Thursday, October 3, 2019

TBT #22 Coneflower Crazies

This is one of my Fall quilts I like to bring out around this time of year. It is such a fun quilt, and very modern when you start to look at it. Today's Throwback Thursday is hosted by Andrée at Quilting & Learning - What a Combo!

We had a gorgeous hot start to the week here, but I didn't do the photos until yesterday...in the rain. It is still raining today, and woke me up in the night with its pouring so hard. If you look closely, you can see drops hanging from the deck rails! The colours are a little washed out (pun not originally intended) because of the grey skies; they are much richer and more vibrant in person.
Looking at the label, I see I finished this quilt in 2010.
This was before I got Avril, my longarm, so it was quilted on my DSM, my Bernina. Isn't that binding a fabulous fabric? That was when I sewed all my bindings onto the front by machine and stitched them down on the back of the quilt by hand.

This is one of a few Buggy Barn patterns I have, two of which I've made, a third has the fabric all pulled, just needs making! It's a very cool, random method, much like Karla Anderson's Stack the Deck method. The Buggy Barn is a little more complex; sections are stacked and then slashed, and then the sections are sewn back together to make the block.
The blocks in this quilt have two sections, the top flower head and the bottom leaves and stems. The sashing around just two sides of the block (modern) is also made using this method. Note the improv look to it, modern again. A third component I've noticed is that there is no quilt border. Finally, compare the two side of the quilt: the left has the wonky flying geese while the right has nothing.

I bought the stack of fat quarters from a shop that was in Bradenton, Florida, at the time, now moved to Sarasota, Cotton Patch Quilt Shop. Every January 1, same day as the Super Bowl, yep, she has a huge fat quarter sale, and back then they were $1 each I believe. I needed 25, one per block. Oh I had fun pulling them. Although I love the brighter hues of today's colours in quilts, I still do love, especially in autumn and winter, these rich deep ones.

Isn't that green fantabulous?! You can see how the colours appear randomly in various parts of the quilt: here the green is the flower petals, but the background of one of the crazy flying geese, as well as the triangle of the flying geese in another spot. Same with the purple that is the stem and leaves in the coneflower block.

I stitched in the ditch around each block and sashing unit. For quilting I used several Sulky threads. Rayons and Blendables I can see on the front, with a burgundy cotton, probably Mettler or Gütermann, on the back. My Bernina has such wonderful tension, doesn't she? No eyelashes or pokies anywhere.
Ah, that glorious texture!

A longarmer once asked me if I had the stitch regulator Bernina, but nope, I bought mine in 2003 before they were out, and I didn't buy one when they did come out. Lots of practice, and lots of just going for it and trying not to fret too much as I learned. In 2010 I'd been FMQ-ing for 15 years though. I still do my fair share of fretting, both about what to quilt and at the imperfections as I am quilting. However, I do know that it will all be fine in the end: step back and go, 'Ahhh! I did that. ' 😁


Some of the cornflowers got loopy petal quilting while others got squared-off petal quilting. I did freehand arcs in the flying geese; I didn't have any rulers then. In fact, I only got my Bernina ruler foot a year ago. I would have used the Quilting in Thirds method (my own tutorial is there) I learned of in a book out of the library, which, along with basting spray, and Kathy Sandbach on Simply Quilts, and the subsequent purchase of her books, changed my quilting life! The petals don't quite match up perfectly with the slashing that's involved, so the pattern had you stitch a big button at that meeting point in each of the flowers. I had to work hard to collect 25 big buttons, from my own collection as well as from my mum's.

Here is the entire back:
Clearly (or not so clearly lol) I didn't have enough of the burgundy marbled fabric, purchased at a wholesaler's shop in west Edmonton, so I pieced in the burgundy with gold leaves, purchased from Fabricland. The binding was from a quilt shop. I think it's Kona Bay, as it has the same feel as Art Gallery Fabrics, so smooth.

I started sewing the blocks at a guild retreat, so this quilt not only makes me think of that happy time (retreats are just the best) but also of the happy time spent choosing the 25 fat quarters in the shop in Florida, where it was a helluva lot warmer than Edmonton, Alberta on January 1, ha!


Quilt Stats:
Pattern:  Cone Flower Crazies by Buggy Barn
Size: 57 X 70"
Fabric: various
Backing: a marbled one, and another from Fabricland R.E.D. brand
Batting: Warm n Natural 100% cotton
Quilted: on my Bernina
Threads: pieced on my Bernina with Mettler and/or Gütermann; quilted with Sulky threads, both rayon and Blendables

13 comments:

  1. Cute! very modern indeed, and the colors are perfect for this time of year.

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  2. That's a fun quilt! It definitely seems very modern in style to me, but has that cozy fall feel, too. I really love the improv geese!

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  3. Hi Sandra! Ahh yes, I can easily see the coneflower in these shapes. It also reminds me of a pattern that Dione at Clever Chameleon released earlier this year using Island Batik fabrics. Anyway, this has such fun fabrics and wonky flying geese. Speaking of which - geese that is - I saw a gaggle flying in formation just last night on my way home from work. I hate to admit it, but Fall is here. ~smile~ Roseanne

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  4. What a cute, fun quilt. Glad someone is getting rain. We are dry as a bone here.

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  5. I still have BB quilts that I want to make. Actually I want to take some of the patterns and use modern fabrics. Someone had done that with the cats pattern and now I really want to make that one. My oldest UFO is a BB; still not done, but closer! And I have another BB set of blocks (yes, blocks) in my UFO stack. I need to check my quilts and see if I still have some TBT to show.

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  6. Wow, I love this quilt. Not sure I would be able to not 'square it up' by putting flying geese around the top and right hand side - might have to go find that pattern. Love that all the quilting isn't the same on the flowers - I would never think to do that. Thank you for sharing - you've given me lots to think about.

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  7. The colors are just so rich in this one! The dark green almost looks like velvet. And I love this pattern! How cool to find out that it's a sort of stack and whack :)

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  8. Purples and teals, two of my fav colours, and what a novel way to quilt on a domestic machine. So much less bulk to handle,or struggle with. This looks very modern. Rain, we have had a lot this week, and only 3C earlier this morning, we should be having warmer days now it is spring.

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  9. The colours do say fall but are so cute together. I like the wonky geese on the just the top and side. I have quilted large quilts on my dm the same way, it is certainly a lot easier to handle.

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  10. It's fun to look back over what's been made and not on the blog. I sometimes forget that I made quilts long before then.

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  11. Gorgeous and yes, so modern, for a TBT quilt. I love BB patterns but I don't think I ever made any - kind of odd for someone who has been quilting as long as I have.

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  12. This is a gorgeous quilt, and the memories associated with it are fun. Certain quilts definitely are tied to good memories! Some of mine remind me of shopping with my mom—we’ve bought and sewed a lot of fabric over the years.

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  13. Hi Sandra, what a great quilt. You really have a great memory for all of those quilting details although that Florida Superbowl sale sounds memorable. I love the colours and the flowers. Thanks for linking up to Throwback Thursday :-)

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