Archive | August, 2020

Improv Complete: “Fruit Salad”

By Ellen Lindner on August 30, 2020 in Uncategorized

I’m really loving my latest quilt, Fruit Salad.

When I was a kid, at least once per summer my parents would get a watermelon, chill it, and then make a big to-do about eating it outside as part of an evening picnic. We ate it outside because my 3 siblings and I made a MESS with that watermelon! We had juice dripping down our chins and, of course, we had to have contests to see who could spit the seeds the farthest.

As this quilt developed that’s what it made me think of. Thus, the name.

A detail shot:

This quilt was originally inspired by a photo of lillies. As it evolved, the stronger colors became dominant, and I was disappointed. But, I reminded myself that the inspiration photo was just that – inspiration. If it got me motivated to try something it had served its purpose. With that in mind, I looked at the quilt with new eyes and fell in love with it. I hope you like it too.

Purchase details and more info.

Ellen Lindner
P.S. A design note: can you see how important the neutral white and grey are? Can you imagine the quilt without them?

Improv Quilt Nearly Complete

By Ellen Lindner on August 30, 2020 in Uncategorized

I’ve been having so much fun working on this improvisational quilt. (See the previous two posts for more in-progress photos and explanations.)

After LOTS of piecing, slicing, and repiecing, I finally thought the quilt sections had enough energy and excitement to start thinking about how to put them together. First, I looked for sections with similar dimensions and cut them so they could be pieced into rows. This involved making another few blocks to fill gaps. And finally, I had the sections arranged and ready to be pieced together.

Here it is, completely pieced. Of course, it shrunk again.

For quilting, I thought I could play up the curving lines. I drew some reference arcs and here’s the quilting in-progress.

And a detail shot, again, in-progress.

I think the quilting really adds a lot!

Ellen Lindner

Improv Energy

By Ellen Lindner on August 18, 2020 in Uncategorized

Improvisational piecing is really a lot of fun. You sew and slice and reassemble and trim. As you go, the pieces get smaller and things get much more energetic. See where I left off last time.

It was time to downsize some of the colors. This one below, for instance. It had a really large section of green. So, I just sliced it, joined new fabrics in and turned it into two blocks.

Can you find the new blocks in this collection?

It was time to add in some narrow strips. I really love these! They add a lot of interest, but because this is improv, nothing has to match up. This photo shows that I’ve sliced through this block and sewn on the first side of a narrow fabric strip. (3/4 -1″ wide)

There’s no need to match seams when sewing the second side of the strip. Leave a big seam allowance and just lay things in place, (parallel) so you’ll catch both pieces when sewing.

Then, flip it over and sew the second seam referencing the first one. Use whatever distance you like to determine the finished width of the strip. Press seams out and trim off the excess seam allowance.

Ta-da! Pretty neat, huh? You can do the same thing with a gentle curve.

See how much energy they add?

At this point, I began to study what was happening on the design wall and making more purposeful changes. I realized I had missed the mark with my color selection. That’s because I used too much of the darkest red. Not only that, but since it provided some of the highest contrast, it was taking over a little bit. I knew I’d need to reduce the size of the red pieces. And, since they were inspired by flowers, I thought I wanted to make them more triangular, so they wouldn’t be so chunky. On with the plan.

After a bit more work, these blocks had been altered. Much better, don’t you think?

See the three little dark brown dots? They were inspired by the dark stamens in the flowers. They started as a rectangle. Which I then turned into a narrow strip. Which I eventually sliced and repieced off-kilter. I liked them.

I should have this mostly finished by my next post.

Ellen Lindner

Lily Improv

By Ellen Lindner on August 13, 2020 in Uncategorized

Are you familiar with Linda and Laura Kemshall? They’re a mother-daughter duo who make fabulous art – in fabric and paper, and who have a weekly newsletter. Recently, they featured this photo. Isn’t it lovely?

I was enamored with the colors of the lilies and wrote to ask if I could use it for a quilt’s inspiration. Linda had taken the photo and she gave me permission to use it.

