WIP Wednesday: Supernova Starburst

I looked up the definition of supernova. There were several, but I liked the wording of this definition the best:
"the explosion of a star in which the star may reach a maximum intrinsic luminosity one billion times that of the sun."

I present to you Supernova Starburst:

I can't even begin to tell you how much I love this quilt. The explosion of colors, the hot saturation in each block, the subtle luminosity. 

Most of my batik fabrics had been given to friends as it seems the "modern" quilt movement doesn't generally embrace batiks. But when I looked at the colors of Lee's blog button and my stash of batiks, I knew they were made for each other.

 I paired all those gorgeous fabrics with some cooling Kona solid grey to really make the colors pop.

I think all these triangles that were trimmed off will somewhat appear on the back of the quilt. They are much too pretty to toss.

I also have this stack of scraps. It isn't enough to make a Supernova quilt, but I'll send them to the first person who wants to give them a good home.

So that's what I've been working on in the last week. Now go see what everyone else has been doing.

WIP Wednesday #33: What I am and what I am not

What I am: a quilter. I love cutting fabric into little pieces and then sewing it all back together again.

(My second Supernova block--could have used a better pressing--sorry, Lee. I LOVE these blocks!)

What I am not: a bag lady.

That being said, the Amy Butler Weekender Bag is finally done. Finished. Complete. Never to be done again. At least not by me.

It looks like it is ready for a tropical vacation.

 I know I sure am ready for a vacation after making this bag.
Alternatively, I'll just take one of these.

(NOTE: I cut the tulip fabric straight. The crookedness at the bottom happened during the construction. At this point, I don't know how it happened, nor do I care. And it's not because I had ordered one of those special cafe mochas.)

What I love: The fabric. Jessica Jones' Outside Oslo is gorgeous. You can see the Weekender that her mother sewed here. She was my one-person texting support group throughout the whole process. Hers turned out perfectly. And here is why. She is not a quilter. She is a bag lady. In fact, she just finished this bag. See what I mean? She also knows who she is. Plus she has the perfect little model for her bag.

But I digress. I had one-yard cuts of the entire line (you can order from Marmalade Fabrics) so I ended up using four different fabrics--three for the outside and a different one for the lining.

What I wish I had done differently: other than not starting it in the first place (oops, did I really just say that?), I wish I had made the straps longer so I could use it as a shoulder bag.

I also wish I had done the piping differently. Rather than going to my dad's house and using his industrial sewing machine (he used to do upholstery), I would have used fusible interfacing to fuse the raw edges together, as someone suggested. Ultimately you end up with three lines of stitching, each one getting closer and closer to the cording. Because his machine sewed so closely to the cording itself the first time, it was really hard to cover up that stitching when I assembled the bag.

I previously posted pictures of binder clips needed to hold all the many layers together. Also be prepared for a pile of these totally misshapen pins.

The fun little "surprises" I added: In the picture on the front of the pattern, the bag has an Amy Butler tag. So I decided to do a little "branding" of my own. That's what selvages are for, right?

So, once again, just to be clear:

What I am: a quilter.
What I am not: a bag lady.

I think it's important to know these things about yourself.

Now go see what everyone else has accomplished this week!

WIP Wednesday: Caution--Curves Ahead

While the Weekender Bag and I are still maintaining our separate lives, I finally have a finished quilt top. After spending nearly three glorious days with my friends and my sewing machine, the Single Girl quilt top is completed. Do songs ever endlessly loop through your brain? The whole time I was sewing Single Girl, and including times during the night when I would wake up briefly, I could NOT get Beyonce's song, "All the Single Ladies," out of my head. Okay, Beyonce, I get it. The name of my quilt is "Put a Ring On It." I'm pretty happy with it. Um, both the name and the quilt top.

This was the view from my ironing station.

After all the curved piecing that SGQA entailed, I was kind of on a roll, and moved on to my 3x6 Sampler Quilt Mini Bee, the same block done in six different color schemes. Of course each block will be in the hands of a different person, but even with all the variations in colors, isn't the secondary circle design cool?

It's a little hard to see with the bottom right block because it's quite busy, going into a quilt for little boys, but I sure had a good time making this block

I'm planning on doing a Sherbet Pips quilt using this block. I got the block information from Mary at Molly Flanders. It's called Flowering Snowball. Thanks, Mary!

By then it was late Saturday night and I was tired of curves. So I started working on Supernova. Yes, just a bit behind on the schedule. I had changed my mind so many times on which fabric to use. Then I was staring at Lee's blog button, with all the hot hot hot colors against the cool grey.

I haven't sewn with batiks in ages. In fact, most of them have been given away. But for some reason, I had saved all the colors Lee used in the button.

 So here is my first block. I adore the block and can't stop staring at it. Worth the wait, I think!

Don't forget to see what everyone else has been working on this week!