Jun 03 2009
Playing with wonky letters
And using wonky letters to make wonky words. While I was house sitting, this was the perfect diversion from all my hand pieced projects. Well, that and looking through quilting magazines and books that lined the shelves of the quilters’ houses where I was house sitting. . . Not only did I take more projects than I could complete in the time I was away, but I came back home with even more projects floating around in my head. And, thanks to Tonya of Lazy Gal Quilting, several of the new project ideas are for word quilts. I had TOO MUCH fun making wonky words!
I volunteered to do the word “shriek” for Tonya’s Slither Eek Boo Halloween Noises quilt but never having done words before, I thought maybe I should practice a bit first. Tonya was also looking for 4 letter words for another quilt project. The first 4 letter word that popped into mind was “pray.” It looked like no one had signed up to do the word “home” either so I thought I’d do both “pray” [for myself] and “home” [for Tonya]. [Tonya has since received a couple of blocks with "home" but I didn't know that because I don't have computer access while I'm house sitting.]
I started out by printing the words in block letters on plain paper as a visual clue for piecing. That was really helpful for me when I was piecing. I can’t find the piece of paper at the moment. I wish I had it to show you the difference between my original word layout and what I ended up with. In the original my “r” was a bit longer and my “a” was slightly under the “r”. One lesson I learned was to pay attention to where the 1/4″ seam allowance should be before whacking off bits from the letters. This was important because I planned to do “shriek” in long, pointy letters and I didn’t want my points getting chopped off. You can see where the top edge of my “r” got whacked off. I decided from the start I was not going to get hung up on perfection though and work with my letters however they emerged from the scraps of fabric. So I just kept on going.
Another thing I learned was how hard it is for me to vary the position of my letters. I tend to want to make them all even across the top and bottom. Something to work on in the future. . . House sitting for these 2 quilters is a lot of fun because basically I get to sit and quilt all day for days on end and no one cares that that’s all I’m doing because I’m the only one there [except the dogs]. It’s BLISS. At one of the houses I get to play with all her quilting gadgets and comb through her pile of scraps that’s been accumulating for 6+ years. I even have permission to take some of the scraps home and I did — for my Apple Core Charm Quilt.
I thought that since I was making wonky letters into wonky words I should experiment with hand quilting Tonya’s Fantabulous Freehand Fans also. The only problem was I couldn’t remember if she quilted right over the letters or not. I decided not to but wish I had. I like the way the fans came out and for the most part was able to hand quilt without getting hung up on my stitches being perfectly uniform.
So the third thing I learned is to go ahead and quilt the freehand fans all over. I ended up doing a bit of quilting about 1/8″ inside the letters. Not a perfect solution but suitable. I do like my block though and, hey, it’s DONE!
that looks really cool: especially with the top stitching on it :)
what a great little quilt – looks very antique in the pic. I’m impressed that these are your first letters – they already look great and you’ll just keep getting better as you do them. These days I usually quilt in the ditch around the letters and then freehand elsewhere, but I used to do a lot of that 1/8″ in from the edge.
I’ve done both quilting over them and quilting inside or around them, depending on where the seam allowances fall. I also quilt heavily inside of them — quilting lines 1/8 inch apart, more or less, following the countours of the letters. I like the texture it creates. You’ll figure out what works best for you. Great start!