I am stepping back into my own and it feels good.
Artistically speaking, I have been on ‘secret hold’ for more than a year. Meaning, I have not been able to show my art, talk about it, not much of anything really. That is a difficult place to be, when you keep a blog where you talk about what you make. As I resume my artistic trajectory, I have been circling several different projects, the quilt top challenge being among them.
So far, I have made 5 blocks, pictured in the first photograph of this post. This morning, I did the math for the cutting of the rest of the star blocks. I am calling this block the Squat Star, because the points of the star are so short. (But also because I love squats in weight lifting!!).
I have been fussing and fretting over how to most effectively make Half Rectangle Triangles while keeping strong points. I have settled on using paper piecing as my method of doing so. I am unsure this is economical, it seems to waste quite a bit of cloth, but, I have gotten the swing of this approach, so I will stick with it for now.
I feel somewhat lost in my ability to grab this project by the horns and just make the top! I haven’t made a quilt to a specific scale from start to finish before, designing, doing the math, cutting, sewing and quilting. Usually, I either freeform or use an established pattern. So this is really working my skill set.
I have completed these 5 blocks:
My next set of blocks will look like this:
I need to make 12 of the above block. I really look forward to cutting and using the fruit print. I had a bunch of fun creating that multicolor set and seeing it printed in Meadowlark is a treat.
Want to know some inside information? The blueberries, seen in the lower right, were originally drawn while going to school at the Fashion Institute of Technology. I normally draw things out on tracing paper, I find it easier to work with because it is transparent and you can layer and shift it around, making it easier to see what you are doing. That piece of tracing paper was tucked into a journal from that period and when I started working this fruit piece, I knew I had to make use of the drawing. I has stuck with me through 5 moves and I still knew where to find it when I wanted to use it this second time around! If you have this cloth, check out the little crown where the blueberry flower would have been attached, I love how that area printed. The above photo, unfortunately does not show the detail well as it is a screen shot from the Quiltography for iPad app (which I curve!). 😎
Are you making a quilt top (or any other item) using Meadowlark? If so, I would love to see your progress.
Melanie Testa 