It's Been Forever Since I Posted but I Have Been Busy With Donation Quilts!

 

This is just a 10 in square of the fabric that I used for the next two tops.  I thought it would be okay for a "stack and whack" but was a bit disappointed when I got the two done.  The repeat on this fabric was 24 inches so I had a lot of blocks!

This is one of the two quitt tops I made.  It actually looks better in person but still a bit like Halloween with all the orange! 

This is the second one where I spaced the blocks a bit further apart.  I will probably put a small border but I don't add borders until I am quilting these days!

The next three are baby qults made with already constructed four-patches and some of my 5 in squares that I had to cut down to 4 1/2 inches.

This was also four-patches but Ihad to create most of these as t had no four-patches that had three darks or three lights together.

I have been trying to find uses for all those orphan blocks I  have accumulated and this was created from blocks from 3 different quilts.  I think I had to make a few more of those outside blocks to fill in the space.

This is another of the bagel quilts made from purple pieces I had on hand.  I probably have made four or five quilts from these leftover purple triangles.  The original quilt they were cut for was finished 25 years ago!!

 

It's Been Far Far Too Long Since I Have Posted!!

It has been a record two months since I have posted on this blog.  My excuse is that (besides the annoying way pictures are stored in this new computer) is that I have been very very busy machine quilting the 30 tops I completed up north.  I have done 15 so far -- 9 since the last quilt meeting 3 weeks ago.

This is one of two that I completed. and they are pretty good sized at 42 x 80.  If you look closely, you can see something new that I tried -- faux piping (that thin yellow strip next to the blue binding).  Luckily, I didn't look on the internet on how to do it!  My way worked well and I think was a lot simpler.  I cut my binding at 2 1/2 inches like always and then cut some yellow 2 1/2 inch strips in half (I have a ton of them!) so that I had strips that were 1 1/4 inches.  I folded them in half and ironed them.  The trick for me was how to turn the corners.  Well I did for the blue binding as usual but started the sewing down of the binding at about an inch from the corner with the yellow strip with the folded side out reaching to the corner.  It worked just fine and the 1 1/4 inch size seemed just about right.  I did this with several of the quilts I completed that I thought just needed a little something extra!

This is another of the larger quilts I finished.  I also did the faux piping on this one.  

This is one of the "potato chip" block baby quilts I finished.  I have tried to use cute fabric for the backs of the baby quilts I made this summer as I used fairly bright colors on front instead of the more subdued colors I usually use.

Another of the quilts with chickens on the back.

There are a bunch more of the baby quilts that I have finished but the next three are just starts of yet more baby quilt tops!!  I have literally a huge stash of 5 in squares and bags and bags of 2 in strips.  I saw the block on the internet in two different settings -- one straight rows and one with rows going diagonally.  I decided to try something new and these were the results.  They are made up of half square triangles and 2  in strips -- very simple but I think a design wall really helps setting them up.

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I now have piles of yellow, blue, green and purple blocks so there are definitely  more of these in the future.  As they are a bit small for the neonatal quilts, I will be adding a white border and then a colored border (color yet to be determined) before binding them.  I have seven more baby tops to do but have to get some batting from the club to finish them..

Finishing Up Some Tops

Finally got the inside of this quilt sewn together.  I will be adding a couple of borders after I do the quilting.  As I no longer have any batting here, it will wait until I head south.  I am pretty pleased with the result.  I found that I really didn't like surrounding the blocks with anything other than white but compromsed on the border.

I actually tried a configuration with half square triangles like I have done previously but again, didn't likee the colored fabrics abutting the "posies".  So I tried this configuration which was okay but didn't increase the overall size of the quilt anymore than surrounding each of the blocks with white sashing which is what I finally decided to do.

Here you can see all 64 blocks completed and basically how I decided to go with for a solution as I really like the individual blocks.

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All the blocks properly sashed.  Like the other quilt, I will first put a white border and then probably some green and maybe a dark purple.  It is currently 38 x 48.

 

I have a ton of 4 1/2  in x 2 1/2 strips cut.  There will probably be several more of these neonatal quilts done before I can use them all up!!  I don't have nearly enough of the 6 1/2 strips cut so that will be next.  

I still have some more blocks to deal with as well  - more stack and whacks.

A New Computer and Miscellaneous Baby Quilts

Quite a learning curve with my new computer which has a very sensitive mouse pad so I am forever closing down everything!  I also no longer have Picasa which is how I editted my pictures and the one that comes with Google now doesn't do all the things that I used to be able to do.  I had to buy an SD card holder as well so I could transfer pics from my camera to the computer.  This and the next one are two of four baby quilts utilizing this super easy pattern.  The other two just require binding.  I have two more that need some more machine quiting and are different patterns using up some of my random four patches.

This was inspired by quilts seen on Scrap Quilt Enthusiasts on Facebook.  The original one was by a woman named Duckworth so people have taken to calling this a Duckworth quilt.  It is basically a wonky log cabin using scraps of all sizes but pretty much sticking with a consistent color although all different variations.  I show 49 blocks here but I have finished over 100 now.  The blocks are each 6 1/2 in square unfinished.  It took me a while to find a rhythm and a way to do multiple blocks efficiently so that no two are alike..  I will keep going to use up the scraps but just found I have multiple bags of blue scraps that are a little wider.  I packed up my 2 in brown scraps and will make a brown one when I return north.  I have two boxes filled with squares and "kits" to make several tops this summer.

I had all my hand dyed solids spread out sin several large boxes and got sick of looking for what I wanted and so utilized the bookcase in our guest room to store them (husband hasn't notived yet!).  I also wanted to determine what colors I was short on as I haven't done any dyeing this winter as husband took over my garage work table for his tools!  I do need greens and oranges as you can see! 

