Holiday Squirrel Finish

I did it! With time to spare. Last time I wrote about this squirrel, I had taken a break because I didn't have the basting pins available to get it ready for quilting. I got the other quilt done (wrote about it in my last post) and then hopped right into this one. You can read about the process here. But here it is--my daughter's new Christmas tree skirt. It was a dark, wet day, so we moved our table out of our dining area to get as much light from the deck doors as possible for the photos.

I did all of the quilting with my walking foot. To kind of emphasize the snowflake shape of the skirt, I started with rows of lines through the longest sashings using the width of the walking foot to space them. 

At that point I wasn't sure what I'd do with the main sections of the quilt, so I started with lines along the sashings. I was tempted to quilt them as densely as the first sashings, but there was a bit of a problem. I was playing thread chicken with my quilting thread. I had an order in for more but wasn't sure how long it would take to get it. I was using white thread for both the top and bobbin, but decided to stretch it by switching to off-white in the bobbin. I also decided that I'd better not quilt the whole quilt so close together. 

To figure out what to do with the diamonds, I laid out thread across them. Option 1:

Option 2:

Option 3:

I ran them past my daughter, and we decided on Option 1, which was good as it would use the least amount of thread, but I liked the argyle look of it, too. I waited until the end to quilt the stars. I knew I wanted to outline them, but also knew that they would require lots of quilt wrangling if I did them with the walking foot. They actually were pretty easy, as the quilt is not that big and the stars were mainly near the edges.

The next step was cutting the skirt. I was a little worried about that, but it went fine. 

The binding was a different story. I knew I wanted to use straight grain binding for the edges of most of the quilt but that bias would be better (or should be better) for the circle. You have to know, though, that from the time I learned to sew as a teenager, I have had trouble with bias binding on inside curves. Any clothing I made that had bound armholes or necklines had that "homemade" look. This little project was no exception.

See how wavy that circle is? I'm thinking there are three things I might have done to make it smoother. I could have used narrower binding, but I really wanted to use my current favorite width of 2 1/2 inches (before folding) because that extra width helps me make better corners especially when they are other than 90 degrees. Maybe I should have clipped the curve before binding. I know I've done that before, but I wasn't sure how it would affect the size of the circle. Or maybe I should have sewed the binding to the back and flipped it over to the front to stitch down. Whatever, it did get done. And, hey, it is homemade, so the homemade look is fine. Best of all, no one will see that part under the tree, except the person responsible for tree watering. I'm really pleased with how the binding turned out on the rest of the quilt. Here are some too many close-ups.

The back is a tiny white print on turquoise. I know, it looks like a solid.

Here is the skirt under our tree because I couldn't resist trying it out. 
And some stats:

Pattern: Atomic Christmas Tree Skirt--a tutorial by Violet Craft, based on her pattern Atomic Starburst.
Fabrics:  A variety supplied by my daughter. The background is Kona PFD (Prepared for Dying). 

Batting: Hobbs Heirloom 80/20 

Thread: Superior-- Masterpiece in Granite for piecing; King Tut in Temple for top thread of quilting, and mostly White Linen in the bobbin. Treasure in Old Lace for handstitching on binding. 

Binding: 2 1/2 inches cut, double layer, machine sewn to front and hand stitched on back; cut width of fabric, except for area around circle cut on bias.
Finished Size: 56 inches from straight edge to straight edge and about 64 1/2 inches from point to point. I did not wash it because I liked the flat look of it when it was finished. 

Machines: Singer Featherweight for piecing; Singer Treadle 115 for walking foot quilting.

Here it is, sent, received, and under its own tree--

And I just had to include this one--

And how about those socks?!! Hello, Sunshine, indeed!

My daughter thinks the skirt pattern could be marketed as a poncho, too!

Well, I think this might be it for the year. I have a few projects in the works. I have RSC quilts to finish and some other things, but I think I might take a break until after the holidays. Maybe there will be one more wrap-up post of the year's projects. We'll see. Oh, and remember I was playing thread chicken? Even though I won--sort of, by using the two colors--my thread did arrive in the mail the day after I finished the quilt. So I'm all set for sewing in the new year.

