That dreaded triangle border

As much as I'm enjoying making my second version of the Marcelle Medallion (designed by Alexia Abegg and found in her Liberty Love book), I must admit I was pretty hesitant about the triangle border after all the dramas I had with it last time. Because I'm teaching it, I wanted to work out an easy way to make this border fit, without the pain of unpicking and re sewing the borders.

This time around, I made my first border a little wider than the pattern's measurements, and cut it down to size once I had my triangle strips pieced together. It has worked rather well - I'm extremely happy with my points, aside from that pesky little one at the top left. I even tried to fix it, to no avail - so I'm going to leave it and hope that it won't be too noticeable when it's quilted. In normal circumstances it wouldn't bother me, but I still hope to enter this in my local (very traditional) quilt show this year, so I'm trying to be as perfect as I can :o)

Because that first border is a little wider than it should be, the whole thing measures slightly bigger than it should - but it won't be too hard to adjust some of the other solid borders to account for it. I'm hoping to be able to show you the quilts my students are working on soon - they are all SO different from each other, but look amazing so far. It is such a fun quilt to teach!

xx Jess

WIP Wednesday

I've pretty much been working on my ongoing projects this week. I managed to get a couple of extremely overdue bee blocks done (as in some from May and June that I'd totally forgotten about!!), and I'm hoping to get completely up to date on my bees in the next week or two.

More quilting on the Full Moon Lagoon quilt. Thanks so much for your lovely feedback last week - I've decided to keep going as is and hope for the best. The quilting looks completely different when you step back from it - I think when I'm up close to it for a long time all I see are the imperfections. It is slow going, but also lots of fun changing between different motifs all the time. The blue and green sections are done and I've started on the light part at the top. 

Leanne asked me an interesting question about how densely FMQed quilts look once they're washed. (I have to be honest here - I don't wash my quilts straight away. Retro Flowers is still unwashed and will probably not be washed for a while.) My Groove quilt from last year washed really well - but the quilting was quite even across the quilt. This one varies in density a lot (deliberately), so I'm really not sure how it will go. The bits I'm most unsure about are the parts I've left unquilted - the sea horses and some random logs through the quilt top. Has anyone had experience with this sort of thing?

My Marcelle Medallion is growing too. The first border is on and I've cut my triangles for the next border. I've decided to restrict the palette of the triangles after seeing Heidi's amazing version. I probably will make the other borders more scrappy, but this one is just the warm prints I pulled. I'm enjoying making this quilt as much as I'd hoped :o)

I've also started cutting my purse for Sara's upcoming Purse Palooza - I'm so excited to be a part of it this year! 

I hope everyone is having a great week! 

xx Jess

Linking up with Lee and FMQ Friday.

Quilting along. Again.

I knew there was a reason I'd resisted the lure of Instagram for so long. Earlier in the week I was innocently browsing my IG feed, and came across the Marcelle Medallion QAL (#mmqal) being hosted by Penny Poppleton. I've been wanting to make a Marcelle Medallion quilt since all the beautiful versions started popping up around blogland over the last few months - and honestly I though I was safe from it for a while longer since I didn't have the pattern. But then (fate??) I was in Spotlight with my daughter collecting a few supplies for another project on Wednesday, and she spotted Liberty Love and picked it up off the shelf (she is obviously a very well trained three year old ;o) ). How could I resist any further in the face of that?

So I'm quilting along. Again. 

I pulled this pretty pile of fabric yesterday afternoon, using the LouLouThi print at the bottom for my colour inspiration. I will definitely be adding a few more fabrics (especially more oranges) but this is my starting point. 

I'm not a fan of templates or y-seams, so I drew up the central star block in EQ7 last night and started paper piecing it. I finished putting it together tonight, and I'm pretty happy with it. My points are pretty awful in some spots (and that's after unpicking a few times), but I think overall they won't be too noticeable. I do like the colour combo though (night time photo, so the colours here are a bit off).

I am still working on quilting the Full Moon Lagoon quilt - and trying to catch up on some bee blocks - so this week is looking pretty busy on the sewing front! I hope everyone had/ is having a great weekend :o)

xx Jess