LEXINGTON LABEL

I actually worked a little bit more on the back for the Lexington quilt.

I made the label.

CHANGE OF PLANS

I had originally thought I'd need to put all of the pieces up on the design wall - which would have been very difficult, because it's not really big enough, and the pieces are easy to fall off.  But I don't want to make up a bunch of blocks and then try to arrange them either because I need to see the whole quilt all at once to get a good color flow and balance since I have such a strange assortment of fabrics to work with.

Once I realized that my orignal plan wouldn't work, for the above stated reasons, I realized I could make the block into it's three separate unit-parts (well, nine parts in all).  That way, I could put the pieces up on the wall and still be able to move them around to get the optimum color flow.

So, that's what I'm doing.

It's still pretty slow going, but still fun.

Only two of these are sewn together blocks, the rest are just the separate units - the 4 corner parts, which you can easily see here, the 4 arcs, and the center diamond.  Should be fun to mix and match when I get a bunch made up.

MAKING THE FIRST BLOCK

I thought it best to make one block to see how it would go.

Luckily I read the instructions from the magazine.  I was all set to do it in a different order.  Their instructions make more sense.  You sew all of the straight lines together first.  You are then left with several long arcs to piece. 

I haven't done much curved piecing.  It's slow going.

First, the center section, all straight seams.

Next, the other two sections, still all straight seams.

Then add the arc to the corner pieces.

Lastly sewing the corner pieces to the center.

Actually, it's not difficult, it's just slow.

And, it turned out exactly the right size - 14-1/2" square (finished size will be 14").


This quilt should keep me busy all winter.  


Remember:  enjoy the process.

CUTTING OUT THE ARCS

I'm not sure I'm going to have enough of the whites and lights of the original fabrics to do all of the arcs and X's.  So, I'm cutting them first.

Only 392 pieces needed.  Here we go.

CUSTOM MADE TEMPLATES

I finally decided on the pattern for my Kentucky fabrics.

The pattern was found in a magazine, Quilt Life, April 2013 issue.

I redrew the block in Electric Quilt, making it smaller, so there could be more blocks on the quilt.  

It has lots of curves and odd shapes, necessatating templates.

I asked my wonderful husband if he could cut them out for me.

I printed the templates out with Electric Quilt.  I was thinking acrylic, but he asked if masonite would work, and I couldn't think of reason it wouldn't.  After all, they are just for this one project.  The masonite is easier to cut with his woodworking tools, whereas the acrylic requires special (expensive) blades.  We glued the paper onto the masonite then he cut them out with the bandsaw and sanded them down to the line.  He made it look really easy.

So, here they are:

Weird shapes, huh?

P.S.  I'm such a lucky gal.  Thank you, Darrell.

FABRIC SHOPPING IN KENTUCKY

While on our trip to Kentucky, we stopped at a few quilt stores so that I could buy some fabrics to make a Kentucky Quilt to commemorate our vacation.

Those of you familiar with this blog will know that I have been making these kinds of quilts for a while now.

First place we stopped was only because of our annoyingly stupid GPS machine.  He programmed it to take us to Midway, which was only a few miles northeast of Lexington.  The machine thinks Midway is somewhere on the other side of Louisville (a difference of 75 miles).  So, we're driving along, I'm kind of sleepy and dozing, pretty soon I say how much farther are we going?  He says the GPS says we have another hour or so to drive (in a rain storm).  I wasn't happy.  I kept thinking, the farther we drove out, the farther we would need to drive back.  So, we punched in the nearest Starbucks and headed there.  We got some coffee and connected to the internet with his computer and looked up Midway.  Ha!  We had passed it by probably an hour back.  I don't know where the stupid GPS was taking us.  While we were sitting there talking about what we were going to do, I looked up quilt shops in the area, turns out there was one just a few miles up the road.  So we went there.  It had to be one of the nicest (and biggest) quilt shops I've ever been in.  There was a great selection, laid out nicely.  Lots of samples on the walls, books, and gadgets, and all kinds of interesting things.  Darrell even found something he had to buy.  Here it is, Among Friends Quilt Shop in Louisville, KY.  

