Kantha Quilt

Another finish. Yay! Last year I joined Alison Glass's Kantha Sew Along. I don't often join group sewing events, preferring to go my own way, but I find Kantha quilts quite beautiful and the unfussy hand stitching seemed like something I would enjoy. I am thrilled with the result!

If you aren't familiar with kantha quilts, they are a traditional Indian craft, made with a front and back, but no batting on the inside, held together with simple running stitches.

I pulled a collection of golds, pinks and blues out of my stash and pieced them in random sizes and orientations rather than in the long parallel strips that many other participants used.  I quilted each section in a specific color or pearl cotton with a specific stitch size and arrangement. I also embroidered simple paisley designs using chain stitch on a section of solid blue fabric. I suspect my stitching was more dense than is typical. At least, that's my excuse for it taking me until almost the end of 2023 to finish the 2022 sew along! 

I also pieced the backing, starting with a length of a traditional French fabric that was handed down to me from my husband's stepmother. The variety in stitch colors and styles makes it look like it is made from multiple different fabrics.

I finished the edges in the traditional way, turning the front and back fabrics under and stitching x's to hold them in place.

I am glad to know this technique and expect I will be making more of these in the future. The resulting texture is lovely and the weight really practical for Texas's hot climate. Plus, the hand stitching is easy and fun to do.

Courthouse Steps Log Cabin Quilt

I was about to ship a fairly recently finished quilt to its new owners when I realized that I hadn't taken any photos of it. Now that I've done that, I thought I'd share them.

The quilt is a modern take on the classic "courthouse steps" variation of a log cabin. It has a modern feel to it because each block, at eighteen inches square, is unusually large. It took only twenty blocks to make a full-size quilt!

My fabric choices, a combination of contemporary graphics, batiks, stylized images and low volume backgrounds, further contribute to the modern feel.

I quilted it on an APQS long-arm machine (thanks once again to everyone at Over the Top Quilting for their help), using the block by block feature to ensure the quilt design perfectly aligned with the pieced blocks. The resulting secondary diamond pattern turns out to be more prominent than the original star design. I added circles between the stars to fill in a large open space and to give a little relief from all the straight lines.

I finished it off with a crisp blue on blue striped binding.

I hope this quilt's new owners are as pleased with it as I am! It's making me think it might be time to start yet another log cabin quilt. 

Day trip to Austria's Wachau Valley

I'm still trotting along with my husband to various geological meetings around the world. Most recently he was in Vienna where we had enough time to make a day trip to the Wachau Valley.  A pleasant hour long drive took us to the Melk Abbey, an enormous complex perched on a rocky outcrop above the Danube and the town of Melk. Sadly, photography is not permitted inside the buildings so I cannot show you the impressive library, nor the over-the-top Baroque church interior. 

Here you see the entrance to the complex and the church dome. Though the Benedictine abbey on this site dates back to 1089, the church in its current form was completed in 1736.  

It is a still a working monastery and tours are limited to a number of rooms dedicated to displays about the history and purpose of the abbey, the library, and the church.

You can also wander the extensive grounds and gardens.

The terrace outside the library affords sweeping views of the town of Melk below, the Danube, and the surrounding countryside.

Here is church's front, which shares the same vibrant egg-yolk yellow color as much of the complex and hints at the treasures within.

Because I am a sucker for cobblestones and narrow passageways, here is an image from inside the complex. It is an atmospheric place and you can understand why Umberto Eco drew on this setting for his book "Name of the Rose."

Our next stop was Arstetten Castle, which compared to Melk with its busloads of visitors, is off the beaten path. Arstetten Castle is the present day home of the Hohenberg family, descendants of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the presumptive heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife Sophie, whose assassination in June of 1914 is credited with triggering WWI.

A portion of the house has been turned into a museum with displays on various facets of Franz Ferdinand's life, the Hohenberg family, and details of the assassination, including a reproduction of the open car in which Franz Ferdinand and Sophie were riding when they were shot.

We visited the crypt where Franz Ferdinand and Sophia are interred, and found it remarkably moving and intimate. I chose not to take photos, feeling it would be intrusive and disrespectful in this solemn and personal space. 

We did wander through the grounds, enjoying the fresh air, long views, 

and early spring flowers.

To cap off the day we stopped in Durnstein, a tiny but picturesque and very popular town along the Danube, best known perhaps for King Richard the Lionheart's imprisonment in its hilltop castle in 1192. We sadly didn't have time to climb to the castle, instead satisfying ourselves with a stroll along the main street. 

I often find small details are essential to the character and charm of a place. 

 

Having found eating establishments along the main street to be either too busy or not to our liking, our guide eventually led us down a side street to Alter Klosterkeller, a family owned restaurant that proved to be the perfect choice.

Our table was right next to the just budding out vines leading down to views of the Danube and hills beyond. 

We shared an unhurried and delicious meal of local specialties and crisp, local wines. It was a delightful ending to our day in the Wachau Valley.

I must give credit to the wonderful staff at our travel agency, Travel Abundance, who arranged this perfect day trip (along with the rest of our adventures). They built an itinerary tailored to our interests and ensured that it was totally stress free.

Star Quilts

I have been on a roll at the quilt studio lately, finally finishing up quilts that I pieced during Covid. The first of these was a very late wedding gift for my niece and her husband. 

I completed the top nearly three years ago, but Covid closed the quilt studio and when it re-opened I thought I was too out of practice at free-hand quilting to risk working on such an important quilt. When I learned that QuiltPath had implemented a new feature, called "Eclipse," which allows you to pick an overall pattern but define areas to leave unquilted, I realized I had a solution. I excluded the star points and instructed QuiltPath to quilt the background with simple wavy lines. I finished by hand quilting the star points with light grey pearl cotton.

I chose a pretty floral for the backing and a modern gray for the binding.

I am quite pleased with how it turned out and hope the not so newly-wed couple will enjoy it for years to come.

I finished another quilt in time to give to my best running buddy and dear friend for Christmas. Though it is also a star quilt, with its dozens of stars and a decidedly feminine feel, it is as different as could be from the wedding quilt. 

I alternated quarter square triangles, made with mostly small scale florals, with low volume squares. I quilted this one using QuiltPath's "multi-placement" function which allows you to specify multiple blocks to be quilted in one pass, each with the same design.

I really like this style of quilting as the quilt design follows the pieced design and results in interesting secondary patterns. It has become my signature style of quilting.

Many thanks go to Susan and Chris at Over the Top Quilting in Cedar Park, Texas, for their guidance and encouragement. It is always a joy to spend time in their studio!