Calm Knot and RhombiTriHex Pillows

I made these two pillows for Christmas presents:



The first one is a present for my nephew. The block is a simplified version of a block I found in the EQ7 library they called "calm knot". Here's how it looks in the EQ7 program:



I didn't scan the fabric in, so that part doesn't match, but the colors are close enough. The colors are the school colors of DU where he is going to school.

The other one is for my Mama:



I wanted to see if I could machine piece the RhombiTriHex pattern. It was quite difficult and there's a lot of slop in the final product (but my Mom won't care). I think if I were to try this pattern again, I would have to hand piece it. I think this pattern lends itself to English Paper Piecing.

Deltoid Tri Hex

3 Color

Go Broncos!

Mardi Gras

Since I did the dual for the Snub Hex, I figured I should do the dual for the Rhombi Tri Hex. This tiling is called deltoidal trihexagonal (I say Deltoid Tri Hex or DTH). Like the Pentagonal Florets (and all duals to uniform tilings), this is a one-patch quilt.

EQ actually lets me tile this one without any workarounds. One of the quilt layouts they offer is called Baby Blocks:


This takes a square block and distorts it to fit in the diamond shape. So I had to reverse distort my custom block so that it would ultimately fit right:

Floret Pentagonal Quilt

Here's another one:

Flowers

3 Color

This one's a Floret Pentagonal tiling. It's the dual of the snub hex tiling I posted yesterday. A dual is basically when you convert the vertices of a tiling into faces and vice versa. One of the nifty properties of the snub hex tiling (and all the other uniform tilings including the rhombi tri hex) is that every vertex is the same as all the others. In the case of the snub hex every corner is made up of a hexagon and 4 triangles. This means that a nifty property of its dual is that every face is the same as all the others (i.e. a one patch quilt; it would be a good pattern for a charm quilt).

Each tiling would also be a good quilting pattern (by this I mean the stitching on top) for the piecing pattern of its dual.


I think it would be cool to make these projects in pairs (gifts for couples, perhaps) where one quilt's quilting is the other quilt's piecing.

Snub Hex Quilt

Another quilt I designed on EQ7 this weekend:

Custom Block

Gradient Heat

It's another alternative tiling like the Rhombi-Tri-Hex quilt I posted yesterday. This one's called snub hexagonal tiling (I just call it Snub-Hex). I used the same workaround that I did with last one; I designed a custom block that would tile on a grid. But the smallest segment of the pattern that would repeat on a grid turned out to be big enough to be the entire quilt (a small quilt anyway).

Some alternative colorings:


I wouldn't piece the larger equilateral triangles out of the four smaller ones; I'd just make it one patch. I like how this gives each patch a more equivalent size. It makes the pattern elegant and balanced.


Here, too, I would combine the two small brown triangles into a single rhombus patch. Notice if the rhombus was a square, it would be a Rhombi-Tri-Hex.

Rhombi Tri Hex quilt

I designed this quilt on EQ7 this weekend (with four alternate colorings):

RheaTH

RTH Flowers

Grapevine

Cosmic Jacks

I wanted to see what a quilt would look like if it was based on a tiling other than squares. Specifically, I thought this tiling would lend itself to a nice quilt:


It's called a rhombitrihexagonal tiling (I just think RTH or Rhombi-Tri-Hex). Unfortunately, EQ7 doesn't let me set up my own custom tiling (at least I can't figure out how). But I did figure out a work-around; I designed this custom block:



When this block is put on a grid, the pattern repeats. The only difference is that the block edges split some of the patches where they won't actually be split on the real quilt. So disregard those grid line on the images above.

Learning Electric Quilt

One of the incentives I gave myself for finishing my last quilting project was that I would buy myself Electric Quilt 7 (quilt design software) when I was finished.

I installed it on my computer on Friday, and I have been playing with it all weekend. The first thing I did while I was figuring out how to use it was to retroactively design the two quilts I've already made.

