Quilt Chains

Quilts made for my enjoyment - without a person or organization in mind, can feel very creative. I love the quilt on the December cover of American Patchwork and Quilting. We do not need any more Christmas quilts, but I figured that I could find an owner. The flannel medallion backing that worked well with the colors in this quilt - black, red, green and white, was a bit too small for the original layout, so I played in EQ and found a layout that was a bit shorter, to fit four yards of backing. I did pre-wash the flannel before measuring.

The designer used a mix of blacks and greys, and it was fun to pull the fabrics from stash. For the snowflakes, just two fabrics were used - a pearlized cream, and a Kona black that had a honeycomb texture. Two reds for the X blocks, and they had a variety of blacks and greys as background. Multiple greens for the trees were found - even some very small scraps for HSTs, and a black with a small white square dot that reminded me of snow for those backgrounds. The border is a grey on black.

One of my neighbors happily claimed this quilt.

The extra red squares drew me towards a bag of 2.5" -ish squares that were leftovers from a sale, gifted to me by a friend. this led to a search for more small pieces or squares, and the Unexpected 9-patch quilt came together. With careful pressing, the 2-color combination blocks all nested nicely. The backing fabric is a green with white Christmas kitties. Red and white diagonal stripe for binding.

Another neighbor, who happened to see these blocks on the design wall, adopted this quilt. It was very fun to piece, though I learned that not all squares are really the size they seem...some were too small, many too large (or not square) and needed trimming before assembly.

I picked up a small charity quilt top to assemble at our December meeting, only to discover that the top was already sewn together. It was a bit too small, and the overstuffed red stash drawer yielded a cheerful gingham for a border. A white and grey print backing was pulled from stash. Solid red for binding.

The bag also contained some extra strips sets. Again - and interesting size - larger than 2.5" but not 3". I converted them to 4-pathes with careful trimming. Searching for more pieces, I came across the saved stitch-and-flip squares from Through the Woods (top quilt), pressed and trimmed they came together with the 4-patches, and a yard of red/white/black print became alternate blocks and border. A couple of darker reds to pull from the print and some other grey bits rounded out another charity quilt. A rather crazy red paisley fit as a backing.

And then a rail fence quilt variation seen on Pinterest sent me to four oddball FQ's. The the fabrics been cut on the straight of grain, piecing would not have been needed. Once started, I just went ahead and pieced some of the small strips to get the number of blocks needed. Another white/grey print worked for the backing, and my favorite black and white diagonal print for the binding kept it jaunty.

The current projects in progress include an American Hero top and placemats for a Master Gardener sale. There are a lot of scrap leftovers to organize, and my Pinterest boards are just full of ideas.

Twin Twirlas, Two Cheerful Charity Quilts

I found the tutorial for Twirla on the butterflythreadsquilting.com blog, and thought it would be an interesting way to use some stash FQ's, in this case Kaffe prints and some light chambray semi-solid fabrics. Originally the plan was to make a twin-sized quilt. The block was sized to make good use of the FQ's.

It may look like I've posted the same photo twice, as the color combinations and placement are the same. If you look closely, the quilt on the left has prints making the dominant patter, and on the right it's the semi-solids.I liked how each print wedge fits against contrasting solid. The backing is gold and there was enough extra to use as binding. The Bellini quilting pattern is an abstract leafy-looking design.

Since Last Time

Quite a few projects have been finished since last I wrote.  Five burp cloths and a heavy single layer flannel blanket with a binding edge were made for our neighbor's new grandson. The flannel was leftover from a bathrobe made several years ago. They liked both so much that they offered to pay me to make more. I could not find the nice thick flannel and suggested they look in person. My flannel scraps are mostly pinks and yellows now and they wanted "boy colors only". 

Charity Quilts: Hexagon strippy quilt 56.5” x 40.5” , Spilled Ink Quilting. 

Purple triangles + string blocks  61” x 42.5”, Sinuous Wave Quilting This used up some triangle UFO blocks and leftover string blocks. 

Diamond String Quilt 61” x 50”  Sinuous Wave quilting.

Not pictured: Green leftovers NICU top ~ 36” x 24” quilted on Juki and 2 NICU wholecloth quilts – flag fabric quilted on Juki.

Gift Quilts:

Binding Tool Braid –Gingiber Christmas jelly roll & panel quilt-70” x 71”

Butterflies pink and purple lap quilt 54” x 41” given to neighbor. A different coloring of MSQ's "Outstanding Stars" quilt.

Son’s Trip Around the World -  Blues/Greys 90” x 90”. This was a good stashbuster.

