100 Things Quilting Meme- Updated Version

I did this meme for the first time back in 2005 and I was glancing at it today and realized I've now done a bunch of these things that I hadn't done then so I thought it would be fun to do an update. Things I'd done as of 2005 are still bolded; things I've done since are in red.

1. Visit a quilt shop. I go to quilt shops as often as I can. My favorite near me is The City Quilter, in Manhattan.
2. Make a Nine Patch.
3. Make a Log Cabin.
4. Label a quilt. I used to use pre-printed labels but these days I like to get creative with labels even if it takes a little more time.
5. Figure yardage for a quilt.
6. Learn about warp and weft.
7. Use a rotary cutter. Don't know how I'd live without it!
   
8. Use templates. I used to sew miniature quilts by hand and always used templates for my pieces.
   
9. Paper piece a quilt block. I love paper piecing!
   
10. Hand applique a quilt block. I have appliqued but I am not a big fan of applique.
    
11. Make a yo-yo.
12. Embellish a quilt.
13. Try free motion quilting. Ugh.
    
14. Stitch in the ditch.
15. Try hand quilting. I prefer hand quilting over machine quilting.
    
16. Bind a quilt.
17. Miter the corners of quilt binding.
18. Join the ends of quilt binding.
19. Sew diagonal seams.
20. Use a walking foot.
21. Attend a guild meeting. I was president of my guild too!
22. Visit Houston for International Quilt Festival. I would love to attend this festival!
23. Have a quilt appraised.
24. Visit a quilt museum. I've been to the Quilt Museum in Lowell, Mass. It's very nice.
    
25. Go on a quilt retreat. I love retreats!! Retreats are the best.
26. Try curved piecing.
27. Miter the borders.
28. Learn to do blanket stitch by hand.
29. See a local quilt show. Not since I moved to New York, but I loved going to quilt shows in the Boston area. Always so much fun to see the quilts, and you get to shop too!
    
30. Put your quilt in a local quilt show.
31. Sell raffle tickets on a quilt.
32. Take a road trip with quilt friends.
33. Create a Pinterest board with quilts. Yup.
    
34. Make a 3-D quilt block.
35. Donate a quilt to a good cause.
36. Make a sampler quilt. My first quilt was a sampler quilt, which I made for the class in which I learned basic hand piecing.
    
37. Make an art quilt.
38. Try bobbin work.
39. Learn to maintain your sewing machine. Those felt pads in your bobbin aren't actually supposed to be there!
40. Add rickrack to a quilt.
41. Design a quilt. (Remember, you don’t necessarily have to make the quilt!)
42. Change/tweak/alter a pattern to make it your own.
43. Make a color wheel with fabric swatches.
44. Chat about quilting with a stranger.
45. Go on a blog tour.
46. Give a quilt as a wedding/graduation/retirement gift.
47. Visit Paducah during the AQS Show.
48. Take a class with a nationally known teacher.
49. Use some fabric you dislike.
50. Participate in Show & Tell. One of the funnest times I had at my old favorite quilt shop was a show-and-tell night in which the owners had turned the cutting table into a "runway" and we had to climb up and show off our quilts.
    
51. Volunteer for a job in a quilt group.
52. Use a color you detest.
53. Make a quilt inspired by nature.
54. Get up early to quilt or stay up late to quilt.
55. Make a scrap quilt.
56. Make a tote bag.
57. Make a postcard quilt.
58. Make a baby quilt and gift it to a newborn.
59. Understand the basics of caring for quilts.
60. Borrow a quilting book from the public library.
61. Teach someone else to quilt.
62. Creatively piece a backing for one of your quilts.
63. Apply a piped binding, or some variation of it.
64. Post quilt pics to Facebook.
65. Install quilty wallpaper on your computer.
66. Put a quilty bumper sticker on your car.
67. Cuss mildly when you realize you’ve been sewing air (because you ran out of bobbin thread). Well, I wouldn't say mildly.
    
