The Whole Enchalada

I love new projects…

There’s something about new fabric and new patterns that just put the creative juices into overdrive and sends inspiration and ambition down on angel wings. I can’t wait to get them home and into my quilt area and just…start.

Starting is the easy part.  Finishing is, well…harder.  I have great plans, great ambition, and great intentions.

Only sometimes to have all three melt away when I find newer fabrics and newer patterns.

So this year, in some of my blogs, I want to discuss finishing – the process, tricks, tips, and how I make it through to the end.  I have always had to be somewhat organized since quilting isn’t my full-time job yet.  I’ve always worked one or more full time jobs in addition to teaching, designing, and making my quilts.  I’d like to share my process with you.

It’s hard to pinpoint what inspires us to undertake a new project.  For me, sometimes it’s the fabric.  If there’s a line of fabric that just takes my breath away, I’m known for buying two yards of each bolt and five of the one that I want as the focus fabric.  That fabric may sit on my shelves for a while – until I find a pattern that works. 

Here’s where my new iPhone comes in handy.  I’ll take a picture of the fabric with it.  That way there are no fabric swatches to lose.  I can pull my phone out, go to my pictures, and have it with me at any quilt show or fabric shop.   I can compare the material that is there to those in the picture (in case I’m short a few yards) as well as see if the pattern I’m considering will work with the fabric.

 

Sometimes it’s the pattern that drives me to start a new quilt.  If this is the case, after I purchase the pattern, I use my iPhone to take a picture of the front of the pattern and the sheet that has the fabric requirements on it. 

Lovely in Lavender by Debbie Beaves

 

 

 

My iPhone also has the option of turning the picture from color into a black and white photo.  I frequently use this option to study the color structure of the pattern – this allows me to see the darks, lights, and medium values used without being influenced by the colors the designer has chosen. 

 

That’s how it starts.  I think that’s how it starts with most of us.  Fabric or pattern…sometimes both…often dictates what we’re going to do next.  And I think this where a lot of quilters make errors.  We tend to think of this as the first step, instead of thinking through the quilt process in its entirety.  In fact, unless you are beginning quilter, I don’t think you should think in steps at all.  Beginning quilters have to, because they are learning and every concept is new.

However, if you’ve got three or more quilts under your belt, the time of thinking in steps as you pick your project is over.  I believe the reason a lot of quilters “hit the wall” in their quilts is that they can’t see beyond the excitement of new project.  Regardless of whether it’s the pattern or the fabric that has driven a quilter to start something, you have to see beyond this. 

For instance, take this little quilt top I finished this weekend.

 

This is Spring Bertie by Bonnie Sullivan.  I love Bonnie Sullivan’s patterns and the wooly flannels that have been designed to go along with them.   I decided I wanted to make this pattern, but there were a couple of issues I had to determine how to deal with before I committed to the project.

The first issue was that a lot of applique is involved.  I love applique, but I’ve already got two handwork projects going, and I really did not need another one.   I had to make a decision to be satisfied to machine applique it.  The background was not a firm cotton, but a soft flannel, so I had to make sure there was a stabilizer I could use that would allow the flannel to evenly feed through my Janome but not impede the quilting process.

All those half-square triangles were the second issue.  I love half-squares and their design possibilities are endless, but you’re dealing with bias edges no matter how you make them and bias edges can get a little wonky if you’re not careful. Couple the bias edges with the fact that this quilt is flannel and you could develop serious trouble with them.  Cotton fabrics can be starched to stabilize the bias, but flannels can only be starched so much.

So I did a test drive with the flannels and Thangles.  Worked like a charm.  Half-square wonkiness was avoided.

 

It’s important that as you consider a pattern, you look at its entirety, and not just its beauty.  If there is a block in the pattern you’re not fond of or that gives you serious construction issues,  meet that issue head on before committing to the project.  How will you get over your construction problems?  Can you possibly paper-piece them?  Can you get a quilting buddy who has mastered the block to show you how he or she does it?  Are there tutorials on YouTube? If applique is involved, do you have the time to commit to it by hand?  Is it a good candidate for machine applique?

If it’s a block you can construct just fine, but you’re honestly hate making, can you live with making several of them if the fabric’s pretty?

Don’t let the lovely pattern dictate your project.  Carefully look at it.  Open it up.  Read the directions.  If you love it, but there are a few things that may give you issues, can you develop a plan to deal with those to push your project forward? I think that’s the reason so many of us (me included) have so many UFOs.  We start the quilt and then run into an area that gives us problems and we haven’t come up with a plan to deal with it.

So we set it aside and start on the next project that catches our attention.

Other quilting areas should be considered and dealt with before rotary cutting one strip of fabric for a new project.  I’ll talk about those next week.

 

Love and Stitches….

Sherri