This 'N That

I'm trying to finish up some odds and ends around the sewing room before I start March's projects.

I've had the center of the little churn-dash wall hanging hanging on the display wall ever since I sewed it together. I guess I was afraid if I put it away, I'd never get back to it.

I needed the space so I decided to get him finished. I went with a simple checkerboard border for the first border and finished it with blue for the outside border. The binding is made. Into the ready to be quilted box he goes. I don't know if I'll hand quilt him or donate him to a charity that will hand quilt then sell in a auction.

I've used the same blue for the churn dash quilts as I used in my blue & white Dear Jane quilt. I had purchased a whole bolt because I didn't want to have to worry about running out of fabric. 

I measured the fabric left on the bolt, there are 3 yards left out of the original 15. I love this fabric today as much as I did when I purchased it back in November 2014. The name is Evening from Robert Kaufman's Fusions Mist collection. I'm also using some of this fabric in Nearly Insane.

When I was piecing the Scrappy Stars charity quilt, I started thinking about a different scrappy star quilt to make with 5" squares. After I finished sewing the small churn dash wall hanging together, I started on the new comforter top.

This is what I came up with. I keep seeing the 16 block scrappy star around on different blogs. These are two big scrappy 16 block stars. He measures 60" x 82". 

The box of purple fabrics is getting very low. In fact, it is so low, I didn't have enough variety of purple blocks to make another scrappy border.

Things I would do differently? I would make the yellow border 3" wide and put it in between the stars and purple squares. The outside purple border would have been 5" instead of 3". But it is finished and he is not going to be redone. Another charity comforter top, ready to be knotted.

The hand quilting has started on the blue churn dash quilt. People often ask me, how long it takes to hand quilt a quilt? It takes as long as it takes. You can't speed up hand quilting unless you make your stitches huge.

There are feathers in the white border. They take time but they are so lovely to see.

I basted the edge of the quilt to the backing and batt with longer stitches. To quilt the square-in-a-square border, there are 3 needles going. One to stitch in the ditch along the border edge. Two going along the sides of the squares. You can just keep going when you quilt like this. 

I'm using a wool batt and the quilting thread is white YLI. Now you will get weekly updates on the quilting process.

Linking to - Esther's Wednesday WOW!, Let's Bee Social, Sew Some Love, My Quilt Infatuation, Finished Or Not Friday, Crazy Mom Quilts, Confessions of a Fabric Addict, Show & Tell Monday