Learning about my UFO’s and the in-between projects

I’ve been trying to analyze how my UFO’s develop. Some are just a bundle of fabrics that need to become a project. Some have been started and I’ve hit a stumbling point. Some of them are inherited UFO’s. If there is a goal for a project – a gift or charity quilt, they are more likely to get finished.

Two inherited projects are on their way out the door, to someone who wants them. I spent 5 years hand piecing an EPP diamond star queen-sized quilt with fabrics that I didn’t love (a gifted UFO), and relating that to why this project has been sitting for several years is clear.

One of my FAL goal projects, the chevron tablerunner, has all the blocks finished. This project did teach me about chain cutting. With a large cutting mat it works to lay out a bunch of pieces to cut apart and then move the ruler from place to place. Saves wear on the cutting mat by not being in the same spot.

One in-between project is a small charity quilt with oranges and yellows. This used up some small leftover pieces, and some larger coordinates. There are 8” squares, 4” squares and 4” four-patches.

The portable design wall is done. I found inexpensive wide tablecloth vinyl with a flannel backing, squared it up and hemmed.

Double Square Star

Another in-between is a Double Square Star quilt. I divided a bundle of 8 Sunprint FQs into two groups of four colors. They’re a quirky print. Four FQs plus some white 2 ½” strips will give a 36-block small quilt. The white sashing has two stich and flip triangles. If I make a quilt from the other four FQs I might use a 3” strip instead so the points at the edges have a bit more breathing room.

Knitting and crocheting has been ongoing. I’m knitting on my third charity hat using yarn purchased online that turned out to be rather drab, mainly grey (good color for men.) Also finished is another crochet scarf.  As I make my way through my yarn stash, I’m staying away from yarn sales and resolve to make purchases in person.

A new project in the works is Garden Party by Laura Heine, an applique flower and butterfly quilt. I saw it at the Sew Expo but didn't buy it while there. It was gifted to me for my birthday (early), and a small collection of bright fabrics is coming together.

Over the Top Finish

This quilt is just crazypants, but it was a fun learning quilt. Besides making the crazy-pieced blocks (nine at once) in Katie Pedersen's class, I learned to re-check the block size before cutting sashings, used the Sashing Stars ruler set from Marti Michell for the first time, and found that basting spray really is the way to go with spiral quilting. I played with the points in EQ, and decided  to place only one star point on the interior sashings.

Over The Top, 38" Square, 2016

Angular spiral quilting - starting from a square in the center - is a bit different than the round variety, but this quilt was asking for more angles. I love how the dense quilting feels - sturdy and soft at the same time.

For 2016 I'm trying to keep the mindset of "Stay Teachable", as there is always something to learn.

Disappearing Pinwheel

The disappointing Disappearing Pinwheel (albeit somewhat redeemed as a finished project) has been tracked down and photographed on the new design wall in my sewing room.

It is quilted with the pattern "Circle of Life" in bright blue, the binding is my favorite diagonal print black and white stripe, and the back is pieced with the remaining pinwheel block. It measures just under 38" square.

One project always leads to another - after installing the light grey flannel design wall behind my old green and white ironing mat cover, it's time an upgrade. The original mat cover was from June Tailor, but the layers came apart and it was recovered with canvas ticking that was on hand. It stretches over a piece of plywood and is hard to remove, so the new cover will either have a drawstring or elastic so it can be washed without struggle. It needs to be something dark enough to hide the green and white stripes.

FAL #4 Complete - Pinwheels

Last week my work quilts were smaller, giving me a window to quilt my Pinwheels Quilt. It is only 57" square, and after quilting a client's quilt that was about the same size with the pattern Spilled Ink, I knew it was do-able. I think this is my new favorite spiral pattern - even coverage, slightly oval, a bit quirky. Pinwheels and spirals were a fun combination.

Spilled Ink pattern, 3.5" across

The pinwheels started out as a Disappearing Pinwheel quilt - that didn't quite work. It came together in the year that I did not blog. I found the pattern on a blog somewhere, cut a test block using 5" squares, made the pinwheel, re-cut into 9 pieces easily. The block went together nicely - a Churndash with a pinwheel in the center.