68. Read your sewing machine manual cover to cover.
69. Learn to thread baste.
70. Learn to pin baste.
71. Use basting spray.
72. Help a friend make a quilt.
73. Make a quilt for a special child.
74. Make a quilt for a spouse or partner.
75. Make a quilt for a friend.
76. Include your quilts in your will (i.e. who gets them).
77. Determine your favorite thread for piecing.
78. Understand the concept of value.
79. Understand the mathematics of quilt blocks.
80. Apply a bias binding.
81. Take a guild speaker to dinner.
82. Comment on a quilt-related blog post.
83. Make a mystery quilt.
84. Take part in a block exchange.
85. Write how-to instructions for making a quilt block.
86. Watch a quilting video.
87. Know the difference between lengthwise and crosswise grain.
88. Know the parts of a sewing machine needle and why they matter.
89. Organize your stash. I've done this a few times! It's an ongoing process, really.
    
90. Know the names of hand sewing needles used for different tasks.
91. Finish a UFO.
92. Purchase fabric on impulse.
93. Try sewing with precuts.
94. Trade fabrics with quilt friends.
95. Identify your ancestors who quilted.
96. Visit a quilt shop while on vacation. I often visit quilt shops on vacation. I've been to quilt shops on trips to Hawaii (Maui, Oahu, and Kauai), Austin, California, and London (if Liberty counts).
    
97. Sew on a treadle for old time’s sake.
98. Subscribe to a quilting magazine. I used to get Better Homes & Gardens American Patchwork & Quilting.
    
99. Become a regular reader of a quilting blog.
100. Go on a Shop Hop. Fun!

Quilting in Progress

The pattern here, Fractal, is from the book Quilt Lab by Alexandra Winston. It's a book of patterns inspired by science- chemical formulas, math, etc. Very modern and fun. I bought the book for this specific pattern.

I'm only showing a little because the story is the quilting. It's not exactly matchstick quilting- that would be even denser- but it's more modern than my usual style. I'm liking it a lot though.

It will end up as a gift for a family friend, nice sizable throw about 60x60 inches or so. The batting is my usual Quilters Dream Green and the thread is Aurifil 40wt in Aluminum. I haven't decided on a binding yet.

It's taking a long time just due to the density of the quilting. I've been working on it for two weeks and I'm only barely half way done. Usually my half-ass minimum-standards approach to machine quilting means I'm done in two weeks or so! And I'm definitely going to need another spool of thread!

To measure the intervals I'm just using the quilting foot. The biggest challenge is keeping those lines straight so the quilt doesn't lose its shape. I started in the center and worked my way out to the right hand edge; now I'm back to the center and going out the other way. Wish me luck!

Color Blocks Wall Quilt, Pattern by Tina Curran

This was a fun quick project. I actually managed to chew through a lot of my smaller scraps for this; it's more pieces than you might think at first glance! The pattern is Color Blocks by Tina Curran. Curran is a prolific quilt artist who does a lot with Victoria Findlay Wolfe's partial-seam herringbone technique but this quilt is just some scraps arranged in a rainbow. 

I say "just" but I really love it. It finished around 36x36 inches which is a great baby size but actually turned out to be a nice lap size for me as well. 

I used Aurifil monofilament to quilt a relatively simple pattern of swirls (I tried to do a beaded-curtain pattern tbh but I'm not sure how well it turned out) and black binding. I used my favorite Quilters Dream Green batting and it quilted up beautifully as usual.

The Gift of Music

I finished my GiftWrapped quilt top the other day. You can find the pattern here.

I am very happy with this; it's richer looking in real life than it shows in the picture. I love Christmas quilts and plan to keep it. 

I made the throw size and used a variety of reds for the bows rather than the single red suggested by the pattern. This allowed me to pull from stash and not buy extra red fabric. I used a white fabric with gold musical notes as the background. The inner border is a red fabric with musical instruments. I started learning to play piano this year and I'm calling this "The Gift of Music". Once it's quilted I'll add a label to it with a musical theme.

Here you can see a close up on the border fabrics. I had a stash of reds for the bows but I did buy the two green fabrics especially for this quilt. I like the way the bows look like they are floating on the background.

