Jungle Elephant Quilt DONE!

Well good grief, Charlie Brown!  Not only did I think I would NEVER get this quilt pieced and on the frame, I was beginning to think I would NEVER get it quilted and bound - WHEW!  Finally, I can FINALLY say I finished this Big Boy:

I know I'm including ALOT of photo downloading time, but I thought you might enjoy the close-ups of quilting and application techniques, since the long-shot photos don't due the fabrics and threads justice - they are just gorgeous!  (Complete info on threads, etc., on another earlier post HERE - and I caution you, that post is even heavier w/photos.)

Turned out pretty good if I say so myself ;-)  I LOVED working on this quilt, too - it was an evolutionary-type quilt as it didn't start out with any kind of pattern, just some elephant embroidery blocks, some vibrant colored hand-dyed batik fabrics and some, thank goodness, much needed inspiration!  

I had a ball quilting it, primarily with my favorite type of quilting, McTavishing and again, I think it gave this quilt additional movement and character that enhanced the batiks and the embroidery quite nicely.

Binding this dude was a little challenging:

Thank heaven for little card table...

Blind hemming the binding w/clear monopoly

The clear/invisible monopoly thread is such a life-saver w/multiple fabric colored binding, as with this quilt, and is virtually undetectable when applied in this fashion.  I cannot however, take the credit for this amazing technique.  

As with many, if not most of my quilting/sewing ideas, this one has been permanently 'borrowed' from professional quilt artist, Leah Day:

Part I

Part II

These videos are a little long, but if you are in need of learning how to apply quilt binding completely by machine, then these are for you and well worth your time.  I use this technique on ALL my gift/charitable projects because it's FAST and stands up to repeated laundering - a Win/Win in my book.  I've used all kinds of threads to apply, but my favorites are clear/invisible monopoly and matching embroidery/quilting threads from my quilt.  

When I use clear monopoly and/or embroidery thread, I follow it up w/pre-wound polyester bobbins (the same kind I use in my embroidery machine will fit in the machine I apply my bindings with, both are Vikings, so I have these bobbins in bulk and on hand most of the time, and another time-saver for me ;-)

Alrighty then, just need the quilt label finished up and I'm golden.  But for now, I'm off for some shut-eye so I can get rested up and try to get caught up with Bonnine Hunter's annual Mystery quilt, Easy Street, 'cause the Monday Morning 'linky' is in a few short hours!

Later,

~Deb

PS...

For the complete Jungle Elephant story, you can go to the original post w/updates here: 

Jungle Elephant UFO catch-up w/Updates

And we're on to Part V of Easy Street

Even though Miss Bonnie gave us a somewhat 'easier' Part V of Easy Street Friday prior to Christmas, I've just been too gosh-darned busy with family and holiday events to even consider cutting fabrics until last night:

2" purple strips and 3 1/2" turquoise blocks

2" purple squares w/3 1/2" turquoise squares all ready for assembly

chain piecing the 'houses'

chain piecing the first side for all afternoon sewing today... 

Trimming off the second dog flap

                  1st one done - just 63 more to go!

I'll post updates when I get finished up and have everything in temporary storage, and for now...

time to get back to it!

UPDATE 12/27/2012 7:05 PM (CST):  All 64+ units finished and ready for storage:

Trimmed/pressed/ and ready for bed...

All tucked in safe and sound ;-)

Later,

~Deb

PS...Hope you ALL had a wonderful Christmas Holiday!

PSS...Don't forget to check out ALL the Easy Street Mystery Quilt participants, their gorgeous fabric choices and progress here:

12/24/2012 Monday Mystery Link-Up Part V

Easy Street Part I

Easy Street Part II

Easy Street Part III

Easy Street Part IV

Easy Street Part V

Easy Street Part VI

Easy Street Part VII

Easy Street Part VIII

Part IV Easy Street - w/SNS

I can hardly believe we're already up to Part IV of Bonnie K. Hunter's annual mystery quilt - this year it's 'Easy Street':

Since I chose to use four different purple batik fabrics and four different turquoise batiks for this step, it occurred to me that Jodi Barrow's square-in-a-square (SNS) method could work quite well to create the 64 flying geese units needed in Part IV:

Ready for trimming

The first 2 adjacent cuts leave a 1/4" seam allowance

The last 2 adjacent cuts do not leave a seam allowance

 to allow for a cut through the middle of the purple center square from point to point

which make 2 separate geese units

Only 63 flying geese units left to sew together!

