Quilts by Julie Ramsey
designs
Quilt insomnia
Aug 11th
It’s 2:30 AM, I’m awake, and I can’t get back to sleep. What do I do? Why, I get up and goof around with my quilt software for two hours, that’s what! My husband suggested I make a quilt for our bed, since the one we have has gotten fairly torn up, and I’ve practically been dreaming new designs; I haven’t been this motivated to do a quilt in a long while.
I “borrowed” this design from a pattern I found online and worked it out first on graph paper, and then in Electric Quilt. The smaller half-square triangles will be 4″, and the finished top will be 100″ square, which should be plenty big for a queen size bed.
I think I like this color scheme, though I’m messing around with a version in all different shades of blue. My husband doesn’t share the same quilt-color tastes as me (he thinks most of my projects are WAY too bright), so something subtle like this should work nicely for the both of us.
Next step: counting pieces and figuring out yardage. EQ can supposedly calculate fabric amounts for you, but it assumes that long pieces, like those for borders, are cut in single pieces parallel to the selvedge rather than being pieced by strips along the fabric width. I think I’ll do it by hand, just to make sure I’ve got things right.
(Click to enlarge.)
Rainbow Sherbet
Jun 18th
My husband is going out of town for the weekend, leaving me at home to go on a quilting spree. I need to put the binding on my table runner and do the piecework for a baby quilt, but since I should finish those fairly quickly, I decided to pick up fabric to do another lap quilt once those are finished. This design is from Creative Two Block Quilts by Trice Boerens, and I really look forward to making it.
Inspiration
Jun 4th
While googling for examples of quilts made from this book, I came across this quilt: “The colorful quilt” by Jacqueline de Jonge. I can only hope that someday I’m good enough to make designs like this! I love the color scheme, and I’ve decided that I need to steal it for a quilt of my own someday.
So much for lime and black!
May 21st
I took a trip out to the bookstore today and came home with a copy of Celtic Pieced Illusions by Karen Combs. Now I can’t wait to make my own Celtic knot quilt! The method is very simple, using just two blocks– triangle-in-the-corner blocks and nine-patches– and I think I can put together this multicolor knot quilt without too much pain sometime in the near future.
More in lime green
May 16th
I’ve been playing around some more with Electric Quilt, trying to come up with something snazzy in a black/white/lime color scheme. This one is from a “Northern Star” pattern book I picked up a while back, and would be fairly easy to put together with my special flying-geese rulers.
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I can’t decide which color scheme I like best. I’m leaning towards the one on the left, but it might be too much black. I’ve asked my Facebook friends to weigh in on the question, so hopefully I’ll have some help with the decision 
Twist of Lime
Apr 29th
I’ve wanted to do a lime-green-and-black quilt for a while, ever since I saw a really neat one in that color scheme hanging at the local quilt shop. I spent some time playing with Electric Quilt this morning, and I’ve come up with a few possible designs. The two that I like best are also the most complicated, but I’ve got a pattern book that actually makes the construction very simple, and I’d be able to put them together in a weekend if I didn’t have anything more pressing to do (which is usually the case).
Next up
Apr 28th
After sending a quilt off to one set of grandparents, I’m getting ready to start into a quilt for my other grandmother. (Gotta share the love with everybody!) I have some really neat reproduction fabric on the way– just waiting for UPS to show up this afternoon– and I’m looking forward to getting this one finished, maybe even by the weekend.
Fun with Electric Quilt
Apr 21st
My fat-quarter assortment from Connecting Threads showed up on the doorstop today, hooray! Now I just need to finish off my two commissioned quilts so I can start in on this one.
I made up a rough draft of the next quilt in Electric Quilt; the colors aren’t quite right (slightly less obnoxious than these!), and the design will be more scrappy, but hopefully it’ll be a good approximation of the finished result.
Retail therapy
Apr 10th
My car needs to go into the shop, so I’ve been stuck at home all by myself for several weeks now. I’m in a spot where none of my non-urgent projects seemed all that appealing, so even though I can’t drive to Jo-Ann, I did the next best thing: shopping online!
I’ve had this pattern from a magazine sitting around for a month or so, and decided to take advantage of a coupon I had for Connecting Threads and order the FQs I needed to make this. I ended up picking up a FQ pack from their “Slip of Summer” collection, and I think the colors will be very cheerful:
Of course, this puts my to do list as such, in rough order of priority:
It may sound like a lot, but I do have a regimented order to finish everything, and it’s actually best for my sanity to have my sewing somewhat scheduled out like this. And with unemployment marching on, keeping myself sane is a top priority right now.
Two new geek ideas
Mar 15th
Idea: quilts inspired by engineering!
Engineers use diagrams like these to design circuits, and I think they’d translate fairly well into a quilt. There wouldn’t be a lot of color involved, nor a lot of actual piece-work, but I think a satin stitch to do the lines, and my embroidery machine to do letters and numbers, would make for something very cool.
My dad and my little brother are both engineers, so I may need to recruit them to do up a simple circuit design for me to play with.
Another fun project, once I get the hang of appliqué, would be a circuit board quilt– though hopefully a board a little less complicated than this one. The background would be pieced in the light and dark green to represent the paint on the board, and then I could appliqué on the chips, resistors, and whatnot. It would look especially snazzy if I used silver metallic thread to embroider on the letters and other small details!
