Stars!!!

When last we visited my Stars in a Time Warp project, I had 114 assorted stars hanging on my design wall.  They remained that way for **many** months. 

I finally pieced a few additional star blocks, to bring my total up to 121, which gave me 11 rows of 11 stars each.  Then a million or so sashing strips and cornerstones were cut and assembled, and at long last here we are:   

This top is 90" x 90" and I'm going to leave it this way -- queen size with no additional borders.  I did  a little multiplication, and there are 2465 pieces in this top.  It isn't scheduled to go onto the long-arm machine until maybe late summer, but the piecing phase is officially DONE!!!! 

Thanks, Barbara, for Stars in a Time Warp 2015!

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North Star

I finished assembling the blue stars from my

STARS IN A TIME WARP

block collection!

All year long, Barbara Brackman has been teaching us about fabric styles from the 19th century.  In
her introduction last January, and several other times throughout the year, she suggested that we try to think like early quiltmakers might have, and use unusual combinations and off-kilter fabric placements when creating our stars.  With this suggestion in mind -- and since most of my blocks came from smallish pieces found in my scrap bag, and I was "loose" about running out of fabric and subbing in something else -- I ended up with a lot of quirky stars!

None of these star blocks have anything in common other than the same star design, and blue fabric of some sort or another. Since my blocks are so casual, I chose to use them in a strippy "utility" quilt rather than a more formal layout, sort of like this quilt Barbara shared with us in October.  Ha -- my imaginary early quiltmaker even ran out of fabric for her border, and had to substitute in some other blue pieces! :)

It is my intention to tie this top rather than quilt it, in keeping with the "no frills" utility feel of my project.  I plan to keep this quilt in my own collection, as a reference for all the fabrics we learned about this year. 

This series was an outstanding learning experience!  And I still have another 114 star blocks waiting to be used in future projects!

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

 

Big accomplishment here! 

Today is the last installment of

Barbara Brackman's year-long

STARS IN A TIME WARP

study series, and I made it through the whole thing!

 

Our final assignments were

 shawl prints,

 printed textiles which resemble woven paisleys: 

 

stick prints:  

 and cracked ice prints:

both of which were popular novelty styles

during the 1800s.

 

I learned a great deal about textile history from this series, and also spent some quality time throughout the year rummaging through my stash for appropriate fabrics!  I was able to come up with at least one example of every week's study topic -- what can I say beyond "deep stash." :) 

 

I've ended up with 44 stars that have blue fabrics:

 

 and 114 stars that don't include any blue colorations:

 

The blue stars are on my To-Do Short List 

to become a strippy quilt, and the others will eventually be another large quilt.

 

Thanks, Barbara,

for an enlightening and entertaining year!

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

Our study topic this week at

Stars in a Time Warp

 

was Early Roller Prints - Clouds and Storms

 

I read Barbara's articles early on Wednesday mornings and then think about fabrics that I might have to illustrate the topic.  Some weeks I know right away what I will use, and other weeks I need to ponder for a while.

 

I did have a good idea this time what I was looking for in my stash.  "Storms" in this case referred to prints that look like cyclones with rings of branches and stars twirling in the "wind". It's nice to have a very DEEP scrap bag -- yes, there's the piece I was looking for!  Here's how my bag of purple scraps turned into a star this morning.

 

Only three more weeks left in our Stars in a Time Warp series.

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

I'm still working along on Barbara Brackman's

STARS IN A TIME WARP

Just a few weeks remaining on this informative series!

 

This week's topic is Provincial Prints - bright multicolored prints that became a fad in the mid 1800s and remain popular even today.

I have nearly 150 stars sewn already - this group which barely fits on my design wall any more, and also another set that includes blue fabrics.

 

Looks like several projects in the offing :)

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

 

This week's Stars in a Time Warp topic is

 

LAPIS BLUE

 

These fabrics were manufactured with a particular indigo dye process, and included madder reds in their  designs.  I was fortunate to unearth quite a few examples from my fabric stash, because I did a couple of quilts using similar blue and red fabrics a while back, even though I didn't realize I was using a "lapis" color scheme at the time.

 

 

 

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

 

I'm still working along on Barbara Brackman's
 STARS IN A TIME WARP
weekly series.

 

This week we learned about early indigo prints,
and I made two stars:

We're on Week 28 of this series, and I have half a zillion stars sewn already.  I selected out the "blue" ones to admire this week :)  The tentative plan is to eventually make a smaller star quilt using my blocks that include blue, and then to make a humongous quilt using all the rest of my stars. 

To learn more about antique and vintage fabrics
 click HERE

 

To enjoy more stars
 click HERE

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

This week we learned about

California Gold fabrics 

at Barbara Brackman's Stars in a Time Warp series.

 

This style of butterscotch-gold prints came into fashion during the California Gold Rush in the 1850s, and continued in use until the end of the century.  Since our local history here in Big Bear Lake began with gold mining, this topic was especially interesting for me to read about.

