Cold Tuesday

Weather-wise that is. On Sunday, this was the view outside the sewing area. 

 

Monday, the frigid temps arrived and will be here until Friday when we should get back up near 30.  In the meantime, we are staying hunkered down - hopefully.  (Oh Please, Oh Please, Oh Please). 

See, we have a bit of a situation here - sick dog.  Hobbes is under the weather and under his quilt.

And I'm hoping we don't need to make the trek up to the vet unless necessary.  Normally, Hobbes is an Artic Beagle but below zero temps and with the wind kicking up to 30 mph gusts, it is just too dang cold & hard on his old bones.  Waiting for a call back from Dr. Chris (wonderful vet!) to see how we want to handle this right now.  If we don't have to go out, we will just be focused on supportive care.

Down in the sewing area yesterday, I boxed up the Celtic Solstice chevron blocks and started cutting. Remember those narrow black strips?  They have some company on the cutting table.

Cherrywood Fabrics - Lagoon colorway

 

Which led to this

Ziggy: It's okay Mom, I'm guarding the blocks from prying eyes

 Ziggy had to be convinced that it was okay to share these blocks

 

Me: Really Ziggy, it's okay to share - these are not a secret

 So here are the first 8 blocks

and here's the color pencil sketch of the small Irish Chain quilt they will become.

You'll have to wait to see the rest until I get back downstairs. Hopefully, I'll be able to get true color on the pictures of the finished top.  Hope you all are keeping warm if it's cold where you are.

Barn-ette Quilt

It done! 156 little squares contained on a 24" square of wood - just needs several coats of clear protective finish & it will be ready to deliver & get hung in place.

 

I did have an 'AH HA' moment. Remember that in order for my design to fit the predetermined size (already cut & primed the wood square), I ended up with a 5/8's inch grid. The entire square surface had to be marked - how to do that as accurately as possible?  With a quilt ruler of course - DUH!!  Sometimes it takes a minute or two for the logical side of the brain to catch up with the creative side, especially with a lack of sleep & no where near enough tea factored into the equation.
 

 

 

I used Behr interior paint samples, starting with matching the Behr Barn Red to an interior Behr color, then finding a golden yellow & a forest green.  I used white to create the two lighter cream shades & the lighter green. I thought originally I was going to use 3 shades of green but I didn't like the lightest shade so I cut it from the palette. To achieve the middle red, I mixed the Poppy red with the barn red color - it's okay but could have been just a hint brighter.

 

 Several hours later...

 

Here's the finished barn-ette quilt on point.

 

Here it is square - Not sure which way I like it better.

 

Most barn quilts I've seen are usually done with larger pieces - less complicated/busy blocks. But they are also much, much larger & on the side of a big, big barn. Since this is going on a barn-ette and Irish Chain is one of Martha's favorite quilt patterns - I couldn't resist doing this design.

 

Still in between but something's coming

Still in the 'in between' state.

 

After slamming to finish two large quilts, a wall hanging, a Scot Pirate tailcoat, 6 head wraps and 4 shirts in the last two months, a few days away from the sewing room might be a good thing for my hands. The brain however is not taking a break. I have a few things lurking in the background that need some design time put in on them.

 

I don't follow a lot of blogs (yet) so I was catching up on some older posts on my dear friend Martha's hand weaving  blog (tandrhandweaving.blogspot.com) and ran across the post from Oct. 29, 2012 showing her brand new barnette that I need to design and paint a barn quilt for.  I have the wood cut & primed and it's been waiting for me.  I also prepped a second one for the shed for my folks place in Michigan, but that's not pressing.  Martha is an incredibly talented weaver, seamstress, cook, homesteader, knitter and yes, she quilts & paints too!  Trying to pick a quilt pattern for her has been a bit of a challenge but I think I finally have it narrowed down.  Mart has always been partial to the Irish Chain pattern but I wanted something a bit more detailed. And then I found 'Entwined', a variation Irish Chain pattern from the book "40 Fabulous Quick Cut Quilts" by Evelyn Sloppy. I plan on tweaking this a bit to fit the 24" square for the barnette and then add my own twist on it.  Just need to plot out the design on graph paper, pick some colors, plan my attack & get busy. 

 

Hopefully, I can get this to translate to the wood & not lose detail.  Wonder how I'm going to incorporate my twist into it.  Bet Martha's wondering the same thing!