Still Making "Comfort" Quilts for Charity With All My Already Cut Strips and Pieces!!

 

This is my latest Quilt As You Go quilt using more of those brown 2 inch strips and a bunch of "frankenbatting". Each block is 10 inches square.  I have since bound it with a medium brown fabric which finished it off nicely.  The quilt is 60 inches by 80 inches and will be donated this coming Thursday to my guild up here.  As I don't have batting up here and my guild in the south provides batting for donation quilts, I will again be making a ton of tops and take them south.  I prefer machine quilting on my Juki but it had some serious issues so I took it in for repair and I still haven't gotten it back and I may have to ask them to replace the machine as I am beginning to think they lost it!  

This is one block of a new bunch of stack and whack blocks.  The picture shows the block in its best light!  All the blocks are pretty dark although they all have good patterning so trying to decide how to best present them so 31 sit on my design wall waiting for inspiration.  They are only 4 inches finished.  I have been thinking bags or purses at this point as they needed to be seen closer up than a quilt althogh I have also considered using in a jacket of some sort  We shall see.  I atisll have a bunch of fabric that i haven't made into squares yet.

This was a far more successful choice for making the stack and whack blocks.  It is a fairly small print but amazingly the repeat was 16 inches which is rare for a small  print. 

Here are the 70 blocks that I constructed.

This is the latest one I am constructing using triangles leftover from a quilt I made almost 30 uears ago.  This is about the 4th quilt I have made from these triangles.  I am going to make this quilt to be full bed sized.  The center of each "bagel" will be yellow and i haven't decided whether  to use anything but the plain bege in the center of the "stars".  Ufrotunately, the bag of purples doesn't seem to be getting any smaller!

 

Still Making Comfort Quilts!

Trying to use up the bags of miscellaneous strips that I brought from NC and I am absolutely sick of looking at them and the pile never gets smaller!  I may do the unforgiveable and just heave them! 

I had a couple of huge bags of purple 45 degree triangles left over from a quilt I made in 1998!!  So I decided that I would make a purple version of the "blue bagel" quilt I made a couple of years ago.  I did have to cut up the light colored background pieces though as well as some of the corners.  This is a closeup of the block so I will remember it the next time I make this quilt!!

I decided to do something a little different with this one.  I get bored easily!!  So I added yellow in two corners so I would end up with flowers of a sort!  I had to hold myself back from adding light green in as I do love the purple/green/yellow combination.

And here it is -- the finished top!  I do  like the combination and may do this again.

I didn't even touch the lighter purples in the previous quilt but thought they would be nice for a baby quilt.  This is using the medium purples.  I intended to put it together like the previous one but accidentally twisted tthe upper left hand corner and decided I liked the look so twisted all the corners.  It then gave me an idea for yet another variation which I will try some day.  Surroundind the four inner bagels is somewhat of another circle in white.  I am thinking I will vary either that color or the pieces in the center of the four bagels!  

Truely Miscellaneous Today!

I was inspired to make a Quilt of Valor quilt by our speaker and so picked up a couple of fat quarters of patriotic fabric as I have none.  I found a pattern on Facebook that I liked and that I thought would be appropriate.  This is the finished top.  I am going to let someone else do the quilting as it is pretty big and I wasn't comfortable with doing it.

This is what the individual blocks looked like.

The back of yet another Quilt as You Go.

This is the front.  I added the green as the gold and brown started looking like Brownie uniform to me!!

This is a block I did for a friend who had sent me a envelope of scraps from a bridal quilt she has made for her son and daughter-in-law to be.  We have been email friends for close to 25 years along with two other ladies.  We have met up a number of times over the years despite geography!  I really wanted to have four stack and whack blocks but only had enough repeats for two.  I only had tiny scraps left when I was done!  I have held off posting it as I didn't want her to see i before she got it!

The last of the baby quilts made from those long ago striped fabric that I had made.  I don't have enough left for any more.  I tried to use lighter fabrics both on the front and the back.

All done except for the binding which is done now.  I only had 1/2 inch of the blue fabric left!

Had a nice visit with my daughter and was surprised to see a bunch of Cedar Waxwings in one of her trees.  At the time, I only saw 2 but when I looked at the camera pictures, there were obviously six or seven!

Her neighborhood Great Blue Heron payed us a visit as well.

A Great Egret also visited but was chased away by the heron who had claimed the territory!

 

Oh No. More Quilt as You Go!