Where things got tricky was trying to recreate those blocks using Summersville charms with pinked edges.  The semi-solid colors are a weave texture (Timeless?) After sewing all of the pinwheels, I started slicing up the blue and black pinwheels, and made some of the new blocks. The pinwheel blocks were a bit smaller than the test block, and the cutting and sewing was challenging. In a couple of places the seams were so scant, Steam a Seam was needed to add just a bit more fabric. A small quilt was finished with those blocks, and I'll have to track it down and take a photo.

The remaining blocks weren't quite enough on their own, but luckily I had bought some fq's of Summersville and had almost enough of the solids to make the smaller, floating pinwheels. I had to toss in another similar weave print to supplement the blue. This could also be called Perseverance #2, as it took me a bit to get over the disappointment of the original project.

The binding finishes about 3/4", and it was cut from leftover backing fabric, a Jinny Beyer sponge-print blender. I like slightly wider bindings on quilts without borders.

Over the Top

In late January I spent a fun day taking an Improv Piecing class from Katie Pedersen. My quilting space has a large number of fabric collections - leftovers from projects, fabrics that want to be together, project idea stacks. Learning a new technique sounded like fun, and it was.

Here are the nine blocks completed in class. It was a fabric sampler that had some pretty wild prints, plus the blue solid, chartreuse dot and black and white dots thrown in for contrast.

 

My goal was to make a small quilt, and just use stash. I though the solid blue would make a good sashing. They looked a bit lonesome floating on their own, so I used a specialty ruler to add star points, after having played with layouts in EQ. Not enough solid blue for the cornerstones, so they were sashed too.

 

It looks rather crazy now, but in a good way. I'm calling it "Over the Top", and keeping fingers crossed that I can get all the small pieces stitched together before the cat decides to pull pins out (the design boards sit on the floor.) Being in Katie's studio inspired me to make a new wall-mounted design wall for my sewing room, coming soon.

Finish-A-Long #3

My 2016 Finish-A-Long project #3 is completed - the Churndash Table Runner. This came to me as a partially sewn project in a bag; the seam allowances had issues and all were taken out. Turned out the pieces were not cut accurately and had to be trimmed as well. There were enough pieces for three Churndash blocks, and I chose to make a scrappy pieced backing from some of the other pieces. Fabric for the binding was short as well, so had to piece some muslin to the binding to make it stretch. I liked the fabrics, but perhaps the next recycled project will be passed along.

Quilting was stitch in the ditch, crosses in the center and echo along the triangle edges.

Last Sunday I made nine improv blocks in a class with Katie Pedersen last Sunday, and I've been playing with layout ideas in EQ. My goal is to make a small quilt or wall-hanging out of them.

Also started is the Bird Nest quilt, using a bird batik and some hand-dye batiks in sherbet colors. I'm using the Hex 'n More ruler and strips around the outside, still in the test piecing stage.

Weekend Finishes

After finishing my work quilting for the week, I was able to load the Colorblock 16-Patch Charity quilt on the longarm Wednesday evening. I used the last large piece of floofy Hobbs poly batting, so chose a quilting design that would work well with it - Butterflies. The backing is pale yellow floral. By mid-day Friday, it was off the machine, trimmed, and edges zig-zagged for Jennifer to bind. She had chosen the layout and headed up the group of four of us that put it together.  It finished at 80" x 70".



The Scrappy Flannel Charity quilt was on my design wall, and since I'd found a coordinating backing it was next to be quilted. It also has the floofy batting, which really shrunk into the flannel top, making it rather cozy. I played with freehand designs in the different fabrics. It was finished by Friday afternoon, and Saturday I found time after chores to assemble a scrappy binding from the leftovers box and finish it with a hem stitch, turning the binding to the top. Next time I'll use a different sewing machine as I like the buttonhole stitch better. Finished size 36" x 30".
 
Two of my eight 2016 Finish-A-Long projects done!






Today I made a lot of progress on the Churndash tablerunner, a "rescued" project that a quilter gave me. These must have been leftovers from a larger project. There were enough pieces for 3 churndash blocks, but it took some sorting as many of the rectangle pieces were too small. After putting the blocks together, I decided to use the leftover squares and strips to make a scrappy backing. I'll need to make a split binding to make use of a strip of the dark red for the binding.

I'm finding the Finish-A-Long helpful with keeping me focused on one project at a time, rather than getting side-tracked. I'm still looking at other fabrics and drawing blocks and quilts, as that is so much fun! Next week I'll be taking a 5-hour class on Improv Piecing which I'm very much looking forward to.