Saturday, March 03, 2007

Desert Twilight



I realized that I never did post a finished picture of "Desert Twilight," so here it is. (Once again, it's straight even tho it looks funny from the photo angle here. I've got to figure out a place where I can photograph quilts hanging in a straight vertical...)

Anyway. Can you see from the picture that the binding colors change and angle to follow the main lines of the quilt? That was tricky and mainly a function of fussing and fussing until things lined up. There's probably an easy way to do that, but I used my own "seat of the pants" method. Also, in the lower right hand corner, I wanted the binding to change colors right at the mitre... Which presented a challenge as I figured if I pieced the color change there, my usual continuous-binding method would leave me with an even bigger lump at the corner. What to do?

Well, Ricky Tims came to my rescue. I know I've raved over and over about his Grand Finale DVD on machine quilting and finishing techniques, but I remembered that he showed a mitred corner method that involved joining the binding pieces in the mitering seam. I put the DVD in my computer, followed the steps (again, having to pause, run to the machine to execute it, then play the next bit) and I came out with a PERFECT corner.

I"m going to use this mitering method on all my quilts in the future, because it really does work. And as soon as I finally get the steps fixed in my thick head, it'll be easy. (It's actually quite simple, just so different from what I usually do that it's not fixed in my brain yet.)

So, check out that DVD. I've gotten my money's worth several times over. (He shows how to stop and start machine quilting so it's secure and invisible--another challenge for me. I'm going to do some practicing on that today, in fact.)

Whether or not this Desert Twilight quilt established my "credentials," I'll never know...but I've been invited to join a small art quilt minigroup of quilters whose work I admire tremendously. I'm quite thrilled. They don't meet regularly, but they do coordinate a few small shows at local wineries and arrange to bring in really great teachers for private classes. I'm delighted.

11 comments :

  1. Your quilt is beautiful. Now I want that Ricky Timms CD. Any way of machine finishing is great in my books.

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  2. Anonymous11:39 AM

    Congratulations! The quilt is rich, and I bet the group will be enriching as well.

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  3. This is a very eye-catching quilt. Great colors!

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  4. I think I've said before that I love this quilt, so thanks for showing us the 'finished' view.

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  5. great stuff Diane and congrats on being asked to join the art quilt group :)

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  6. Anonymous2:39 PM

    Would that be the Gilded Lilies? Love the quilt - the colors are so soothing.

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  7. Diane I really love this quilt even though the colors are not ones that usually grab me. Your design is well thought out, there is great movement due to the color placement and it's well balanced even though it's an asymetrical design. How's that for using for using lots of critique buzzwords.

    Karen

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  8. I agree that Grand Finale dvd is one of the best ones out for quilting and finishing a quilt. Very informative and entertaining. Take a class from him if you get a chance-live. I haven't tried the pc channel he and Alex Anderson have. He really wanted on television, but, I guess this is the next best thing, or added to TV.

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  9. I've tried to comment three times. Now I hardly remember what I wanted to say, other than the quilting is amazing and I can't wait to see the whole thing.

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  10. Oops. Now I see I've commented on the wrong post. (The Desert quilt is also beautiful -- but I was thinking of the eucalyptus quilt.) I should just stop typing and quit while I'm ahead. (Or blame bad blogger.)

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  11. Anonymous12:35 PM

    Hi! Gretchen here, the gallery manager for Ricky Tims. Thank you for the kind words about Grand Finale in this blog- it truly is a terrific dvd- especially since the quilt he is working on in the dvd won the Best Machine Finishing award at Paducah for 2006. It is truly wonderful to watch such a spectacular quilt unfold!

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