Well, first I have to show you a piece of fabric I fell in love with and am pondering what to use it for!  The repeat is 36 inches which is very large for fabric like this and I only have a piece that is 40 x 108.  It was a gift from my sister, who, I might add, is a very bad influence on me!  I visited her in Florida last week and the first day, she suggested we visit a local quilt shop that was in its last week of going out of business!!  Everything was 75% off and even me, who has sworn off buying any more fabric, succumbed and bought a couple of smallish pieces of purple (my weakness) and a whole bolt of a green leafy grassy print.  When it is less than $3/yd, who can resist?  As it turned out, I bought as a backing for one of the two Farmer's Wife sampler quilts but it is perfect for both of them and there will only be a scrap left when I got it for them!  

Then I mentioned to my sister that I was getting low on purples and greens, so she dragged out two boxes of purples and let me have whatever I wanted!!  More purple and green quilts in my future.  I should note that my sister used to make quilts for Hoffman and got lots of batiks in return!

Here is another qayg baby quilt and I still have a lot of the center strip fabric left so there will be more.  Actually  using up some of my lightly dyed lavender fabric in these!

Here is the back.  Like the front, I chose the lighter of my strips which I don't use in the larger "stained glass" quilts.

This is probably the last one using the darker blue strips.  I do  have some yardage of a lighter set of blue strips so may use thosee.

This is the back of the above quilt. These are so fast to make!

I have proceeded to start putting together the Farmer's Wife quilts, starting with the "20s" version which is puples, greens, yellows and a smattering of blue.  It is in 3 sections and I have spray basted 2 sections so far and will get the third done today and maybe get started on the 30's version which is mainly blues and greens.  Of course both have beige/white components as well.  Both will look great with the green fabric I bought and I am so glad to find a use for for the whole bolt so quickly.  It assuages my guilt a little!

After that, I am going to make a "Quilts of Valor" quilt.  Our current Guild president gave a presentation in November on this program as I was very, very impressed with the care that goes into giving these quilts.  I picked up some blue patriotic fat quarters that she had for working on them and have been searching for  patterns that I like and have found 3 or 4 that I liked.  It might be awhile as the machine quilting on the FW quilts won't be quick!  Hopefully, they will turn out good enough that I can enter them into the Rochester club show in May.


 

Two More Finished!

Everyone seems to want larger quilts these days for "comfort" quilts so I added this sashing to make it about 56 x 78.  Now just to baste, machine quilt, add borders and bind.  I have used hand dyed fabrics for all the solids as i don't ever buy solids anymore.  Can't seem to find the picture of the fabric that this was made from.

And here it is completed.  I like the grey/blue binding I put on it, matching the background of one set of blocks.

I found some major yardage of more strip sets that were much lighter in color and decided I could do baby quilts with this colorway, choosing a lighter color for the sashing and only using lighter colored strips.  I hadn't known what to do with all those light colored strips as I use them sparingly in the "stained blass" looking quilts.  Seems to work here.  I was also selective in the prints I chose for the back.

This is the back.  The white looking block has musical notes all over it.  It is difficult to get the backs and fronts to both look well placed!

I will be working on the last of the "stained glass" quilts tomorrow and use up the remainder of those strips.  It was a tight squeeze to find enough to finish a 40 x 60 in quilt but I did!  I have enough of the lighter strips to make several more baby quilts.

 

Challenge Quilt Done!

I thought I was done machine quilting when I got this far but decided that you couldn't see the reeds in the foreground at the bottom without standing 2 inches away from the quilt so another day of quilting!

And here it is, trimmed to the proper size.  It had to be between 36 and 30 inches high and 24 to 30 inches wide.  I originally made it about 45 by 40 so I could trim it down when I finished the quilting and decided how much of the ocean in front to show.

The top of the challenge was the Cape Fear River which runs behind Wilmington (and me in Kure Beach even closer) and meets up with the ocean at Ft. Fisher.  There is a historic breakwater separating the two at the tip of Ft. Fisher.  I took a picture overlooking the breakwater and a striking sunset several years ago.  (There were a lot of fires west of that year and really colored the sunsets.)

The piece had to feature the Cape Fear River and that is the middle blue piece on the other side of the breakwater.

I took some liberties with the photo in constructing this quilt!  It now sits at a comfortable 36 inches by 29 inches.  I am in the processing of sewing the facing and the triangles I have to put in the corner of the back for hanging at the exhibit.  I am hoping it is not too much too different from the rest of the pieces.  I seem to be very different in my approaches with a lot more color (like my camellias that I did for the last show).