Project Tracking

I keep a Word document to organize my projects. It's a simple way to keep track of things, with several sections: : 

• Projects in progress
• Tops waiting to be quilted
• Projects not yet started
• Finished Projects (with numbers)

The projects are moved around the list as they get started/quilted/finished.

This is my condensed recap from 2020:

2020 Finished Projects

16 NICU QUILTS

LAP QUILTS: 4 Charity, 3 Gifted, 6 Other

TWIN QUILTS: 8 Charity, 4 Gifted, 1 Other

SMALL QUILTS: Garden applique hanging; 2 feather placemats

CHARITY QUILTING (pieced by someone else): 1 TWIN & 2 LAP

OTHER PROJECTS

Charity: 3 pet beds , 4 pillowcases, 7 large Christmas stockings

Four sofa pillows

Clothesline basket – zig-zag stitched

3 Burp cloths to neighbor's daughter

7 knitted “Little Dragons”, given to neighbor kids

New ironing board cover

Recycled old ironing board fabric into seat cushion cover for studio and also the small June Tailor pressing mat cover

Waterproof Gorilla cart cover

Spoonflower fleece blue blanket for TV room

By Annie pouch for Son's girlfriend

There is a separate document that has a list of projects in mind (sometimes just an idea of how to use a bundle or a large piece of fabric), and another listing fabric I'm lusting after (grouped by online store.).

Pinterest is used to track finished quilts, and there are sub-boards Charity Quilts Donated, Gift Quilts Not Yet Gifted. I also have a board called Quilting Queue, and it has several sub-sections too.. I really like having images of ideas.

Tracking how many blocks I make each month has been fun, and I take part in the 350 Blocks Project over at Prairie Moon Quilts. August was the highest month - 283 blocks pieced, with a total of 1376 for the year.

Here are a couple of Christmas quilts made and given away. Both were stashbusters.

Repurposing Finish

Finally done, and I'm happy with this wall hanging. The center block was enhanced with a silver sharpie to give a stronger contrast to the fabric pattern on the watering can, plus some satin stitching on the edges. 45" x 16 1/2". The boots block is called "Repurposing", the series is called "Nesting".

Two Twins

Lego Twin #1

Lego Twin #1 and Backing

Lego Twin #2, quilting pattern "Bauhaus"

Lego Twin #1 and #2 are finished and gifted, both 84"  x 61". The Lego backing fabric inspired me to make quilts for my neighbor's boys.  It is 64" wide so as a backing it didn't need to be pieced, but it was on backorder for a couple of months.  The colored stripes are from two Moda Marbles jelly rolls, with some replacement and additional strips. The pink strips were pulled, and replaced with the dark green and royal blue strips, and some additional red strips were added to have enough strips. The royal isn't the same fabric line but very close. I did need to purchase the dark green marbles fabric, otherwise all the top and binding fabrics were from stash. 

One of the grey fabrics had sun fading on the folded edges, as it was in in front of a wire basket in the studio. There was a large enough piece of some sun-resistant outdoor fabric to make a simple hemmed cover for the three basket stacks, and I'll have to be careful to check other fabrics that had been near the front of the baskets.

In my Knitting, after swatching for a couple different sweaters, I've settled on making a cabled version of a simple top-down raglan. I was expecting to have blue fingers as the cotton is indigo-dyed, but so far only the wooden cable needle is showing the color. The sweater is in my Ravelry projects.

 

 

Oh the Irony!

After finally getting the 3 Blocks applique project (previous post) assembled, the reality that my main sewing/applique machine Bernina 550 needed service hit. The service icon had been up for several weeks, and DH was making a trip near the sewing machine shop, so off it went. Ouch on the estimate. 

The applique project has been pin-basted and carefully folded up awaiting the return of the 550, practice with the Bernina Stitch Regulator, and finishing. Out from the closet came the old retreat machine, my beloved Bernina 1130 that is fortunately in good working order, and I've plowed through an entire rail fence top with no problems.

Then… piecing machine #2 had a broken tension spring. It’s an older Juki straight stitch. I don’t know how long I had been sewing on it with a broken spring. Lately I’d been hemming repurposed fabric for pillow covers and flat cloths. After a lengthy search online, hopefully the right tension spring ($10) has been located and ordered – cheaper than another $$ trip to the repair shop – which is option #2 if my repair doesn’t work.

And the walking foot on my studio machine, mainly used for binding, heavy work and piecing battings, had a break on the plastic casing of the walking foot that holds the quilting bar. This machine is sometimes called into service for heavy duty quilting. DH found a plastic washer and epoxy and glued it on the outside of the casing to hold the guide foot in place. The cost of a new walking foot for this older Janome wasn't justified as the walking foot works fine and the guide bar is only in occasional use.