I've had the pattern around for a couple of years. I figure I am 2-3 years behind in terms of my Christmas quilt-making.  It was tricky getting everything to line up and while it's not perfect it's not bad.

2021 Reading Roundup

Another year, another book recap. 2021 was a pretty okay year for reading. I always had a book or two in my hands. I didn't finish any audiobooks; I'm still listening to the same book I was listening to in March 2020- Samantha Irby's Wow, No Thank You. I have about an hour left. It'll probably get counted next year and meanwhile audiobooks continue to stack up in my Libro.fm account.

I'm pretty satisfied with my total even if it strikes me as low compared to some years. I was trying to work my way through some short books, as well as alternating between books that have been in my stash for a long time and newer things that continue to trickle in. I still work for a bookstore but I haven't stepped foot in my workplace since the shutdown last year so I don't get the same access to ARCs that I used to, although I still can get some. But don't worry- I'll never run out of things to read.

That's my Christmas book haul. But on to the recap from 2021.

How many books read in 2021?

59 books in 2021, up 5 from 2020. 

How many fiction and non fiction? 

37 fiction versus 22 nonfiction. I was always reading one of each but the nonfiction books tend to be longer.

Male/Female author ratio?

27 male to 31 female plus one that I don’t know.

Diversity?

19 authors were people of color or about a third. At least 6 authors are Jewish and at least 10 of the books covered LGBTQ themes or characters.

Favorite book of 2021? 

Milk Fed, by Melissa Broder

Any that you simply couldn’t finish and why? Always, but I’ll never tell.

Oldest book read?  Nightmare Alley, by William Lindsay Gresham, published first in 1946.

Newest? My Phantoms, by Gwendoline Riley, to be published in 2022 by Penguin Random House.

Longest and shortest book titles?

Shortest title: Hamnet, by Maggie O’Farrell

Longest title: Jack the Ripper & the Case for Scotland Yard's Prime Suspect, by Robert House

Longest and shortest books?

Longest: The Love Songs of W.E.B. DuBois by Honoree Fantonne Jeffers

Shortest: My Phantoms, by Gwendoline Riley

How many books from the library? 

None! For the sixth year in a row I did not read a library book.

Any translated books?

I read books or stories translated from French, Italian, Japanese, German and Spanish.

Which countries did you go to through the page in your year of reading?

Apart from various locales in the United States including Los Angeles, Texas, Brooklyn, Georgia, New York City, Boston, Washington state and Oregon, I went to England, South Africa, Korea, Germany, Switzerland, Senegal, Japan, Argentina, Poland, Indonesia, Northern Ireland, Israel, Palestine, Tibet, India, Turkey, Kenya, Italy, China, Spain and Russia as well as the Discworld.

Most read author of the year, and how many books by that author?

I read two books by Melissa Broder.

Any re-reads? 

I re-read Nightmare Alley by William Lindsay Gresham and Made for Love by Alyssa Nutting.

Favorite character of the year? 

Marie de France in Matrix by Lauren Groff.

Which book wouldn’t you have read without someone’s specific recommendation? 

The Color of Magic, by Terry Pratchett. My husband recommended it.

Which author was new to you in 2021  that you now want to read the entire works of? 

Deesha Philyaw

Which books are you annoyed you didn't read? 

The Mirror and the Light by Hilary Mantel

Did you read any books you have always been meaning to read? 

I read all four books I had on last year’s list of books I wanted to make sure to get to- Outlawed, Lampedusa, Grotesque and Luster. I was glad to get to Radio Free Boston by Carter Allan and Savage Nights by Cyril Collard.

Bookish Events in Marie's Life: 

Another pandemic year and not a lot in the way of bookish events. I did enjoy NAIBA’s virtual conference and the CABS seminar I attended virtually in August. I am toying with the idea of becoming a rare book dealer at some point and I learned a lot from that program. 

