Many years ago, I pieced the center of this quilt. I was trying to reduce the fabric stash, didn't happen.
The quilt center laid around here for years, I never could decide what fabric to use for the border.
I had errands to run in Shipshewana one day this summer. I took the pieced center along, stopped at Yoder Department Store and showed my problem to my friend Nancy.
She took one look at the center and said Kansas Troubles. We walked over to the shelf of Kansas Troubles fabrics and she pulled out approximately 10 bolts for me to peruse. I decided on one of the lovely reds.
During the rainy week several weeks ago, I sewed the borders on the center. Now she is a finished flimsy and I don't even have to quilt her!! She will be hand quilted and donated to a fund raising auction for the school my Pennsylvania grands attend.
Yes, another project crossed off the list!
Linking to - Quilting is More Fun than Housework, Show & Tell Monday With Bambi, Em's Scrapbag, Love Laugh Quilt, BOM's Away, Quilter's Monday, Fiber Tuesday, Sew Fresh Quilts, My Quilt Infatuation, Finished Or Not Friday, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, TGIFF!, Finish It Up Friday, Show Off Saturday
Another small quilt I quilted last week was Blue Squares that I pieced in July using 10" squares. He was fast and easy to piece.
I need the rush of some completed projects after the stress of piecing that last Nearly Insane block, so, after finishing the quilting on Circle of Squares, I pinned Blue Squares and quilted him.
He got simple straight line quilting. The lines are approximately 1" apart. I'm not going to stress out about not perfectly straight lines. He measures 54" x 56". In a perfect world, he would have been square but within 2 inches, that's close enough.
I added a white flange to the binding to add some zing!
For the backing fabric, I used the last of mom's border fabrics. There wasn't enough fabric so I pulled these other blocks from the leftover block box.
Another charity quilt finished, too large for a crib quilt but too small for a throw. Hopefully he will go to the right person and be a perfect fit for them.
Linking to - Quilter's Monday, Fiber Tuesday, Sew Some Love, Esther's Wednesday WOW!, Sew, Stitch, Snap SHOW, Sew Fresh Quilts, My Quilt Infatuation, Finished Or Not Friday, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, TGIFF!, Finish It Up Friday, Free Motion Mavericks, Show Off Saturday
The big baler wasn't available to bale earlier this week and now we are having several days of rain and drizzle. Definitely not haymaking weather so plenty of time for sewing.
I had been undecided about how to quilt the Circle of Squares quilt that I pieced in June for the RSC. I tentatively thought I would do spiral quilting but that just didn't seem right. After I read the post by Roseanne about quilting of Irish Chain (9-Patch), I knew how I was going to quilt her.
I did a little preliminary work before starting the quilting.
First I marked a X on the quilt then a +. The + was so I would know where the pivot point was supposed to be.
I think it helped. I quilted the quilt in 4 sections, trying to do a section a day. She turned out very nicely. She measures 44" x 45" and will make a lovely baby quilt.
I didn't have enough of either of the larger pieces of yellow or flowered yellow fabric to use entirely for the backing but I had a lot of the checkerboard blocks leftover from the front of the quilt. It worked!
Linking to - Free Motion Mavericks, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Finished Or Not Friday, TGIFF, Finish It Up Friday, Let's Make Baby Quilts, Scrap Happy Saturday, BOM'S Away, Quilting is More Fun Than Housework, Show & Tell Monday, LoveLaughQuilt, Em's Scrapbag, Fiber Tuesday, Sew, Stitch, Snap SHOW, Sew Some Love
And I just about did go Insane! The farmer put off hay making for a week so after I pieced as much as I could of 9-Patches & Baskets, I decided to work on Nearly Insane.
These blocks finish at 6" and there are 9 blocks in this diagonal row.
Back in July, before things got really busy, I had pieced these 4 blocks.
They weren't very complicated and went together easily.
Now the blocks that were pieced in August.
Another straight forward block. Sometimes it's hard for me to envision what the block will look like. I wish now I would have put the lighter fabric in the corners instead of the darker fabric but, it's too late. Unless there is a big problem, I don't redo blocks.
This was an easy block, simple to piece. She's just a quiet, simple, troublefree block.
This block is interesting because the on point corners are at the edge of the block. It looks like I made a mistake because there is no seam allowance left. That's the way it is supposed to be. When the block is sewn into the row, the points are cut off. Look for this block in the picture of the flimsy at the end of the post.
This block is my favorite block of the row. I don't mind set in seams. Wouldn't this star look great as a center medallion in a larger quilt?
This block, #75, just about put me over the edge to Insanity! There were 185 pieces. I can't believe how many errors and mis-cuts I made with this block. It took me 3 days to piece her! She's finally finished and I know she's not perfect but I don't care, she is NOT going to be remade. Finished is better than perfect.
The quilt top progress so far. Click on the picture to enlarge. I am making the quilt in two sections. The bottom two rows (right diagonal) are not attached to the to body.
The corner pieces for the center row are pieced and ready to be attached after the the 2 sections are sewn together.
There are 4 more diagonal rows to piece. Each row decreases by 2 blocks so the next row will have 7 blocks. I'm hoping to have the center section pieced by the first of November.
Linking to - Quilting is More Fun than Housework, Show & Tell Monday With Bambi, Em's Scrapbag, Design Wall Monday, BOM's Away, Quilter's Monday, Esther's Wednesday WOW!, Sew Fresh Quilts, UFO Progress, My Quilt Infatuation, Finished Or Not Friday, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, TGIFF!, Finish It Up Friday, Show Off Saturday
I found the blog Fairies & Fibres hosted by Karen H several years ago. She is an EPP extraordinaire but she also has some interesting quilt patterns for pieced quilts. Click on quilts by Karen H. in the heading of her blog and scroll down.