It was pouring down rain when I took this photo

Cutting the 'theme' fabric

And the fabrics I picked out, with the 'theme' fabric on the bottom

My usual way to do this is: I pick a 'theme' fabric and then pick fabrics that 'go with' it.  Not usually liking something so obvious, when I saw this fabric I couldn't resist, being in the "Horse Capitol of the World"    It's possible it will end up only on the back.  At this point there is no plan.  After that, I don't take these fabrics with me into the next stores, I just buy what appeals to me at the moment, with a general idea of color, texture and value, trying to remain true to the fabrics already purchased.

Next stop, much later, after a day of sightseeing in Frankfort and the elusive Midway, was a very nice shop in Lexington called "Q-first in Quilting".  Odd name, but a very nice store.  They haven't been in business long, but they are doing a fantastic job.  Darrell immediately noticed the ceiling was painted flat black, he found that much more appealing then the usual all white everything in most quilt stores (I think I was guilty of that myself).  I liked it, too.  It's easier on the eyes and sets off the colors very nicely.  This too was a big store with lots to see.  The people were very nice and even stayed open past their closing, since I was still shopping.

The GPS had a hard time finding this place, too.

Inside Q-first, and no, those are not my fabric picks she's cutting.

Here are the fabrics I bought. I had to stop myself, they had great choices. 

I also ended up buying a book because of one of the samples they had on the wall.  I have a lot of Kaffe's books, so what's another one, huh?

Game Board Quilt by Liza Prior Lucy

The book is Kaffe Fassett's Quilts en Provence.  I love Kaffe Fassett's fabrics.  In fact, they had a very nice selection here at this store and I kept going back to look at them, but I only found one that fit in with my 'theme', (that would be the second up from the bottom on the left, above.)

The next morning, we had some time before our plane left, so we did some more sight-seeing and went to this last quilt store as an after-thought, since it was so close to where we were.  This one wasn't as nice as the last two, but the people were very friendly and we had a nice chat with the gal cutting my fabric.  Her daughter had just moved to Seattle and we talked about that.   They do have a very nicely organized 'color-wall' (as you can see on their website).  In all the excitement, I completely forgot to take pictures of the place.  But here are the fabrics I bought at The Quilter's Square in Lexington.  I was thinking I needed more greens because Kentucky is the greenest place I've ever been!

The colors of Kentucky: greens, grays and whites.

I don't have a plan yet, but ideas are bubbling around in there.   Stay tuned.  

CAJUN LUNCH

We stumbled upon a wonderful little Cajun cafe in the middle of Frankfort, Kentucky after our tour of the capital building.  It had everything we love:  we found it by happenstance, it has character and is like no other place you've ever been, and the people there are friendly and/or quirky, and best of all the food was fantastic.  The owner, Rick, was the cook and greeted everyone as they entered with "How y'all doing?  Where y'all from?"  The food was organic and local and very, very tasty.  We both had Jambalaya Cabbage Rolls.  I had greens, he had the beans and cornbread.

This is a semi-blind contour drawing with a little watercolor splashed on.

STINKY AND COCO'S

After we our gps took us to get coffee at Cairn Coffee in Winchester, KY, we couldn't resist having breakfast here at Stinky and Coco's when we saw the name.  The food was so-so but the people made excellent sketch subjects.  They appeared to be regulars.

This is a semi-blind contour drawing with a little watercolor splashed on.

LUNCH IN CAMPDON, KY

Not wanting to stop at a chain-restaurant our choices were slim.  We found this little Mexican restaurant in the middle of Campdon.  This is a little semi-blind contour sketch I did while waiting for our food to arrive.  Darrell was having a hard time hearing whoever was on the phone.

SHAKER VILLAGE SKETCH

We had a great day at Shaker Village in Harrodsburg, Kentucky.  We had dinner at their restaurant.  You pick your entree, and then they bring around side dishes and serve you family style.  There were electric candles hanging on the 'pegs' all around the rooms. 

I did this semi-blind contour sketch while waiting for our food to arrive.  They brought our dinner out pretty quickly, I had to finish it after we ate.

LUNCH WITH THE LADIES

We stopped for lunch in Harrodsburg, Kentucky before heading to the Shaker's Village.  This was a little narrow cafe, Blue Moon Cafe, in a group of Victorian type buildings with very high ceilings and interesting facades.

The only other customers there was a small group, all dressed very nicely (did they just come from church?). There were five ladies and two gentlemen, they were all quite genteel.  Pearls and pink hair, even.  Great to sketch.