Charity quilts update

I have one more bound and ready.  This one is backed with a donated duvet cover . 

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And the next, layering in progress....

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The last three flimsies of the current batch have been webbed.  

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The webbing of my bow tie quilt  is in progress...

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A little bit of cutting-I found this block a while ago, loved the sample and have been cutting the strips for a while. It looks complicated though it is only HSTs and four patches from 1 1/2'' and 2 1/2'' strips. 

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And of course, MORE binding. It has been a week of record temperatures in the UK, so sitting with a quilt on my lap hasn't been an option for most of the week! 

I got this silver thimble in a house clearance. It is marked 'James Walker the London Jeweler'. 

A little bit of research told me that they were given as a free gift with wedding ring purchases.  It came from the house of a 90 year old bachelor!  Maybe he had a romantic disappointment. They used to make thimbles in much smaller size increments, this one fits me perfectly.  Shortly after, I bought another antique one in the perfect size from Ebay.  

Charity quilts

At the moment I'm working on 40 lap quilts for an old folks care home. I have had a lot of stuff hoarded for charity quilts but lacked the enthusiasm to do more than one every six weeks or so. Now I have a definite goal as there are 40 residents.  

Most of the flimsies are done, I finished webbing these tops and putting on scrappy  borders today. I cut the borders at 2 1/4", same as the binding. I love a scrappy binding! 

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A sample batch of 6 have been delivered, including these .

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I bound these two this week

There was a hiccup with this one, I cut the backing tooo small, so some orphan blocks came in handy! 

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These broken dishes blocks are my leader enders, cut from 2" strips 

I have been doing these for months now and have quite a stack, the aim is a queen size! 

Linus quilt bound

Boyish quilt for Project Linus UK finally bound and ready! 

Orphan blocks, Bonnies Garlic Knots variation.  

I intended to make a quilt for me, but I didn't like the bright white, too much contrast for my taste. 

The colours are brighter in sunny weather, it has been dull here for days, sewing weather.

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!

Decluttering and mending

I started another ten stitch blanket this week for Project Linus UK (well, 20 really-it grows quicker!)

I have a lot of random green yarn scraps, they may as well go to make someone warm rather than be binned. It will be my YouTube  watching project for cold winter nights. 

Sewing this week has been clothing repairs and a few 3" finished leader-ender broken dishes blocks...

...and a LOT of draw cleaning and reorganisation! I have five empty drawers now that I must not fill up with NEW projects! 

I found lots of  half made four patches left over from Perkiomen Daydreams-this was intended to be a large quilt, however I wasn't happy with the accuracy, so it ended up as a cot size flimsy. 

I need to find something to do with several hundred navy four patches that finish at 2". 

Project Linus

Another Linus finish. 

Not the best picture, the colours are brighter in real life! 

These orphan blocks have been languishing for over 10 years, they were a first try for background fabric. I felt the seagull fabric was too busy and too dark for a big quilt. 

I recently had a sort through and decided they had to be used or go, so now they will cheer up a poorly child, hopefully. 

I like the seagulls and their dinosaur relatives in juxtaposition. 

The border blues came from my scrap users system stash, the binding is scrappy. 

It was quilted with gifted polyester thread. 

Use it or bin it!

I had a sort out: dozens of batting trimmings and shirt pieces that weren't getting used had to go, but how can I part with it?!

The grandpup needs a blankie when he visits, so I pieced the batting into two cot sized sheets and appliqued the shirt parts onto them using a dense zig-zag. I have not used this function on my machine before so it gave me a chance to experiment with the density, neatness didn't matter too much for a dog bed! 

Back and front of both pieces:all the scraps, uglies and ends of poly thread used. 

 

 

 I will be sandwiching these two together and practicing McTavishing. Archie won't mind if it looks hideous and the quilting is dubious, he just loves his comfort.

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This week I quilted Eclipse #2, it has been pinned and waiting for a couple of weeks. It has been on the shelf for over 10 years waiting!!!

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Yesterday I finished the binding on this cot quilt that I did a month ago. You may think that the colours are a little dull for a baby quilt, but the blocks were orphans from Noah's mum and dads wedding quilt. Noah was I year old last week, so its a late birthday gift. 