Several years ago I made her pattern, Cherry Blossoms. Of course I made the quilt larger than her pattern and added the pieced border.
I've always wanted to make her 9-Patches & Baskets pattern. I can't believe I did this during the summer, but I actually started the quilt last week. Many years ago I sewed strips and pieces and made a large quantity of 3" finished 9-patch blocks. I used some of them in my double 9-patch quilt but I still had a large basket of the blocks left, perfect for Karen's quilt. I've run out of 9-patches that have neutral corners so I'll finish the quilt another day. This was a fun and quick piecing project since I had most of the 9-patches already pieced.
Of course I modified the pattern to suit me. My quilt is going to be king sized. Also all of Karen's 9-patches had dark corners. I pieced my quilt with alternating 9-patches so they would interlock with each other.
I'm going go through the small pieces of fabrics around here and make more 9-patches. Hopefully I'll have enough pieced to finish piecing this quilt sometime this winter.
I need to add 3 more rows with the blue squares (already pieced) and 4 more rows of 9-patches.
I'll worry about piecing the basket border after the center is completed.
Now I need to return to Nearly Insane.
I'm including a picture of these heifers in the pasture south of our house. They are enjoying the treat of corn husks left after husking sweet corn.
Linking to - Quilting is More Fun than Housework, Show & Tell Monday With Bambi, Em's Scrapbag, Love Laugh Quilt, BOM's Away, Quilter's Monday, Fiber Tuesday, Esther's Wednesday WOW!, Sew, Stitch, Snap SHOW, Sew Fresh Quilts, My Quilt Infatuation, Finished Or Not Friday, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Finish It Up Friday, Show Off Saturday
The end of July through the middle of October is the busiest time on the farm for me. Besides the challenge of hay making, the garden's bounty is ripening and ready to be preserved. There isn't much time in the day for sewing. When I do have time to sew, I need to work on something that can be put down and picked up easily, nothing challenging. Nearly Insane has been put on the back burner and I have worked on the RSC blocks.
The August color for the RSC is neutrals. Well, that won't work for me, I'm making the actual rainbow colors for my quilt. I only have 2 more colors to make, pink and orange so I pulled out the appropriate 4-patches and made the blocks.
I'm making 28 blocks of each color. I sew the blocks in groups of 3 so I can vary the fabrics. The first group makes 10 blocks, the next two groups make 9 blocks each.
First I organize the squares.
Then I web sew the first two vertical rows together. I sew all the first vertical rows.
Then I add the third vertical row.
Finally the 4th vertical row is added.
After all the blocks have been webbed together, I press them and then start sewing the rows together.
After all the rows are sewn together they get a final press.
Here are a few of the pink blocks for display.
I also sewed the orange blocks. Now orange is a challenge for me because it is NOT a color I especially like.
In fact, when I joined the RSC, I didn't have very many orange fabrics at all. The fabrics with the dots are left over fabric from making the pinwheel crib quilts along with a few other fabrics. I actually ordered a fat quarter bundle of orange fabrics from Connecting Threads so I would have a variety of orange to use. They turned out ok. I'm still not excited about orange but I can live with these blocks.
When I started making the RSC blocks, I was using leftover white on white fabrics. I've use them up! I needed to expand the selection fabrics to be used for the solid squares.
The little squares finish at 1" and the solid squares are 2".
I'll be putting these blocks away until later in autumn when I have time to sew the blocks into a top.
Linking to - Scrap Happy Saturday, Quilting is More Fun than Housework, Show & Tell Monday With Bambi, Love Laugh Quilt, BOM's Away, Quilter's Monday, Fiber Tuesday, My Quilt Infatuation, Finished Or Not Friday, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, TGIFF!
Working with hand work is a good way to unwind and relax in the evenings. Lately I have been embroidering.
I finished the block with the blue applique. I am so glad I appliqued the little heart. Looks so much better than my fill in embroidery stitches would have.
Using variegated thread makes embroidering so much easier because I never have to change the color of my thread! I used #12 pearl cotton on these blocks.
Then I embroidered these two blocks. Do you see the difference? Click to enlarge them.
The block on the left has been embroidered with the outline stitch. This is my normal stitch, one that I have been using for 50 years. It just comes natural to me.
The block on the right is embroidered with a back stitch. This is the stitch that Gail Pan used for most of the projects in her book. It was very hard for me to have even stitches. You know what this means, practice, practice and more practice.
If I don't feel like embroidering, then I knit dishcloths. This is one I finished this week.
Every time I show a knitted dishcloth, someone asks for the pattern and what kind of yarn I use.
I use Lily brand cotton yarn and here is the pattern.
I don't know where I found this pattern, I do know it was a free pattern where ever I found it. Seed Stitch Dish Cloth - With a size #4 circular needle cast on 40 stitches. Row 1 & 2 – knit. Row 3 & 4 – Knit 2 *K1 P1 repeat from * across to last 2 stitches k2. Repeat rows 1 – 4 for pattern until measures 9” (same as bottom edge), ending with Rows 1 & 2. Bind off.
Linking to - Slow Stitching Sunday, Show & Tell Monday With Bambi, Love Laugh Quilt, Em's Scrapbag, Super Mom - No Cape, Esther's Wednesday Wow!, Finished Or Not Friday, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Friday Night With Friends
