Tuesday, July 12, 2011

In Progress - The Scrappy Denim Applique Quilt

So when I was in KC, my mom took me to a really neat quilting store. It was amazing the quilts they had in the store and all the cool sewing notions and fabric.

It got me to thinking about my inability to take on a project that takes more than 2 sittings to complete. Like I prefer ones that take less than 2 hours. I have sewing ADD and I get bored FAST. Like I can't even stand to look at the same color thread on my sewing machine for too long. It's pretty bad.

About the same time, I was confronted with the huge stash of big random pieces of fabric that I have that are big, but yet too small to make anything other than 1,000 zippered pouches or every kind of fabric flower imaginable. 
 After it was all said and done, it ended up being far worse than this meager stack of fabric.

I needed a real project.
Or at least a way in which to purge enough fabric so my husband will let me buy all the amazing new fabric that I've been eyeballing :)
 Enter these charming little denim squares.

I had a little idea to make a simple 4 square quilt using one denim square in each square that had a little applique on it. I LOVE playing with fusible web stuff so this was perfect.

I ended up with 30 4.5x4.5 in squares. So doing the quilt 6 squares by 5 squares I get a 40x48 inch quilt. Really small and perfect for my first venture.

So here is what I have discovered.

#1 I need new blades for my rotary cutter.
#2 I also need a new cutting mat (there is literally a GASH in my mat)
#3 This is probably going to take a while. So I have therefore given myself a 1 month deadline on this project.

 If you have never tried to put 4 squares together, just sew together, RS facing along one side.
 I am trying pressing the seams out like this. It make the seams really flat.
 Take two of your 2 square pieces and put them RS facing and sew along one long side and press open and voila, a big square.
This is basically the gist of what its going to look like (Only have 7 complete squares at this point so not much to show.) 

I have to admit it's a little wonky looking and ridiculous at this point, I am thinking the most likely name for this quilt would be "Kitsch on crack". 

But who knows? This is just scraps after all.
If you are going to venture into quilting, pick up a quilting foot. This is the one for my machine. It makes those 1/4 inch seams a breeze!

Oh before you go, check out my awesome rig for my sewing machine pedal.
 Have you ever been at your machine sewing for a long time and the top of your foot starts killing? Well it's because your foot is locked at a funny angle and you are killing that muscle on the top of your foot. This totally ghetto prop puts my foot in a more natural position, so no foot cramps. Yay! I am sure there is a cuter way to do this, or pedals that don't make your foot do this, but this is free and it works!

So I have my work cut out for me. And it's possible this could be the most hideous quilt ever, but I have to say, my points are looking super awesome and even so I don't really care :)

2 comments:

Joanne said...

I am already IN LOVE with this quilt!!!!!!!!!!! I can not wait to see more photos.. please show as you go!!!

Unknown said...

Looks really cute! Can't wait to see more!