Mom-in-law's Snail's Trail:




and niece's Bento Box:

Brielle's Quilt Completed

I finally finished it!



I managed to get it done in time for her birthday; hopefully she's not too big for it already.

Last time I posted about this, I had just finished the top. All I needed to do was quilt and bind. What took so long? Well, I'm not going to blame anyone else for my procrastination, but shortly after that post, I posted about my new feline roommate. I had put my quilting gear away when he moved in because I wasn't sure how well-behaved he would be. Turns out he was unobtrusive... well, mostly.

A Weekend in Portland

FRIDAY

Chris is attending the CHI conference in Vancouver, BC this week. Our friend Todd was giving him a ride up on Friday, and I tagged along as far as Portland. We arrived at lunchtime and stopped at my tradition base of operation in Portland, The Backspace Cafe.

From there, I took the streetcar to Heron Haus B&B in the alphabet district where I was staying. After I checked in, I explored the neighborhood. I had tickets to the Portland Timbers game that night, so I scouted the ballpark.

I was surprised to see the folks with general admission tickets (like the ones I had) were already lining up to get good seat 3 hours before game time. I wasn't hardcore enough to wait three hours in the rain, so I accepted the fact that we'd have bad seats and found a nearby bourbon bar I had read about, The Pope House, and had a Manhattan while I waited for game time.

My friend Eric drove up from Corvallis to see the game with me. We met up at the Pope House and walked to the game just as it was starting. We had to stand up in the back row with a post partially blocking our view, but that didn't matter, it was still a blast.



The north end of the stadium is general admission seating and is referred to as the Timbers Army. If you loop the above 10 second video 540 times, you'll get an idea of what it's like. These folks never sit down, and never stop chanting for the entire game. I've never seen this happen at a Rapids game.

After the game, Eric and I got food and beer at 21st street Bar and Grill.




SATURDAY

I spent Saturday morning at my other favorite coffee shop in Portland, Anna Bananas. Then I went to an independent movie theater in the neighborhood, Cinema 21, to see the matinee showing of the new Werner Herzog documentary. After lunch at Laughing Planet and a haircut, I went back to the B&B to get ready for an evening out.

I had wanted to check out a jazz club while I was here, and the jazz calendar said that a Django Reinhardt tribute band (the Djangophiles) was playing at the Livingroom Theater - I had always wanted to check out the theater anyway. I arranged to meet up with some old friends, Jamie and Rachael, there.

I initially figured that I'd catch a movie at the Livingroom Theater, but after all the food, cocktails, jazz, and conversation, we had talked past the starting time of any movie we wanted to see. So we went to Ground Control instead. It's an old school video game arcade/nightclub. Rachael and I threw away a couple of dollars worth of quarters playing poorly (like back in high school), then watched Jamie, who is very competitive and excels at everything she endeavors, get the high score on Galaga.



SUNDAY

After coffee at Anna Bananas, I headed downtown. I had initially planned on hiking Forest Park, but it was too rainy, so I decided to go to the Portland Saturday Market (special Sunday edition). I bought an umbrella (I've lived in the northwest for almost 4 years now - this is my first umbrella). After Pad See-Ew at the Thai Peacock, I went back to The Livingroom Theater - this time to actually see a movie, Bill Cunningham New York. The person who sold me the ticket and the beer was our server from the previous night, and she remembered me (Jamie and Rachael - you'd never guess what her favorite movie was!)

That night I went to The Blue Monk, a jazz club in Jamie and Rachael's neighborhood that they had told me about. It was probably my favorite discovery of the weekend. The place was just about my class of people - not too snobby, but not divey. The basement bar, where the live music was had a great vibe. I'll definitely be back to this place.

MONDAY

Today's a travel day. I checked out of the Heron Haus, and I've been spending the last couple hours at Backspace Cafe writing this post (I'll probably finish this on the train). I'm heading over to Union station next. I'll be on the train for 10 hours, arriving in Vancouver at midnight. Go Canucks!