Saturday, March 26, 2011

Having fun

At last, it is going together. I did go fabric shopping way back when and brought home pinks and purples and reds. Sometimes it’s fun just to look at new fabric and fondle it for a while. Last week, I finally plunged in and started cutting it up.

Some of the templates I made were not quite right and I had to re-do them. The angles on the basic heart parallelograms are a whacky 51.36 degrees – not standard 45s or 60s. Then, I didn’t like the look of the lines and labels. I asked friends on my quilt designers list for help. They were generous with offers to redraw them for me. One designer on the list reminded me about upping the dpi (dots per inch) with raster graphics and then reducing them for the final templates. Of course she was right. I’d forgotten all about that simple technique.

I like to take process photos to include in my patterns if necessary. Sometimes a drawing will be best for explaining a detail and other times a photo is better. I take the photos as I go along so I can decide later.
My patterns are usually at least eight or nine pages with some color inside. The other day I saw a pattern online and sent away for it. When it arrived it was one folded black & white page in a color cover! I could not believe it. It merely had rotary cutting dimensions and a line drawing of the finished quilt.
So far I have completed 12 rows and only have seven more to go for the table topper before I quilt it (by hand). Next, I’ll make larger templates for a bed-size quilt and have it tested by a quilter. There is a long way to go. It is fun to be creating something again.

I’m trying to come up with a pattern title. So far I’ve thought of “Dear to my Heart,” and “Dear Hearts.” There is a back story for those. Click here.

Labels: ,

Tuesday, March 08, 2011

Fabric shopping tomorrow

I’m going to look for pinks, reds, and purples because I’ve started my fourth try making a hearts quilt. The THIRD try did not work. I’ve used up most of my pink/red stash trying to make this darn thing. I sketched the original idea in 2001.

The weather has turned sunny and it will be fun to get out of the house and into a quilt store. I’ve started a corner with my newest idea. I hope it works.

If I were making a piece for my own pleasure I could just put things together to get the effect I want. I could fuse and glue. I do that every so often. But this is a pattern I want to sell so I have to consider how someone else will put it together and how it might have to go through the wash. My first three tries involved a lot of tucking and hand sewing. Very tedious stuff. I also have to think about writing instructions and doing diagrams. I usually write them out and draw them first and then try to follow them as I’m putting the project together. Sometimes when I’m sewing I say out loud, “This doesn’t make any sense!” That’s when I re-write.

Labels: , , ,