I am heading north soon so may be short on posts again for awhile.  

An Old Time Favorite - Stack and Whack!!

Another baby quilt of truly leftover fabrics.  It's not too bad!  I am trying to use up random baggies of 4 patches and 2 1/2 squares that were just sitting there as I always overachieve when cutting pieces for a quilt.  Needs borders, quilting and binding.

The last of this patterned baby quilts for awhile!!  I picked up a bunch of random baby prints from quilt club and used them all!

I was scheduled to show some ladies how to do "stack and whacks" and found a lovely piece of flowered fabric to play with for myself.  It was enough for 8 repeats so I made an 8 piece stack and whack with half and used the second half to made 4-patch posies  I should have made the strips larger for the 8 piece ones as they will only finish to about 4 inches each and you lose a lot of the pretty flowers.  These are 58 of the 60 I made.  Now to figure out a setting for one or two quilts.

This is a closeup givig you a better idea of what they look like.

This is a lot of the 4 patch ones but I have more to add

This is a closeup of several of the blocks.  I do like these better.  They were cut from the same size strips as the 8 sided ones!


 

Whew -- It Has Been Some Time -- Baby Quilts

It's been a while since I have posted as I have been busy finishing up all those baby quilts.  I have pictured the final quilts with the backings (which are really as nice or nicer than the fronts!!}.  This one has cats on the back pictured up in the left hand corner.  I used up quite a few of my 5 in squares but still have bags of them!

This is the old faithful pattern that I have done before.  A couple days of my time was spent just cutting 6 1/2 in by 3 1/2 in rectangles of a lot of my black and white fabrics.  I already had all the four patches done from before!!  The backing has polar bears and penguins!

This and the above quilt are variations on the pattern and have really cute wildlife fabric on the back.  I still have enough of that fabric to back two more quilts.  I have done a couple of stack and whacks from the fabric too.  I decided it was better as backing for these baby quilts.

And who doesn't like dinosaur fabric which I used on the back of this one!

I already backed a couple of quilts that I donated already with this cute fabric with cows on it!

This is the last of the finished baby quilts which also used the dinosaur fabric on the back.  Altogether, I made 7 quilts with this pattern (3 have already been donated).  I probably won't do anymore of this particular configuration.

This top is finished, ready to be basted and machine quilted. As I have mentioned before, I don't add the borders until I have finished the machine quilting.  I have found it is much much easier to add them then and you don't have to measure anything to make them even.  You just need to remember to add a little backing and batting around the edges!

The blocks are done but not sewn together yet.  I have the pieces for one more and then I will probably cease baby quilts for awhile -- I will have run out of batting and need to get a little cleaned up as I leave for the north in a few weeks.
 

Neo-natal Quilts and Farmer's Wife Blocks

This and the next two quilts were made for our Guild neo-natal program.  

This was made from the blocks that were not 60 degree angles which I didn't realize until I cut all the fabric up!  So I call it my original design!

I call this my Mother Goose quilt.  I made it a little smaller than I was supposed to in my hurry to get it finished, forgetting to add an additional border.  It's still cute though!

Just a couple of the blocks I have done the last couple of days.  I am getting better at not having to rip out seams because I have the half square triangles going in the wrong direction!!

 

Here is the current status of the blocks.  I am trying to do one a day but if they are super simple, I overachieve.  Some of my fabric choices are better than others but hopefully it will even out at the end.  I was worried about what to do for sashing but decided I will probably use a very dark forest green.  I do them as a reward for having machine quilted a baby quilt!  

My E-Mail Friends are a Bad Influence on Me!!

 

Years ago I got addicted to doing Dear Jane blocks and exchanging them with several email friends.  They were entirely too addictive (although they taught me a lot about quilting because they were such small blocks with so many pieces).  I ended up making about 1000 blocks, enough for several quilts and I still have about 50 I haven't used yet!  About 100 of those blocks were from another series of 30's blocks from a very obscure source!

Well, those email friends strike again as they started making "Farmer's Wife" blocks from two books, one featuring 20's blocks and one 30's blocks.  They are probably the only two books I have purchased in the past couple of years!

I used EQ8 to diagram all the blocks from both books but didn't start them when I was here last year.  I finally got a lot of unpacking done and some organization and decided it was time-- I had selected the fabric palette I was going to use last year.

These are the first five blocks I have done.  For some reason, even though I did them in the alphabetical order in the book, EQ randomly moved them around and I can't figure out the order if there is any!  So I just doing them in the order of EQ.  This one was pretty straightforward.  I am probably going to overlay part of the yellow but will decide for sure further on.

This one was a bear!  It ended up being 5 1/2 inches instead of 6 1/2 inches, thus the border.  The "grid" for it was 5 and when I did my drawing on EQ, I didn't do what I did with other grid 5 blocks which is to add the 1/2 in border all the way around.  So I ended up doing it after the fact.

This one was also a bear to do and it was much too big and then I trimmed down pieces and it became too small!  So another border!

Finally an easy one!

This was an easy one but did have 51 pieces so it took some time and a lot of ripping out as I kept sewing in the wrong directions despite my nice organization of the pieces on a piece of batting!

This is the palette I am using, many are very small scraps so it will truly be a scrap quilt.  I have just about used up one 10 in square already with the light purples.

I have got to get started quilting the many baby quilt tops I have made.  Here is another one which I haven't sewn together yet, having been distracted by the above project!  I was trying to do one block a day but ended up doing 2 each of the last two days!