Posts Tagged ‘jingle bells trunk show’

Changing It Up: From Christmas to Industry

Written by Diane Harris on . Posted in Blog, Quilt Lifestyle, Uncategorized

I posted an image of my recent modern Christmas wreath quilt on Instagram, and a follower named Karen saw “urban-industrial style Christmas.” What a great description!

Oh, Christmas Wreath by Diane Harris; quilted by Julie Lechner @beenquiltin

Her thoughts moved me to play around with this design and purposely go for an industrial look. So I moved away from Christmas entirely, to these possibilities.

A little bit different, but it still feels like the same quilt. Sashing is wider and all of the background and the border is one color.

Here I moved to a darker background color. I kind of like this idea. In terms of fabric, I’d use a lot of variety in the Bow Ties. (Ha, they don’t even look like Bow Ties now!)

More playing around. I’m not sure how effective this really is. But you never know until you try, so I don’t rule anything out when I’m experimenting, especially if it’s just in EQ. Even in fabric, play is the name of the game.

Whoa. This happened by accident! The background is the same color as one of the Bow Ties, so that piecing disappears and they look like weird C’s. Now we’re getting somewhere. In reality you wouldn’t actually piece the C’s, you could just use a solid patch in the same fabric as the background. I love this one, and surprisingly, it looks Christmas-y to me once more.

I had one more thought. I changed the gray to another green.

Like I said, you never know until you mess around!

A note about Electric Quilt design software: I resisted upgrading to EQ8 from EQ7 because I thought I didn’t have time to learn a new program. But when I did upgrade, I was blown away by how easy and intuitive it is. I spent almost zero time learning EQ8 because everything felt natural and logical. I love it. If you’re interested in designing quilts, you should get it. Well worth the investment!

Today, I wish you the courage, the curiosity and the commitment to play.

Let’s Talk Quilts! Does your quilt group need a speaker for 2019 or 2020? I’m booking entertaining, energizing, inspiring trunk shows now.

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Holiday Designs by Stash Bandit, Part 2

Written by Diane Harris on . Posted in Blog, How-tos and Ideas, Trunk Shows

My exceptional longarm quilter said to me recently, “I think everything you do is modern.” I’d commented that I didn’t think of myself as a “modern” quilter, and her response gave me pause. I’ve been (very happily) fielding inquiries from modern quilt guilds, and the truth is that some things I design and make lean toward the modern aesthetic, some are traditional, and some are hard to put into a category.

Oh, Christmas Wreath by Diane Harris; quilted by Julie Lechner @beenquiltin

Today I’m introducing Oh, Christmas Wreath! This design is decidedly modern: solid fabrics, negative space, clean and fresh. Oh, Christmas Wreath appears in the Nov/Dec issue of Quilty, on newsstands now. I hope you’ll grab it when you see it or order it online in paper or digital format.

How to Make a Scrappy Quilt Binding

Written by Diane Harris on . Posted in Blog, How-tos and Ideas, Quilt Lifestyle

Whenever I finish a quilt, I put the leftover binding into a shoebox in my closet. When I’m ready to bind a scrap quilt, I start by checking in the shoebox. Last weekend I wanted to bind my scrappy green and teal Patchwork Forest quilt, which I’ve named Can’t See the Forest for the Trees.

Can’t See the Forest for the Trees by Diane Harris

My Little Christmas Tree Quilt

Written by Diane Harris on . Posted in Blog, How-tos and Ideas, Quilt Lifestyle, Uncategorized

Merry Christmas! I hope your holiday is full of the love of family and friends. Let me tell you about my little Christmas tree quilt, Twinkling Bright.

It all started with this small block that I call a Baby Windmill. I’m on a mission to design as many interesting quilts as I can with this as the starting point. You can read more here.

Patchwork and Quilting: Building Better Habits

Written by Diane Harris on . Posted in Blog, How-tos and Ideas, Quilt Lifestyle

I’ve been working to break a few bad habits and build some better ones related to my quilt making. It’s never easy to break a bad habit. It’s not easy to form a good habit, either!

The bad habit I want to break is finishing the piecing of a top only to fold it up and put it in the “to be quilted” pile. Sometimes it doesn’t see the light of day for months, even years! I have more than my share of UFOs already, and I am determined not to add any more.

This week’s finished quilt top is “Felicity,” a design by Kate Spain.

So the new habit I want to build is this: when I finish the top of a project, I immediately prepare the backing. This means going to my bin of backing fabrics (cuts of 3 to 7 yards mostly bought on sale) and finding something that will work, or finding several smaller pieces that can be pieced into something interesting.

One Hundred Small Quilts #1

Written by Diane Harris on . Posted in Blog, How-tos and Ideas, Quilt Lifestyle, Trunk Shows, Uncategorized

I’m going to start sharing my quilts here in short posts. They’ll give you an idea of what my trunk shows are like, which is the thrust of my business, Stash Bandit: I’m a speaker and a teacher on the topic of quilt-making.

Nested Nicks by Diane Harris. Photo by Mellisa Karlin Mahoney. Used with permission.

When a quilt (or several) intrigues you, I hope you’ll visit my Trunk Shows page, or get in touch via Booking Inquiries. You can email me, too: diane@stashbandit.net. Let’s Talk Quilts!