Plans for 2023

 Happy New Year everyone!

Ann and I have been setting challenges on this blog since January 2017.  We have noticed that recently fewer people have had the time/inclination to follow the prompts, though in some cases we know you are still working on prompts set some time ago.  With that in mind, we are not proposing to set a prompt for the first half of this year.  Instead, we're going to suggest a monthly topic.  Hopefully this will prompt some interesting discussions around quilts and quilting.  

Of course you are still welcome to post your quilts here and to share other ideas/thoughts/inspirations as you feel inclined.

So, to kick us off, I'm inviting you to post about your quilting hopes and plans for this year.  I hesitate to use the word "resolution" because I know that's not everyone's cup of tea, but is there a new technique you would like to try, a quilt you want to make or  a project you plan to finish?  Is there something you've done already that has left you with an itch to scratch?  Have you already spotted the first squirrel of the year?  Or maybe you just need to figure out a way to carve out more time or space.  

I'll post mine in a day or so, but feel free to chip in any time.  

The gratuitous quilt picture shows four of my tops done in response to challenges: Two blocks, Tulips, Symmetry and Sun.

Ukiyo - the Quilt

Ukiyo is finished.

(noun "living in the moment, detached from the bothers of life")

55" x 71"

This was the second quilt as part of the 2021 AHIQ Symmetry or Not challenge.

(the first quilt top was Pandemonium - later donated to Mercyful Quilts by way of Alycia during Hands 2 Help 2022)

No outdoor photos - just too darn cold thanks to Winter Storm Elliott.

I do love the binding (cut lengthwise from KF yardage).

Here Ukiyo is laying on the floor in the sunroom with late afternoon sunshine.

Quilted with Glide in Pink Rose using my liberated all over spiral fans.

Quiltdivajulie

Bringing Myself Up to Date

This is Concatenation ("a series of interconnected or interdependent things or events"), my quilt top from the AHIQ Color Palette challenge.

It measures 56" x 72" and is promised to our younger son once quilted and finished.

 

Here you can see the backing (upper left) and the binding (lower right).

You can read more about the quilt's story HERE on my blog or by using the labels in this blog's sidebar.

This is Pandemonium from the AHIQ Symmetry or Not challenge.  

I donated the top, back, and binding during the 2022 Hands 2 Help effort.

Alycia of Quilty Girl quilted and bound Pandemonium and then shipped it off to Mercyful Quilts.

Here is another photo of it finished.

You can read more about this quilt HERE on my blog or by using the labels on this blog.

You can also see Alycia's finished reveal post HERE.

(finished photos from Alycia)

And this is Forty-Six from the AHIQ String Tulip QAL challenge.

I also donated this top, back, and binding during the 2022 Hands 2 Help effort.

Alycia of Quilty Girl quilted and bound Forty-Six and then shipped it off to Mercyful Quilts.

(finished photos from Alycia)

This is the back side of Forty-Six.

You can read more about this quilt HERE on my blog or by using the labels on this blog.

You can also see Alycia's finished reveal post HERE.

* * *

So this brings me up to date with three recent AHIQ challenges.

And I'll be back with another post next week to share the finish for Ukiyo, my second quilt from the Symmetry or Not Challenge.

Quiltdivajulie

Looking For Asymmetry in the Final results

 Here's my two attempts at working with the latest AHIQ prompt, symmetry/asymmetry. Or better yet, what I ended up with after winding through the process journey and hoping something would come up looking asymmetrical. While symmetry comes a lot more naturally to me, asymmetry does not fill me with terror or otherwise stop me in my tracks. I went with asymmetry mostly because it is the one that I'm least likely to attempt at first pass.

Ode to Joy

What I did figure out while tentatively {very open-endedly} pursuing this challenge, is that I do NOT like to start out with the idea that my quilt has to be either/or. It's like a huge, red caution light that I just didn't have the strength of will to shove aside at this particular moment in time. I kind of felt like making that line in the sand before the quilt was started would just shut off all the creative flow for that particular project and that was that.

A new, scrappy baby quilt

Hmm... Me-thinks this is a prompt that deserves further exploration in the future. For the most part, I can now see that I generally end up with symmetry, or as something Julie so wonderfully described as gently off-balance symmetry. Rarely unmistakably, true asymmetry. It's something to think about! You can read much more about the adventure of these two quilts over at my blog, Quilty Folk.

Asymmetry Needed

 Kaja’s {A}symmetry prompt drove home my overwhelming use of symmetry in quilting. Even after posting the prompt, all my quilts have been symmetrical. Butterflies has 90-degree rotational symmetry.

Butterfly baby quilt

And Scrappy Trips has either that or reflective symmetry when looked at block by block.

