The Brighter the Better - Project Quilting challenge 8.4

I love bright colors.  My fabric stash is full of bright colors.  And the brighter the better.  So when this week's challenge for Project Quilting was announced as "The Brighter the Better" I thought I had it made in the shade.  But for some reason I was initially stumped.  Not good when I knew I'd be away from home for two days this week and had a few commitments that would eat into my sewing time on the other days.

By the end of the first day, I did at least have a pretty good idea of the fabric I wanted to feature.

 Malka Dubrawski is one of my favorite fabric designers and I had two charm packs from her last line with Moda as well as some coordinating yardage.  I also have a pattern for some quilted slippers that uses a charm pack.  The slippers have been on my future project list for quite some time now and so I figured if I didn't come up with an original idea soon, I would make those.

But before I could do anything, I needed to spend Monday and Tuesday in Tucson as one of the volunteers to help at the quilt judging for the Tucson Quilters Guild show.  Part of my job was to stand by the tables as the judges were going over each quilt and then move the quilt to the appropriate spot depending on if it was held as a contender for an award or released from further judging. Which means I got a good look at most of the quilts that had been entered.  There were several that featured arcs of flying geese in the borders.  Which gave me an idea.  I would make some free form curved flying geese.  I decided to only use the green, yellow and blue fabrics with a black background so they would really glow.  I even had the name figured out.

First thing Wednesday morning out came the freezer paper and I began sketching out my idea.  First I drew curved lines to outline the path my flying geese would take.  Then I traced those lines onto a new piece of freezer paper to use as my pattern to paper piece my geese.

After I got them all traced and the pattern marked, I remembered that using freezer paper for a foundation is not a good idea.  It is too thick and can be difficult to remove.  So I took my first drafts to my printer/copier and copied them onto regular copy paper.

It wasn't until I was ready to start sewing my first set that I realized I had forgotten to make my patterns as mirror images of my final design!  When you paper piece, the fabric goes on the back side of the paper, not on the side with the marked lines.  When you turn the piece to the fabric side, it will be a mirror image of the marked side.  So the marked side needs to be the reverse of what you want to end up with.  Which meant I needed to retrace the marks yet again on the other side of the paper.  Not difficult to do, but time consuming.

All of that took up most of the day so I was only able to complete one set of geese before it was time to pack it in for the day.   Thursday I was able to get the rest of the geese done.  My friend Sheryl says it looks like octopus tentacles now.

Next step was to add the pieced strips to the background.  My preference would have been to piece the strips into the background.  But that would have taken some figuring and probably a couple of test runs as well.  So with only two days till deadline I went with turned edge applique instead.  It looks a little rough with all that bulk at the edges but I was hoping the quilting would smooth it all out.  The next morning it occurred to me I should have used a reverse applique technique to reduce a lot of that bulk, but too late now.  Next time.  Lesson learned.

Once it was quilted, I decided to try a new (to me) facing method to finish it off.  I saw the method here on the We All Sew Blog about a week ago and I'd been wanting to try it out.   In this method, you use four squares folded on the diagonal to make triangles for the corners.  I started with 5 inch squares. Then cut four 2.5 inch strips a few inches shorter than each side of the quilt and press them in half lengthwise.  On the right side of the quilt, place one triangle in each corner, then put one strip on each side, aligning raw edges.  Stitch all the way around with a 1/4 inch seam allowance.  When you turn the facing to the back, the triangles will cover the ends of the side strips.  It was so easy and it turned out beautifully.  I'll definitely be using this technique again when I want to do a facing.

Night Flight

For Project Quilting The Brighter the Better challenge - February 2017

Size: about 18" x 18" 

I create in Casa Grande, AZ

Check out all of the wonderful and creative challenge entries at Project Quilting

2/11/2020
I also just added this quilt to Sarah Goer’s Show Me Something linkup challenge for February, 2020.   Sarah is hosting a fun little challenge on her blog where she asks us to post new or old projects that fit the theme.  This month is Show Me Something with Triangles.