Think positive thoughts for my old Bernina and the serger.

Three Blocks

 Three blocks from McKenna Ryan's "Nesting" pattern, fused but not yet stitched.

I waited until the block patterns were on sale, and it took me over a year to actually start on the blocks. Once I got going, it was assembled in about a week. The blocks were enlarged from 8" to 12", and even so some pieces were very small. I'd done one of McKenna's patterns many years ago. I changed up the colors quite a bit - had to have a red boot, re-drew the birds to look like goldfinches, and the wheelbarrow needed to be blue like ours. The center block watering can has a scrolling design, and I'll probably enhance the design and give it more weight with thread as it looks washed out.

Friday Finishes

I've wanted to make a picnic quilt for over a year, and had all kinds of designs in mind. Wide canvas in green was purchased for the backing, so there was a target size - 56 x 68. Finally, the utility of the quilt pointed to a simple design, squares cut 4 1/2". The starting fabric was a gifted piece that was challenging to use, it has large white un-finished paint by number bird and flower images (Moda - Lush Uptown 'Paint by Number' by Erin Michael.) I loved the red background, and since there was a lot of green, a red and green checker quilt was the goal. Almost half of the red blocks were able to be cut from the print, and other reds were pulled in.

For the greens, one floral print with white and yellow flowers was the main fabric, and assorted leafy prints rounded out the green blocks. Most of the squares are laid out in diagonal strips of varying lengths. They seem to pull the eye along instead of jumping from print to print. There's a bit of "mushiness" where one floral was almost half-green/half red, but it was a sentimental piece and needed to be included.

Keeping with the no-stress design, straight lines -- two through each square in each direction, were quilted on the longarm. They are equal distant from each seam, and the center opening is slightly larger (4 doesn't divide by 3 easily.) On a domestic machine I continued with stitch-in-the-ditch along all seams.

Also finished is knitted Little Dragon #6, grey with pink accents. I had to figure out how to make the "afterthought" bobbles, where in the pattern they are knit from the main body color.

Project Round-up

I love seeing quilts photographed outside, though the weather has to cooperate. I had thought our horse fencing and cedar fence would be a great place to hang quilts...until it was clear that the birds love to sit on the top rail, especially the robins and quail. The salal is in berry right now, not so tidy. Smaller quilts can be photographed on the design wall, but the lighting can still be a challenge.

Bricks 6-piece charity quilt, 88” x 60.5” 

There are a lot of quilts made with these colors, to the point that it's getting hard to pick the correct picture from the folder! This is a scrappy bricks-type quilt, with only 6 pieces per block. The block is a rectangle, and the sizes are limited since you alternate vertical and horizontal columns. Of course partial blocks could be an option. It gives a different look than the square blocks with 8 pieces.

Preemie Quilt, Chicken Panel

The last two preemie quilts made from chicken fabric - one panel and a coordinate that I picked up at a guild meeting for this purpose. I thought this tilted setting might be more interesting than a straight set, though if using such a panel again would stick to a straight set.

Dragon #5, Ozzie's

Dragon #5 is another mini, about 6" tall. Each one gets a bit more refined. I've used up almost all of the poly batting scraps that were pulled apart for stuffing.  I'm tempted to buy a bag to continue knitting toys. I've also fallen in love with a sewing pattern for a cat named "Mr. Socks" at Ann Wood Handmade, though she uses wool stuffing. 

I'm piecing the last 24 of the Twirla blocks, and sewing masks in small batches. I bought the Creative Grids mask template with three sizes, and have been adding 1" to the outside fabric on the straight end to make a casing for elastic, similar to a downloadable free pattern used earlier. Sewing in the elastic makes it harder to adjust the size, plus some elastic gives out after time. 

I saw a tip on the Selvage Blog about using a bead to make the elastics adjustable, and have a question in to her on the bead specifics. I've made masks for several neighbors of all sizes, and getting the elastic the right length is a challenge. With a casing at the sides, pleats aren't needed, and I've been making the elastic a loop tied with a knot, so they can be adjusted, but the bead idea looks slick. I've made some with long ties too, using a bias maker, as they are supposed to be more comfortable for those who wear glasses and/or wear masks all day (such as DH.)

Slowly, Slowly Catchy Dragon

9-Patch Plus, started from a small group of 2.5" squares, some gifted to me, others cut from scraps. Quilted with a combination of freehand curves on the longarm and diagonal stitching on the Juki. I thought the curves would help soften all the straight lines, and kept notes on doing a variation that doesn't put so many threads in the center of each 9-patch block.

