Mug Rugs

I'm participating in a swap through Quilting Gallery (see sidebar). Over 300 people signed up to trade two mug rugs with another quilter. We've had about a month to work on these and it's both my first attempt to make a mug rug and my first swap!

Naturally, I stalked my partner's blog to see what she might like. I did get some preferences from her via the swap coordinator: modern quilting and artsy quilts. I think we like some of the same things.

This first one is randomly pieced, I just kept sewing until it measured 10" x 6". It has a bit of an Asian look to it:

On her blog, my secret person used black, white and red fabrics to make a quilt. It sounded like she wanted to go with black, white, and yellow, just couldn't find the right fabrics to go together. I understand this. Only after making a Tuffet with these colors for my eldest daughter, did I think outside the box and incorporate yellow like this. I'm using the fabrics from that project and some stash favorites.

These were pieced following the directions provided by Ryan Walsh, inspiration to all us swappers: http://www.ryanwalshquilts.com/2010/11/dresden-wedges-mug-rug-tutorial-bliss.html

One of these will make it to my swap partner, but I'm asking myself, "Where's the red?" The other two will be added to the color ensemble in Sarah's room :)

Copyright ©2011, Sharon Baggs

Testing the Thread

After considering the three choices for top thread, I started with the darker variegated thread (right). It seemed to blend the best across both the light and dark fabrics. I began quilting with it and then decided to use the lighter (middle) thread. Sometimes you have to try quilting a bit to see which one works best.

I used a darker bobbin thread. When I use a 40 wt. as the top thread, I use a 50 wt. in the bobbin (always Presencia brand, my personal favorite--good for top thread quilting too!) There needs to be a slight adjustment in the tension so the bobbin thread doesn't pop up. Each of these three stitched lines were set at a different top tension setting--3.0 on the first line, 2.5 on the second, and 2.0 on the third. The 2.0 tension setting gave the best result for a balanced tension.

With the lighter thread (Superior's King Tut 40 wt. Color #904--Mirage), it blends right into the pink fabric. The original quilting plan was to quilt a grid out across the border. The grid looked a little lopsided and with the light thread on dark fabric it is difficult to hide the unevenness. A new quilting plan for the border will be decided later. For now there is plenty of stitching-in-the-ditch to be quilted in all the pieced seam lines, as shown above and below.

Starting at each corner of the quilt, I stitched-in-the-ditch across the bottom of the square, pivoted at the inner border and stitched down to the edge on the opposite side, pivoted and stitched back to the starting point. I did this on all four corners. Since the quilt is longer than it is wide, these "anchoring lines" created two large X's on the back of the quilt as shown here:

Always begin quilting with these anchoring lines so you can check the back of the quilt. If there are any puckers, you can fix them before moving on with the rest of the quilting.

Copyright ©2011,Sharon Baggs

Thread for Boston Commons

For this quilt, the top quilting thread will have to blend in with the pinks and variety of blue fabric. I pulled some of my lighter shades of Superior's King Tut 40 wt. cotton thread to audition for the quilting.

The quilting plan is to quilt a grid across the entire surface of the quilt. The piecing seams will be stitched-in-the-ditch and the stitching will extend across the inner pink accent border and the outer blue border. To get an idea what the thread will look like, the strands of the different colors are set on the pink and blue fabric.

Boston Commons Quilt

A Boston Commons Quilt is constructed of strip sets which provide enough to make two quilts, sometimes called a two-for-one quilt. Typically made of two color gradations, this twin sized quilt features a variety of pinks in the middle and moves to shades of blue out to the border. The other quilt is a small square quilt with blue in the middle and pink on the outside edges. That will be finished later. For now, the focus is on the twin sized quilt.

This quilt top was pieced by my friend, Ruthann, who gave it to another friend, Felicia, about seven years ago. She asked me recently if I would help her finish it up and quilt it for her daughter, Aimi. The quilt covers a standard twin mattress but we plan to make it a bit bigger.

First, we trimmed the blue triangle edges off, to make a straight edge. Then we added a 2" inner pink border.

Next we will add a dark blue border which will really make the pink inner border pop.

Copyright ©2011, Sharon Baggs