Scrappy Trip baby quilt

The Baby Word quilts

LOVE baby quilt

and the Baseball quilt demonstrate translational symmetry.

SF Giants baseball quilt

although there’s also reflective symmetry between left- and right-handed players.

Ruth McDowell wrote Symmetry years ago. In the 90s? It’s an excellent explanation of the seventeen tiles in a plane. She uses 🖐 hand prints 🖐 to highlight each. 

In geometry we say there are four types of symmetry: reflection, rotation, translation, and glide reflection. In geology, we identify 32 combination of symmetry operations in crystal morphology {which is just another big word for the natural shape of crystals.} Of course, there are extras because it’s three-dimensional.

I have to look a long way back to find an asymmetrical quilt. All the way back to the first quilt I posted on my blog.

A Daisy a Day

And my favorite quilt - The Live Oak - from sketches of my children in their favorite tree.

The Live Oak

I need to work on asymmetry. Some day soon.

Ann

Symmetry Challenge - Times Two

Pandemonium is my quilt top for the current challenge.

It was a long and winding road to completion -

you can read more about that journey

in previous posts here on the AHIQ blog

(use the Pandemonium label at the end of the post)

 and in the top's reveal post on my blog.

Ultimately the fabric on the left 

is what I've chosen to back Pandemonium.

(City View by Michael Miller)

Quilting will not happen until after the first of the year.

I had planned to use the leftover orphan bits

to piece a scrappy back for Pandemonium.

You can read THAT long and winding story HERE.

Instead of a back, those orphan pieces became

a second quilt top named Ukiyo.

(n: living in the moment,

detached from the bothers of life)

I pulled the yardage on the left from my backing stash

but again, FMQ will not happen until next year.

* * *

This symmetry v. asymmetry challenge

has been a very interesting process.

Ukiyo's asymmetry is far more obvious

while Pandemonium's is more subtle.

I wonder what the new prompt will be in January?

Quiltdivajulie

Challenge Project Update

 

I have lost count of the changes through

editing, unstitching, and do-overs,

but here is where things stand now

with Pandemonium.

More photos and details on my blog HERE.

Quiltdivajulie

I Usually Make Symmetrical Quilts

Most of my quilts fit into the symmetrical category. 

This month I dug into my orphan blocks and parts and made a few asymmetrical tops just for fun. 

There may be more but for now it is back to my regularly scheduled symmetrical quilts. 

More on my blog post:

Out Of The Orphanage And Into A Quilt

 

Itching to unbalance

What I am learning from this challenge is that symmetry is definitely a much less comfortable idea for me than asymmetry.  I think my decision to use courthouse steps as a starting point has been helpful, up to a point,  but really all I need to do now is just keep cutting strips and going round and round.  And where, I ask myself, is the fun in that?  

You would think, wouldn't you, that I would be grateful for a nice, simple, pretty solution but clearly not.  I love these fabrics,the mix of florals and stripes and plaid,  and the general feel of what I have so far but I am itching to start unbalancing things.  I'm not even sure that would be a good idea at this point, but still I want to meddle.  

I will try to think of a way to tinker that doesn't upset things too much.

Pandemonium - Asymmetrical Work in Progress

This is where things stand for now . . . 

You can see how it happened using the links below

for the process posts on my blog:

July 14, 2021

July 12, 2021

July 9, 2021

Introductory post - July 5, 2021

As is so often true for me,

I'm as excited about designing the scrappy back

as I am about designing the quilt top (grin).

Quiltdivajulie

 

Symmetry (or Not) Challenge Response

I posted about my orphan block stash here.

Since then those blocks have not been quiet 

about remaining in their project box.

\

Once I had LUDIC clipped for webbing

leaving the design wall empty again,

I pulled out all of the orphans.

Hmmmmm . . . 

Almost immediately I removed the orange blocks

left behind after piecing the top for 

October's kitchen table quilt (Trick or Treat).

They have been passed along to another maker.

I also decided that I will NOT be using 

black and white prints as filler.

(I've been watching Agilejack and lots of her blog followers

making Frankenbags and thought Anne's b-w ideas 

might work with my stash of orphans)

Instead I have pulled out several unused 

2.5" strips and a few more pieces 

of quilt back trimmings.

This mixture definitely has possibilities.

Next step will be to measure the various blocks,

count the scrappy rectangles and misc. HSTs,

add in the extra HSTs from Ludic, and

play around with graph paper and layout ideas.

Clearly I will be focusing on the 

ASYMMETRICAL

aspect of the new Symmetry challenge.

I have named this project Pandemonium.

(meaning 'a wild uproar')

* * *

This post was previously shared on my blog,

but I'm also adding it here to enhance the

AHIQ conversation.

Quiltdivajulie