For those familiar with the SNS method and have the ruler w/instructions, I can save you a little time by giving you the measurements I used to make the center square and side strip units to create the flying geese, so here you go:

Center square cut: 3" x 3" *

Side strips cut: 1 3/4" x wof *

* These measurements INCLUDE seam allowances and are raw measurements, meaning these are the exact measurements I used to cut my fabrics prior to sewing the units together.  Please check my math and cut at your own risk!

Here's Jodi demonstrating a few of the options available w/her SNS method, including Option #3 flying geese (Please Note: I am NOT affiliated in any way shape or form, just sharing tools, methods, and ideas that I use and enjoy ;-):

And here they all are stored with the first three parts of Easy Street:

I added a smaller container for the extra fabric units 

Bonnie's had us cut along the way, 

including the (145) 3 1/2" apple green squares...

looks like I need to get another container for Part V!

For now, time for some shut-eye - I still have tons of presents to wrap and ship, need to finish my SID work on the Jungle Elephant quilt (thank goodness, now it doesn't need to be done until Friday!), I'm halfway through and really need to make some serious headway later today ;-)

See you on 'Monday Mystery link-up'...

~Deb

PS...Don't forget to check out ALL the Easy Street Mystery Quilt participants, their gorgeous fabric choices and progress here:

12/17/2012 Monday Mystery Link-Up Part IV

Easy Street Part I

Easy Street Part II

Easy Street Part III

Easy Street Part IV

Easy Street Part V

Easy Street Part VI

Easy Street Part VII

Easy Street Part VIII

My Heart is Broken...

I can't stop crying today while trying to go about my normal duties.  My heart is broken as are so many hearts across our saddened country over the tragic events that have transpired in Connecticut during the past 24 hours.  My thoughts and prayers are with those who have suffered such a horrific life loss in their lives.

I offer this as a small condolence to those who survive, and in honor of those who have fallen:

May God Bless You and Keep You Safe,

~Deb

Jungle Elephant UFO catch-up w/Updates

Clear back in March I started the blocks for this UFO while my quilting studio was under construction.  Actually, 'we' started planning this quilt more than a year ago when we first learned of the impending arrival of the bundle of joy ;-)  With everything going on over the past year, this quilt got put onto the back burner until my youngest daughter reminded me the bundle of joy was turning 1-year old this December - Oh MY!  Has it REALLY been that long?!  Time to get back to it... So in between Bonnie Hunter's annual Mystery Quilt, I got busy:

Playing around w/lay-out options

I settled on a fence rail design for alternate blocks to keep with the animal/barnyard/fence idea I'm trying to blend into this unique quilt for such a special one.  

Sewing the fence rail blocks

These colorful fabrics are some of my very favorite hand-dyed batiks w/wonderful tropical prints which complement these adorable elephant embroideries:

Elephant embroidery blocks

Corner Block w/side borders                     

 

Close-up of one of the embroidered blocks 

w/crazy quilt piecing and embroidery top-stitching...

this was soooo much FUN to do ;-)

And now to get back to it - this MUST be pieced AND quilted AND bound by Monday the 17th...YIKES!  (Luckily, I was granted a much needed extension ;-)

UPDATE 12/14/2012:  It got BIGGER:

This one should be lots of FUN to quilt, don't you think?

The outside green border fabric is called 'Jungle Picnic' ;-)

And now I'm off to load this big boy onto my quilting frame.  I'll post quilting pics when I can.

UPDATE 1/1/2013:  Just got this quilt off the frame, here's the previous corner quilted:

          McTavish quilted w/Rainbows

Center borders quilted out

Purple batik border w/ruler work        .

Embroidered crazy batik quilt blocks

Close-up of embroidered block w/McTavishing

Back of quilt w/McTavishing and ruler work          

Just off the frame - ready for binding and label...

