Swoon...Swoon...Swoon

It's hard to believe, for me, but I am actually finished my Swoon quilt. Yes, you read that right. Finished. It's done. And its FABULOUS! I know they say self praise is no praise, but, honestly, I am utterly in love with this quilt and so delighted with how it turned out. Cue lots of photos.

It seems an awful long time that I've been working on this quilt, and it is really. I started back in the back end of June with this bundle of fabric: 

 

I swapped around a few fabrics as I worked through it, and it began to take shape. One of the things I found with this as I made it was that pretty much every block became my "favourite" as I moved through them. I really love each of the colour combos and the fabrics - there is one block that I wasn't as keen on, but since finishing it, I've just fallen in love with that one too.

When it came to choose colour palette and fabrics, choices were dictated to a large extent by the fact that I was making it for my own bedroom, where the feature wallpaper is duck egg blue, and shades of aqua and teal feature in the curtains, lampshades etc to tie in with that colour. I used a number of different values and shades of aqua and teal - from the very light to very dark, and from a number of different fabric ranges such as Kate Spain's Fandango, Boho by Urban Chiks, Carina Gardner's Pinfeathers,  Joel Dewberry's Modern Meadow, Denyse Schmidt's Hope Valley and Bonnie And Camille's Happy Go Lucky.  To balance the aquas, I used navy and yellow prints. I did consider adding grey as well, but ultimately decided against it.

I was nervous about limiting the colour palette to 3 colours - its not something I've done a whole pile in the past, and I wondered how it would work out. My primary concern was that it would be a bit flat, at the end, but I kept faith, despite my misgivings at times, and love the vibrancy of the colours and how they work together. No flatness to this quilt!

Some of the fabrics I have been hoarding for a very long time, waiting for a special project - like my Saffron Craig navy Birds fabric, or the Amy Butler Arabesque or the Lotta Jansdotter Echo.

You know that moment when you cut into them and wonder if you're doing the right thing? Because they're so lovely you can hardly bear to cut them? Do it. Because they're even nicer put together in a quilt :-)

This quilt is a monster, size wise, 80" x 80". I table basted it a few weeks ago, and I quilted it on my Pfaff, at home, after deliberating sending it to a long arm quilter for a while. I expected the quilting to be torturous (honestly) but it wasn't. It flowed really well, and I did it block by block, and I got it done in 2 days, doing short enough sittings at various times. The biggest problem I had was manipulating the weight of it which took a while to get used to.

 

I didn't do anything fancy in the quilting - I stuck to my regular FMQ stipple (I thought this was a bit boring, but was under time pressure and didn't want to try something new on such a big and special quilt). I'm delighted with how it turned out though, all lovely and crinkly.

The backing is a print that I can't remember the name of, that I bought about 2 years ago in a sale from Julie, which worked out super, super cheap (about $3-4 per yard). It was the perfect colour and print type for this. I didn't bother doing a pieced back, because, honestly, after all those massive 24" blocks, I couldn't face it. And I knew I'd never get it matched up basting it without giving myself a heart attack from stress. 

The binding is a navy dotty popline which I got specifically for this and I love how it frames the quilt.

All in all, I can't quite believe its done, finished, and on our bed. I couldn't be happier!

Have you made a Swoon? If not, I'd highly recommend it. Yes, it's a lot of work, but the pattern is really well written, the blocks are insanely addictive, and it makes a wonderful quilt. And woohoo! I love mine :-)

Swooning again....

I decided this weekend it was time to get moving with my Swoon. I didn't want to make a mockery of the 2013 part of the #swoon2013 hashtag, and I knew if I didn't get it quilted in the next week, I would not get to it until well after Christmas.

The biggest issue stalling me in the last couple of months was basting. Swoon is 80" x 80" and I needed to move some furniture in my living room (my sofas) in order to have enough floor space to baste it. But moving furniture is easier said than done with the 2 big kids confined to the house in miserable November weather. So off I went to my friend Google to find out about table basting alternatives, having seen a link to a tutorial for board basting a few months ago.

I read quite a few, and decided to try this method, using clamps. I ran over to the hardware shop yesterday, but the clamps were more expensive than I anticipated and I was too cheap to buy more than four. Really, for this to work, I would need at least 8, probably 10. I think I'll do some searching online for cheaper options for next time, because I really liked this method. No crawling round the floor, and working in defined sections makes it feel quite quick, although realistically I'm not sure it really is any quicker than doing it on the floor. My knees and back definitely liked it better though.