Books I'm Looking Forward to in 2022:

• All of You Every Single One by Beatrice Hitchman
• Vladimir by Julia May Jones
• Vernon Subutex by Virginie Despentes
• The Piano: A History in 100 Pieces by Susan Tomes

Christmas Scrappy Lattice

This is a quilt I made with more scraps from the same Fig Tree kit whose scraps I used for the Christmas tree I showed in my last post. The pattern is called Scrappy Lattice and it's by Bonjour Quilts.

I was able to go through quite a few of the scraps but there is still probably enough left for another small quilt. The quilt shop I bought the kit from gave waaaaaay more fabric than I needed!

The author gives fabric requirements for fat quarters and scraps but I think I figured out that you can use a layer cake too. I'm going to re-crunch the numbers before I cut into the one I want to use but I think it will work.

It's a fairly simple pattern that I think came out cute. I made the Baby size which comes out at 42x54 inches- for me this is a reasonable throw size. It's going to be gift along with that tree from the other day, for a friend who needs some holiday cheer.

I do want to make another with a Nordic-Christmas-themed layer cake I have; I'll let you know how it goes.

Modern Christmas Tree Wallhanging

This is a wallhanging sized modern Christmas tree made from the scraps of a very large Fig Tree block of the month kit that I completed a few years ago. 

The large quilt is still sitting unquilted; I suppose I will have to hand quilt it one day. It's pretty epic.

I also made a throw sized quilt from the same fabric but I don't have a picture to share with you right now. Both will be gifts this year for a friend who needs some holiday cheer.

I don't have the pattern name for the tree; I can't find it right now in my sewing room and I can't find the pattern online at all. It was pretty fun to make though it's a lot of organization of small pieces and careful work. It's a great scrap-buster project. 

Finally, A Halloween Quilt

Well I finally made a Halloween quilt. I had this fat quarter pack from Keepsake Quilting sitting around for like 15 years? Maybe longer? And finally this past fall I got it together and found a pattern I liked, from Lynda Milligan and Nancy Smith's book Positively Pineapple. I used some orange and yellow print and batiks that I had in my stash with scraps of Widescreen by Caroline Friedlander and of course solid black. I love the way it turn out.

Here's a closeup on one of the blocks:

The Widescreen fabric is in the corners. I had a lot of fun picking out oranges and yellows for the blocks and then arranging them into the finished layout.

It's been a slow season for me. I'm still working on my scrap stars and I also decided to take on the City Quilt, which was a kit I purchased in 2014. Or rather, my husband gave it to me for Christmas after I strongly hinted that I would like it. The store, The City Quilter, closed several years ago so the kits are gone, baby, gone. I'm glad I got one! I finished the top today and will post something soon.

 

A Dino Quilt for Damien

I finished this quilt over a year ago; it was a baby quilt for a family friend. She wanted dinosaurs for her infant son and so I found a dino pattern and here it is. The pattern is by Made by Marney, here on Etsy.

It is foundation paper-pieced. Fabrics were mostly drawn from my Victoria Findlay Wolfe collection as well as some other things from my stash but Victoria's blues and especially the black and white stripe I used for the teeth seemed really fitting. I did not do the embroidery seen in the original pattern. The border fabric is an Eric Carle print that drew together the palette used for the dinos.

It was pretty fun to do though it did take a while. I quilted it with either Aurifil white or invisible/monofilament thread (I can't remember which), by machine. I used Quilters Dream wool batting for the little one to enjoy. Of course Eugenie had to photobomb. She's such a drama queen.

Finally Finished Something (Tiny)

So in my last post I told you about my herringbone; here is my miniature herringbone. 

The strips were 1.5 x 3.5 inches (I think); no pattern, just kind of winged it.

Here it is next to the larger, human-sized quilt, for scale. After I made the larger one, one of my friends teased me about my Baby Yoda obsession and said I should make a mini version for Eugenie. So that's what I did.

I used scrap of batting and Aurifil monofilament for the quilting which I did by machine. I learned that running a line of quilting along the non-jagged edge (the edge that gets trimmed off at the end and comes out straight) helped to stabilize that side of it for the binding.

I really love how it came out. The jagged binding is a bit of a hot mess if you look up close but that's OK. It would be fun to make a pillow version too. The colors are just right up my alley.