Posts Tagged ‘quilt design’

President’s Blocks, Part 3

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

Hello and welcome to Stash Bandit! I’m Diane Harris and it’s nice to have you here. 

I’ve been telling the story of some blocks I received in the late ’80s.

Read Part 1.

Read Part 2. 

 

 

 

 

This takes us up to The Rest of the Story, in the words of Paul Harvey.

When the quilt top was finished, I still had the other half of the Nine Patches left over. It seemed a shame to throw them away.

All of those fabrics had been cut into patches for me. The stitches had been taken for me. The blocks had been gifted to me. I just couldn’t pitch them.

I brainstormed for what to do. Making another quilt wasn’t sensible, but using them in this quilt was. I toyed with creating a border but decided to sew the halves together into wonky Nine Patches.

Only one of these has a signature. It belongs to Lorena, my renegade friend who had to sign one name in each white patch, of course. Two of her names are on the quilt front and two landed here, on what will become the back. (If you knew Lorena, you’re laughing.)

For the quilt back, I set the new wonky Nine Patches into columns with scrappy pink setting triangles and sewed the columns together. Lengths of two more pink prints went down each side to make it big enough. And now we are ready to quilt.

While this is no masterpiece, I had so much fun making it! It brought back memories of so many people and our happy times together. There’s even a block from one person whom I didn’t really care for, but I’m glad she’s on the quilt. Funny how time softens the edges.

These blocks have stayed with me for around 32 years as a UFO of sorts and as soon as the quilting is done, they’ll be an FO instead! What a victory! I guess it’s never too late.

In case you’re wondering, these are the names found on the quilt.

Kathleen Ernesti, Donna Rector, Ellen Boyle, Gloria Nelsen, Penny White, Velesta Halbur, Sandra Renli, Wilma Amen, BJS, Doris Volk, Joyce Pick, Shirley Anderson, Maxine Kraemaer, Sue Sindelar, Sandy Eckert, Inger Hansen, Lavonne Hornik, Mattie Niewohner, Daytime Friendship Quilters, Mary Goetsch, Lila Brown, Marilynn Heller, Julie Deering, Carol Monk, Elsie Acklie, Joan Waldman, Lorena Edna Marie Kouba, Peggy Haas, Genelle Trowbridge, Shirley Hassler. There’s an unsigned block from Sherry Stuifbergen. 

I can’t wait to reimagine another long-stored project, but right now I have my mind on Dresden Plate quilts. My next two programs will feature my Dresden collection and I want to have some new things to show. All of that upcoming. Until then, keep on scrappin’!

I’m a quilter who loves everything about the process and I enjoy sharing it with others. My energetic trunk shows are lively entertainment for your quilt guild. I’d love to come to your city so give me a call and Let’s Talk Quilts! 

President’s Blocks, Part 2

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

In case you missed Part 1, you’ll want to catch up by reading President’s Blocks, 32 Years Late. I have an idea for reinventing blocks I received from guild members more than 30 years ago.

The blocks are 9″ (give or take) Nine Patches in ’90s blues and muslin, with signatures in ink or embroidery. I have about 40. I’ve decided to create blocks like the one above by slicing the Nine Patches 1/4″ to the side of the diagonal center and joining them with a big red triangle.

Make a Little Halloween Quilt!

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

I love small quilts!

Small quilts don’t take up a lot of time or space. They quickly satisfy my need to create. They’re fun to use in my home as the seasons come and go. And they make great gifts. What’s not to love?!

I have been making small quilts ever since I started quilting in 1984. That’s 35 years.

The Great Pumpkin Backstory and Giveaway

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

Last year I had this idea: Design a Christmas quilt with giant candy canes. The candy canes would be so big they’d cover the entire quilt. I nestled them together and topped them off with a Starlite™ mint.

Prancer’s Peppermints, designed and made by Diane Harris, appeared in Quilty Nov/Dec. 2018

Quilty magazine published them as Prancer’s Peppermints in the Nov/Dec ’18 issue.

