I was browsing on the internet recently and had a look at the Missouri Star site. Jenny Doan is a legend, and she had a great quilt which was made completely from one Carpenter’s Star block, made from a layer cake of 10” squares. It looks fabulous, and as I was admiring it, I thought ‘that would look great as a Linus quilt using smaller squares!’ So here is my version.
I have been busy cutting Linus kits etc and trying to make some sense of the orphans drawer. I found a bag of 5.5” blocks and tried to make them play nicely together.
I have realised that if there are only three blocks, I can always make an extra one! There were three drunkards path blocks for a centre, so I made one more. Good to get the orphans into a family! I have loosely grouped the other blocks together.
There. A jazzy batik border and it’s done! Not the most impressive of quilts, but a finish. I’ll find something interesting for the backing, and it’ll all be good.
Well, look at this finish!
I have really been digging out the orphan blocks, and putting them to use - good use, I think. Here is an applique centre I took on holiday a few years ago to keep me amused plus various 6” blocks from the orphan bag. The black Dala horses were made from a pattern in Today’s Quilter, but while I enjoyed making them, I didn’t want to make more! I had the orange batik border fabric I my stash, and I think it is perfect for the job.
Whoops! A little frayed hole! Have a look on the quilt and see how I resolved it. A little ‘I spy’ for the recipient!
As Project Linus coordinator I was contacted this week by Rosie, who works with children with life limiting conditions. She needs more quilts. That’s no problem, but it made me think about these professionals who are prepared to go the extra mile to make their patients feel good. So I decided to make her a small gift.
I love making these little pouches and find them really secular for all sorts of things. Since her name is Rosie, I thought I would use some fabric with roses on it. I looked in my pink drawer and saw this fabric, which is much more fun. Fabrics all have their own memories, and I remember buying this in New York at ‘The City Quilter’ in 2004. I was determined to visit this shop and persuaded my husband to fir it into our schedule first thing one day. He wanted to leave it till the end of the day, but I was concerned that it would get squeezed out if we did that! It’s happened before!
If you’ve never made a bag like this, here is the pattern. It’s very easy.
I belong to a challenge group, and last year we decided to make some group strip quilts. The idea is that we take turns to select a picture we like and cut it into strips. These strips are given out to the rest of the group and each person recreates their strip in fabric.
I have finally finished my strip. Any guesses as to what it is?
Does that help? I asked my husband whether the two strips looked the same, to which he replied, “Yes, they do, but I can’t work out what it is!” Of course, it’s a puffin. Or at least, a slice of puffin!
I get bored quite easily, and am always looking for new blocks and ideas to try. I am running out of strips (I know it’s hardly credible, but it’s true!) so fished out one of the donated tops to finish.
It’s a lovely set of tumblers cut out by Julie. Julie has an Accuquilt die which cuts these beauties, and since they have all the relevant corners cut off, they go together like a dream. It needed a small border, and I bound it in yellow for a bit of extra pizzazz.
Then on to something else. I saw a YouTube video by ‘Just get it done’ with 10 different scrap blocks, and decided to try this one. Yet another take on 2.5” squares and strips.
A centre 2.5” square, then two 6.5” x 2.5” strips and two 2.5” squares of another colour. Looking good. I cut a kit out of the scrap pinks ready for one of my willing volunteers to make up. Then I cam across quite a few brown fabrics. I often put them in the rummage box as they aren’t very child friendly colour-wise, but this time I decided they could be sophisticated for an older child.
Not completely sure about it, but I’ll carry on and see how it turns out.
We have all felt the seductive power of a bargain, and that is the only reason I can think was behind this purchase!
It’s very American and somewhat religious. I think I had hopes of using it for backing or with other more suitable blocks. It’s been in and out of my fabric drawers so many times, and then rejected that this time I decided to use it!
As foundation for more string blocks! As you can see, I’ve already started using it, and since my foundations are 7.5” and this piece is 23” wide, it couldn’t be better! There isn’t enough for a whole quilt, but I can use Vilene for the rest of the blocks. Clearing out the drawers, one piece at a time!
My local group, Piecemakers are currently running a BOM called Hope Stars. It’s just six months of blocks to hopefully keep us busy until the end of lockdown, and I have been coordinating it. All the committee have made input, everyone choosing a 12” star block and a 6” star block. It’s lovely to be part of a true collaboration. The instructions for the penultimate blocks should be available this weekend, so I thought I’d put all my blocks together to show a possible arrangement.
I thought I had rooted out all the little bags of stuff, but it seems not. I found a bag of little four-patches made from 1.5” squares, which would measure 2” finished! I know they were the remains of something, but I can’t remember what! I decided to use an idea from Cynthia Brunz of Scrap Mixology, to make squares in a square. I joined them in fours, then cut a 6.5” square diagonally twice and bordered them.
