Winning Color Combinations

Red and Brown

Quilting inspiration comes from many places: a photograph, a shape, an emotion even. For me, it almost always begins with color. One of the reasons I love fabric so much is all the lovely colors. It’s like a painting you can cuddle.

In this series, we’re going to discuss awesome color combinations, and we’re going to begin with one of my all-time favorites, red and brown.

All the Feels…Color always sparks some emotion. Blue is calming, yellow, uplifting. Red on it’s own can be angry or passionate, but pair it with brown and it becomes cozy, warm, (sometimes) rustic. And who doesn’t love being warm and cozy? That’s why it’s the perfect combination for a quilt.

Famous Fabrics… 

 
I hopped over to Missouri Star Quilt Company to see what fabric lines they had in red/brown and found the lovely Simply Red collection by Mary Koval for Windham Fabrics. These are classic prints that would look great in a traditional quilt.

 

Inspiration from around the Web… 

—Photo credits: 1) fiberonthewall.com/jean-jurgenson/gallery/ | 2) takingonsewmuch.blogspot.com | 3) SarahMikk on flickr.com—

What I’m doing with Red and Brown…

This is basically a fence-rail block with a pinwheel in the middle. It’s a UFO from several years back. Maybe, probably, hopefully — no, dammit — I WILL finish it one day. I think this would have been just fine without the orange, but I ran out of my reds and browns so being the innovator that I am… haha.

How do you feel about red and brown? Have you ever used it in a quilt? I’d love to see it.

Mahalo, y’all, for stopping by.

Five Years Later…

So… I offered to make a memory quilt for a dear friend using her father’s old t-shirts. And I did. But it took me FIVE years to complete. I have felt horrible about it for the last 4.5 years.

In the normal course of things, I’m a slow finisher, but this was ridiculous. I encountered several setbacks including a crazy work schedule, an overseas move, and technical issues with the quilt itself, but finally, it’s done.

In accordance with my goal of finishing a UFO a month, this was my April 2016 project. Don’t judge me, but I actually ran into May with it. Don’t worry, I’ll catch up eventually. Maybe.

One of the first problems I had was the machine quilting. I set my stitch length too short and that combined with a high-loft batting caused me to put a small hole in the green shirt. (Sorry, Carrie.) Discouraged, I set it aside for a few months until I ran across an article about hand quilting with Perle Cotton embroidery thread. I used DMC size #8 in a variegated blue and am quite pleased with the results, despite some sore fingers.

I used flannel on the back so it’s super-cozy. However, I wasn’t thrilled with the back of the quilt because A) I didn’t do a great job of getting the wrinkles out when I spray basted, and B) my stitching is not very pretty on the backside. Lessons learned.

 

On the plus side, my friend FINALLY has her quilt and I can mark another UFO complete. Yay!

2016 – Year of Scrapfabulousness

After nearly 40 years of sewing, I have accumulated a LOT of scraps. You’d think I would have done something with them by now, but sadly, I have not. I might never have, except we recently moved to Hawaii where the houses are much smaller. I have hardly any storage space, so the scraps must go. I can’t bear to throw them away, though, which is why I’ve designated 2016 as the Year of Scrapfabulousness.

By the end of this year, one of my scrap tubs must go.

I’ve made some progress…

I used my Accuquilt cutter (which I adore) to cut 4 1/2″ and 2 1/2″ squares. I’ll keep doing that all year. But… one of my favorite things to do for those pieces that are smaller than 2 1/2″ is this…

This is such a low-stress sewing activity for me. When I don’t feel like doing anything else, I’ll grab a stack of scraps and start randomly sewing them together. Once I have something close to 4 1/2″ square, I run it through the Accuquilt. Aren’t they cute? I can’t wait to make a quilt with them.

The only problem is, the more scraps I take out of the bucket, the madder my dog gets.

TTFN.