The exhibit will be at the Burgwin-Wright house in Wilmington between Feb. 23 and Mar 17 in 2024.

I happened down to Carolina Beach Lake one very cloudy day last week but was rewarded with quite a few birds -- some that I hadn't seen for awhile.  There was a flock of these Bluebirds sitting on the lines.

There were several Dunlins and they were still there the next time I went by.  Most of the time, you couldn't see their bills as they were buried in the muck!

A Kildeer and he was also hanging around the next time I went.

Not as impressive a speciies to sight, but there was a huge flock of these Starlings and I do like their winter plummage.

This is a Lesser Scaup, a bird I haven't seen at the lake in a couple of years at least!  They used to be there all winter.

I did finish another one of the QAYG quilts although not quite done in this photo.  I have enough pieces of the blue stripes to do one more and it is in my bag waiting to go to the next "Open Sew" we have.

 

It's Been a Bit of Time!

 

Since heading back down south, I have been trying to get my sewing room into some kind of order.  I left in a hurry in the spring so left things much worse than usual!!  

I have a ton of tops that I did last summer so have been trying to finish those up before I start a couple of new projects.  I had even forgotten I had done some of them!  

This and the next one are about 42 by 58 inches.  I can't believe how much black and white fabric I unearthed down here!  I did sell some of my pfd fabric as I don't seem to be doing a whole lot of dyeing although I may have to for the next project which is a Guild Challenge on the Cape Fear River.

This is the back of the last of the QAYG quilts for awhile!  This one is going to my daughter as she liked it and wanted it.  I still have another one like it and may also keep that one rather than donating.  The previous two will be donated.

Again, one of my favorites and has inspired me to make some more yardage of strips in darker colors.  I have a 2yd+ piece of lighter colored strips which I don't think would work well in this design so will figure something else out.

I am pretty sure what I will be doing for the Cape Fear River challenge and have been gathering my various hand dyes but I think I need more gold/orange and purple/blue.  I haven't gone through all my hand dyes yet so we shall see!  It is due in December.      

I did purchase a 40 yd bolt of batting as I have several tops I need to quilt (those Farmer's Wife blocks that I made into tops which will be quilted in sections as they will be pretty big quilts).

Quilt as You Go (QAYG) Again!

This is another version of QAYG.  I had tons of the 2 1/2 in strips in these colors so just used them.  This is not my color pallette and I will be happy to give this one away.  It is 40 x 50 instead of my usual 40 x 60 in as I just didn't like working with the colors.  I may do a more random one the next time as I have a ton of scraps and won't attempt to arrange it.

This is the back of the quillt.

This is the beginning of another quilt.  I showed my  EQ8 image a couple of days ago.  There will be black sashing.

There will be three more rows making it my usual 40 x 60 inches when finished.  As hard as I have tried, I never seem to get that center block exactly in the center or maybe it is my trimming that is at fault.  Close enough I guess!  I do like this pattern.  I have an idea for another variation too. 

You would think after using over 100 of my 10 in square pieces of fabric, the bin would look just a little bit emptier but no...

There is no hope for the bins of 5 in squares as I have 100's and 100's of them!

 

Second "Quilt As You Go" (QAYG) Almost Done and How I Do them!

 

1.  Place the one inch strip of the sashing for the right side on top and a folded 1 5/8 in strip of the sashing for the back on the right hand edge of the first square, making sure the open edge of the back sashing is at the edge of the square.  Pin in 3 places.

2.  Sew through all the pieces 1/4 inch from the edge.

3. Take the second square and arrange the top sashing along the edge, again placing three pins and then sew in place a 1/4 in from the edge.  This leaves 1/2 in of sashing on the front all finished.  Now to finish the sashing on the back.

This is how it should look at this point with the second seam in the front sashing completed.

4.  Now open up the two squares and pin down the back sashing in three places and sew fairly close to the right edge making sure you have matching thread on the back and the front.

This is what the back looks like finished.

If you are really likely, you can get the sewing right in the ditch but here it is on the front sashing and sometimes it sits on the finished part of the block.  It really doesn't show too much if you use thread that is a neutral on the front.

Once you have all the rows completed, do the same steps to sew the rows together.  The only additional thing to be mindful of is that try your best to get the vertical sashing lined up, both front and back.  I am sometimes more successful at that than others but again, it is a little annoying but probably not too bad!

Here is the front except for the binding for QAYG2.  I used blue sashing for this one and will use the same fabric for the binding.

This is the back of QAYG2 and I used all different squares for this one but still didn't arrange them in any kind of order.