Saturday, March 22, 2014

Soupcon trunk show and a finishing idea

Spring is coming and the cardinals are courting! This guy was sitting on top of the wisteria, surveying his territory. Normally the moment I point a camera in the direction of a cardinal it will take off lickity-split! Not this guy - he was quite content to be admired! Mind you I was some distance away and using a zoom. He kept an eye on me the whole time but didn't seem overly concerned. His colour spectacular so I think he was quite happy to be admired! He perches in the same spot every evening around 7:00.


So how about a mini Soupcon trunk show? Yes? Well here we go!

Mary has a beautiful large floral print which was used in a previous step. She decided to repeat this fabric in place of the appliqued border and I think she made a great choice! I said it before and I'll say it again: it reminds me of a movie theatre stage with the lovely, heavy, velvet curtains. Mary has been making the little hexagon flowers to be appliqued (you can see them one the left) but I think the quilt is  fabulous as is!  You may not know that Mary has some great tutorials on her blog. Yesterday shew wrote about fussy cutting diamonds and you can read about it here.


Sheila is the first to finish her Soupcon quilt! She added the 1 1/2" border and repeated this fabric for the little spikes in the pieced outer border. The effect is so elegant! I love the scrappy red thimbles - heck I love everything about this one! This is a four season quilt. I can see it being used in the summer but also during the Christmas holidays.


Heather the Happy Appliquer is the second to complete her Soupcon! What a lovely fresh-looking quilt she has made. Heather too has added her own person touches including the narrow outer border and the fussy cut hexagon flowers in the middle border. I also like that she has the blue spikes radiating out! Absolutely lovely!


I haven't forgotten that I promised to give you some ideas for making Soupcon larger. Here is one suggestion for another border. I love hourglass blocks, especially if they are scrappy. I used 2" hourglass blocks as a border on my Piccadilly to the Nines quilt. You could use any block you chose and any size you want but today I'll talk about 2" finished hourglass blocks.


The first step is to determine the measurement of your quilt without seam allowances and the measurement of your block without seam allowances.  My quilt measures 31 1/2". I want to use 2" hourglass blocks. To make them fit I'll have to add a border and that border mus be divisible by the size of the hourglass blocks. If my quilt were 34" it would be divisible by 2 so that means I would need to add narrow borders to my quilt to bring it up to 34". If I subtract the size of my quilt from the desired size (34" - 31 1/2") the difference is 2 1/2". That means I would need a finished border of 1 1/4" on each side. Since all of these measurements exclude seam allowances the strips I would cut for the border are 1 3/4". I would cut four strips that measure 1 3/4" by 34 1/2" and attach them to the quilt. The corners would be mitered. This is a great place to use a directional print. You could add a single row of hourglass blocks or you could add multiple rows! I've placed my blue Soupcon on Piccadilly to the Nines to give you and idea. The colours are wrong but you can see that this would be a great way to add a border.


If you wanted to use 3" hourglass blocks, eleven of them would measure 33". If you subtract the measure of Soupcon from the desired size the difference is 1 1/2". This means you would add a narrow 3/4" border (1 1/4" with seam allowances). If you want a weightier border then the next size up would be 36" (finished). The difference between this measurement and the Soupcon measurement (36" - 31 1/2") is 4 1/2" so your borders would have to measure 2 1/4" (2 3/4" with seam allowances). You would cut four border strips that are 2 3/4" by 36 1/2".

One of the blogs I really enjoy is Every Stitch. Hilda is very talented and one of her quilts that I love (truth be told I love them all)  is Simon. It is a medallion quilt entirely surrounded by hourglass blocks. You can see the finished quilt here. It would be a great finish for Soupcon. Alternatively you could use perhaps three rows of hourglass blocks (I like odd numbers) as a border and then add another border of a different block. I'll share more ideas in the near future but in the meanwhile do some snooping around Hilda's blog - just make sure you have a nice hot cuppa and time to look around and be inspired! You won't be disappointed!

Time for me to get back to quilting my Lazy Girl! Until I post again, happy sewing!
Karen H

7 comments:

  1. Thanks for the kind words about my blog Karen. I agree that the hour glass blocks would make a wonderful border for your design. And there you have generously done all the maths work too! You have inspired your students to produce some stunning work ...
    Hilda

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  2. The hour glass border would look great. i too had admired Hilda's "Simon" quilt and wonderred about using it as a border. I would like to use both the reds and blues in the next border with a variety of "lights" so i am not sure it would look "right".. I will let it mature for a while and see other suggestions you may have.. Thanks for those kind words about my quilt, i have really enjoyed sewing along with you.

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  3. Dear Ladies,
    Congratulations to all of you who have completed Karen's QAL, you've done an amazing work.
    I am, on the other hand, so behind (still working on the pieced borders) but my sewing area (my dinning room table) has been "INVADED" by 2 students working on essays and preparing for exams so all you can is books, paper and their laptops, and my sewing has been put on HOLD. I promise to post a picture on my page whenEVER I'm done.
    Thank you Karen for having organized this QAL. I have enjoyed working on it.

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  4. I certainly admire the group of quilters who completed these quilts. They're all beautiful and the amazing amount of detail is inspiring.

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  5. The Soupçon shows are always so inspiring, Karen. Thank you for bring these to us and sharing ideas of how to progress. Love all three you showed today. And those links you shared - spent quite a while on them and now have become a follower.

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  6. Thanks again for the Soupcon QAL, Karen -- I'm quite pleased with my piece and appreciate you mentioning my blog. Have two more little hexie flowers done and have been moving them around on the outer border all weekend -- no decision yet!?!

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  7. All these quilts are special, it's great that you encourage people to go their own way and make their quilts unique.

    ukcitycrafter@live.co.uk

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