PMQG Block of the Month: January - April

So the first third of the blocks for the Block of the Month I'm doing with the Portland Modern Quilt Guild is complete.  The point of the program is to make one block for yourself, and one for charity.  For the charity blocks, we can do "black, white and a splash of color," "scrappy" or "ROYGBIV."

For my charity blocks, I chose to do the black, white and a splash of color.  Honestly, I didn't think to take pictures of these blocks, but I have been changing up the splash of color each month. 

For my blocks, I also chose to do the black, white and a splash of color, buuuuuut I chose a theme...and it should not be surprising at all to anyone reading this blog.  Yes indeed, my Block of the Month is Halloween themed.  Hey now, this girl can never, ever have too many Halloween quilts!

So I grabbed all of my Halloween themed black and white prints, and I've been tossing in splashes of orange, green, purple and pink, with the intention of using my Michael Miller hearse fabric.

Hearse fabric. I like the touch of morbid humor, with the little casket bouncing out of the back.

So here are my blocks thus far...

 January 

This block was tricky for me because my brain did NOT want to think of this in tube format, which is how it was initially assembled and which is why not all my prints are right side up. I just figure the skeletons have been listening to too much Lionel Ritchie and started dancing on the ceiling.

February

I initially was going to just keep it to purple, orange and green, but I had this bright pink and orange geometric and I thought it'd be fun to pop in there.  

March

Not going to lie, I'm going to use a LOT of that bat print because it is my absolute favorite.  The green is much more of a bright, borderline neon green instead of the kind of bluish green it shows here.

April

This is when I wish I had a better camera than just my cell phone camera.  The pink is much more similar to the bright pink from February instead of the bubble gummish pink in the picture.  Also, the strip in the middle isn't burgundy, it is a really rich deep purple more similar to the purple from February as well, and the spots are a bright pink.  In person, it is much more cohesive than this crappy picture shows.  Someday when I am rich and famous I will have better equipment to take better pictures with.

I am SO impatient, I can't wait to get the other 2/3 of the blocks done so I can see what the whole thing will looks like...but that won't be until December!

PMQG Michael Miller Neon Challenge: Mission Complete!

Well, I was going to do a few blocks out of the neon selection from my last post, but after some pondering I went in a completely different and nerdy direction.

If you know me then it's no secret I have kind of offbeat interests (as if you couldn't figure that out from my blog theme), and this is no different. Leave me to my own devices and every project wills imply reek with nerdiness. I'm primatology geek and my favorite of all the monkeys, lemurs, apes, etc is the gorilla. They're badass, period.  

Any questions? I rest my case.

So, since I was in need of a new makeup bag for my purse anyway, on account that my old one is looking just pathetic, I decided it was time to give it a whirl. Here's the result...my killer gorilla makeup bag. I'm pretty proud because I actually managed to improvise the whole thing, and even popped in a zipper, which I haven't done in years. 

The front

The reverse

The interior

It's all quilted with glow in the dark thread.  Just because. 

After this, I can't wait to see what our next challenge will be! 

Portland Modern Quilt Guild: Michael Miller Neons

I'm a member of the Portland Modern Quilt Guild and during March's meeting, we were given a challenge to use the Michael Miller Neons and a few of their neutrals in either a 12.5" block (raw) or an accessory to bring to April's meeting.

These beauties, plus three neon solids, which you'll see in a minute.

You all know me at this point and so when comes to color... mo' louder, mo' betta.  I've always loved neons, ever since I was a little kid telling my mechanic grandpa to paint me a car in all the hot colors when I had a car someday.  Had he made it that long, I know he would have!  But this project excited me because now I had an excuse to use alllll the hot colors and no one can tell me it's too loud. Ha!

While I was in the meeting, some knowing soul piped up and said that she had heard the neon solids weren't color fast and that they should be prewashed first because they were SO supersaturated with dye to get that lovely neon.  When I got the fabric in hand, wow...it was bright!  But it was also stiff as a board because of the copious amounts of dye.  I never, ever prewash my fabrics before using them, because I like the crinkly look they get when they're washed after being quilted, but this time, for sure, I was going to prewash those suckers like the lady said.

So here we are...just a couple weeks away from the next meeting and I"m getting ready to make my project.  I can't decide between a couple blocks or a super kickass dino makeup bag but anyway, it's time to prewash the solids. It's not like I travel a lot or anything...mainly that I'm clumsy and neurotic...but I have a pack of those handy dandy Tide sink pack to wash clothes in hotel sinks with.  Yeah, I use them at home for fabric too.

The lovely pink solid before washing, and you know, a little product placement. 

I set to washing the pieces in order from lightest to "darkest," so from yellow to pink with orange in between.    Yellow, when dunked in initially, didn't bleed out at all.  It took quite a bit of agitation before it got the excess dye out. But still, not as much bleed out as I expected.  I don't know what I was expecting really, I guess it wasn't going to look like an exploded highlighter. 

I don't think I need to outright say what I thought this looked like, when I giggled about it like an 8 year old boy.  Make you own joke here. 

The orange I have to say, was pretty color fast.  That I was quite surprised at after the yellow.  No change to the water at all, and I'm not exactly gentle on these pieces of fabric when I hand wash them to get excess dye out...an industrial washer is probably gentler than I am. But hey...well done orange.

And now the pink.  Oh, the pink.  As soon as I dunked the fabric in and submerged it, this happened: 

I hadn't even agitated the water yet! And there is is...it's like sink full of soapy Rosè.  It only got worse the more I agitated it.  So...word to the wise...wash the bejesus out of your Michael Miller pink neon solid, it is the most saturated of the three here.  

I was kind of hoping it would make the fabrics softer, but it didn't...the greige goods themselves are just rough, which I assume is necessitated by the volume of dye that is in there.  This challenge isn't just fun as a quilter and a guild member.  As a store manager who sits in on fabric ordering, this is REALLY good info to know.  If we order these solids, it will definitely be made known far and wide to our customers to prewash the ever living out of these solids.  Retayne will be a good ally with these guys!  

Now that being said...block, or dino makeup bag...block, or dino makeup bag?