CQJP April

I've finished all my April seams for CQJP 2013. I'm so happy to be done on time!

I think I got all of these seam ideas from Carole Samples' book Treasury of Crazy Quilt Stitches. As usual, all the fabrics are black, but some look grayish in the photo, probably because of where the sun was when I took the picture.

Here's how the whole quilt looks so far. April's section is on the middle right.

CQJP March block

I finished stitching the seam treatments for my March block of CQJP (Crazy Quilt Journal Project) 2013. The fabrics are all black, but when I take close-ups, they look a bit washed out.

Almost all of my seams are from Carole Samples' book, Treasury of Crazy Quilt Stitches. I could make crazy quilts until I die and probably not use every stitch in that fabulous book! There is one seam, above, that was inspired by Susan at CQ4fun. The half circles above are kind of similar to a stitch she did recently, although when I went to copy her stitch, mine didn't quite turn out the same. If you haven't seen her wonderful CQJP blocks, you have to go over to her blog. She's making all of them with mini "war propaganda posters" - very fun!

Here's how the whole thing looks now. The March block is the one in the upper right corner.

Happy stitching!

CQJP 2013 February Block

Here's the stitching I've done on the February portion of my 2013 CQJP (Crazy Quilt Journal Project). I've realized that a main reason I'm not as motivated to work on CQJP this year is because I'm not doing lots of fancy, colorful stitches and I'm not adding any beads or other embellishments to the black fabrics. Once I get to the center, I will add lots of bling, though, so I just have to get through this part. It's certainly been challenging to come up with seam treatments that will look okay with the colors (or lack of variety in colors).

I'm not sure if I'll keep the two seams on the left as they are. They're a bit boring compared with the other seams.

Here's a closeup of the "basket weaving" I did on one seam. You can also see the "Danish knots" to the left of it and the curvy buttonholes with chain-stitched flowers and the triangles with French knots to the right of the weaving.

Here's how the whole thing looks so far. February's section is the top middle.

Happy stitching!

CQJP January block

Here's my January block for CQJP 2013, just a few days late :) This block is in the upper left corner of the quilt. You'll notice that the seam embellishments start out black in the upper left corner and turn to gray then white as they get closer to the center. In the close-ups, the black fabrics look washed out; the last photo is a better representation of the color.

This seam has a star-type stitch.

Here are more of the seam treatments.

This is the whole quilt (with just the black fabrics). At this point, I'm not going to do any beads or buttons on the black fabrics. I don't want those to have any bling. I want the center to shine.

Happy stitching.

CQJP 2013 background piecing

I've finally finished piecing the background fabrics for my CQJP 2013 project (Crazy Quilt Journal Project). As I mentioned back in November, I'm going to make a wall-hanging crazy quilt to hang up each Easter. My plan is to use black fabrics in the background (or maybe it should be called the border?) Anyway, the inside of the quilt will be a circle with a "landscape" of a hill with a cross and some flowers. I'm tentatively calling this "Celebrate the Resurrection."

The seam treatments for the black fabrics will start out with black threads on the outer edges, then progress to grays and white as they get closer to the circle. I know what I'm envisioning, but I'm not sure if I'm getting it across in writing. The big trick will be to see if the finished product looks anything like my vision ~ LOL!

Since I'm making more of a wholecloth quilt this year, rather than working on individual blocks, I'm aiming to embellish approx. 8 X 8 inch sections each month. The total size is 24 X 24 at this point; I might add a solid black border at the end.

This project will be a challenge to me for a few reasons:
1. I've never done a whole-cloth crazy quilt before, so the larger size will be a challenge.
2. I will need to stay consistent in how I progress from black to gray to white threads as I go around the quilt.
3. I've never done any type of landscape quilt, either in a crazy or a sane quilt, so this will be a new thing for me.

I started off piecing this basically like I would piece a crazy quilt block, putting a 4 or 5-sided piece near the center of each corner. I then machine-stitched pieces to each side. However, I got to a point where there were funny gaps.

At that point, I pieced chunks of fabrics together. (Yes, these are black, but the color is a bit off on this photo.)

 The 3-piece I sewed together will go in this spot above.

 I attached the 3-piece chunk by machine on one side.

Then I turned under a seam allowance and hand-stitched the left side of the chunk to the base. Since I will be doing fancy stitches over the seam, I didn't worry about making tiny applique stitches. Just enough stitches to hold it in place until I can do the fancy work.

When I wasn't working on this, I had it on the ping pong table, on top of some patriotic fabric and on top of my American Patchwork and Quilting Mystery Quilt top. Callie decided to rest right on top of this! I've never seen her on the ping pong table before ~ this must be her stamp of approval on my work!

After I hand-appliqued the chunks that connected the corner areas, I turned the piece upside down and stitched on the blue lines I had marked before I started the piecing. This white stitching will help me know how far to do my fancy stitching on the seams.

My plan is to piece the inner circle on a separate piece of muslin, do all the embellishing, then applique it onto the black. But that may change as I get further into this project.

No, I haven't forgotten about my CQ Anniversary Quilt. If you remember, my goal is to make 25 blocks for our 25th wedding anniversary (December 2015). So far, I have 15 blocks made and 2 years to finish. I'm taking a break from that to work on this project. I don't expect this new project to take all of 2013, so I will probably make a few more anniversary blocks at the end of this year. Click the "Anniversary quilt" label in the sidebar to see the blocks I've already made.

Happy stitching!

Crazy Quilt Journal Project 2013

If you’ve been to the CQJP 2012 blog recently, you’ll know that Kathy has put up the information to register for CQJP 2013. Even if you didn’t participate in CQJP 2012, you are invited to try the challenge in 2013. Basically, you just have to make a crazy quilt block each month that is equal to a 6 X 6 inch block (36 square inches) or larger. See the blog for all the rules and guidelines. You can participate whether or not you have your own blog. It’s a fun way to see crazy quilting from stitchers all over the world!

I’ve started thinking about what I want to do for 2013. If I stay on track and finish 12 blocks of my anniversary quilt this year, I will still have 10 blocks to make. My goal is to have 25 blocks done for my 25^th wedding anniversary in 2015. I made three blocks before CQJP started, then the 12 from this year equals 15 completed, so I will need 10 more.

I don’t really want to make all 10 of those blocks next year. We are already signed up to help chaperone another trip to Europe with students from my husband’s school in 2014, so I will want to make a block from that trip. I also want to include a block with a photo of the two of us from 2015. Not to mention that I am kind of tired of working on basically mono-chromatic blocks of white, cream, and gold all the time!

So, the idea that’s brewing in my mind is to make a wall-hanging crazy quilt of nine squares, probably 8 X 8 or 9 X 9 inches. I’m still thinking out the details, but I think this will be something I can hang up in the spring to celebrate Easter.

That will take me nine months and then I’ll have three months in 2013 to work on three more blocks for my Anniversary quilt.

That’s my plan for now, at least. I’ll keep you posted.

Happy stitching!