My name is Charlotte, sometimes known as Ms Lottie, occasionally as The Slightly Mad Quilt Lady. This is my blog, where you'll find me writing a lot about my quilting and textile arts and a little about my family's life in a small seaside town in New Zealand. Haere mai!

Monday, September 8, 2014

Beginner Quiltmaking Classes


I'm sitting here in the wheelhouse of my boat.  It's our third night staying aboard.  I hesitate to say we've moved in completely because the majority if our stuff is still in our house.  Our plan is to collect the things we need day by day and after a couple of weeks, everything that is left in the house is either junk and can be tossed/recycled/donated or things that we won't need until we live in a house again (think wheelbarrow and rake) and can go into storage.  I think this is the lazy persons way of moving and downsizing, but it seems to be working!

So the reason that I'm telling you all that is to say I don't have internet hooked up for my desktop computer yet.  I have cellular access through my ipad, but the Blogger ap just doesn't compare for usability, and I can only upload photos that are on my ipad.  Meaning?  My blogging might be a little weird, and scant, for a while.  Bear with me.

But I did find a couple of photos on here that I want to share.  These are the table runners from my beginners classes that finished up a couple of weeks ago.


There are only four pictured as a couple of students couldn't make the final night.  But these four all got to the hand-stitching down the binding part and it was so cool to see the different runners evolve out of all the different fabric selections.  Each person had different challenges, but they all got there in the end.  Do you remember the first patchwork item you completed and were proud of?


I thought I might run a sampler class next time as everyone was keen on this idea.  Problem is, I'm not a traditional block sampler kind of girl so I'm thinking I might do a strippy type sampler instead.  I've been having fun looking at block books and thinking of the different skills each block needs and what I should incorporate.

Do you have any suggestions or ideas as to what skills you think beginners should learn?  


7 comments:

  1. Hi Charlotte,
    I've just downloaded an app called blogsy. It behaves a bit better than the blogger app but you still only load photos from your ipad. May be worth trying though.
    How about a row by row for your sampler quilt? If you work on a quilt width being a multiple of 12inches then you have lots of options. I did one once with three 12" blocks in the middle and then rows of different sizes, eg 6 x 6" blocks or 4 x 9" blocks. Then if put smashing between the blocks, you end up with more options. Enough variety to play around with different types of blocks, nine-patch, four-patch etc.

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  2. Ok, entering comments on an ipad is still difficult. That was meant to say *if you put sashing between*.

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  3. You can take pictures from your camera and email them to yourself, then save them to your iPad camera roll... Still, seems like they could get a better system figured out :-/. Sounds like a good plan on moving.

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  4. I like the idea of moving items day by day. Great way to down size. Lovely student projects!

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  5. My problem with a sampler for a beginner quilt is that they don't necessarily learn enough about block construction, to ensure that the blocks all fit together. Perhaps this could be solved by having groups of blocks that all have similar construction eg rectangles, or HS triangles, so that even though each block is different, you would put together four or so that are very similar. Make sense. Of course, I still think you're crazy - but love you anyway.

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  6. I hope all is gong well on the boat - the start of a new phase in your life! Great to see the results of your class - well done!

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  7. What a great way to determine what you actually need and use. I love it!

    I think a beginner quilt class can have lots of options that don't come out like a sampler. As long as the students learn about the basics (accurate quarter inch seams, nesting seams, strip piecing, maybe an intro to applique). I like the idea of a row by row quilt.

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