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! 

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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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

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 HAD to clean the sewing room first!

My latest charity make at the binding stage: I needed free motion practice so this one is quite heavily quilted.

 I usually make charity quilts the width of the fabric so I don't have to piece the backing but I miscalculated with this one, its about 45".  

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I have been cutting triangles for the leader-ender project after raiding the 2" strip bin. 

They are sorted into groups of four

I sorted the odd ones separately, thinking I would make  really scrappy version: this morning I was reading my Kindle copy of More Adventures with Leaders and Enders and realised that the pattern uses these triangles, so I think a very scrappy version is on the menu! (Eventually)

Today the border went on this charity quilt (trimmings from a backing), and I am webbing another.

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I have been doing some of these

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 I have to keep a handle on the crumbs!

 All the trimmings of late have been binding trimmings or 2" ends, so today I sewed them into 10 1\2 inch strips to join the three sacks full I have already-I blitzed all my strings and crumbs before Xmas. I will save that mess for another post!

More exhumations

I tackled another tub of unidentifieds.........

33 blocks left from Sisters Square Dance top (not yet quilted).

Sisters Square Dance

May be enough for a lap quilt?

77 moth blocks from Moth in a Window. Oh dear.  

I made 3 small charity quilts from the leftover blocks that had sashings on as well! All not yet quilted.

 

Kiss in the Corner

Six of these at 12 1/2" square from Kiss in the Corner. plus one crib charity quilt......and ..........

45 of these three patches!  

And stupidly I did not take a picture of the  finished hand quilted Kiss in the Corner before I gave it away! 

I found the strips I had pieced for Bow Ties and put them together today: I only needed 7 of the 10 I made to complete the bed topper at 66 x 84". 

I am happy with it at this size with no borders (it's for ME!).  616 bows and 3, 696 pieces!

But. 

I have enough left to make an even bigger quilt!

Recent excavations have brought my issue into focus, I don't plan properly and end up with too much stuff made!  

Meanwhile, more box kites-

these are so ugly I truly love them, no one else that has seen them does, another one for me!

I also made the decision on the filler triangles for the next leader and ender, Garlic Knots, at the bottom of the picture. I thought I had the perfect fabric, but it was really UGLY when I tried it out!  Then I found this blue and white, enough variation not to be a solid but it has movement.  Because I used white sheeting as the background, whichever way I laid out the blocks there was a glaring  white area in that corner, it needed something. Problem solved.

I am going to shelve this now it has been kitted up and decisions are made and use the bow ties I found as leader-enders with the box kite project, to get the second top put together!

There are going to be so many huge quilts to try and stuff under the tiny space of  my Bernina this winter, I probably wont need to put the heating on  as I will be swamped in them for weeks as I wrestle them through!

Good job I bought two full rolls of batting! 

I am going to count the quilts that have to be machine quilted next week......

Linking for quilterinthecloset.blogspot.co.uk Building blocks Tuesday
and
WIP Wednesday  http://www.freshlypieced.com