I'm linking up this week with Sarah of Confessions of a Fabric Addict for Whoop Whoop Friday and Wendy's Quilts and More for the Peacock Party, and next Saturday with Sandra at mmm! quilts for DrEAMi (Drop Everything And Make it) because I can't just let this squirrel finish hang out there from last month. There needed to be the rest of the story.

I hope you have happy holidays wherever you are and whatever you're doing.


(I'm not affiliated with any company, so when I mention products, services, or stores I'm just documenting what I used or liked.) 

Baby M's Chicago Skyline

Get ready. This is a long one. Because, you know, one of those secret projects that couldn't be revealed. Until now. Baby's not here yet, so I don't really know his initial. M is from his last name, but the baby shower has happened, so I can share. Yippee! 

This all started with a question to Baby M's parents about colors and possible theme for a quilt. They said the nursery is neutrals, with tan walls, black and white furnishings, and pops of color for decorations. They also said maybe buildings for a theme, since they have lived in some of the largest cities of the country. They currently live in Chicago, so I took that theme and ran with it. Here it is: my sort-of Chicago skyline--an abstract, with some well known buildings and the elevated train (the "L"), not necessarily where they are really placed, but in an arrangement that pleased me.

All washed--looks wobbly, but that's just from the hangers and breeze.

So now that you've seen the big reveal, I'll share lots more photos, with a visual tour of the process.

I started with the fabric you can see at the bottom of the quilt and in the backing here:

Here's a close-up:

It's from the Robert Kaufman Let's Go line. I found it online and was immediately smitten because it was in colors I was looking for and even more important, the cars, trucks and bicycles were all in the right orientation for a city street--no upside-down vehicles--so they'd fit perfectly at the bottom of a row of buildings. 

After looking at oodles of photos of the skyline of Chicago with labels of major buildings, I drew a plan on graph paper. 

You can see in the photo above that I've labeled and listed some of the buildings. The numbers at the bottom are planning for the amount of yardage for the vehicle and background fabric. I think. I can never tell from my scribbles. While waiting for my fabric order, I colored in the drawing and started planning the scale and piecing (those numbers are along the side of the photo, with each square of graph paper equaling 2 inches). The numbers along the bottom and in the body of the quilt drawing correspond to buildings and background pieces, which I may or may not have attended to while actually piecing. 

When the vehicle fabric arrived, it was time for a trip to the fabric store for fabrics with building-ish prints and colors that coordinated with the vehicle fabric. I was thrilled with my finds. I had a few pieces in my stash that worked, too, so in no time, I was all set to dive into piecing. 

I started with the Willis (formerly known as Sears tower) section of the quilt. There is another building in front of it (Board of Trade--the gold one) and to keep things easy where there were tricky seams, I freezer paper pieced parts of them where they overlapped.

 Here's a close-up of the front of that part:

And that section, finished:

 Then it was time to plan the next section:

I planned window color and placement.

Those copies to the left are just to cover the fabric.

And another section done:

It took a little time to plan the next section of the quilt. I had trouble at first getting the proportions of the windows of the CNA building (the red and white one) the way I wanted at first, and I did redo some of those seams to make the windows narrower. I also had to plan that building so that I could later fit the "L" in, which required some partial seams. I designed the building so I could remove a few stitches to insert the L train during the last phase of sewing.

Headed to too much white

Better

Ready to move on

Moving on, I forgot to take some photos, but all went well, with more freezer paper piecing where buildings overlapped.

The last big building was the John Hancock, recognizable for it's distinctive X's in the structure. I tried out several blackish/grayish fabrics

but suddenly realized that the blue/teal print was the perfect value and repeat of fabric use. I again used a slice and insert method--combined with freezer paper piecing to keep it neat.

Then it was time to add the L train and do one more slice and insert of the rail. Using the 1/2 finished rail kept the integrity of the building design--no windows or structural elements were distorted. And the last step was adding the street at the bottom. This whole process was so satisfying, and I'm thrilled that it turned out as I envisioned it. 

For the quilting, I stitched in the ditch (-ish, I sometimes get a little off seamline) around each building, and then followed windows, quilted abstract windows and other building-ish lines. In the background (both the street and the sky) I did long wavy horizontal lines. Chicago is The Windy City, but I wanted just a decent breeze.

