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.  

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". 

Busy year, but still sewing!

Thank goodness for sewing, its got me through a tough year! 

 I have logged my finishes on the 'finish' tab.

This is a little of what's been happening in the last couple of weeks: 

I have so much scrap yarn-this is my busy bag project, blanket squares for Project Linus

There are about 200 done, clipped into sets of 10, not enough to start making blankets yet as the colours are too varied. 

The next batch  of scraps  is ready for use. I have my mums yarn stash that was used for Linus blankets now, I have to use it somehow. It is impossible for me to sit and watch TV with nothing in my hands so it will be knitted up eventually. I even took my bag to an open air theatre event: there were some strange looks, mostly as I was watching the play, not my knitting!  I would have been too self conscious to knit in public a few years ago, now it has to be done. Idle hands and all that...…... 

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I made 64 railroad tracks blocks from my 2 1/2" strip stash. I had lots of muddy neutrals that were not moving from the stash, which I paired with darker shades. the blocks came out really well,, I will be keeping this one for me! 

There are lots of other blocks made with the leftover cuts from this project, more of that in the next post. 

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Leader~ender blocks are coming along, broken dishes made from the 2" string bin.

I cut  up a lot of fabric that would never go into a design of mine normally, use it or bin it! 

Also some four patches from 2" strings. I have enough of these for a queen sized quilt now.

I need to browse some designs that include random four patches for inspiration.

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This is the second sandwich I have quilted this week.  The pattern is Bonnies Garlic Knots, from 2" strips. I loved the pattern, but using the white sheeting for a background was too stark for my taste with the dark 'knots', so this is one for Project Linus, boy themed with rhinos. I find that many of the Linus quilts I make end up a bit girly, so I went with these little grey tough guys for a border. 

The binding wont be sewn down for a bit, I like to do that in batches in the cooler weather. 

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This little darling came into the family on Valentines Day

I am going to be looking after Ellen one or two days a week. 

She already has too may blankets! 

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Postage Stamps

A while ago I decided that my original piecing for Perkiomen Daydreams was not good enough to continue with for a large quilt: I sewed up completed blocks into a cot size.

I may try one of these in a different colour set in the future.

So, I needed work on my piecing accuracy. It's not bad generally, but with 1" finished pieces the 1/16" and 1/23" errors quickly add up.  I had cut lots of 1 1/2" strips from all the ugly fabric I came across, but was not using it. I spent several hours running strip sets through the machine this week and have cut and stitched the strip sets in batches.

The pieced strips are 105" long.  I have played with the assembly, four, eight, six and random patches so it doesn't look too uniform. 

I am keeping back two of each symmetrical four patch I make for future projects, as I would never cut this much variety for one or two quilts.

I am working on 25 patches now to use up part Perkiomen rejects.  

All of the uglies have gone in here! 

Just about had enough of this fix now, it will go away for a bit as I have two large tops to quilt. My accuracy has definitely improved in the last week working on this. 

3,465 of  11,025 1" finished squares in the completed strips so far, with partials done as well. Almost 1/3 done!

Linking for Move it forward Monday
and Oh Scrap!

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!

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!