Please excuse my dog ears

A weekend of pressing...some time ago I stitched hundreds of HSTs for charity quilts from all sorts of fabrics (probably about a year ago!).  I will use these as leader-ender patches whilst sewing on other things. So many dog ears to clean up! 

I put the borders on my granddaughters first quilt, made from orphan moth in a window blocks. That backing is soooo cute! It was on sale, I ordered 5 metres but they only had two and a half in stock 😕

I started cutting all the string blocks to size for crumb quilt strips.  I am saving 3 1/2" strips for a scrappy border for some UFO or other! 

Sewing this weekend was Allietare blocks from Bonnies mystery a while ago. All the component bocks are made for this quilt, so it's only the  large block assembly that's needed. My daughter in law may claim this one. 

Last night I finished the binding for a Linus quilt made from orphan blocks. 

Definitely a girl quilt!

Stripper

I raided the string bin for neutral strings, then chopped into rough 5" strips. I also cut off some selvages as the cream stash was handy and used some uglies up. 

 

 

 

 

Pieced onto 4 1/4" strips of paper: not ideal as it was quite heavy paper, but it did the job.  I used strips from 2 1/2 to 3/4".

My Daughter in law happened to come over and got rather excited about the peeling process! She had not seen this before, so we both worked on the papers for an hour, then I finished them the next day. Help was gratefully received!  I recon I have enough for three borders for king size quilts! Each strip is about 11"; pressing and trimming at a later date, as I could cut them in half for 2" sashing too.

I also made some pieced squares with the larger crumbs as I was going. I can use these as centres in a charity quilt. 

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 Still plugging away with the 3" finished broken dishes blocks as leaders and enders. I have sewn a lot into sets of four as I keep loosing the bits if they hang around on the sewing table too long between being needed. Much more user friendly. I have quite a pile now. I spin the seams as they come off the machine, but don't iron.  These need a lot of accuracy: as they are so small there is no wriggle room.

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This weekend I am working on the Allietare blocks, tricky little things to get the points to meet! Taking it slowly. The blue is my 'red' from Bonnie's design.

 A few more geese were needed for accuracy practice.

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I was all sewed out in the middle of the week: I found some short lengths of yarn, a couple of metres each (I am not a hoarder!) and made a scrumble, very therapeutic.

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Other evenings have been spent ironing blocks and ironing blocks and ironing blocks......

....these are done

 and these are done.

 About the same to go!

I put the mini ironing board  and iron on my lap on top of a cushion in front of the TV, I don't feel its such a terrible chore then.

Cat-napping

It seems the word went round the neighbourhood that I no longer have a resident quilt inspector. The vacancy has been filled: he does have a home (somewhere), but obviously no duties there. Every time the door is open, he is in! So much for ironing the backing and patches!  Encourage him? Noooo, 'course not!

Testing my lap for comfort too-my last cat didn't do this in 17 years so I made the most of it! 

 He is a bit gorgeous, is genuinely pleased to see me and had a marvelous purr. I am clearly not properly trained yet as I don't act like his real servants at home, he tries to tell me what he wants but I don't understand!

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 Allietare four patches have been waiting since December to be sewn, so I cut the strips that had been hanging over the door for three months and got on with it. 

Then I cut the next stage. The patches were not meeting at the points properly when I sewed a few. (:@{

I had leftovers of the 2" strips, rather than add them boxes, as I had cut a few as goose blocks (too small) I trimmed all the leftovers down for the mini broken dish blocks and goose centres for future use. 

 

Then I sewed a few goose blocks to work out where the accuracy was failing by two whiskers on Allietare blocks. 

I think I have worked it out now, after much goose beheading and broken wings. 

Next update will tell!   

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I have sewn up trimmings from other things to 10 1/2" strips as I go for the crumb quilt, to keep the piles down.

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I am wading my way through ironing several hundred pinwheel and broken dishes blocks, sitting on the floor in front of the TV with the mini board and iron on my lap, on top of a cushion!

These will take a couple of days. 

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I was feeling stressed yesterday morning so sat down to push a few random mini triangles through the machine, it did the trick.  I am thinking these could make Ocean Waves

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We have Storm Katie hitting the south of England today, roof felt/fence panel lifting winds. I will venture a short walk, then it's back to sewing related occupational therapy for me  and finishing this...

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Happy Easter!

Allietare week three

A quick post for the Allietare linky party on Bonnie' blog this week: I am about half way through the four patches. 

Still working on finishing two doubles for Christmas, so a little behind.

Allietare!

 

 I just had to try some parts for Bonnie Hunter's Allietare Mystery  part two.

 There was a bit of fiddling to get my seams accurate, as I am using a fine Aurfil thread, not my usual all purpose cream cotton. 

I have gone for sea themed blues instead of red, from light to mid blue. They go with the grey constant. As this grey constant is quite light, I have kept my neutrals light. 

My blacks are grey-black and I have chosen mid- yellows.

I may take some of the lighter ones out. 

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Last night I got most of the way round the binding on Sisters Square Dance: I had to unpick and re-attach in a couple of places as the backing was caught up.

I have to hide all the ends from ditch quilting and hand-quilt a small motif in the centre of each star block to stabilise it.  It shouldn't take long, has to be done for Christmas.! (;@|

I'm also layering another quilt, more in the ditch sewing for speed, that has to be done by Christmas too!  Play was interrupted by the grand-pup at the weekend, he approved of the backing fabric, insisted on trying it out for comfort! 

 Link up here for Alletare part two, to see others progress.

I won!

I have had a sumo contest with this beast and my 440, quilting in the ditch, 100  x 100".  Too big to do any free motion, so I had to go for stitching round the dark star borders in the ditch. Still hard work turning the quilt round!

 

Sisters Square Dance

Checking the back to see if I missed any ......all OK. 

I used this thread, it was very good, no breakages. 

One final round of ditch stitch on the border.......

Binding on. I feel a film coming on this afternoon.....

This is some of the work I have been doing in the last three months, in an effort to tidy and consolidate:

Enough of these for two king size projects, one of which will be combined with geese, all prepped and ready to go after Xmas.

170 scrappy Box Kite blocks, enough for two quilts. 

A few more of these to add to the stock

And a couple of hundred four patches  from a box of 2" random squares I found.

All the crumbs string pieced to make hexies, I have about two hundred to trim down.

Some random hexie and teeny diamond paper piecing whilst out and about 

Clue one of Bonnie Hunters mystery done,  'Allietare'. Cutting for clue two tomorrow. 

And I pieced the backing for nine quilt tops that are ready to go!