On the cutting room floor

I've been cutting some 4 1/2" squares for the charity quilts from the 'not so pretties' I want to use up and 'large lengths'. I have to tidy up various piles of fabric before son number two arrives next week from his three month break in the far east.

I cut some strips for the bins too and some
4 1/2 x 2 1/2" bricks......

And some hexies whilst the fabric was on the table, for the brown flower garden/random hexie.........



and Darwin's flower garden.......

..........and the stash of diamonds for baby blocks-these are from the same size strips, 2 1/4", as the hexies.There are piles of cut things everywhere.

Of course, the waste string/crumb bin is now overflowing and needs sorting.  Job for another day!  I'm itching to start the charity quilts as I want to make a couple to practice my machine quilting before I do the moth in the window quilt. 

O.M.G. I finished something!!!

The bow ties baby quilt for a colleague, finishes at 35" x 25", small baby/play mat size.  Bow tie blocks are 3" square. 

I really liked hand sewing the binding on!  I chose black spotted yellow in the end, it picked up the yellow ice cream and currants in the backing-see previous post-and doesn't overwhelm the front.

Hope baby likes it.

Quick, quick!

I have put together a baby quilt, from the bow tie stash.  It's all a bit of a panic as this is the only time I will have before the end of the month. Wish I'd had more time!

 


I quilted it with the walking foot rather than free motion: although the curves weren't supposed to be symmetrical, they were too tight for the walking foot really and are more uneven than I intended!

 


The sex of the baby is unknown, hence the random colours.  I cut the trusty ice cream fabric for the backing but now its on I realise its rather PINK!  I used a variegated green on the back to quilt. picking up the ice cream green and trying to offset the pink. I like the quilting on the back more than the front!

The front is sewn in a heavyweight rainbow dyed variegated.  It needed a lot of quilting as it will probably get a lot of washing.  Either the thread was poor quality (it was rather furry) or the eye in the needle was too small (probably) as every so often it would break down and fray in the eye, so I have a few ends to secure.

I learned a lot doing this quick project.  As time was so tight I didn't have time to worry if it was 'right' or good enough, my usual train of thought for most things.  Probably why I'm not a great 'finisher'!




Not sure what to use for the binding, don't want to 'pink' out the front with ice cream fabric! I will try to find a brown or an almost white cream.  Or yellow.

Refuel necessary!

I have done very little sewing for a couple of weeks, very little anything.  A series of migraines has floored me (:¬/

A little bit of this is all

Altogether, I will have just over three of these tins of rosette sets with papers in when I'm done.  There are already a lot sewn up

ready for the Grandma's flower garden I'm working on

I have way more than I need to compete this quilt as I only have to square it off in the red, orange, green and blue sectors.  Enough, for another quilt, methinks!

Probably not much sewing on the next two weeks either as I have to finish decorating before my son comes home from 3 months in the Far East, his bedroom is full of furniture from the area I'm decorating!

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. 

Blue footed booby

Regular readers may have noticed I'm a committed sewer/crafter  with an interest in everything.  

This causes difficulties  when you are also blessed with an enquiring mind and the practical attention span of a blue footed booby. 

 

 Earlier on the year I listed over 30 ideas and WIPs and UFOs (yes, I am making a distinction there it makes the whole mountain of things easier to comprehend!!)  The total is now at 'around' 35, with not one item finished this year.

I have used 'development as a quilter' as an excuse to 'just try this'' most of the year. I have done that twice in the space of 10 days!!!   

I started a little bit of crochet  for the tactile quilts and 'tried' out the tile  log cabin technique this week. 

I have seriously defaulted on my commitment to finish the had quilted wedding quilt.  That's really bad news.

So. Deep breath.  I will not begin another project this year.  

No wait.  That's not enough.  

With so many begun, I can faff about for the next three years and not finish anything.  'Completion' has always been an issue for me and I can never work out whats at the root of that.  

Regardless, I need to master it!

NEW YEARS RESOLUTIONS

1. I will buy no quilting fabric for one calendar year.  IGNORE THE SALES!!!  THERE WILL ALWAYS BE BARGAINS!!  (Notice I have left an opt-out here, with regard to charity shops!)
2. I will work on on one machine project, one leaders and enders project (bow ties) and one hand pieced project at a time unit they are finished and gifted or in use. 
3. The first hand sewn project will be the wedding quilt.
4. The machine project is moth in the window.

5. I will complete a tactile quilt by February 13th as I have bagged a Linus fund raising day at work for 14th (UK Valentines day).
6. A colleague at work encouraged me to commit to three finishes by the end of March.  That's my first target. On my birthday I will re-asses.
7. I'm going to add to the list: I will not buy any books for one year, charity shops or otherwise!

Just has a skype call with my son in the far east and I told him if he catches me buying fabric this year I'll give him £50  .His response?  I'm quids in then!  I thought you were supposed to support addicts, not tell them they will fail!

Dominance

Tile log cabin blocks: one light, one dark dominant. I think I'm going with the dark dominant, to use up more of the murk green uglies.

 Spiral stitching on the back........

The Quilters Apprentice

Here is my read for this week-not much of a challenge, but it's ticking along. It's a Bookcrossing ring-it started its journey in the US, and has been to Australia, New Zealand, France, Switzerland, Germany, Finland, and now the UK, I'm the 8th reader so far.

I couldn't resist

It will only take a couple of hours........

9 1/2" background square  and a pre-cut 3 1/2" square, wrong sides together and centred.

A rummage in the 2" strip bin......and a bit of hand stitching....I have pulled out browns for the backing squares, from tan to dark brown

with some judicious folding...

Each strip is folded so the first third matches the 2nd third, leaving the last third to be sewn down on the next round. It's stitched in a spiral, through all thicknesses.  I used thread that matched the back so you can't see the stitches-it's difficult to get them even as you stitch through three thicknesses, five layers on the corners.

The finished block, using up some uglies.  These blocks will be mixed fabrics, using up some poly-cotton light coloured shirts that I had donated from a colleague.  I'll slip a few other fabrics in there too, I have some silk and lining and curtain fabric to use up. 

There are three green shirting strips in here. I'll also get to use up that hideous bear paw print fabric (the picture was misleading, I bought 3 bargain metres!!). It looks like cut off paws, not prints!

The backing is a smidgen too small for comfort for when the blocks are joined, so I have cut the next four at 9 3/4"-another dodgy buy, the pattern was much bigger than I thought it would be!

I worked out the finished quilt will weigh about 5 1/2 lb, not as much as I thought. 

One more block, then its going away!