I was pretty happy with the results - it wasn't absolutely perfect on the back, but its a huge quilt, my first time trying it, I only had 4 clamps and its for my own bed so a couple of minor puckers here and there are not going to bother me. I think a bit of practice would sort out those issues very quickly. This is a great option for me. I normally baste on the playroom floor which is not that fair on my kids and their constant in-and-out looking for toys, walking across my quilt sandwich drives me nuts. So I'll be using this method again for definite.


Once it was done, I moved on to quilting it today. I was nervous about this, it's by far the biggest quilt I've ever tackled on my machine.  I had considered sending it to a long arm quilter but decided against it for cost and other reasons in the end. It took a little while to get a flow going - getting used to the weight of it! It's seriously heavy with the batting in there. But, on the advice of my buddy Fiona (BetsyGreyCrafts) who quilted hers just before me, I did it block by block, and about half way through the first (humoungous) block, it just fell into place.

Of course, once I really was moving with it, I had to stop and give the kids baths and do bedtime. But I returned to it once all that was out of the way and in another hour and a half, I realised I had 6 of the 9 blocks quilted. No broken threads. No snarls. No needles snapping. One bobbin change. Pretty much perfect quilting - I couldn't quite believe how easily it had flowed.

So, one more column to do and then it's on to binding. Can't wait.

Swooning.....time to show off your quilt tops!

I'm still in love with the Swoon pattern. And I hope you all are too! I finally managed to get my quilt top done, only a week behind schedule, and I love, love, love how it turned out!

It's for my own bedroom, which has a duck egg blue wallpaper on the main wall, so I chose my palette to match that. Its a bit more restricted, colour-wise, than I normally do, and despite being a bit nervous about making it work, I think it does.

This is such a great pattern to make, and at 80" x 80", its a whopper of a size. You can see on the bottom left where I managed to stand on the bottom of the quilt top trying to hang it. Oh well. It will come out in the wash. I was just glad it fit on the swing frame, as otherwise I had no way of hanging it anywhere else for a picture and would have to wait for a dry day to take a picture with it spread on the ground (pretty challenging in an Irish Autumn).

I do have to say though, I'm pretty happy to be done trimming HSTs! That was the worst part of making these blocks, all the HSTs to trim. (I'm typing this knowing that the next border in my Made to Measure quilt top is entirely HSTs, which is why I've been putting it off for months).

My next issue to figure out is how to quilt it. I'm really, really tempted to handquilt it. As in, I am very close to doing it even though it would take a while. But then I would love the texture of a stippled quilt on the bed. But stippling this huge quilt would be my idea of a less-than-fun quilting task. Hmmmm. I am still mulling it over. Opinions anyone?


And I'd love to see your Swoon top if you have yours done - feel free to link up below so we can all go visit. If you do link up, please go have a peek at some of the other completed quilt tops and leave some comments. I'll leave this linky open until mid-November because I know everyone is working at different paces on this one.

August Goals

Seeing as we're almost (almost, yay!) in back to school mode here, I decided that it might be a good idea to write up my goals for August to keep me on track. I have a lot going on, with preparing the back to school stuff, trying to fit lots of activities/visits in for the kids before the summer holidays come to an end, and working on some requests for baby quilts & other items. As well as working with Cindy on some stuff for the Modern Quilt Guild of Ireland.

So I really need to keep a couple of my "own" projects uppermost in my mind so they don't get lost in there.

My August goal is very simple:

Finish my Swoon blocks. If I get them sashed and pieced into a quilt top, all the better. But I'll be happy with 9 complete blocks! I have 4 done already and am totally in love with them. 5 more to go, and 1 of those is cut. So it's definitely do-able!

If I'm very, very organsied, I'd love to get the final humoungous HST border on the Made to Measure quilt cut and the HST blocks trimmed. I think it would be too much to ask that I would get it pieced as well! This is my progress so far:

Linking up to Shanna and Melissa :-)

 

Are you getting your Swoon on?

I never thought, in my wildest dreams, that we would have over 100 peeps Swooning Along with us over in Swoon 2013. There were so many  people who Swooned last year, I thought if we have 20 or 30 this time it would be brilliant. But no, Swoon has worked its magic yet again and the blocks are popping up all over blogs, Flickr and Instagram (#swoon2013) and they are so BEAUTIFUL! I totally see why everyone falls in love with this pattern, its stunning.

I have been making good progress with mine. I cut and pieced 3 blocks pretty quickly before I took a little break with my family in the past couple of weeks. So despite the fact I haven't touched them for a fortnight I'm still on target for 1 block a week. They are coming together quicker and quicker as I get more familiar with what I'm doing, so I might sneak a couple extra in there if I can.

