Thursday Tidbit - Using Your Phone as a Design Tool

I hope this is not a "Captain Obvious" post, but did you know that you might be carrying an important design tool in your pocket every day?  I'm talking about your cell phone if it has a camera!

I use the camera on my phone ALL THE TIME when it comes to laying out blocks or entire quilts.  I arrange things like I want them, snap a picture, and then refer to the photo when it comes time to sew things together.

For example, here's my Grandmother's Double Diamond quilt laid out on my living room floor.

As you can see, the photo doesn't have to be pretty - I just used it as a reference for color and block placement.

When laying out a quilt, sometimes you can get better perspective from a photo than you can from looking at the actual blocks.  The smaller scale allows you to see if you have a block turned wrong or if you have a certain color bunched up in one area.

I was at a retreat in May and there was one main design wall.  I was putting a quilt together and used the design wall to arrange my blocks.  Since there were many of us sharing the same space, after I got the arrangement I wanted, I snapped a photo with my phone.  I then took down all my blocks and let someone else use the space.  But I had no fears of getting blocks out of order - I just used my photo for reference at my sewing station!

A photo on your phone is also great for putting blocks or small quilts together, especially if you are travelling.  I worked on the Go and Sew Mini Quilt while travelling to Quilt Market in May.  Here's my hexagons laid out on my lap desk at home.

After I took my picture, I threw all the hexagons in a bag and hit the road.

Here's the finished quilt.  Every hexagon ended up right where I wanted it.

I did the same thing a few weeks ago while on vacation.  The layout:

And the finished mini quilt:

As you can see, I didn't lay out the white pieces.  I knew those would be all the same.  But I wanted to make sure that I got the placement of the colored pieces right.

Isn't it great when you can transform your cell phone into a Pocket Design Wall?

One Week, One Thing - August 6

I can't believe it's August already!  Where has this year gone?

I must admit that I was not as productive this past week as I had wanted, but sometimes you just gotta pull back on "full speed ahead" and take a nap!

I did get the August Marti & Me Club top put together.  It's not quilted yet (my nap yesterday got in the way of that!).

I made some 9-Patches for our block swap here at the shop.  32 down, 64 to go....

I'm pecking away at some projects that I hope to pull together into a program either later this year or early next year.  All of them are mini quilts that are English Paper Pieced.  The first sample is done...

And the second one is underway!

I've taught my daughter how to EPP - she's doing an art project for school using 3/8" hexagons!  I've been a good mom and helped her baste.  Since school starts in 3 weeks (and she needs 3 pieces of art finished by then), I have a feeling I'll be basting some more this coming week.

My goal for this week is to get the Marti & Me top quilted and bound.  I'm sure I'll peck away at some more 9-patches, and who knows what else I'll piddle at.

What one thing are you focused on this week?

Thursday Tidbit - Standard Bed Sizes

Have you ever found the perfect quilt pattern, selected the perfect fabrics, yet still aren't sure if it will fit the size of your bed?  There's a couple of great booklets available with all kinds of quilter's math in them that include bed charts, but I've found a basic chart on bed sizes to share with you today.



Image Source:  Pacific Star Products

This handy diagram shows actual mattress sizes.  You can click on the link in the caption to print your own copy of this diagram for future reference.

Once you know the mattress size, you can decide how long you want the drop to be (i.e., how much you want it to hang over the sides), or if you want a pillow tuck, etc. to begin determining the finished size of your desired quilt.

Now, you can look at your perfect pattern and know if it will fit your bed!  And if it doesn't, at least you now have a point of reference to figure out how many more blocks and /or borders to add to get it to the correct size.