Modern Quilt Aha Moment

Do you remember those moments when you saw something differently, where you had a paradigm shift or an 'aha moment'?  That's what happened to me while I was making this wonky star quilt.

About four years ago I joined the Music City Modern Quilt Guild.  At the time, I was interested in learning more about how to make art quilts.  For some reason, I thought 'modern' meant art quilts.  I was really disappointed the day that I realized modern quilts were simple minimalistic quilts and for some reason they always seemed to have grey backgrounds.  And, there was also a lot of emphasis on negative space.  The modern quilts didn't appeal to me at all.  I didn't get it.  I felt like a fish out of water in my guild, even though my guild members make and appreciate all kinds of quilts.

Back to the wonky star quilt.  One day my quilt was at about the stage of Elizabeth Hartman's quilt below, minus the cat.

(source)

I remember staring at my randomly placed wonky stars against the rectangular shape of my design wall.  And that's when I had my aha moment.  The negative space jumped out at me.  I noticed the artsy-ness of the placement of the stars.  I started imagining more negative space and wondered what would happen if I removed one of the stars in the middle of that cluster.  Or, what it I had pieces of stars wonkily placed in some of the negative space.  It was a very exciting moment for me and I felt like I finally 'got it'.

I'm really excited to create the quilt that I imagined that day when inspiration struck, and I had my modern quilting aha moment.

Sam-I-Am

I finally finished the Sam-I-Am baby quilt.  The only problem, Sam is not a baby any more.  Okay, he just turned one recently so it's not like he's in college or something.  But, I know his personality now and he is ALL boy, so this quilt seems a bit babyish for him now.  I still love it, though!

I call it the wonky star pattern.  The designer, Elizabeth Hartman, calls it the Sparkle Punch Quilt.  Go here for the tutorial on how to make the stars.  It was a lot of fun making wonky stars.  I highly recommend it!

I decided to put one star on the back in the corner and use it as the label.  Notice the 2013 date.  This quilt was sandwiched and ready to quilt back in 2013, but I froze up because I didn't know how to quilt it or what color thread to use.  I ended up using off-white, as a friend recommended, and I ended up stippling it.  Since the piecing is so sharp and pointy I thought it needed curvacious quilting.

Can you see the Sam-I-Am fabric in the star?  This could only go to a boy named Sam.

Kathy's Wonky Paper-pieced House

Wonky.  Hubs says that I love that word and use it all the time.  So, when the Music City Modern Quilt Guild challenged me to create my own 12-inch block, I just had to make a wonky house.

The challenge was to use Moda Flirt fabrics.  It's not my favorite fabric (all pink and cutesy flowery), but I made it work and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

I would call this pattern 'intermediate level' because you have to sew it in sections.

Here's what it looked like before I trimmed it up.

When you do a pattern in sections like this, you have to remember to leave a 1/4" seam allowance on all edges of each section.  It's a good idea to leave a 3/8" or 1/2" seam allowance on the outside four edges to allow you more flexibility for squaring up your block after all the sections are sewn together.

Now it's time to tear off the paper and sew the sections together.  I find that it's easier to tear the paper off of each section in reverse numeric order.  For some reason it always works better.

And here it is again, Kathy's Wonky House.  

Here's a miniature version.  I reduced my 6-inch block pattern to 75%.  I wanted to show my fellow guild members why paper piecing is an awesome way to deal with tiny pieces and sharp angles.

No, you can't have the $20!  I took this picture so you could get some perspective on how small some of the pieces are and so I could use some fabrics that I like from my stash.

Here's the pattern if you want to give it a try. Let me know how it goes.