The Madness Within

“The Madness Within"

An Improv-Pieced "crazy" quilt.

This was a quilt I started at the beginning of the covid era, taking my raw emotions out into the making of this chaotic acid-trip style of a design. All of the fabrics consisted of scraps leftover from past quilts and sewing projects, and my Spoonflower design sample pieces.

You can see that the center of the quilt starts out in a small, circular type of design, and gradually gets bigger until the outer edges where there’s less chaos but more normal shaped pieces. As time progressed, social distancing and other things in life gradually became to somewhat of a normal state again as 2021 rolled in. The anxiety & stress of covid and all the stupid crap associated with it (hoarding for example) lessened, and my nerves calmed down a bit. So it took me a year and half from start to finish, April 2020 to September 2021, to make this. With the long arm quilting skills of Quilting by David, this quilt completely represents how I felt since March 17th, 2020… the day most of Wisconsin shut down at 5pm, aka: St Patrick’s Day… also my birthday. Dinner plans with my bestie had to be canceled for after work that day… so I’ll always remember that dreaded day and when it all started…

 
One person commented on my Facebook post, prior to reading my description, that she thought my design resembled a rose.  I love her interpretation of what first came to mind when she saw the photos.  Once she said that, I couldn't help but to agree with her!  It really does resemble a rose.
 

A 2020 Highschool Grad Gift for My Niece...

 The year 2020 sure was one of pure chaos and craziness.  Unfortunately, we weren't able to attend my niece's high school graduation because of the pandemic.  But I did get to watch her open this gift, via Face-time.

This project took me 1-1/2 years to complete, from start to finish.  It was my mom's idea for me to make this, and we are all so happy with how it turned out. 

Name of Quilt:  Photo Memory Crazy Quilt
Techniques Used: Improv-Piecing, Raw Edge Applique, Basic Piecing

Photos were snatched off my brother's and my sister's-in-law FB pages, as well as a few from my niece's FB page.  I did a lot of fun edits to many of the photos, to take them from plain to insane, LOL!  All the photos were then uploaded to Spoonflower, then printed on fabric. 

Once all my insane piecing was finished on the top of the quilt, I took one of my Spoonflower fill-a-yard panels, featuring all of my personal designs, and added borders onto it until the panel was large enough to accommodate the long-arm quilting part of the project.

I then shipped the quilt top and back off to Amy Ellis of Amy's Creative Side to be long-arm quilted.  In the meantime, I also made a custom, reversible pillowcase with my parents’ handwritten notes to their granddaughter on it, which was also printed on Spoonflower fabric. And last but not least, a reversible tote bag with personalized notes to my niece from both Brian and I, also printed on Spoonflower fabric.

I used an iPhone app called Bazaart to create the fun designs featuring the notes on the pillowcase and tote bag.  And I used a plethora of different iPhone photography apps to do the numerous edits on many of the photos in the quilt itself.

This was a true labor of love.  Needless to say, now my sister-in-law wants one.  :)

I told her to start gathering the photos!

To see additional photos, please visit my Facebook Page: Gina's Custom Creations and go to the album titled 2020 Sewing & Quilting Projects.

"The Yearning" - A Modern Mini Quilt

I just finished my Modern Mini Quilt for the #ModernMiniQuiltChallenge at 11:30pm last night, and got some photos of it this morning. WHEW! Talk about cutting things close since the deadline is today at 5pm Central Time!

The Great Wisconsin Quilt Show

My entry is called, "The Yearning"

It features an image of my son, surrounded by dark, modern fabrics with a pop of golden sunshine seeping through. The dark colors represent depression and sadness in missing my son throughout the stay at home orders of Covid19. As well as the loss of one of my beloved cats, Jasper, who passed away one week ago today, after being a part of my family for 14 years. The improv-piecing represents the chaos and upheaval in life these days. The zipper pull represents the unzipping of the dark and dreary, to let the sun finally shine in and bring forth happiness and contentment to my soul. So in short, The Yearning stands for my desire to have things go back to normal... to be released from the depression and anxiety... to once again be happy.

I mainly improv-pieced this mini quilt, which measures 12.5 inches wide x 13.5 inches high, using a mixture of scrap fabrics leftover from previous projects. Some of the fabrics used are from Northcott's Stonehenge collection. The sun and burst of golden pieces that are appliqued on top of my quilt, are fussy cut from two of my own personal surface designs on Spoonflower, called "Blazing Sun" and "Hypnotic Sunflowers, Large Scale". 

I machine quilted this, which is not my forte! I usually pay someone else to machine quilt my projects... so I am quite proud of myself for being able to pull this off!

Watching The Voice on Hulu while sewing.

Scrap-Happy Meets Wild & Crazy!

Earlier this year I decided I wanted to do something with all the scraps of leftover fabric I've got in my stash from previous sewing projects.  And right around the time this idea popped in my head, Amy Ellis of Amy's Creative Side was hosting an Improv with Amy sew-along/tutorial event on social media, so I decided to challenge myself and join in...  And here it is!

 This was the start of my #improvpieced quilt top, featuring many un-matching fabrics that kinda make it look like a Wild and Crazy quilt!  🤪 

Besides all the scrap fabric pieces I was using in this project, I also used a number of my own #spoonflowerfabric designs. For example, the purple petunia is one of my own personal fabric designs, along with a number of others. 😊

 Let the piecing begin...

 

 Below shows a closeup of a number of my Spoonflower designs

incorporated into the piecing along with the scraps.

 And the quilt top is completed...

 Just another closeup...

 Curved piecing below = great practice and I love how it turned out!

AND FINALLY...

My Improv with Amy quilt is completely finished!

I designed my quilt label using Bazaart and PicMonkey,

then ordered it through Spoonflower.

 

The best part about this quilt?

Well, that would have to be that Amy Ellis quilted it for me! 🥰.

I love her Broken Glass Quilt Design on this quilt...

it works perfectly with the busy fabrics!
 

While geocaching at an old cemetery after work,

I decided to take some of these photos.

I just love the history and reading the headstones,

especially when they’re from the Civil War era.