WARNING: If you think
quilting isn't funny, or are easily offended by (im)mature language, I recommend you stop reading now. You've been warned.
Back in April of this year,
The Bitchy Stitcher wrote a
fun post that tickled my funny bone. I set out to make some of her amazing modern quilts. In miniature. I also found a short thread (that I can't find now) over on the Quilting Board where there was some butt-hurt that lasted about three posts until someone pointed out that her new book,
Modern Quilting: F*ck Yeah!, was a joke. The original post was posted on April 1st, after all.
First I picked out my solids, because everyone knows that modern quilting demands solids. Lots and lots of solids. These are all
Kona Cottons from Robert Kaufman that I had in my stash. I have so many of these because they are quilting staples. I also have batting by the roll and thread in colors the rainbow never heard of. Don't judge.
I was going to use Kona white (there are actually several shades of white/neutral in this line) for the backing and the background for some of these. I ended up changing my mind on the backing fabric since I decided to print the label directly on the backing fabric. I used the prepared fabric you can get at quilt shops for printing with your inkjet printer at home. I've had these fabric sheets for a long time and decided that I should use them. It is only a matter of time before the sticky backing either doesn't come off or falls off before I can print on it.
To get the shapes for the front of the quilts, I went with English paper piecing. I have an unnatural (and disturbing) urge to do this sort of sewing. It goes against everything I am when it comes to quilting. I am a machine sewer. I am a machine quilter. I finish binding by machine. But... English paper piecing is a topic for another blog post.
I attached the shapes to my white background fabric. Sometimes, my hand work is better than others. The hexie was fine. That quadrilateral challenged my sewing ability and my inner calm. I decided to just let that one ride. Life is too short to rip.
The quilting is where I really let this project take off. First was
Far From the Madding Crowd. I sort of let the walking foot do the work. This is another thing you see a great deal of in modern quilting; long parallel lines that use some of the piecing as a base and just take off across the surface of the quilt.
Here we have
Dream Your Explosion Tiffany. I used one of the fancy stitches on my sewing machine to balance the feather I put in the white background. That feather isn't perfect, but I love it anyway. Sometimes the feather, an heirloom quilting motif, is stitched into the negative space of modern quilts because, well, feathers are awesome.
Finally, we have
Meadowlarking. I love the quilting on this one. Each of those little clams challenged my free-motion quilting abilities. Overall I like this one the most. The quilting is perfect!
I trimmed and added the binding to each tiny quilt to contrast the quilt and really help the design stand out. Nah, I just sort of followed the book on this one. I still love the effect. Megan picked great colors.
Each back was printed with the label prior to quilting. This is a great way to label your mug rugs. I should use some freezer paper to do this sort of thing with other mug rugs. Sometimes I'm such a genius! (One millisecond is all it takes.) I suppose if I do that I should also share a tutorial.
Far From the Madding Crowd
Dream Your Explosion Tiffany
Meadowlarking
These quilts were a blast to make. After they were done, I bundled them up and sent them to The Bitchy Stitcher. I can only hope I did her patterns and designs justice.
As I
mentioned before, The Bitchy Stitcher is collecting quilt blocks to create
the Laughter Quilt. This is a great way to share something that makes you laugh with the quilting world. Seriously, lend a hand. Remember, if you can't laugh, you'll cry. There is no crying in quilting, especially modern quilting.