Diane’s giant pineapple “Welcome” quilt, click for free instructions!

Then I thought it might be fun to make a giant pineapple quilt, and that’s how Welcome was born.

Churn Dash Remix with Stash Bandit, Part 3

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

The back story: I was away from my machine for four weeks this summer so I played with the traditional Churn Dash in Electric Quilt. I called it the Churn Dash Remix.

See Part 1 of Churn Dash Remix

See Part 2 of Churn Dash Remix

We’ve played with block proportions, now let’s mess around with settings. A setting is just how blocks will be put together. A setting can be blocks arranged in horizontal rows or on point, blocks with sashing or without, blocks arranged vertically or randomly—there are endless variations.

Churn Dash Remix with Stash Bandit, Part 2

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

While I was away from my studio for the arrival of new grandbabies, I dreamed up the Churn Dash Remix so that I could play with virtual quilt designs in Electric Quilt design software. I used a basic traditional Churn Dash quilt block as my starting point. If you missed it, check out Part 1.

In the first part, we left the block proportions alone and just played with the lights and darks plus some scrappy variations. Pretty entertaining! But now we’re getting to the really fun stuff: altering the size of the block’s grid.

Churn Dash Remix with Stash Bandit, Part 1

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

I’m away from home for several weeks because I have new twin granddaughters, born in Hong Kong about two weeks ago. It’s been a whirlwind with so many emotions, and it’s been wonderful.

The short story is that everyone is doing great! I’ve had a lot of extra time with my grandsons, ages 3 and 7, as everyone adjusts to new babies. It’s been heaven on earth.

Being away from my studio for three weeks means that I don’t have much to share on the sewing front, but it has given me an opportunity to create some virtual designs in EQ8. In case you’re not familiar, EQ8 is  quilt design software from The Electric Quilt Company. It’s an incredibly powerful tool and I design most of my quilts with it.

I dreamed up something called Churn Dash Remix last week in order to demonstrate some concepts about color and design while I’m away from my machine. I’m using the simple Churn Dash block as my starting point. Just above you’ll see a basic version with a nine-patch grid so that each of the three columns of patches is of equal width.

There is a lot you can do with just color and value before you ever alter the proportions of the block. Just above, the background patches become more important with zesty teal and a large-scale hot pink/orange. So simple, but effective.

Changed it up a little for a whole new look. Yellow adds spice to just about anything.

Now let’s rearrange the value placement. Value is just the lightness or darkness of the fabrics compared to their neighbors. The block above hardly looks like a Churn Dash, but it is. All I’ve done is place the lights and darks in different spots.

Here I’ve substituted reddish-pink roses for the aqua, and I love it! Plus-sign designs have been hot for a while. Have you seen them popping up in magazines, books and on social media? Who knew that a humble Churn Dash could masquerade as a plus sign?!

One more variation, above. Before we leave these proportions, let’s look at a few scrappy versions.

Here’s a tip:

One easy way to elevate your block to something special is to swap the normally light background for a dark one.

The navy blue above is a good example. The block is more exciting just by letting the Churn Dash shapes be lighter than the background and almost glow against the dark blue.

The same block with pinks instead of yellows. Here’s another tip:

The most important thing in a scrappy block is that the values in the different areas are similar.

See how all the dark background fabrics above read in a similar way? Nothing sticks out as a lot lighter. Same for the pinks: They’re all about the same medium value.

But here is what people sometimes do:

See how two of the background patches, even though they are blue, are much lighter? That doesn’t work in this case. The backgrounds need to be similar in value if they’re to work together as one.

You’ll notice that some of the pinks are more peachy and some are more purply, but that’s a good thing! The value is much more important than the shade of pink. Variety in the shades of pink makes the block interesting and engaging as long as the pinks are similar in value, which is just lightness or darkness.

Here’s the block in scrappy navy and aqua. Love it!

Everything we’ve done has just been with color and value. Wait until you see what happens when we change up the block proportions in the next post! So much fun!

~Diane~

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