See more gold stars HERE
Learn more about California Gold fabrics HERE

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Stars in a Time Warp

This week's topic at Barbara Brackman's

 Stars in a Time Warp

study series is

Conversation Prints.

 

Conversation prints are defined as small regular prints featuring figures of recognizable objects other than florals or abstract geometrics.  Conversation prints are fun and whimsical!

 

I found the following 1900s-style conversation print fabrics in my stash:

 

Baseball bats and balls

 

Hound dogs that remind me of Elvis 

Birds carrying twigs for nest-building

 

 Children playing at the beach

Commemorative American eagles

 

Find more Stars in a Time Warp information HERE

and more conversation print stars HERE

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

 

Catching up with my Stars in a Time Warp photos ...

 

Paisleys

 Woven Plaids

 

Rainbow/Ombre Prints 

Printed Plaids

 

 

 

More Stars in a Time Warp HERE

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Stars in a Time Warp

 

I've been keeping up with Barbara Brackman's

 Stars in a Time Warp

each week, but haven't added photos of my stars here for a little while. 

Recently we've learned about:

 

FOULARD PRINTS

 

 

GREEN CALICOES 

and PURPLES

I've been able to use tiny little scraps for some of the block parts - you know the little bits we keep saving for something, someday.  So quite a few of my stars are scrappy and mixed up, very informal.
  My star collection is growing!

To learn more about vintage textiles click HERE

To enjoy more star blocks click HERE

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

 

Plenty of inspiration this week at Stars in a Time Warp.

 

We learned about CHROME YELLOW fabrics.  These fabrics were widely used throughout the 19th century, both as calico prints and as solids.

I found quite a selection of CHROME YELLOW in my stash to use in this week's stars!

 

I spread all my stars out today -- very colorful! 

 

For more information about CHROME YELLOW

click HERE

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

This week at

 Barbara Brackman's Stars in a Time Warp series

we learned about

INDIGO BLUE

 

Barbara gave us many examples of early-19th-century-style INDIGO prints, which featured simpler images than INDIGO fabrics produced at the end of the century.  INDIGO was a very colorfast dye, and was used extensively over a long span of textile history.  I found plenty of INDIGO reproduction fabrics in my stash.

 

To learn more about INDIGO click HERE

 

To enjoy more stars click HERE

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

This week we learned about

MADDER-STYLE PRINTS

at Barbara Brackman's Stars in a Time Warp series.

 

Madders were popular and common shades of reddish-brown used throughout most of the 19th century.  The shades ranged from deep "chocolates" through rusts into orangey- reds. I have many brown repros in my stash - the challenge was choosing which fabrics to use this week!  Here's today's quota, but I hope to make more madder stars over the weekend.

 

 

My star collection is growing. 

 

Learn more about madder HERE

and enjoy more stars HERE

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

This week's Star topic is

DOUBLE PINKS

This style of pink print fabric was very popular throughout most of the 19th century, and we have a good selection of double pink reproduction fabrics available today.

 

I think my multi-colored star collection is beginning to have a late 19th century "utility quilt" look.  Nothing fancy happening here -- this is going to be a

cheerful informal quilt.

Find out more about DOUBLE PINKS HERE

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

This week's topic is

OVERDYED GREEN SOLIDS

 

Soooo, right away, the **solids** threw me -- I don't use solids a lot, so I don't have much of a selection in my stash.  Barbara Brackman's article went into further detail, describing a specific dye technology, and a particular resulting shade of green, typically used in the mid-19th century.  I'm learning a lot from this series, and hopefully improving my ability to see and appreciate vintage fabrics.  

 

Starting with the limited choices I had here, and doing a little bit of overdying of my own, I added some yellow to a green almost-solid that seemed too blue/modern. 
I came up with:

 

Here are the stars I created this week.  I used some other solid greens from my stash also, but the overdyed one on the far right seems to me to be the closest to the vintage green that was described in the article. 

 

To read more about overdyed green solids click HERE

 

To enjoy more green stars click HERE

 

My convention for creating these blocks is to combine the current week's color/style with the those of the three previous weeks.  This is going to be a Very Mixed set of blocks!  All my stars so far:

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

Happy Star Day!

 

We're taking a look at cheddar and chrome orange fabrics this week.  Orange is kind of a make-or-break color, either you love it or you hate it.  I'm on the love-it team, including fabric and Cheetos :)

 

This week's cheddar stars:

 

 My mixed star set so far:

 

 And my "other" calico-and-muslin star set:

 

You can learn more about

chrome orange fabrics and dye technology HERE

and see more cheddar stars HERE

 

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Stars in a Time Warp

It's Week 3 of

Barbara Brackman's STARS IN A TIME WARP

study series.

This week, she discusses shirting prints, which were very commonly used as "lights" in quilt creations from last century.

 

I have a wealth of shirting fabrics in my stash, and it was short work to pick out a few likely scraps and sew up

 this week's stars:

 

Here's my eclectic star collection so far: 

 

Lots more shirting information HERE

 

And photos of other shirting stars HERE

 

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