I pulled out pretty much all of my pink and green fabrics and began to make selections. I knew I’d also want to add in some grey, too.

(Yes, I have a lot of fat quarters!)

Have you ever made an improv quilt? The critical thing is to get the colors and their proportions the way you want them at the start. Then, you can sew and slash and piece to your heart’s content. (It turns out that I missed the mark, but more on that later.)

To start, I cut a bunch of fabric rectangles. For the critical pinks I cut them about the size of a piece of typing paper. The whites, greys, and greens were only about 1/4 that size. I also sorted through my scraps and pulled out the pieces that would work. Then, everything got stacked into contrasting pairs and taken to the sewing machine.

The scraps had wonky shapes, but I just trimmed them to straight lines.

Now that I think of it, I guess that’s the crux of this improv method: sew things together and then trim them.

This is what my blocks looked like, above, after that first round of piecing. Everything is large and chunky. But, I knew I’d be GREATLY modifying them so I was pretty happy with them. (Maybe too much peach, though.) Then, the fun began.

Sometimes I sliced across seams and rejoined them with mismatched alignment.

And I began to add grey to some of the oddly shaped blocks.

This was just the beginning of the fun. Watch my next post to see how things progress.

Ellen Lindner
P.S. You’ll definitely want to check in on the Kemshall’s website, Design Matters TV, and sign up for their mailing list.
P.P.S. You can see some of my other improv quilts in the links below.

When You Give a Girl a Class

By Ellen Lindner on August 10, 2020 in Uncategorized

My friend, Esther, was a recent “guinea pig” for my newest class, “Love it and Leaf It.” Well! Not only did she make a striking quilt in class, but she continued to play with the idea, altering and tweaking to her delight. Just look what she’s been up to, (all in the last week.)

First, she changed the leaves to one fabric each.

Then, she experimented with changing the color of the veins.

And then she designed a triptych variation and added frogs! (Love those red veins!)

This girl.

I think she should be in all my guinea pig classes, don’t you?

Thanks, Esther!

Ellen Lindner

Great First Class

By Ellen Lindner on August 8, 2020 in Uncategorized

Whenever I plan a new class I try it out on a group of “guinea pigs.” Such was the case this past Saturday. Twenty students showed up to take my “Love It and Leaf It” class, via Zoom. How exciting! They got the class for free, but in return had to give me feedback on both the class content and the Zoom experience. VERY valuable!

And just look at the great work they did!
This was a 3 hour class. Most of this was accomplished in that time, but the facings and frames were done after class.

"Love It and Leaf It" student work. Ellen Lindner, AdventureQuilter.com/blog

Mary Ann Shupe finished her quilt and then later framed it digitally. As you can see, she had fun with patterns.

Deon Donovan sent me an in-progress photo of hers. Isn’t it going to be striking?

Rebecca Chianese framed hers right away. The quilting adds a lot to it!

Jo-Ann Jensen did a great job, (as always.)

Kat Campau did her own thing and it works. (I can tell she likes batiks.)

Polly Dombroski’s quilt is completely finished, just waiting for it’s frame. Nice!

Don’t these little quilts look great when framed? Annette Moore’s is another fabulous example.

Are you wondering what I learned from this experience?
– The Zoom (virtual) platform works really well! We had no technical issues of any sort, and we were able to chat and interact the entire time. It was fun!
– My pattern was too complicated for the time frame. I wanted the students to finish the piece, AND face it, AND frame it in the 3 hours. Since that didn’t happen, I’m working on simplifying the pattern and the process.
– My guinea pigs were super helpful! BTW, one was from France, and one was from Canada. Isn’t that cool?

This short class would be a great one for introducing your guild to the virtual learning world of Zoom. (And, of course, I have other virtual presentations available, too.)

After months of not teaching it is SO exciting to be back at it!!!

Ellen Lindner

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Archive | August, 2020

Improv Complete: “Fruit Salad”

Improv Quilt Nearly Complete

Improv Energy

Lily Improv

When You Give a Girl a Class

Great First Class

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