9-Patch Plus, 54" x 42'

Mini "Little Dragon", 5 inches tall

This little fellow didn't want to leave the house, and hung around until Dragon #4 was finished.

Mini "Little Dragon", 6 inches tall

The next dragon, another "mini" version, will be a combination of yarns from #3 and #4.
Also in progress are Twirla blocks, and the first of two aqua "Bricks" quilts is ready for binding..

Two Finishes

Yesterday was very rainy, which kept me out of the garden and at work in the studio. Finally bound is "Crayons", based on Color Me by Emily Herrick. This quilt was my way of justifying my large box of strings. It is waiting for a special home, either to a friend or a raffle.

Crayons, 69.5” x 51.5” 

Quilting pattern "Spilled Ink"

Several years ago, a friend gave a demonstration at an American Sewing Guild meeting making a rope basket using clothesline as the core, wrapping strips of fabric around it as you stitched. She had purchased extra bundles of clothesline and I bought one. I'd made coiled baskets before using yarn, which is a slow process. Not long ago I saw some baskets made just with variegated thread, and really liked how they looked. I needed a container for the studio for collecting the leftover bits of projects to come back into the house. This was sized to fit a wall shelf. 

It used up all 100 feet of clothesline and some of the older 30 wt variegated thread that I prefer not to use on the longarm. It took only 6 bobbins and less than 2 hours total. The top binding is home dec weight fabric scraps. I also used a new tool, the Folded Corner Clipper to cut the binding ends before sewing together for a continuous binding.  Krista Moser had demonstrated the tool at a meeting and has a Youtube video demonstrating it. It was really fun and easy to stitch the basket.

Clothesline bowl

Little Dragon

"Little Dragon" pattern by Susan B. Anderson, finished size 8" tall. It was a goal to finish some charity scarves before buying this pattern, and it was finished within one week. A bit fiddly, but just as charming as the pattern photo, though a bit larger. The yarn is probably an Aran weight, an overdyed natural grey that was a bit rough for a hat and not enough for a scarf. There will likely be a 2nd dragon with this yarn and perhaps a third, smaller version in sock weight yarn.

Latest Finishes

Much gardening is happening now, both real and online. We're spreading the most recent load of mulch and trying to get the grass established in the area recently raised to prevent being underwater. The vegetable garden (all raised beds) is in full swing, and a couple of ornamental plant orders should be arriving soon.  The Master Gardener training is all online for now and it's very informative.  With the class, reading list and assignments it's also cutting into sewing time. I'm looking forward to eventually having field trips.

The Spiderweb Quilt is finished, and washed with some color-catchers. There had been a bit of color bleeding when I wetted down the lumpy intersections. There was still a small spot of bleeding through to the light backing.

Spiderweb Quilting

The Scrappy Crayons is ready for quilting, and stash had just the right backing. Lately I've been seeing more of my gifted quilts being used on the floor, so wanted a dark backing. This is also why I chose the tiny black/white check as the sashing and background for the tips.

Scrappy Crayons

In progress are two tops, one started from a collection of 2.5" squares, 9-patch layouts and the other is a shoeboxes full of "bricks", cut 5.5" x 3.5" blue/green/aqua, making a rectangle with 8 pieces per block. The nine-patches are fun to sew, and putting all the blocks up helps me to see what color fabrics are needed to fill it out. I'm ready to cut out a new project, but holding off until these two tops are sewn. 

Nine patch blocks in progress

There's an accumulation of partial bobbins with brown and green thread, which is pointing at the next top being a brown and green charity quilt cut out and ready for sewing. It's another "gingham" style quilt, all squares, and has s backing fabric with it.

Spring projects

Gardening is in full swing now, and there is less sewing going on than in the past couple of months. I'm also studying to become a Master Gardener.  I've made a few masks, so far just for our use (I've offered to neighbors and family who declined.) Living in a sparsely populated area has its advantages, so we use the masks just for shopping trips. About 2/3 of the customers at Home Depot were wearing masks, and those who didn't wear one also had no clue about personal space (waaay less than 6 feet.)

The other non-quilty sewing consisted of two pillow covers for the new sofas. Previously I'd re-covered two cushions and hemmed a large piece of yardage to protect the back of the sofa from the sun. Using an outdoor fabric that is both fade-resistant and washable, the covers overlap on the back side with a narrow hem, without zippers or buttons. 

The current obsession project is scrappy crayons. I've finished eight strips - yellow, orange, pink, red, light green, green and light blue, with two more to come. Some colors did not have as many fabric options. These are mainly narrow trimmings from quilt backings or scraps. It's a bit fussy but I like how it is looking.

