Design Wall Monday--2/25/19

Design Wall Monday is here.  See more Design Walls on Judy's Small Quilts and Doll Quilts. 

The rest of February will fly by this week, but I have been stitching and my Design Floor has seen a number of projects in progress.

I managed to get the label done for the just-turned-1-year old of a family friend--the pieced backing was all from stash.  The plaid has the same green as the Kona Tarragon solid on the front and binding.  I delivered the quilt to DD Erica on Friday and she'll take it to her friend. Can't wait to see little Sid on the quilt. 

Another backing was cobbled from leftover flannels for the baby quilt version of Falling Charms. It's folded in this pic but really is big enough.

Here's a pic of the finished top.  This is to be packaged up with batting for my sister to quilt, then I'll bind it before handing in to Guild for donation.  I kitted up a couple more charm square groupings to sew in the near future.

More Log Cabin Loonie blocks have been forming, my version of Julie's block are 7.5" unfinished.  Lots of 1.5" strips are getting cut from the scrap bins.

There are now 41 finished blocks and another dozen in progress--80 are required for my setting plan.

I spent some time organizing and culling the scrapbooking drawers I use for precut strips from scraps, separating solids by neutrals and colors to their own drawers.  I really must keep up on the scrap management--my cutting table regularly gets out of control!    

We celebrated our 34th wedding anniversary Sunday--well, we were going to have dinner out but then my husband called with a dead car battery, from the mall where he had been on an errand. The jump from my car didn't work so we had to call my mechanic brother for help, then went to his shop and he put in a new battery.  By that time it was  nearly 7:30 pm, our reservation had been canceled, and I voted for staying home for leftover homemade soup and cookies.  We'll reschedule the nice dinner out :)  Our grandsons have their shared birthday this week and then our youngest daughter has her birthday the following week.  It's a busy time of the year for celebrating--five weeks in a row for our family. 

Next up, I will revisit my Three For September challenge beginning March 1.  I've made my list of quilts and will work on one project every three days for the month of March.  The self-challenge I did in September was very energizing and I'm looking forward to more progress on WIPS, perhaps even a couple of finishes.

Sewing and Celebrating

On and off my design floor are several small projects.  I spent more time with charm packs, as I mentioned last post.  The baby sized Falling Charms quilt got laid out and rearranged. 

This charm pack was called Wing and Leaf, lots of bright fun prints.  I have since sewn the blocks into rows and it will become a top in the next day or two.  I believe I have a good option for the backing in stash.  

I got the binding on Sid's quilt (for a family friend's son) and laid it out to show the quilting my sister did before I washed it. Love the baseball hats.  The cloudy day turned my tile pink in this photo but showed the quilting pretty nicely.  A label is all that is needed to get this one off to its new home.  

My mom turns 80 this month and there was a grand party for her this past weekend.  All told, we  were about 50 folks, most of them family, including her sister and 6 brothers, all 5 of us kids and most of her 16 grandchildren, and the three great-grandsons.  Mom requested a bagpiper to play and I managed to get a photo of them. 

He played a few songs, finishing up with Amazing Grace.   My grandsons weren't fans, covering their ears and heading into the house, but the rest of us enjoyed the novelty.  I decided last minute to make Mom a little quilt and cast about in the sewing room for something already in progress.  I happened upon the Sajou quilt from Humble Quilts' mystery sewalong a few months ago.  I had forgotten that I'd completed a backing as well.  I had set aside a green fabric for sashing but opted instead to bind the quilt as is.  A quickly pieced batting from scraps and SITD quilting and I was ready to add binding, which I pulled from stash.  

I didn't label the quilt as I wanted it to be double-sided.  Mom loved it and got lots of compliments on her gift.  I really enjoyed getting this finished and giving it to Mom.  Happy Birthday!

Mixed Bag Progress

Lots of good sewing time lately has countered all the wet and windy cool weather we've been having in SoCal lately.  This is Falling Charms from the Missouri Star Quilt Company.  Very simple and fast block construction--there is a video on their website.  I used two each of 40 prints for my layout.

I have since sewn all the block rows save for one more seam to join the two halves of the center. I'll add narrow borders then hopefully cobble together a back from stash--I'm on a fabric diet as all my storage bins and drawers are groaning!  We had a sew-in for guild and I used a different charm pack to make 25 blocks for this same layout for a baby quilt, but don't have a picture of that.  