Here are the Stats, and then I'll finish with some close-ups:

Pattern: My own graph paper doodle based on photos of the skyline of Chicago.
Fabrics:  A variety (sorry, I'm not good at keeping track of them) plus the car print from Let's Go by Robert Kaufman.

Batting: Hobbs Heirloom 80/20 

Thread: Superior-- Masterpiece in Granite for piecing; King Tut in White Linen for quilting. Unknown black hand quilting thread for stitching binding to back.

Binding: 2 1/2 inches cut, double layer, machine sewn to front and hand stitched on back
Size: 56 3/8 inches tall by 52 1/4 inches wide. 54 inches by 50 inches after washing.

Machines: Singer Featherweight for piecing; Singer Treadle 115 for walking foot quilting.

So, now, some additional photos taken indoors (on our bed) because the weather is dark and yucky.

The major buildings from left to right are:

311 S. Wacker (green check)

Willis Tower (formerly Sears Tower--black squares)

Chicago Board of Trade (gold plaid) 

CNA Center (red/white--the real building is distinctively red)

Either Chase or One Prudential Place (I never did decide, although it lacks the top of Prudential, but it's the teal one with blue windows) 

Two Prudential Plaza (the navy one with the pointed roof) 

Crain Communications (formerly known as the Smurfit-Stone--shorter red building), 

Aon Center (gold with long gray windows)
John Hancock (black with X structure)

And then, of course, the "L" train and track

Blogger insists on turning this photo sideways. Oh well.

I hope you enjoyed seeing this quilt as much as I enjoyed making it. I think graph paper is my favorite way to plan a quilt and seeing this quilt come to life from the paper was such a satisfying experience. Perhaps it will inspire you to interpret a favorite skyline as a quilt. I hope the little guy this quilt is meant for will have fun with his own version of "I spy" with the buildings of Chicago. He even has an awesome skyline view from his nursery window.

I'm linking up this week with Kelly at My Infatuation for Needle and Thread Thursday, Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict for Whoop Whoop Friday, at Wendy's Quilts and More for Peacock Party, and Michelle at From Bolt to Beauty for Beauties Pageant.

(I'm not affiliated with any company, so when I mention products, services, or stores I'm just documenting what I used or liked.) 

Holiday Squirrel (and Hibernation)

I've been up to my ears in quilting projects lately--the reason (or excuse) for my poor presence in blogland. I do hope to fix that. Thanks for all of your comments on my blog. If I haven't responded yet, I will try to soon, and visit your blogs, too. I have some timelines that I'm trying to meet, which in this season of holidays, is no mean feat, so I'm limiting my social media for a bit. 

Anyway, despite all of that, a major squirrel jumped out at me a few weeks ago. 

Well, yes, that one, too. This cutie has been hanging around our maple tree stuffing itself silly for a few weeks now. Whenever it snows, it goes away for while but always comes back. 

No, I'm talking about a different squirrel. 

My daughter saw a cool retro-looking Christmas tree skirt on Instagram, and could I maybe fit in that project? Well, yeah! It's based on the quilt pattern Atomic Starburst by Violet Craft, but was presented on her blog as a tutorial for a tree skirt in December 2017. It has foundation piecing in it. Okay, I'm in. All my daughter had to do was supply me with the fabric, which she brought to me on a well-timed trip to celebrate one of my grandsons' birthday. 

The colors are the teals, apple green and gray of her living room with red and gold thrown in for a bit more of a holiday vibe. 

The weather was perfect for sewing. 

Before diving into the whole project, I made one star block to test out my skills and measurements. I was a little disappointed with the center of the star because some of the seams didn't seem to match up. But looking closer at the pattern, I realized they are supposed to be that way, perhaps to reduce bulk, and the whole star does look right. You can see that off-set part better on the next photo.

Based on the first block, I cut all the rest of the fabrics in sizes needed (usually cutting strips and subdividing them) for the remaining stars and organized them by pattern number before chain sewing them. The work seemed to proceed slowly, but then all at once all twelve stars were done! 

