and made a pillow - and learned that yes, she liked the product and would use it for a whole quilt. I've never heard of Terial Magic until now. Sounds like a great alternative to ironing stabilizer. Thanks Mel for sharing your learning. You are the winner of a $20 certificate from Connecting Thread! Congrats!

I'll be searching this month for a few ideas as prizes for participating. They will be listed in the November Sum Up and the winner will choose the prize she wants! Each prize will be roughly a $20 value - so get that post written and join in!

Four improv quilt blocks made with different batting

October Learning Goal

My October learning goal was to try 4 types of batting to learn the difference in how they handled when quilted.

Since I didn't get a chance to bind and wash them by the Sum Up, there wasn't much to say except that the silk batting was very thin and the cotton-wool batting had more loft that the regular cotton and bamboo-cotton batting.

I also had a chance to try out some new improv blocks and practice my free motion quilting (FMQ). I would say that the experiment was a success, but wasn't finished.

In the next few days, I will write a post on the washed and finished blocks. Look out for it!

November Learning Goal

This month, I will continue the batting experiment.

As I did in October, here are the four different batting I will be using:

Tender Touch bamboo-cotton (50%-50%) with scrim
Warm 100 Cotton with 100% cotton scrim
Hobbs Tuscany Collection cotton-wool (80%-20%) batting with resin bonded
Hobbs Tuscany Collection silk and fine polyester (90%-10%) with resin bonded

The time, I will be comparing the batting to see how they handle different threads as I do some free motion quilting (FMQ). I have a lovely collection of silk threads as well as cotton and metallic threads that I can't wait to use!

FMQ from the back

For the first three, I will be using a technique that I learned from Cindy Needham in her Craftsy course, Machine Quilting Wholecloth Quilts. It's called Large Print Wholecloth Quilt. Essentially it involves FMQ using the backing fabric as a template to create a wholecloth quilt in the front, on a solid fabric.

Here is the wholecloth quilt that I originally created, using this wild fabric as a template on the back.

For more details, see Free Motion Quilting Madness in the Related Links below.

Large Print Wholecloth Quilt

I'll be using these prints to create wholecloth quilts. The solid fabric behind the print will end up being the front of the quilt.

A whimsical birds and leaves fabric with a blue solid

A bird on a tree branch with a blue solid

A wild plant as the template on an off-white solid

For my last piece, I will be FMQ this fabric that I hand-dyed this summer (as my August Learning Goal).

FMQ on hand-dyed fabric

What I learned:

One month isn't very long for learning something new. I like that I can keep learning based on the initial idea of using different batting for various projects.
I suspect that I may be overly ambitious this month - on the other hand, when I get started, the FMQ goes fairly quickly. I guess we'll see 😊
No matter how much I actually get done, there is guaranteed to be learning involved!!!

Related Links:

Mel's October learning at Mel's Quilting Blog
Connecting Threads
October Learning Goal, October 1, 2017
October Sum Up, October 25, 2017
Free Motion Quilting Madness, March 16, 2015
Machine Quilting Wholecloth Quilts with Cindy Needham at Craftsy
Results of Learning to Dye Fabric, August 28, 2017

Linking Parties: I will be linking this post to many great linking parties. Check them out and see what others are doing! Midweek Makers, Let's Bee Social, Linky Tuesday, Design Wall Monday, Main Crush Monday, Quilter's Monday, Needle & Thread Thursday, Finished or Not Friday, Can I get a Whoop Whoop?, MOP Monday, Monday Making,

An InLinkz Link-up

Friday, September 01, 2017

Learning QAL - September Goal Setting

Welcome to the Learning Quilt-A-Long (QAL)

Have you thought about your learning goal for September yet? Since September is traditionally the time for returning to school, it's a good time to consider what you'd like to learn this month.

Since I have a deadline in early October (see you at the Art with Fabric Blog Hop!), I am going to keep this month's learning simple.

September Learning Goal: To learn a few more free motion quilting (FMQ) patterns.

There are so many great resources available - on the internet, in books, magazines, courses, etc. What I will be doing this month is use a few of these to learn and practice my FMQ. Since I have to keep this post interesting with images, here is some of the FMQ that I've done so far.

Race Car design from Lori Kennedy

Re-quilting a batik runner

Practicing my feathers

Using Angela Walter's Dot-to-Dot technique

Here are a few of the resources that I will be using (the links are in the Related Links below)

I want to learn a few of Muv's designs such as the Oak Leaf, the Rudbeckia, and the Berries and Leaves.
Craftsy: I have a ridiculous amount of free motion courses. I have watched and learned from many of them but it's time to get serious about learning and practicing!
Of course I have to mention some of the renown FMQ teachers such as Leah Day, Angela Walters and Lori Kennedy. I have many books, web links and Craftsy courses by these ladies.
There are a few quilters that I've discovered recently such as Esther with her 365 Day Doodle challenge and Yanicka's Three Feathers pattern.