For guild this month, we were to make new nametags.  I wanted to make a more modern style than my simple embroidered one from a few years ago, but it wasn't until the last minute that I dove into my "extra parts" drawer and found some little HSTs to inspire me. 

I used another leftover large HST sewn to the top and bottom of my name, turned under and stitched around all the edges and popped the nametag in a badge holder.  Do you keep leftover sewn parts in a separate drawer?  I find them handy now and again, but that drawer is also full!

A guild member proposed a round robin of another sort, the Pizza Box Challenge, and a bunch of us signed up for that.  The Pizza Boxes contain one finished block of our choosing and whatever "must use" fabrics and instructions.  I made a version of a Grayscale Quilt block (Cluck Cluck Sew blog--she has a tutorial) that we helped make at Sewtopia New Orleans for victims of the Las Vegas mass shooting.  The Las Vegas MQG member who was cutting pieces had devised a quick method to cut from sewn strip sets instead of individual pieces.  

I used the same method for my larger block, adding a final white 12.5" strip to the outside.

I put in the background white and invited others to add whatever solid color they wanted.  We will swap to the next pizza box every month and get ours back in a year.  I haven't peeped in the box I brought home yet, but it was very heavy with fabric!

Here's my written instructions for the block I made:

Clear as mud?  I may get questions...:)

My sister also brought back the baby quilt from charms I showed last month, so I need to apply the already-made binding and create a label for Sid's quilt.  It will be good to get a few more finishes this short month with the quick charm pack projects.  With my sister having a longarm, the already finished quilt tops in my closet will get in line too.  I need a roll of batting, I think!

Design Wall Monday-February 4

It's Design Wall Monday again.  See more design walls on Judy's Small Quilts and Doll Quilts

Is is just me, or did January go by in a flash for everyone?  Well, maybe not those stuck in the Polar Vortex...we've been getting plenty of rain and road closures due to flooding and mud flows from all the burn areas around here.  The hills are green green green, so pretty to look at, but all the grass can become fuel for fires later. 

I've been mowing down projects in my sewing room, trying to add stash fabrics to anything I can. The Moda Love Quilt quiltalong is going on now, and after making a layer cake sized Love quilt last year, I have wanted to try a different size, from a hoarded Bonnie and Camille Vintage Picnic charm pack.  I spent a great deal of time pulling neutrals and stash additions for the quilt--it became abundantly clear that I tend to buy off whites and not many light print backgrounds!

The charm pack had a lot more aqua and I had to sprinkle it around some.  I tried Bonnie Hunter's "webbing the top" method but had two blocks tangle and turn on me and had to take out seven seams to get them out of the red star center.  Of course they couldn't be on the edge!  This finishes at about 32" square so is nice wall quilt size.  #modalovequilt

I played with leftovers from the QOV blocks and came up with these little paddlewheels and windmill, so fun to put together.  I'll add this to the stack of blocks to mail in.  The QOV info said that while they accept other quilts, the majority of Veterans chose a patriotic themed quilt, when given a choice.

Since passing off a baby quilt to my sister to longarm for me, I got out the next priority project box.  I bought the charm packs and background fabric for this quilt probably two years ago--it is a long overdue gift for my son-in-law's  mom and stepdad.  I chose the Falling Charms Quilt from Missouri Star Quilt Co for this grouping: 

The Maison de Provence charm packs were from Connecting Threads, as was a neutral background.   Since I only ordered two charm packs of 28 squares each, I added stash fabrics to make up the 80 blocks for the 8x10 setting I want.  There is a very good video on YouTube for the quilt.  A jelly roll works but I cut the 2.5" strips with my Accuquilt GO cutter from yardage.  The squares now all have the first background strip on, and I got a dozen or so blocks done with the L-shaped sashing.  

Meanwhile, our younger daughter dropped a bridesmaid's dress alteration onto my list.  She called around but no one could make her deadline of Wednesday to shorten the dress before she gets on a plane for a friend's wedding.  So I'll be hemming a lot of chiffon and lining.  Fussy stuff but not a fit problem.  Erica laughed when she challenged me to find a matching thread for her mauve dress and I pulled out a perfect spool from the thread bins!  Stash is a good thing...except when it gets overwhelming.