Auditioning and New Baby Quilts

This was inspired by a quilt I found on Pinterest that had been sold on Etsy.  Mine is a little different but is along the same lines.  I was shocked to see that the one on Etsy sold for $130!!  And I have been giving away 10 at a time sometimes!  Too bad I am too lazy to ever try to do Etsy!

This was made from leftovers completely.  The black and white rectangles were already made and had been used in one of the previous baby quilts.  I always overachieve in cutting!  I still have enough to do another baby quilt.  The strips were 7 1/2 inches long and 3 1/2 inches wide so I just added a 1 1/2 inch strip down the middle so they were square and did the stairstep arrangement.  I will still need to put a border on which will be yellow or green probably.

This was an attempt to use some of the 400 half square triangles that I made from those Hoffman "layer cakes".  I had planned on the arrangment auditioned in the last blog post but just didn't like it when I put it up on the design wall so contented myself with this arrangement  I probably won't do another of these but it was different and will be a good baby quilt.  No borders on this one.

This was an auditioning of a block made with more of those half square triangles as well as the 4 1/2  inch squares of the drop cloth fabric that I had cut all up.  If I finished it, the block would measure 24" square so making six blocks would be an okay size for Sweet Charity donation.  I am ready to give up these blocks as well as the half square triangles!!  I have a couple more ideas I have picked up from the internet for uses of the half square triangles so will try a couple of those as well before I give up an just donate the squares and half square triangles somewhere!

This was another attempt to do something with those squares I cut up.  

Here I have arranged the blocks from above with some blocks that have strips on two sides.  It still looks a little boring to me but an improvment and I haven't taken the time to really arrange them in any order here.  I am making 12 more blocks utilizing a pale yellow around the outside and a rose color.  Hopefully, this will perk it up a bit.  Will see how I like it and whether I will make it big enough for Sweet Charity.  It doesn't look like a baby quilt to me despite the paler colors.  We shall see!

 

What to Do With 400 Half Square Triangles and the Latest Delectable Mountains!

I fooishly decided to make a king-sized Delectable Mtns quilt with the "layer cake" batiks I had picking out the darker colors including greens, blues, purples and a few neutrals.  I also added a few from my reject hand dyes that were in the right color family.  The top will measure 96 x 90 without borders when finished.  I am doing it in four sections to ease with basting and machine quilting. This is the first section completed.  Altogether there are 120 blocks!  It didn't really take that long though as this block is deceptively easy, just a lot of cutting!

Here are the first two sections done lined up next to each other.  It is looking a little better to me now.

This is the third section done.

This is the third and fourth sections done.  The sun is making the right side look too bright!

All four sections are done and pinned up but couldn't get the camera back far enough to see the whole thing!  Of course the sun is still shining brightly.  I guess it is okay.  Not sure whether it will end up on one of my beds are not though.

I took the paler and brighter of the "layer cakes" and made 400 half square triangles!!  I intended to use a portion of these to make a quilt from a free pattern I found that looks like blocks are piled on top of one another.  I always test things before I get too far.  Thankfully I did in this case!

This was the first nesting pair and wow, I don't like it at all!  I think the pattern would be much better with fairly wildly printed fabrics so the contrast would not be so drastic  Even with printed fabrics around the half square triangles, it was not enough.  I only made six of each of these so can incorporate them into something else.  Each block is 8 1/2 inches square unfinished.

I actually liked this better but think I am going to skip the bright reds altogether when putting this together.  Right now my thinking is to make some dark blue half square triangles and use the yellow ones as well and make a primary color top which I will definitely donate somewhere!  I don't do primary colors together!  I rarely use red in anything except my black and white quilts.  

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QBTS February Meeting

It was great to get together for an in-person meeting this month and a lovely program by our own Mari de Moya.  This spectacular quilt was done by Betty Van S!

Loved the colors in this quilt.

This was a crazy quilt which was supposedly done in 1948 and some of the blocks were dated as such  The fabrics were all much older and I suspect this was an update on some "found" blocks  My mother and grandmother did this with some blocks found in a barn in Massachusetts (although they were cotton and I suspect much older)

A Habitat for Humanity quilt.  This is the block I use in making these quilts as well.