The floral HST quilt is quilted, bound and labeled for donation. Finished size is 76" x 64".. Quilted with "Wildflowers".

Twin Boxes is quilted and bound. I'm not sure where it is headed. Size: 85.5" x 68.5", quilted with "Bauhaus".

The Spiderweb top is assembled. It was a bit of a slog, but I persisted. The intersections are not as accurate as I would have liked. Using the spray bottle liberally when pressing, the Rinseaway stabilizer softened up a lot at the intersections. Originally I was planning on a busy backing, then realized that spiderweb quilting would be fun if it shows on the back, so I found a light grey print. I may quilt a couple of spiders on it too. This is a small lap-sized quilt.

Motivation

I’ve been looking at spider web quilts for a while now, and added quite a few to a Pinterest board. The versions with a matching narrow band on each side of the center kite shape were appealing. I used rinse-away stabilizer as the foundations, as it could be left in place and would make the small scraps stronger. A small quilt was drawn up in EQ8, the size determined by the width of the rinse-away, and a trial set of 12 triangles cut. A yellow paisley was chosen for the centers, and one of the colors in the fabric – red – cut into 1” strips.

The best part about scrappy quilts is the variety of fabrics, and the chance to use things up. There are lots of strings waiting to be used, and after sewing the red strips to the 12 yellow kites, I started stringing the blocks along. And after pressing, it was apparent that the blocks were too much the same. The narrow red strips seemed too strong. So, the triangles were tossed in the trash.

Then they were rescued, after I realized they didn't all need to have red sashings. I was able to find variety for both the center kites and narrow strips. I also realized that if all the centers were sewn with the sashing pairs, it would be easy to mix them up and use long strings for the other pieces.

I wound up with 3 center fabrics, adding a red bandana print (2 similar prints) and a bright blue with yellow flowers. The paisley has both red and blue in the print. The narrow 1" sashings were cut either 8.5” long (for 2 triangles) or 17” long (4 triangles), since I wanted them to match for sets of 4. After sewing the first side and pressing, they were cut apart and the second side sewn and pressed (as above.) Next I’ll cut these apart, mix them up, and start sewing the next strips on. Some will be long, and I’ll also make use of short strips and even some triangle scraps to fill them out.

Quilts A-Plenty

Another catch-up post with many finished quilts. I made a batch of NICU quilts with fabric picked up at a quilt meeting. I learned to investigate the nicely folded fabrics, as one piece had actually been cut out as a dress. Still, I was able to cut hourglass blocks for (almost) 2 small quilts. I had to piece some of them and made some surprise pinwheels as a secondary pattern.

2 NICU quilts 36" x 24"

There were two chicken panels, one with a wide border (which I split) around tossed chickens, and another with chicken blocks. These two were quilted with my chicken wire pattern. The last two quilts still need to be quilted.

2 NICU quilts 36" x 24"

The gingerbread man cutting die was on backorder until after Christmas, and when it finally arrived I cut some bright plaid people for a NICU quilt.  I thought they turned out cute and need to raid the scrap tub for more 6" "people" blocks. 

NICU quilt 36" x 24"

Scrapbag Strippy - using rectangles cut 4.5" wide and blue 2..5" WOF strips gave this quilt structure. It was a fun and easy way to use up odd sizes of fabrics. The rows were laid out on the design wall to distribute the fabrics.

Scrapbag Strippy 71" x 45"

Two charm pack gifts and some green FQ's won from a blogger's contest came together for a simple checker quilt. I opted to use the FQ squares in two rows together, giving just a bit of structure. The borders and binding were cut from a green ombre fabric that I found challenging to use. The quilt was quilted with "Lush Leaves" and gifted to a young neighbor.

Charms & Greens 80" x 62"

A twin quilt that had been cut out months ago was quickly pieced, assembled and quilted for a friend's church that had requested more quilts for their transitional housing units. One simple block, with an offset square. I'll make this pattern again.

Offset Squares 91" x 61"

This quilt was pieced by my son when he was about 10. It was never used, and I gave it a quilting update to make it strong enough for a charity quilt.

Space Quilt 36" square

Another oldie - a canning jar swap quilt from perhaps 20 years ago? Recently pulled out of storage and given to a neighbor. The two jars on their side have buttons - ladybug and bees "flying" away.

Two feather block placemats, quilted in a chevron pattern on the Juki. Originally pieced for a bag using a quilt as you go Craftsy class. A UFO finish.

In progress is a half-square triangle quilt, using a floral print plain block alternating with HST blocks from pale blue shirt fabric with colors pulled from the print.