Design Wall Monday--8/3/2020

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

I've been shopping the stash to finish up all the lingering projects and squirrel projects. I finished off the binding for Dreamweaver and attached a label, the quilt also had its first bath;  I did not get to deliver the quilt or get pics of it yet with our son and daughter-in-law, perhaps next weekend.  There was leftover binding so I used it for a Guild baby quilt in progress. 

Looking back, I started this Houndstooth quilt THREE years ago.  Sheesh.  I could have cropped this photo better, but at least my pedicure still looks good--can't say the same about my manicure :)

Walking foot quilting with random spaced lines and then 3 step zig zag in an aqua thread.

Binding with a lighter print is a fun change.  I was annoyed at missing some of the binding while ditch stitching from the front, so added another line of machine stitching IN the binding.  I think it looks good, even if non-traditional. 

Backing with leftover flannel and scraps.   It finishes at about 40" square or so. Glad to have it off the list at last!

In the Squirrel category, I had a finished top that seemed too small to be very useful.  I bought the kit for the gingham plaid quilt at Sewtopia Boston nearly two years ago.  Shopping stash again for a border, I found a print that coordinated well with the teal green of the patchwork fabrics.

Pretty sure that was a quilting cotton I bought at Joann's several years ago.

Won't this make a cute picnic or beach quilt?  I've cobbled together a backing from leftovers and stash so that part is sorted. 

A Squirrel tablerunner also needed backing and binding.  I must have pulled 10 different choices for a pieced backing before cutting to the chase with a single fat quarter. 

I love the way channel quilting looks and chose to group together three lines across the piece.

I used a Hera tool to score the groups 1" apart, and the edge of the walking foot to space the quilting lines themselves.  Binding also got attached but I decided to hand stitch that down, a task for another day. 

Usually this time of year I would be showing how my entries did at our County Fair, but of course that was cancelled due to COVID-19.  Our County is still on a watch list, with more deaths and illnesses.  Scary times to be in crowded conditions.  There is always next year to hope for!

Design Wall Monday--Baby Quilt Finishes

I'm late to Design Wall Monday, but there are lots of great posts already linked on Judy's Small Quilts and Doll Quilts blog for enjoyment.

There was a lot of binding finished since the last post.  I completed four baby quilts for Philanthropy donation for Guild. 

I forgot to take photos of the bound quilts and had a fellow guild member take a few after I dropped them at her place. 

Pink binding for the girly cupcake and ice cream parlor quilt...

Pezzy Print in black and white for the farm animals. 

Speckled aqua for the X-Plus block quilt.

I pulled out another unfinished guild project and scrapped a larger  Houndstooth quilt for a baby sized one.  I had to do some block unstitching to include additional colors, and a little bit of trimming of the pieced blocks, but in a couple of hours the top was finished.

I made the blocks with 10" and 5" cut squares in reverse colorways, paired and stitched on either side of a drawn line down the center, and then cut apart.  There was a pile of already trimmed striped blocks at 9.5" and that sped things up a bit.  Jenny Doan of Missouri Quilt Co has a different method starting with 5" precuts and yardage to make the striped blocks, but I like these big ones which make a quilt with far fewer blocks.

This subtle print fools the eye, right?  This should quilt up fast with likely some channel stitching.  I have some bright plaid print fat quarters for the backing.  These are going to a Mom and Baby exercise class, which hopefully will be able to meet someday again soon. 

..And that leads me to the countdown for our next grandson, who is now 10 weeks from arriving!  We also heard the news that he will be getting three more cousins later this year, identical twin girls arriving in December via our nephew and his wife, and a boy cousin from our daughter-in-law's sister and her husband.  Happy news to celebrate is a very good thing!

Bits and Bobs

I haven't sewn anything yet this week, but did finally get the borders on the Cross Reference quilt (APQ mag April 2017) for my son over the weekend. Borders are so boring to attach, I dragged it out for two weeks, I think.  This is why many of my quilts have no borders!

Now for backing, batting, binding.  I used my GO! 2.5" strip cutter for the outer border and binding strips.  Not sure yet what I'm going to use for the backing, but will purchase white batting to keep the bright cream look.  I promised him it will be finished by his birthday, which is next Monday.  He keeps teasing me that his girlfriend is cold when she sits on his couch.  I'll aim for Sunday night, when we will gather here for a family BBQ.  Deadlines are good for me.

This mess is the UFO Challenge pick of the month, which I plan to turn in to guild as a top.  Due to unforced errors, I am short of the proper sized blocks for the alternate stripes that form the Houndstooth design.  Unfortunately, after messing about with this months ago and cutting a bunch of different pieces from stash, I did not write down my intentions and have to puzzle it out again.  MATH.  Ugh.

And now for some grandson spam:

Check out the eyelashes on Cove! When I was helping DD Elaine get the sleeping boys out of the car that day, both had one shoe on and one shoe off.  Loved that.