My colour palette is aqua/duck egg, navy and yellow. I'm really loving playing with the various fabrics I've picked and pairing them off. I've used some of my absolute favourites that I've been stashing for years, along with some new prints.

So far, I'm happy. Another couple of blocks and I'll really be able to get a feel for how the quilt top will come together.

One of the things I love about this pattern is how different it looks depending on the fabric choices. Look at these wonderful blocks from the fabulous ladies in the Flickr group (I managed to mess up the code with the credits for each block but you'll find them in the group):

So, if you've been sitting on the fence about joining us, I hope I might have convinced you, come on over and play! Details of the (rough) schedule, where to get your pattern etc in the original post here:

Fancy Swooning Along with Us?

Last year, it seemed like everyone in the blogging universe too part in Katy's Swoonalong except me. I just couldn't fit one more thing in when it was all going on. I would see these beautiful Swoon quilts popping up all over blogs and Flickr, and be pea green with envy! Fast forward more than a year, and in a photo challenge I was taking part in over on Instagram, I had to post something I had missed out on - and of course, I posted my regret at missing out on the Swoonalong, and my determination to make it this year. To my surprise, it turned out that I wasn't the only person who missed out, and after a little bit of chat with Rhonda, Cindy, Fiona and Erin, I decided that maybe it would be fun to another Swoonalong. Round 2, so to speak, or Swoon 2013 as I've christened it :-)

This will be a leisurely type of quiltalong. No pressure! As a rough guide I'm thinking pattern purchase and fabric pull this week, then maybe a block a week after that would be do-able for most people. That would bring us up to the start of September and after that its sashing, basting, quilting and binding for which maybe another 2-3 weeks is a good generous estimate. As with any quiltalong however, some people will be ahead of this pace, and some people won't be able to manage a block every week. And, of course, the summer holidays are almost upon us! I'm aiming to have my Swoon finished and on my bed by the end of September at at the latest - sooner if I can manage it (and if the weather smiles on me and allows my kids to play outside during the holidays instead of hanging out of me looking to be entertained!) But really, whatever pace works for you is fine and I hope that the group will remain active for the rest of 2013.

First up - you'll need to buy your pattern. You can buy it from Fat Quarter Shop  here or from Camille Roskelly's own site.

Next you'll need to pull your fabric - you need 18 Fat Quarters and 4.25 yards of background fabric for the quilt top. And those FQs need to be full FQs, as you will be using almost every single bit of them. That's assuming you're making the full quilt - which is a whopping 80" x 80" size. If you're making less, you need 2 FQs per block plus background fabric.

Here's some of my fabric pull:

I'm making Swoon for my own bedroom, and I'm going with an aqua/teal, navy and yellow palette against a white background to tie in with my room decor with is an aqua/duck egg blue and champagne. I've ordered a couple more navy and aqua prints from Cindy and will make my final decision as I go along!

Then all you need to do is to get started on your blocks! These are massive blocks - 24.5" square. I've made my first over the weekend and would say that they are pretty straightforward sewing - half square triangles, and flying geese units, with good pattern instructions. So I think this pattern is very achieveable for less experienced quilters. The biggest challenge is going to be keeping your seams and points precise so everything goes together nicely, and we can share tips and advice over in the Flickr group for this. I used a scant seam and took my time, and mine went together beautifully:

I just LOVE this block. It is labour intensive, lots of cutting, piecing and pressing, but it is so, SO worth it! I can't wait to get started on my next one, I think they might be a little bit addictive. 

So. Have I convinced you? Are you going to join us? You know you want to!! If you have an unfinished Swoon from last year, now is the perfect time to get it out and get it finished. Or you could make a smaller version if you don't fancy the full size.  4 blocks would make a lovely lap size quilt.

If you are, head over to the Flickr group and join. I also have set up a hashtag on Instagram for your pics over there #swoon2013 - if you're not already on Instagram, you should check it out! I love it, so instant and I've met so many new quilters over there.

Even though I had most of the fabric I needed for the quilt, I still needed a few extra FQs to get my palette exactly how I wanted. If, like me, you need to buy fabric for your quilt, my good friend Cindy over at Fluffy Sheep Quilting, is very generously giving a 10% discount to Swoon 2013 participants until 7th July - just enter the coupon code SwoonLove at the checkout, and the 10% will be removed from your order :-) Thank you Cindy!

 

Cindy has lots of loveliness in stock at the moment (some Happy Go Lucky might just have sneaked into my basket over the weekend!) so be sure to check her out, she also has loads of Kona if you need solids for background.

And, I think that might be it for the moment! Oh - one last thing. A button!  Here it is:

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Please please, join in, and spread the word!