The diamonds and sashing strips seemed really big after that tiny piecing. I didn't exactly follow the pattern's methods for cutting the diamonds. The pattern calls for cutting strips the width of the smallest measurement of the diamonds and then using a template to cut diagonals. I wanted to cut my diamonds with the long vertical measurement on the straight grain of the fabric (which might be desired if you have a fabric with a strong directional print), so I cut strips that width. That puts the diamond edges on the bias, but it was not a concern for me, as they would be sewn to sashing strips that were not bias cut. I did not have a diamond plastic template, so I folded the strips in half and used a triangle template to cut them. My template has the seam allowance trimmed for the point, but I adjusted it so that I could keep the points in my cut. This sounds complicated to explain, but it was really easy to do. (Ignore those pieces of tape. They are leftovers from another project.) 

I taped the paper template provided in the pattern to my ruler to ensure accuracy in cutting the sashings from strips. I'm sure there are rulers that do this easily, but my whole ruler collection consists of two rectangular rulers, a square one and the triangle, so I make do with what I have. (Ignore those yellow tapes. Again, leftover from another project.)

I tried several different layouts for the skirt, consulting with bothering my daughter at work by phone to see what she thought. A few diamonds here are just fabric scraps inserted under strips, as I was still debating about colors for the last four diamonds.

I tried some with more scattered placement of the darkest diamonds, but to my eye, it made the whole design look "off."

Anyway, here's the finished layout--and the finished top. 

I have to say figuring out the sewing was tricky for me at first. It is not constructed like the quilt, and the tutorial is what I think of as minimalist as far as instructions go. So my first few parts of a section involved y seams at the outside edge. I can't even tell you what I was doing wrong, but eventually I figured it out, and then the remaining pyramids went together quickly. The other thing that threw me was how uneven the edges looked. See those little notches? Well it turns out there is a lot of room for trimming at the end. By aligning my ruler one half inch below the point of each diamond, the hexagon shape of the skirt comes out right at the given measurement in the pattern. Oh, and see those white half diamonds around the outside edge? The pattern says to take care because all of those would be on the bias if the diamonds are cut as instructed. By cutting them the way I did, all but the sashings are on grain around the edge instead of bias. 

So, anyway, all was going well with my squirrel, and I was happily ready to baste. I asked my husband to bring the banquet tables up to the living room from the basement, and I got all set up to pin.

And then...I came to a screeching halt. All of my basting pins were in another quilt. I had been procrastinating finishing that quilt because I wasn't sure how I wanted to quilt it. Never mind that it had a definite timeline which was shrinking due to the recipient's teasing his mother about his eagerness to enter this world. Thankfully, he's stayed in his proper place for now. So, this squirrel had to go into hibernation until I quilted that quilt. Back went the tables to the basement, with my apologies to my husband. I am happy to report that I did get that other quilt quilted. I can't show it to you just yet, but I only have two sides of binding left to stitch down. 

So, Friday, just before we put up our Christmas tree, I asked my husband to please put the banquet tables up in the living room again for basting this tree skirt--for real this time.

Now this squirrel is back out of hibernation and ready to quilt tomorrow. Oh, and our resident squirrel is also back from a short hibernation, swaying in the maple tree. It's getting pretty dangerous now, as only the tiniest twigs have seeds on them.

Several people who saw this tree skirt in progress on Instagram showed interested in making one. I have to say, I like the pattern for the quilt and I really appreciate Violet's offering of a free tutorial on her blog for the skirt. Having said that, I think you should be aware that the instructions for the skirt are not as detailed as they would be in a full pattern, so you do have to kind of figure some things out on your own. Of course, a few things I did were completely my own decision (cutting the diamonds differently), but do be aware that you will need to figure out what works best for you for the final sewing, as the instruction in the tutorial is limited to a visual.

I'm linking up today with Sandra at mmm! quilts for DrEAMi (Drop Everything And Make it) because even though this is not a total finish, it definitely was a squirrely project with a finished top. I'll be sure to post again when it's finished for good. I only have one thing to be a little nervous about: cutting into the quilt to make the opening and maybe binding around the circle in the middle and the angles on the edge--I guess that's two things.

I hope you are having a wonderful time with your holiday projects whether they are squirrels or not!