The family had a recent few days at Bass Lake in Northern California with friends and spent a lot of time in/on the water.  Cove even consented on the last day to ride the tube pulled behind the boat.  His mother was afraid he might pop out at one point, he is so lightweight, but he enjoyed it, calling it the "best roller coaster ever", according to his mom. 

Hunter crashed in his life vest out after an afternoon in the water.  So cute.  I'm happy the family has gone on so many outings, sorry we were not able to do the same for our kids when they were little, due to DH and me working most weekends and seldom having vacation days at the same time.  We did what we could!  

I'm off to the eye doctor and dry cleaners before work--such an exciting life :)

Sewing Room Orts

While I continue attaching the too-boring-to-show borders for Cross Reference, here are some other things going on around in the sewing room. 

In a sweatshop weekend  I completed two charity quilts for Guild last weekend. This Houndstooth top I actually made myself, and lo and behold it came back to me to be quilted and bound.  Sigh.

Fortunately I didn't have to make the backing or cut the batting--that was done by other volunteers. 

 

I meant for the Guild label to be in the right lower corner but it refused.  I quilted this with randomly wavy lines and hope it looks intentional enough. I ran out of bobbin thread twice and barely had enough on the spool to sew on the binding.  Gah.

This one was made of donated blocks that some other members sewed up, with the backing too.  I added some colorful leftover binding to add interest to the solid binding fabric with the kitted top.  Glad to have those saved lengths used up. 

While not technically modern, it is bright and cheerful and should please someone.  Simple straight line quilting for this one.  I did manage to get the label where I wanted it, but it refused to be straight.  After all that stitching, the organization contacted never responded so the two quilts went to the Philanthropy coordinator to be handed out later.  Well, they are off my list, anyway!

As usually happens while one is looking for something else, in the Hoosier cabinet I came across a bunch of bonus HSTs from the Picnic quilt. 

Above is the original layout idea, but I couldn't help playing some more. 

I squared the HSTs to 1.75 " and played switcheroo.  The upper right is one I made probably two years ago and shows how much they shrink when sewn--to about 5.5".  I'm really loving the Broken Dishes one on the lower left.  No idea when I'll be stitching them together but it was fun to play with little pieces.

Sue Goes to the Orient had a little more work done.  I bravely threaded my machine with black thread and thread sketched around the applique pieces.  Good thing they were fairly unfussy shapes, except for the shoes.

It's a pretty forgiving technique and one it would be fun to explore more. I'd like to thread sketch a couple of Chinese hanging lanterns in the background to continue the theme and add a little more detail to the scene.   I have a few ideas saved on Pinterest and am considering that as part of the quilting.

Meanwhile Sue remains a UFO until I add that detail, choose a backing and get her quilted. She's not going to languish in the box, though, I have promised her. 

Judy of Patchwork times chose the UFO for August as #8, which on my list is another of the Houndstooth charity quilts in a different colorway.  It has been in Time Out since I used the wrong sized squares to make the striped blocks.  I have to figure out how incorporate additional fabrics I already selected and assemble the alternate blocks.  Dragging my feet on that job, obviously.

The event of the decade arrives Monday with the Total Solar Eclipse, which will only be a dimming here on the SoCalif coast.  Perhaps I'll have time to look up from my computer and see it out the window, though they are predicting our usual morning low clouds and fog could obscure it.  No matter, I haven't got the special glasses anyway!  

Back to those boring borders....

Design Wall Monday 10/24/16

On my design surface is the Starcrossed quilt (pattern by Corey Yoder in APQ mag April 2016) I've been working on for DD Erica.    All the pieces are now cut for the two different blocks I'm making, 10 of each, and subsections ready to go.

The plum print on the lower left is a shot cotton in plum and black with a gold ginkgo print.  Unfortunately I don't recall the maker, and my local fabric store doesn't have point-of-sale info on their receipts.  Next trip I'll check the bolt!

Photographing purples is sure a challenge, especially at night!  The leaves are not large but the spray is so pretty.  I love ginkgo trees and leaves, and we have quite a few in our neighborhood. 

This closeup shows the shot cotton base in the 4.5" square I cut for a feature block. 

Unpicking of the inner corner chain was necessary to add the ginkgo print for this cross block; it is kind of a signature thing I often do, one block different as the "heart" of  my quilts.  I'll be happily piecing and pressing away on these big blocks for the next week when I have time. 

Last week our MQG had a sew-in for philanthropy.  I'm so glad my suggestion to have weeknight sew-ins has worked out--the Masonic Lodge building manager is very generous in letting us come in when the room is not being used for one of their events.  We worked on assembling some donated blocks and I had help from two members in marking and sewing pieces for houndstooth block kits I had cut from fabric purchased by the board.  

The Guild president picked this blue and gray and I think it looks great so far.  All the pieced blocks got made and I managed to get a few squared up to demonstrate the layout.  For the guild blocks, I started with 10" and 5" squares for the pieced blocks so precuts could be used.  The solid alternate block is 9.5".  It is really simple construction and there are so many ways to change it up.  I have another kit to sew up as well before handing off to another guild member at the next sew-in in a few weeks. 

See more Design Walls on Judy's Patchwork Times.