• deep stash backing and borders 
• orphan blocks 
• quilted in the ditch in cream, then top stitched in variegated brown
• gifted grey polyester thread on the back
• border quilted randomly with circular eyelet function on my Bernina and stitched in the ditch

The double was hand quilted, I forgot to take a picture  of it finished before I gifted it! 

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Today this cot quilt is done: I started using the bow ties I had sewn together incorrectly for this double flimsy, then added a few more........

• orphan blocks sewn together wrong!
• border fabrics bought recently for charity quilts
• deep stash backing
•  scrappy binding from backing trimmings 
• Quilted in orange cotton on the back, Gutermann variegated green on the front, in a false jigsaw pattern. 
• borders stitched in the ditch

This will need washing as I manged to bleed on the white border and Archie visited unexpectedly and put muddy paw prints on it whilst I was layering it!

I also did a few more strips for the postage stamp quilt.

Last push!

I have completed the last three play mat quilts for donation to a local charity. If they want them all, there are thirteen. Any remaining will go with the three I have reserved to Linus.  

I have several cot size to quilt  for Linus, but three doubles have to be quilted first. 

Then it is about time I made myself a quilt! 

•  scrappy broken dishes
• border and backing from the stash
• quilted back and front with tangerine cotton
• white border top stitched in the ditch in white poly core. 
• Scrappy binding from gifted poly-cotton duvet cover, backing trimmings and recycled cotton sheeting. 

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•  broken dishes blocks
• backing form the stash
• quilted in Gutermann variegated green on the front, gifted pale blue polyester on the back
• white border top stitched in the ditch in white poly core. 
• white border recycled sheeting. 
• grey border and binding was leftover 2"  strips from moth in a window.  

 

• broken dishes blocks
• both borders are recycled bedding
• backing from the stash
• quilted with white poly core on the back, Gutermann brown-yellow variegated on the front
• border stitched in the ditch with white poly core. 
• scrappy binding made from backing trimmings

Four finishes

• orphan blocks
• charity quilt
• border and backing from the stash
• binding from a roll I made up from 2 1/2" scraps some time ago
• quilted in my new quick favourite fake puzzle design
• white polycore on the back, Gutermann variegated green cotton on the front
• border top stitched with variegated red
• about 1m square

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• orphan blocks
• charity quilt
• border and backing from the stash
• binding from a roll I made up from 2 1/2" scraps some time ago
• quilted in my new quick favourite fake puzzle design
• dark blue gifted poly thread on the back, Gutermann variegated green cotton on the front
• border top stitched in the ditch
• about 1m square

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• orphan blocks
• charity quilt
• border and backing from the stash, white is recycled cotton sheeting
• binding from a not-so-neutral neutral, the border and backing are so busy this needed one colour.
• quilted in my new quick favourite fake puzzle design
• quilted with gifted mustard polyester on the back, Gutermann variegated green cotton on the front, a  YLI variegated green in the border
• about 1m square

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• orphan blocks
• charity quilt
•  backing from the stash, white is recycled cotton sheeting, blue stripe is a cotton duvet cover
• binding from off-cuts
• quilted in my new quick favourite fake puzzle design
• quilted with gifted mustard polyester front and back: in the ditch in white on the border
• about 1m square

Two more complete

 Today I am working on a broken dishes quilt with a new FMQ design. I like this, it's really quick and secures all the seams. 

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I tried it out on the border for the last one, binding completed this morning. That border fabric that I was determined to use up was tricky to quilt and match for binding.  I don't often quilt the borders, just stitch in the ditch as I like the fluffiness of un-quilted space.  This one was too wide not to have something in. 

• orphan blocks
• quilted on the front in mid green variegated, white polycore on the back
• heavily FMQ for practice
• borders and backing from a bargain bundle that needed using up
• scrappy binding: I had to cut some extra green for this as the border fabric wouldn't take my usual multicolour scrappy binding from off-cuts.

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Another finish, more moth practice

• Deep stash borders and backing
• Variegated green cotton on the back; cream poly in the ditch, gifted yellow poly on the borders, various experiments on the moth shapes.
• orphan blocks
• binding from a stash I made up a year ago

 Loopy balloons in the borders and sashing

Variegated thread looks awful on the moths! This was my original intention for the big quilt, glad I tried it out.