Cherries Jubilee Flimsy

The red and cream version of my scrap project is now a finished flimsy. I have no idea how many different fabrics are in it. A lot, for sure. The 6" blocks were addictive to make in batches of four. Each little square finished at 1-1/2 inches. Here's an indoor photo on my design wall; I'll get an outdoor photo with better lighting later. 

Two of the cream fabrics have cherries in the print. For that plus the overall red and white color scheme I'm calling this quilt Cherry Jubilee. 

The cream fabrics all came from my stash and the reds are about half from my fabrics and half from PCQ's stash. This will be a donation quilt. This top measures 64" wide by 88" long, so it can work for a twin bed. 

It'll be a while until I can quilt it; the club's long arm has been out of order for over a month already and they've determined it needs a new motherboard. The club voted to authorize the expenditure. Now they're working with Gammill to get the repair scheduled. Then there's a backlog of booked time slots that will have to be rescheduled. 

Link ups: Small Quilts and Doll Quilts 12/16,  Oh Scrap! 12/16,   Alycia Quilts 12/20

Let's Try This Again

 Making the Black and Tan quilt was both enjoyable and challenging. It took a bit of care to get the values right; some seam ripper activity was definitely involved. But the final result looked good and the recipient of the quilt loved it. What more could I ask for?!!

I decided to remake the same pattern using my abundant teal stash. In order to get the values right with fewer missteps, I printed out a greyscale version of the Black and Tan quilt to use as a guide. 

I sorted my fabric pull into darks, medium and light turquoises, and whites. I'm using three constants, a white print for the border and some of the blocks, a navy print for the triangle points, and a teal print for the centers of all the nine-patch blocks. 

So far I have only a few test blocks made. We'll see how this goes....

Link up: Small Quilts and Doll Quilts

November Stash Report and Goals Update

November was an odd month for quilting goals. Not much on the goals list got done; instead I spent time on an unplanned new project. Like that's never happened to any quilter ever! Chasing squirrels is much more fun than following a to-do list.  

Road Trip got its sleeve added and now it's completely finished and ready to hang. 

The Black and Tan quilt is finished and was sent off to a friend. 

The stash report is still looking good for the year, even with the purchase of some backings. The only fabric used in November was 1/2 yard for the sleeve on Road Trip. Everything for the Black and Tan quilt was previously counted. 

November Stash Report: 

IN this month: 7-1/2 yards (wide backings) 
OUT this month: 1/2 yard (Sleeve for Road Trip)

IN YTD: 79 yards
OUT YTD: 93-1/8 yards
YTD Net change: 14-1/8 yards out.

Goals Update:

The goals were very hit and miss this month. Part of the problem was beyond my control because the club's long arm machine is out of order, so my November time slot got cancelled. We don't know when it will be repaired so setting goals for December is conditional on machine availability. 

November Recap

1. Send Black & Tan quilt to friend. Done and received

2. Attach sleeve to Road Trip. Done

3. Put Round About on the wall and figure out how to proceed. Yes, figured out the first round, pieced the arcs and joined them, basted it, and sent it back to Cherie for her to applique the edge down. 

4. Quilt Kevin's tops on the long arm on 11/23. NO, the long arm machine is out of order and is unavailable. My time slot got cancelled and they don't know when the machine will be back up and running.

5. Pin baste or spray baste the Kaffe Gradient top. No, not touched.

6. Plan a complex or slow piecing project to work on at social sewing. Yes, found a scrappy project from Pinterest that uses small pieces and lots of small blocks. 

7. Finish the navy & pink LCT top. No, put it away for a future retreat.

Other: Inspired by the scrappy project (#6 above) I've been piecing blocks for a twin size red and cream version. 

December Goals:

1. Work on the slow scrappy project at social sewing.

2. Finish the red and cream scrappy top.

3. Plan a turquoise version of the Black and Tan quilt to use up some of my aqua/turquoise/teal stash, and practice getting the value placement right.

4. Layer and baste the Kaffe gradient project.

5. Go through all the UFOs and plan what and how to finish in 2025.

6. Consider the scraps and leftover blocks and block parts from Road Trip and figure out how to make something with them. 

7. If the long arm machine gets fixed and I get a time slot, quilt Kevin's tops.

8. Clean up the sewing room; organize the stash, scraps, and UFOs. 

This looks like a long list with 8 items but not intimidating so I don't think I'll have trouble addressing them, except for the long arm issue. The sewing room clean-up isn't as huge as it sounds because for the most part it's somewhat organized. 