Re-quilting a door hanging

As the month progresses, I will s~~hare with you~~ show off my FMQ and tell you what I learned using the various resources.

I really hope that you'll join me on my journey this month. You can follow along and share some of your favourite FMQ learning resources or you can link-up your own learning project below!

One Monthly Goal (OMG) - Updated September 3, 2017

Black & white fabrics for my OMG

When I wrote this post all of these projects were rather overwhelming. Now that I've had a couple of days to start and think things through, I've decided that my OMG for September will be to create a little wall hanging in black and white for my niece. She asked for this at Christmas but I was stuck - I just had no inspiration (more about that when I finish this project). I will be combining the FMQ for this month with the OMG to create that wall hanging that will showcase some of the FMQ I've practiced and learned.

What I learned

Design It, Quilt It: Free-Form Techniques
with Cindy Needham

It was so tough coming up with something that would be fun to learn but that could be done in smaller chunks of time and not too large and overwhelming. I really want this Learning QAL to be about the fun of learning and not the stress. I will be consciously trying to live that principle.
Since it was tough to decide, I now have a list of the many, many things that I want to learn in the next months. It was really good to take a look at all of the resources that I have access to. There is so much out there!
As I was adding the resources to my list, I wanted to make sure that I promote not only the obvious resources, but also the up-and-coming and not so famous ones. There are so many talented people out there who are so generous about sharing what they learn. It's so much fun to find them.
It's often a challenge to find visuals for a blog post where I haven't really done anything yet! Oh well, I guess that's when re-using photos comes in handy :-)

Related Links

Free Motion Quilting Design Videos - by Muv of Lizzie Lenard Vintage Sewing
Craftsy
Leah Day of the Free Motion Quilting Project
Angela Walters of Quilting is my Therapy
Lori Kennedy at The Inbox Jaunt
365 Day Doodle challenge by Esther at ipatchandquilt
Yanicka's Three Feathers FMQ pattern at Finding Myself as an artist
Art with Fabric Blog Hop

Links to posts of the images

Practice Makes Better

Race car design by Lori Kennedy: Back on Track - August 20, 2016
Re-quilting a batik runner: Projects Update - December 2, 2014
Practicing my feathers: Too much quilting? - September 24, 2015
Using Angela Walter's Dot-to-Dot technique: Colourful Learning Project - May 21, 2014
Re-quilting a door hanging - September 12, 2014
Design It, Quilt It: Free-Form Techniques with Cindy Needham: Free Motion Quilting Madness - March 16, 2015
Practice Makes Better, December 15, 2015

Linking Parties: I will be linking to many link-up parties. Feel free to follow along. Free Motion Mavericks, Off the Wall Friday, Finished or Not Friday, Can I get a Whoop Whoop?, Oh Scrap!, One Monthly Goal Setting, MOP Monday, Main Crush Monday, Monday Making, Linky Tuesday, Design Wall Monday, Midweek Maker, Let's Bee Social,

Prizes
The August prize for participation goes to Donna of quiltpaintcreate. Thanks so much for participating! I will be in touch with you about sending you Yanicka's Cougar pattern featuring her Fractured image technique.

The September prize for participating in both the September Goal Setting and Sum Up link-ups will be a $20 (US) gift certificate for a quilting book so that you can keep on learning! For those who don't want to pay shipping, it can be a e-book (they are my favourites!) I am sorting out the details and will announce the publisher in the September Sum Up post.

An InLinkz Link-up

Monday, August 01, 2016

Working with Needle and Thread

It's been ten days since my sewing machine (my Jag) went into the shop. In my last post, I was wondering what I would do....bring up one of my other machines to do some piecing, do some handwork and/or finish some projects?

So far, I haven't brought up another machine. I worked on an outstanding project, started a hand sewing project, read a few books, cleaned my sewing space and started on a new project.

Block 47 Heroine's Crown

This hand appliquéd block is from the Grandmother's Choice Block of the Week project that I started a few years ago. I went through my blocks and realised that I only have 8 blocks left to do. When I complete a few more blocks, I'll write a post about how they relate to the fight for women's rights.

Hand appliqué is not my strength, even after making many orange peels, I appliquéd most of the pieces in this block by basting over the freezer paper, except for the oak leaves. Considering how difficult it was, the block came out better than I expected.

A few months ago, I discovered the Make Modern magazine from Australia. It has some lovely projects, it's a great price (the Australian dollar is roughly the same as the Canadian dollar) and it's available to download.

I've been interested in English paper-piecing but I really don't like hexagons! Don't know why, I just don't! I found a great little project that involves English paper piecing with triangles. It's called Shattered Cushions by Susan Bolte. It's from the eleventh issue of Make Modern magazine.

Aren't they lovely? I found some fat-quarters that I had been saving for something special - and this is it. They are grey and that lovely teal that's been so popular in the last couple of years.

The instructions suggest using a quick way of English paper piecing, but for me the whole point is to enjoy working with needle and thread. So I'm using the freezer paper, applying it to the back of the fabric and then basting each piece. It's just like doing those orange peels I loved so much.

