do. Good Stitches - August 2012

August was my month to be the quilter for our do. Good Stitches circle, Dream. I chose to have everyone make this (what I thought would be) simple starburst block by Ashley at Film in the Fridge. Looks easy right?

As it turns out, it’s really a lot more of a pain to get those points to line up than I ever imagined. I ended up making two of these blocks. Our group is in a bit of flux right now due to new babies and moving members and other exciting stuff, so we were a little short. I was going to make another 3 to make the whole quilt 3×4 blocks, but just couldn’t bring myself to do it. Those blocks are a pain! I apologize to all the lovely ladies of the dream circle for picking it.

do. Good Stitches -- August 2012

As it turns out though, the 3×3 layout inspired the quilting. After I’d quilted along the block seams I realized I had the perfect tic tac toe board, and so I quickly cut out an X and an O template and laid them out for quilting.

do. Good Stitches -- August 2012

The binding I chose was a plain teal blue. Originally, I’d asked everyone to include a bit of gray in each brightly colored starburst as a way to tie them all together, but as it luck would have it, the aquas and teals really stand out more.

do. Good Stitches -- September 2012

And here’s my block for September. I’m afraid it doesn’t look as bright and cheery as it did when I first pulled the fabrics. Really, quite muted.

Now, I just need to find the time to package these two goodies up and send them off.

I’ve been teasing instagram viewers with shots of this quilt in progress for weeks — maybe months — but it’s finally done. A quilt for my favorite little guy.

I am a Ro-bot.

I’m not sure what inspired the robot theme. It was so long ago that I dreamt this pattern up. I thought about it for weeks before I got up the nerve to draw it out in Illustrator, then I waited even more weeks before I actually started piecing it. The whole top is paper pieced. I was worried about that at first. I was thinking there would be too many seams, too many tiny pieces, but it seems to have worked out just fine.

Robot close-up

I started with quite the collection of reds, blues and grays. Then threw in that Remix zig zag print and another stripe at the last second. Originally I’d considered doing the whole quilt in solids. I sort of wish I’d gone with that. The whole top is very very busy… Just like it’s new owner (“I buzzy momma!”).

The back and binding were a bit of a challenge. After I’d put the border on the top, I was about 2 inches short on the backing. And the amount of fabric I had left from the top was seriously about 6 2 inch strips in various fabrics and lengths and that big piece of Remix. Finally I scrounged up enough of the remix to squeak out the needed length. Poor Chris and Alex offered about a million suggestions, none of which I took. I also solicited help in choosing the binding on instagram, twitter, and facebook. But guess what? I didn’t take any of those suggestions either and ordered this red polka dot and another multicolor dot from the Remix collection. Obviously I picked the red, but I’m not sure I really like it. I think it’s really very Christmassy. On the other hand, the other dot was just a bit too much for the eye.

Robot Back

I’m really loving doing these quilt labels with the embroidery. It’s such a change of pace after piecing a quilt to sit on the couch with some trash tv show on (ahem anything on HGTV), and stitch away. I wonder if Sean will sleep with the label by his face the way Alex does with her quilt.

Robot Label

PS — wow, my quilting stitches look awful in that picture! I swear they are way straighter and more even than that in person… Really. wink wink.