Carried Away

In my previous post (scroll down) I talked about a project to work on at social sewing that would use up scraps. While I was making blocks one at a time at social sewing, it occurred to me that it would be easier and more efficient to make strip sets and sub-cut them. So, I tried that with a couple of red and cream strips of fabric. One WOF strip yields enough pieces for 12 blocks.

Which led to the concept of a whole red and cream quilt. 

Which inspired me to start making blocks. I put a few of them on the wall to see how this would look. Here's one option: 

Here are the same blocks with a different orientation:

Either way it'll be a cool quilt in red and cream. I'll put more blocks on the wall to see if I like the diagonal setting or the chevron layout better. Do you have a preference?

The strips are cut 2" wide and the blocks finish at 6". The blocks are so addictive to make that I may have gotten a bit carried away, making them in batches of four at a time. I now have all of the dark blocks that I need, and many of the light ones, for a twin bed size quilt comprised of five light columns and four dark ones. I'll frame the whole thing with a red border to control all those seams around the edges. 

For a project that started on a whim, this has turned into an obsession! 

Link up: Small Quilts and Doll Quilts

A New Scrappy Project

I need to have a slow project to work on at social sewing, something that won't get finished quickly. Something I can pick up and put down without losing my place in the construction process, since I plan to only work on it once a week, sometimes less. 

I recently saw something on Pinterest (no attribution, if anyone recognizes the source please leave a comment). I liked the image and I thought it might be just what I need. I have an overabundance of 2" strips cut for previous projects, and overflowing scrap drawers. This could work. 

After studying the photo and breaking down how the blocks are made, I made a few test blocks. 

Basically it's all about the placement of lights and darks. I think this will work. I've stocked my project kit with strips of white and off-white, and a random assortment of colors. 

After two days of social sewing, I now have a few more blocks made, enough to see more of the pattern. Even though I studied the blocks and figured out their construction, I've had to use the seam ripper on almost every block so far. Getting the pieces oriented in the right direction to feed under the needle is the biggest issue, but I think I have it figured out now. The light blocks need to feed differently than the dark blocks. Stupid mistakes like not putting the fabrics right sides together generated more seam ripper activity, too. Easy to do in a social environment. These little blocks are addictive to make, though. 

Since the blocks finish at only 6", it will take a lot of them to make even a lap quilt, 55 light and 44 dark blocks for the 54 x 66" size shown above. I think this will make a nice donation quilt. And I'm hoping it will make a dent in my scraps. 

Link up: Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts

Road Trip, Finished

 Finally! Quilted, labeled, bound, and sleeve sewn on, ready to hang in my foyer. 

Because the piecing is so busy, it didn't need fancy quilting, just a simple meander that I was capable of doing myself. 

The backing is a print in all the right colors that I found at Sheila's shop at retreat last April. Another retreater and I loved it so much that together we bought the whole bolt. 

Even though there were some design missteps and challenges, and quite a bit of seam ripper activity, I enjoyed making this and I'm pleased with the result. It finished at 87 x 90". 

Link ups:  Alycia Quilts 11/22;  My Quilt Infatuation 12/5

Donation Tops from Kevin

A while back, my buddy Kevin the Quilter had asked if he could send me donation tops. He has nowhere to donate them to. Kevin has been busy piecing. Let me tell you, his piecing is exquisite; every seam is perfect on the back. He sent two beautiful tops. 

Did I mention scrappy? Scrappy is definitely Kevin's thing; he used to run a Scrap Club back before covid. I actually found a few familiar favorites among the fabrics here, probably left over from projects we worked on together. The pieces in the top above finish at 1-1/2", and the top is 45 x 60 inches.

I particularly like the layout of this one, so unusual. This top measures 48 x 64 inches. Each of these pieces is 1" - tiny! 

These tops represent many hours of careful piecing, not to mention all the time and effort needed to organize so many scraps and cut so many tiny squares. Thank you, Kevin! 

I have backing for them on order and I'll quilt them at the end of the month. Wide backing fabric in a light blue with white swirls will complement both of these tops. I'll load them side-by-side on the long arm and quilt them both at the same time. 

I enjoy quilting with my new Pebble Creek friends, but I miss my Missouri friends, too. Fond memories of sewing together! 

Link up: Small Quilts and Doll Quilts