Liberty Trip - Finished!

So, I finally finished the Liberty Trip quilt! I drove to Massachusetts to visit my parents this week and finished sewing on the binding. Just so happens, they live on a farm, which made for some fun quilt photography. It's interesting how blogging about the quilts I make is getting me back into photography, which is something I love but had fallen by the wayside over the years. Still working on re-learning settings and how to balance colors, but trying to share the quilts in the best way possible is really motivating me.

Llama wants a quilt!

I used the Quiltville Scrappy Trip method for block construction. My fabric selection consisted of about 18 fat quarters of Liberty Prints, all (I think) from the Bloomsbury or Stile collections. I had 4 FQs that were somewhat more pastel-toned so I used them as the center diagonal in each block. For the others I aimed for a dark/light red/blue quasi-gradient, but really just went with what I felt looked right.

Here's the front! 

For the back I just enlarged the scrappy trip block (and made it as a 5 x 5 rather than 6 x 6 layout), as I wrote about here. The back is all from the Stile collection, I believe.

Here's the back!

For the quilting I machine quilted on my home machine. I marked 4 straight lines using painters tape that intersected at about the center of the off-centered central diamond. I then echoed the triangles using unevenly spaced 'organic' (we know what that means!) straight lines.

Drying on the line after a good wash. 

It was a lot of fun to make, and by far my quickest quilt. I've got ideas for another scrappy trip style quilt, so stay tuned. I've also got some plans for all the left over squares from this liberty trip quilt (hello, matching pillows!)

I like how the Scrappy Trip Pattern helps the Liberty florals blend together. 

Fabric close up! Some of my favorite prints.
I have to remember to USE this quilt, not HOARD it. 

Linking up to TGIFF at Riddle and {Whimsy} this week and Finish it up Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts!

Scrappy Trip Progress

I've been slowly quilting my Liberty Trip quilt. I'm doing a kind of wobbly star motif, radiating out of the central diamond. It'll make sense if I ever finish and get to show off the layout! Luckily the Liberty florals are beautifully busy, which will hide my many mistakes. I love piecing quilts, but quilting is still very much a challenge for me.

Some of the quilting and the binding fabric. This quilt is 100% Liberty. Except for the batting, of course. 

I've decided to make some cushions with the scraps from this quilt. I've got a layout in mind, just gotta get on it. And buy more batting. And maybe zippers.

Lots of scraps!

If I EVER FINISH THIS QUILT I can't wait to get back to my Southwest Dead Pixel quilt. Don't worry, I'm still working on the name.

Center panel and Daegan. 

Linking up to Freshly Pieced's WiP Wednesday. ALSO, today the New Quilt Blogger Blog Hop starts over at Plum and June (with a giveaway!) Go check it out!

Liberty Trip In Pieces

Two pieces to be exact...ha!

I finished putting together my liberty trip quilt top, although I will refrain from showing it in its entirety until I've got it quilted up. Here's a teaser shot:

After I finished the top I figured, "I've come this far...can't stop with the Liberty!" It also didn't hurt that my LQS (Brooklyn General Store) is having a May Day to Mother's Day sale, 30% off everything!

I decided what better back for a scrappy trip than one large scrappy trip block! My quilt is square, so I figured it'd be easy to enlarge the pattern. I also wanted some overhang on the back, between 2" and 3". Here are my super technical notes on what I needed to cut for the back. I only got 2/3 yd cuts of each fabric, figuring that I only needed 5 blocks from each, and crossing my fingers that the extra inch or two for good measure would be enough for my purposes.

It was! I pulled together a back that makes the front proud. I like the contrast of the smaller squares on the front allowing the liberty prints to play together, and the larger squares on the back letting the prints speak for themselves.

Here's a close up of some squares so you can ogle the fabric
detail. The back is all from the Liberty Stile Collection. 

Now I'm thinking this would make for a super quick and easy quilt top. This would be especially successful with some large print fabrics (Echino, I'm thinking of you!).

All you need is [5] for 5 x 5 layout, or [6] for 6 x 6 layout 2/3 yard cuts of fabric.

For a quilt top you would then cut that 2/3 yard into [5] or [6] 12.5" squares. Arrange in the typical Trip Around the World Block layout (as depicted below), and sew each row together, alternating seam directions as shown by the arrows. When you sew the rows together the seams should nest nicely, giving you beautiful corners. I would suggest pinning, because these larger cuts of fabric tend to move around a bit more than smaller pieced rows (for me anyway), and I'm a fan of neat intersections.

Super easy quilt top (or back as in this case!)

I finished with the cutting and sewing in one morning. And I'm not even that quick. Pretty satisfying. And leaving me plenty of time to get back to my 'real work' of groundwater modeling.

Here's the quilt back on the design wall,
giving a little perspective to the scale. 

Can't wait to get these guys basted together...hopefully later today...if I can find a space large enough and convince the dog that his idea of helping is my idea of hurting.

One last look at the top...I'm pretty happy with the way
these collections worked together (Stile and Bloomsbury). 

Linking up with Crazy Mom Quilts Finish it up Friday.

Liberty Trip Layout Help!

I've finished all the blocks for my Liberty Trip quilt! This has got to be the fastest a quilt has ever come together for me! Usually it takes me months and months, and here I've got all the blocks ready to go in a week and a half! This quilt is made with a bunch of FQs from Liberty's Bloomsbury and Stile collections, which gave me just enough strips for 25 blocks.

I ended up piecing the batting from scraps and then I pinned it up on my wall, and now it's my design wall! Pretty McGuyver of me, if I do say so myself. I've arranged my blocks into several layouts and taken pictures so I can try to figure out which one I like the most. If you want to weigh in your opinions are more than welcome!

Layout 1:

Off-center barn raising layout. 

Layout 2:

Zig zags. 

Layout 3:

Sort of like granny squares, or maybe just a scaled square layout. 

Any suggestions for other layouts are welcome too. As you can see, I'm still working on it:

 'Pensive face'. This is what it's like quilting in a Brooklyn apartment.

Linking up to Freshly Pieced WiP Wednesday. 

Liberty Trip - WiP Wednesday

The first fabric bundle I bought (after that hand quilting class) was a Liberty bundle from the Bloomsbury Collection. I liked the colors and most of the florals, and had no idea what a 'good' price for fabric was (it was a good price, I just didn't know Liberty tends to run a little more expensive than typical quilting cottons). Of course I had no project in mind, and then they found their way into the stash bin, never to be seen nor heard from again (much like every fabric bought without a purpose).

Two years later (ahem) and a few weeks ago it was my birthday, so I made sure to walk by my LQS on the way home, and lo and behold, their Liberty selection was lookin' mighty fine! And their prices were right! And it was my birthday! But I decided to pass. Did I WANT the fabric or did I NEED the fabric? I wanted it.Of course, the second I got home I realized the perfect project: TRIP AROUND THE WORLD IN LIBERTY FABRICS, and suddenly I 'NEEDED' the fabric!

10 Blocks Completed!

So, later that week I went back and got two fat quarter bundles (I did the math, you get more strips than with a skinny quarter, plus a little left over). Now I've got enough strips for 25 blocks cut out, and am in the process of sewing up the strip sets and making the blocks. Not sure how the final arrangement will look, but here's some of the blocks I've got so far. Best of all I've reduced my stash by 10 fat quarters...after purchasing an additional 10...hmm.

Playing around with my blocks. Can't wait to see how it progresses!

Linking up with Lee at Freshly Pieced for WiP Wednesday.