A little trivia about this quilt.  6 different hand-dyed Batik fabrics were employed in the construction, in addition to white kona for the borders, back, and interior embroidery block bases. It took 46.7 hours to quilt, 8 different colors/types of thread including the following:

1) Superior's clear monopoly thread for SID, outline and stipple quilting of the embroidery blocks
3) Superior's Rainbows for McTavishing and stipple quilting - Brasilia Blue (blue batik), Northern lights (green leopard batik - inside green border), Turning leaves (yellow batik), Victorian Choice (purple batik)
4) C&C Trilobal - Plains Green (Jungle Picnic green outside border)
5) C&C Twister Tweed Rayon - Pinata (red batik)
6) Maxi-lock white in bobbin and for all white areas of quilt top, including borders and embroidered blocks

...and required 27 bobbins to complete!  I thoroughly enjoyed the entire process of designing, constructing and quilting this special quilt and learned a whole lot in the process.  My only wish - the intended will enjoy it half as much as I have during the creating process ;-)

Happy New Year,

~Deb

PS...for the 'rest of the story' and the grand binding finale, check out this post with even more pics:
'Jungle Elephant Quilt DONE!'

Easy Street Part III - movin' right along...

Part III of Easy Street seemed to be the least intimidating of all for me so far - maybe it's because I got soooo much practice w/this type of piecing while working on Orca Bay last year.  Whatever the reason, I was able to complete this part of the quilt in fairly quick order.  Here's my progression on Part III of Bonnie K. Hunter's Easy Street Mystery Quilt for 2012:

Turquoise triangles ready to be sewn to purple/black-on-white units

Sewing on the turquoise triangles

Sewn, trimmed and ready to join Part I and II for temporary storage...

Not too bad for a Friday night of sewin' FUN - I'll take a storage photo later and post, for now I need a little shut-eye :-)

UPDATE: 12/8/2012 and here's the storage photo:

The completed units fit in just fine w/Part II ready and waiting...

So, how are you doin' on Bonnie Hunter's Easy Street Mystery Quilt?  I'll be checking everyone out over the weekend in between wrapping Christmas presents, dog-sitting, and trying to catch-up on my Hurricane Sandy Quilt project ;-)

Later,

~Deb

PS...Don't forget to check out ALL the Easy Street Mystery Quilt participants, their gorgeous fabric choices and progress here:

12/10/2012 Monday Mystery Link-Up Part III

Easy Street Part I 

Easy Street Part II

Easy Street Part III

Easy Street Part IV

Easy Street Part V

Easy Street Part VI

Easy Street Part VII

Easy Street Part VIII

Cruisin' Along on Easy Street - Part II

And we're now on to Part II of the Easy Street Mystery Quilt, courtesy of Bonnie K. Hunter over at Quiltville.  I'm making fairly good progress so far, have all the flying geese units cut:

Flying geese units all cut along w/(64) 2" x 3 1/2" rectangles 

Bonnie said we'll need for a 'future step'...

    Close-up of black on white triangle units w/rectangles

(128) Purple quarter square geese triangles                       

                                                                               Sewing first side wing triangles

and half of them sewn - only 64 left to go!

 And I have to admit, this mystery quilt has been somewhat 'easier' than the previous Orca Bay mystery I worked on last year.  Even though we're early on into this mystery, I can already tell we're doing about half the units we did last year at this point, so I'm fairly optimistic Bonnie will continue to live up to her word and our mystery's name of being somewhat 'easier' this time around ;-).

And now, time to finish up on the second half...

UPDATE 12/4/2012:  And here they are:

ALL 128 flying geese ready to be pressed - 

Again actually, I ended up w/a few extra to the tune of 135 total ;-)

Getting pressed and ready to have those dog ears trimmed off...

Dog ears trimmed off and flying geese ready for temporary storage

Tucked in w/ Easy Street Part I, waiting for their time

Later,
~Deb

PS...Don't forget to check out ALL the Easy Street Mystery Quilt participants and their gorgeous fabric choices and progress here:
12/3/2012 Monday Mystery Link-Up Part II

Easy Street Part I
Easy Street Part II
Easy Street Part III
Easy Street Part IV
Easy Street Part V
Easy Street Part VI
Easy Street Part VII
Easy Street Part VIII