TBGO

Sewing the two-patches into four-patches is easy (but monotonous!), as the hand sewn ones had been bagged up tightly with the seams folded towards the green side for about two years so there was a nice firm crease.  I just had to butt the seams together and feed them through.  I did not hand sew to the edges of the patches, I left 1/4" seam allowance, so it will be really easy to spin the seams at the centre of the four patches. I just have these few to go......





....... these are done, I'm sure there are way more than I need, they will be bagged up for another project if so.


The joy of snipping all these is ahead!

I have started to iron all the triangles for TBGO, but that's a gutty job too!  I can see why Bonnie did this as a leaders and enders project rather than the main focus project! Very glad I had all the pieces cut and ready to go. This is about 1/4 of the pile.


 

It's the 26th..........

.............and despite getting three or four

 emails a week regarding fabric

 sales, I haven't succumbed once, 

not even so far as looking at a website!   

Only 48 1/2 weeks to go.

There is a catch!.

 

This is it .

My daughter in law liked it.  So I thought I would make it for her (don't ask me WHEN!), so I looked for the wool on line.   I thought it may suit me too.  

 

We both liked this colour:

 then I browsed the sale section.  Oh dear. 

I love random yarns especially ones with varying lengths of colour.  In cotton.

I have been hankering to do some knitting for a while (ten years ago it was my main pass-time instead of quilting).  Now I have 5 garments to knit!

Another thing to add to my 'must not buy (any more) this year' list.  

 

My son gave me an Amazon voucher for Christmas, so I spoilt myself and bought a book I had been coveting for a while.  I have read the stories associated with the blocks in the book already but the quilt will be on the back burner.  As there are so many individual blocks to cut I think I will make two of each, one in black and white and one colour. If you are going to the trouble of making 145 different blocks for the largest version then it makes sense to cut at least two!

The Big Green One returns

This is about half of my hand sewn ugly green two patches that will be made into 4 patches on the machine for 'The Big Green One', hereafter known as TBGO.  I laid them out so I could see what I had and get a good mix in the four patches.  I paired and paired and paired this evening.  Then I found a few hundred I had done on the machine in different greens, so I paired those. Then I sewed and sewed. I have done a lot but barely seemed to have scraped the surface!

You can see the hand sewing here, I just got fed up with it!  I think it was because I was sewing 2" squares to 2" squares for too long.  Yes, I ruled every one of those cream squares (and more) that you can see in the other photo to get my seam allowances right.     All four sides.  Ho hum.







The pairs have turned into The Big Green Snake......there is another one about the same size lurking in a box!


I'm going to have to take a run at this or I will loose interest in this part of the project- I have been sewing 2" squares together for what feels like weeks on the machine, in bow ties and mauve mini moths!

I may have to stop if they are not done by next weekend as I will only have two weeks to make-at least to flimsy stage- a tactile quilt top.  It will only be about 40" square and most of the fabrics are assembled, so it's achievable.

That's me set for the weekend. Back to it.  Listening to 'The Girl Who Played With Fire' on audiobook whilst I sew, 18 discs!

Part 2 from the weekend

I have been struck down. The dreaded migraine!  I won't bother you with the details but after three days I am feeling better.

So, here is the rest of the mini moth saga.......

I smoothed the top, measured the top, whoohoo, it is EXACTLY the same across the middle in both directions!  Miracle!

I measured the moth strips, it worked out OK..........but it wasn't right, the moth strip was too tight  once sewn on and whats more I didn't like it once I had laid the outer border next to it.

Now what? After making about 150 mini moths, don't use them?!

 Well, this looks OK, but its a bit boring.

I had attached the minis in the same direction as the big moths as I thought it would look too busy as it's a scrappy quilt if everything was going off in all directions.   So I tried  it another way...




Actually, that's better.

I sewed the mini moth strips on after pressing them, letting them lay as they wanted, not measuring.  No puckers!

Only trouble is......now there are odd ends-one worked out OK, two are about 1 1/2" out (half a mini moth).  I can make some odd size moths to go in there.  Hoping  the issue is with the mini moths along one side, not the quilt being out, though it WAS OK when I measured it!

The quilt will be about 104 x 104" so you won't see if it IS a bit skewed!

Now these are on I can see the light.  Three midi moths to make and the outer border to go on, then layering.

Almost a flimsy.....

Mini moths ironed and pieced into four strips..........

 

.............and about 20 bow ties made in the process.

The top is ironed and ready to smooth out and measure  to find the final cutting dimensions of the mini moth border sections: I should be layering this next week!  

Looking forward to my first machine quilting experience.

Cozy Sunday

I counted the bow ties, 270 done.  I will need about 1100 for a quilt top. 

Today I will be ironing mini moths and making up the border for moth in the window.  Once that is on I need to wait for son and daughter in law to choose the backing from my stash.  It may be a while, as we have a few inches of snow: those of you from the UK are familiar with the ridiculous chaos this causes!  Its not cold out, really quite pleasant: soft falling snow, no wind, perfect, if it HAS to snow.

This weeks read is my first Iris Murdoch, on Kindle.  

So, I'm set for a cozy day in. The freezer needs defrosting but somehow it's lost its urgency........

How to tie you bow ties

I made up two layouts of bow ties, to see which arrangement I like-these will form the two sides of a big cushion cover.   I'm no where near ready to put the quilt top together.

I like the grid pattern-because I have used scrappy 'knots' that don't match the bows, I think the pattern is stronger with the grid.  

Blue

This week, back to work, no endless days of sewing (:~{

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I  did some cutting in the evenings: 9 3/4" squares for the tile log cabin backing.  These are from the 'big piece' stash, some old cotton curtains (the paisley and the blue), some misfits and some from the 'very big piece stash'.  The colours blend better in real life than in the photo: it's a good 'use it up' project.

I cut a few extra green and cream 2" strips while I was in the mood, I should have enough for the whole project now. It's going into storage for the time being.  Other things need to take priority.

The parcel of texture fabrics (cotton drill, fleece, soft lining material) arrived for the tactile quilts so this weekend I'm washing and ironing.

I went Charity shopping for backing at the end of the year and found 3 quilt covers in good condition. The Mickey Mouse is cotton and perfect!   The stripey one is a double, yards of fabric there.  I will be using the cream one myself for tile log cabin squares and strips.

This weeks work will be on the 'moth in the window' and cutting for tactile quilts as well as the hand quilting.   I have to get Moth done for the end of the month and at least one tactile for early February.




No time to join the  blog Linky party for 12 finishes this year, I won't be sewing if I'm messing about with the computer.....hm......

Reading this week is escapism, part three of the Xeelee anthology.  Amazing set of eleven linked books. Definitely in my top five favorite authors.

Christmas TV project

These are the 10 blocks I completed over Christmas for the Tile log cabin. Half the blocks are white dominant, half green. I have cut up some more ugly greens and have some cream/white strips to do from poly-cotton shirts (use it up!), then it's going away for a few weeks.  It's quite relaxing to do this, as if you're not overly fussy about even stitching on the back (match the thread to the backing as it doesn't show at all on the front) all you need to do is ensure the folds line up with the diagonal lines drawn on the backing and assuming that the cutting is accurate, it works out fine. I have pretty much thrown everything in: as long as I use a strong pattern layout it will work.