Another Habitat quiit!

Again, really liked the colors and am certainly a sucker for anything purple!

This quilt was part of an exhibit at the Cameron Art Museum here in Wilmington as part of an exhibit featuring local pieces of art.  It was a reminder that another show is coming up starting in April.

Liked this one!

This guild participates in a lot of charitable quilt causes and this was a Quilt of Valor to be donated.

This was a quilt done by our speaker and it followed a spectacular applique quilt which I was sure would be hard to be matched but I think she did!!  Beautiful quilt!!

This is a closeup of the center of the quilt.

And this is the quilter (and our speaker), Mari!

This was an embroidered quilt maybe from the 50's?  Lots of signatures on this one and all using the same pattern.

This is a closeup showing the signatures.

This and the next picture were the top and bottom of an absolutely exquisite applique quiit.  Not only was the applique beautiful but the machine quilting was exceptional (done by another member of the guild).  

A closeup of the stitching.

 

Delectable Mountains -- Using Up My Reject and Scrap Fabric!

I thought I would provide a pictorial set of directions for one of my favorite blocks -- Delectable Mountains.  It looks so complex but is very easy as long as you take it slow at first.

The first step is to cut 2 squares of fabric -- one with a lighter value and one with a darker.  Mark a centerline on the diagonal and stick in a couple of pins to keep it stable.

After you have sewn a 1/4 inch from that centerline on either side, cut on the marked line creating two identical half square triangles.  If your squares were 10 inches, these half square triangles will each  measure 9 1/2 inches square. Open and press the seams to the dark side.

I always check to make sure all is nice and square.  Use the ruler like this for the easiest way to square it up.  My squares were 8 1/2 inches at this point.

This is the orientation of the two blocks before you stack them for the final cutting.  Stack them tightly one on the top of the other making sure they are nice and even.

After you have stacked as above, your first cut will be a vertical cut halfway across.  In my case with an 8 1/2 inch block, the cut was at the 4 1/4 point. 

I then stack them again and make another cut halfway across again.  In my case this was at the 2 1/8 mark.  This is how they look when you just unstack them and lay them out.  You then reorder them.

They are reordered here.  I then stack them up and very carefully sew them together.  Even being careful, I guarantee you will sew some together wrong!  I know.  I keep them as separate blocks (left and right sides separate) until I decide on the set.  There are lots of options.

There is a story about the beginnings of this quilt!!  I had three packs of Hoffman batiks that I have held onto and admired for a few years -- a gift from my sister.  Each had 40 10 in squares so I decided I would make two quilts from these that I would keep -- one would be Delectable Mountains.  I carefully got out my hand dyed blue fabric -- a couple of yards and cut what I thought was 10 inch squares.  Being very efficient, I had 8 layers.  Unfortunately, I cut them 9 inches by 10 inches instead of 10 x 10!!  I took some of the darker Hoffman batiks just to get my feet wet in making these blocks and this was my first iteration after I cut down those blue blocks to 9 in x 9 in and trimmed down the 10 in Hoffman blocks.  I had decided I didn't want to waste any of the nicer Hoffman blocks by cutting the down and wasting fabric so I grabbed some scraps I had.  This was how it looked at day 1.  Pretty boring and not something I was going to keep and also a little dull for baby quilts.

I didn't want to use any more of my good dyed blue fabric so scrunged up some miscellaneous pieces I had that had been cut into.  I also went through my "drop cloths" from my ice dyeing (those pieces I put underneath the fabric to be dyed so that they don't get marks on them from my grate) as well as a couple of pieces that were remnants from other projects.  This was how it looked at day 2!

I ended up making 60 blocks!! So it is 6 blocks x 10 blocks (or about 38 inches wide by 80 inches tall)! The blocks end up being narrower than they are tall because of all the seams.

In this picture, the top is finished but unironed.  I haven't yet decided whether I will add any borders.  I also haven't come to grips with how I will quilt it. Putting it together is pretty mindless with the only matching to be done where the edges meet.  I don't worry about the rectangles lining up perfectly as it isn't noticeable if they are off.  I try to keep the points intact as well!

This quilt will be donated to our Sweet Charity group at quilt club.