Last weekend, I went away with my hubby. He went golfing and I drove around the wonderful back roads of the Upper Ottawa Valley. Most of the time, I had the roads to myself.

Antique embroidered hankies

I found an antique shop that had a few old hankies. When I spoke to the owner, he took out a box full of beautiful hand embroidered runners and tablecloths. Here is what I came home with.

I didn't dare iron them since I don't want to set any of the stains. I'm going to have to find some Retro Clean in Canada. This is what Cindy Needham recommends to clean these old beauties.

One of the hankies has a great lace border. Since it's plain, it would make a great background for a pretty art quilt. I'm still thinking about that one!

Antique hand embroidered runner

Finally, I framed "The Feather", the needle felted piece I made at an Out of the Box play day, It's hanging in our bedroom, but there isn't much wall space left.

"The Feather" is now framed

What I learned:

I didn't think I had much to say for this post, but it looks like I've kept busy, even without my sewing machine.
It's been a nice change to do some hand work. I've even brought the projects to work so that I can play during my lunch break. It's a great way to spend a lunch break with my fellow crafters.
My trip through the Upper Ottawa Valley gave me a lot of time to ponder on one of the projects I want to do. I may have finally figured out how to put it together. I've chosen the fabrics and will slowly start playing with ideas. I want this one to be 3-D as well include needle felting and possibly fabric painting. I'm really going out of my comfort zone with this one!

Thanks for dropping by. This post is linked to a few linky parties. Please check them out!
MOP Monday, Main Crush Monday, Let's Bee Social, Midweek Makers, Fabric Frenzy Friday, and Slow Sunday Stitching.

Saturday, May 07, 2016

Floral Fantasy Wholecloth Quilt

It's finished and now hanging at the CTQG So full of love quilt show this weekend. If you're in Ottawa, I hope you'll consider attending. We have very talented quilters. It should be a great show.

Almost finished Floral Fantasy Wholecloth Quilt

I didn't take a final picture of this beauty before it left home because the deadline for handing in the quilts was Tuesday at 6 pm. At 5:40 I was still beading. Thank goodness an extra hour wasn't a problem, but there was no time for pictures.

I've added a couple of pictures at the end of the post, now that I've finished volunteering at the show this afternoon.

This project is based on Cindy Needham’s Machine Quilting Wholecloth Quilts on Craftsy. One of the topics in her course is making a medallion wholecloth quilt, using a variety of stencils and free motion quilting (FMQ). I've used many of her techniques and advice in the last two years. This my second project based on her class - the first one was another wall hanging with tons of FMQ, but all made by following the printed fabric at the back of the quilt. It sounds weird but is so cool! This is a technique that I actually want to make again.

Figuring out what to do with the centre

Here's the process I followed:

I drew the stencils directly onto the fabric then added the batting and backing. It was nice not to do any piecing!
To be honest, I had no idea how to quilt this thing. I FMQ around the medallion using a relatively heavy King Tut variegated cotton thread.
I then outlined the border and added metallic thread through the bobbin. That was relatively easy to do since I only had to stay in the centre(ish) of the outline.
Finally it was time to outline the butterflies and add metallic thread to their body.

I still had no idea what to do with the medallion, so I ignored it. I knew that sooner or later I would figure it out!

Before adding pebbles to the circles of the flowers

I then proceeded to FMQ in straight(ish) lines around the design. I believe these are called match sticks. Since there are many angles to this piece, I just tried to be consistent when changing the angles of the FMQ.

When that was done, I still didn't know what to do with the medallion. I started by FMQ pebbles with metallic thread in the centre circle. I then echoed every second flower with the same variegated thread. Since the flowers that weren't echoed were standing out too much, I FMQ inside them, following their outline. As you can see in this picture, it was starting to look good, but I felt that the circles in the quilted flowers stood out too much so I quilted pebbles.

What I learned:

Floral Fantasy Wholecloth Quilt at the Sew full of love quilt show

I really wanted to block this quilt as Cindy Needham recommended, but I ran out of time. It really could have used it since the medallion was quilted last and was less densely quilted in some areas. Not good practice but if I had waited to quilt the medallion first, the quilt would still be a work in progress (WIP).
As usual, this project wasn't planned - not because I didn't want to but because I didn't know what to expect and what to do next. Now that I have some experience, I'll choose my next stencil pattern more carefully, based on how I'll be quilting it (I hope).
I liked the beads and may add a few more once I get the quilt back.
This was one of the first times that when I quilted the outline of the border, I should have taken the time to tie off the thread. It was a good quality polyneon thread but it tended to undo. Since I have quite a bit of this type of thread, I will try to remember to tie off my ends.
I wasn't as careful as I should have been when I FMQ the corners of the quilt. I actually had to go back and sew a few more lines on two of the corners. This happened because I was quilting them at an angle. I'll have to watch out for the corners next time.
I'm so happy that the next CTQG quilt show is in 2 years! I need a serious break from deadlines.