QuiltCon Review

Hi there!

I went to QuiltCon in Nashville, TN last week.  I had so much fun walking around, seeing and meeting people.  Nothing compares to seeing your quilt hang in a quilt show.  I met so many quilters who shared the feeling.  It literally took me a few days to recuperate from soreness of my body.  My friend and I walked about 2.5 to 3 miles everyday while we were there with our heavy bags.  Unfortunately, it rained a lot from the time our plane touched the ground to the time we left.  We had a lot of fun, nonetheless.

There were so many beautiful quilts in the show and I would like to post some of my favorites here.  I'm sorry I didn't get all the quilt makers' names to go with the quilt pictures.  Some of them I thought I could read from the label next to the quilt, but they are too small to read from the picture.  In any case, I apologize if I got the names wrong.

Top left-In the Michael Miller fabric challenge isle, Top right-the white quilt in the middle is Valley MQG charity quilt

Top left-Geometry Lesson by Jayne Willis. Second row, middle-Found at Low Tide by Juli Smith

Top left-Barn Quilt by Renee Tallman,

Over all, this year QuiltCon was a big success in my book.  Thanks to the MQG and all volunteers who made it a great event.  I know a few volunteers and crew, and I'll tell you, they worked very hard for the show.  Thank You very much, again.

For the love of HSTs, again!

I'm working on a fun project using half square triangles (HST) to compose the blocks.

 
The only thing that wasn't fun about these blocks was trimming all 256 HSTs to 3" pieces.  That task took me a few days to finish because it was so boring.  Sewing them to make 16 blocks was a real fun though.  

By chance, one day I saw a show on PBS by Nancy Zieman, one of the icons in quilting world.  She was sewing small squares to make a block just like what I was doing.  She called it honey comb piecing, all the squares were connected by chain piecing.  So I decided to give it a try.  

First I lay a block on my sewing table.



Since I'm right handed person, I flip the squares on the right side over the ones on the left side, like in the picture below.  If you want to flip the square on the left to the right side, you can do that.  Whichever side you choose to flip, be consistent through out the project.

Continue to pair all the squares.
 

  
Start chain piecing the pairs of the squares.  After sewing all the pairs, put them back in the same positions, do not separate them.

  
Now pair the top row by flipping the right side over the left side.  Continue down to the last row, as in the picture below.  Put one pin to secure the pair in place.  Chain piece the pairs together. 
 

Now you have 4 rows of connected squares, do not separate them.  We will sew the row together by flipping the top row over the bottom row.  Nest the seam together to create a nicely matched corner as you go.  Continue down to the bottom row.

When you finish sewing all 4 rows together, press the whole block at once.  Here's the finished block.
 

I found this method to be very fast and convenient because I only press once after all the sewing is done.  In the past, I would sew and press each pair separately.  Sometime the squares got mixed up and misplaced.  This way each square stays put where it belongs. 

Well, that's my two cents about sewing small squares together.  

I have another great news:  

Monday was my 30th wedding anniversary and I got a great present.  I got an email from the MQG that my quilt, Curved Triangles #2, was selected for QuiltCon 2019. 

I'm super excited and looking forward to see it at QuiltCon.  Nashville here I come!!



Have a great sewing day!





Link to: Sew Fresh Quilts: Let's Bee Social
              Midweek Makers@QuiltFabrication

We are in QuiltCon Charity Quilt Challenge

In the past few months, I've been working on a few secret projects and a few charity quilts.  It's shocking to me how time flies by so quickly.  I can't believe we're in December already.  

In August, our guild, the Valley MQG, participated in the 2019 QuiltCon Charity Quilt Challenge.  The theme for this year is "Small Piecing".  We bought the fabric and made kits for our members who wanted to join in with the fun.  We handed the kits out in our September meeting.  These are the blocks that I got back from our members at the October meeting.

They were on my design wall for a few weeks till I knew what I wanted to do with them and this is the finished top that we showed to everyone at our November meeting. 

Now the top is in the hands of other guild members for quilting and binding.  By the December meeting, we'll get it back and it'll be ready for shipping to QuiltCon in January.  Everything worked out well according to our plan and we're right on target.  I still have a few blocks left over, they will be made into a baby quilt for our Philanthropy group later on. 

I just love a project like this.  It helps us to become one as a guild.  So many hands have helped to make this quilt which will be donated to a good cause.   

Have a great day!!

QuiltCon Submission

Here is my personal project for the QuiltCon submission.  I chose to do the Michael Miller fabric challenge.  I really like the fabric this year.  I love, love the minimalist designs and geometric shapes.  I put some blocks on the design wall as I was trying to come up with some interesting designs.  My husband joined in and played with them too by putting some blocks together and that gave me the idea for this design.  I must say that this is the most quilting on one quilt I've done to date. I used Aurifil white 2024 for both piecing and quilting.

I wish you all HAPPY QUILTING!!