I have been making good progress with sorting out the bags of stuff in my sewing room. Some hexagon flowers have been successfully sewn onto a background square and now have joined the Linus orphans, and some Dresden Plates are ready to be used up too.
It might not be the most perfect Dresden Plate you’ve ever seen, but it’s been ironed flat and will be an acceptable addition to a scrap quilt. Then there were some nine-patches made from 1.5” squares, which I have bigger up into 5” blocks by framing them with triangles.
There were ten of these altogether which went into the relevant Linus bag. But them the next bag was some more Dresden Plate components.
There is small, and then there is ridiculous! There is no way I am going to spend time stitching these tiny bits together! That is definitely a step too far! So, cut rays go in the scraps drawer, pink squares are cut to 2.5” and the black goes in the blacks and greys box. Done!
I am determined not to leave any little bags of c**p in my sewing room when I cock my clogs! I’m not anticipating passing away just yet, but it comes to all of us, so I think now is as good a time as ever to do some rationalisation. I found more HSTs, and this time I made some fish!
Another good way of using up, which doesn’t involve much matching. Unfortunately they finish at 7.5” which isn’t a desperately useful size. However, I’m sure I’ll find a way to use them up! One more little bag of c**p down, lots more to go!
My lovely friend Liz has been having a sort out. She asked me if I would accept some items for our drama group (a full net underskirt - yes please!) and some fabric plus bits for Project Linus (yes please!). We met up outside and had a great chat and put a couple of full carriers in my car boot. I have sorted it all into colours and put it all away, but left out one or two little bags of the usual part cut out, part sewn bits. Here is the contents of one of them.
Half square triangles, usually abbreviated to HSTs, are often donated to Linus. They are also left over from other projects, as we sometimes get into the production line rhythm and end up with more than we intended. I usually toss them into the crumbs drawer, but have realised a really good way of using them up which isn’t too fiddly!
I have been using them in bear’s paw blocks, which is fine for the 2.5” HSTs, but the smaller ones make a lot of work for small blocks. Then I thought, why not use a centre square instead of lots of squares, and voila!
These are 2” HSTs, with a 6.5” square, making a creditable 9” finished block. Lucky thesevHSTs we’re all the same.
These two also have slightly mismatched sets of HSTs, but I’m sure they’ll be fine when finished.
Tip: one thing I have decided recently is that if you’re short a pink square or whatever to complete a scrappy block, you are allowed to make one! Getting these leftovers uses up is the aim of the game!
How many times have there been ‘scrap-busting’ patterns published? And how many of them have actually made any dent in the scrap piles? (Answers are lots and none!). But I have really, honestly made a dent in the scraps, although I have made several scrap quilts recently.
I’m trying quite hard to finish stuff and get to grips with all the boxes and bags of stuff which are in my sewing room. I thought I had a good handle on what was where, when I found this.
I was looking for a book, when I came upon a plastic folder containing this! (I did find the book, but not there!). It’s a block I started from Barb Adams and Alma Allen’s book ‘Home Sweet Home’. I had made their design ‘Quilting the Garden’ and thought I’d like to try another of their designs. I found I didn’t particularly enjoy appliqueing the regular shapes : they’d be better to be pieced, so gave up and sold the book. Although I don’t have the pattern, I have more of the window fabric, so I think I can wing it from here. It’ll be a good evening sewing project.
The title of this post might seem like stating the obvious, but it came as a surprise to me! I saw this string quilt somewhere on the web, and thought it would be an interesting one to do.
It has rectangles instead of squares, which gives the quilt more of a calming waves feeling, as opposed to the zig zag feeling of squares. So, I made a few rectangles, and started to lay them out.
But no matter how I turned them, they all sloped the same way! Squares can be alternated, but it seems that rectangles, though still four sided, can’t. What a surprise! So I had to make some blocks sloping in the opposite direction, and it’s beginning to take shape.
I’m doing it over papers, which is quick and easy, until I have to remove the papers. I used to have a foundation paper remover on tap, but she rudely moved away when she got married. I’ll just have to get on with the job myself! Tough times!
I have really enjoyed working with my scraps drawer(s) and I think I’ve made a good dent in them!
This is all I have left! Well, not strictly. Jackie contacted me to express shock that I had confessed to throwing small scraps away, and volunteered to adopt some, so I took her a small (ish) bag round. I also reassured her that it was only the very, very small bits I was abandoning, not anything significant.
I also sorted some of the scraps into roughly long, medium and small. I found that helpful when I was making this quilt.
I’m determined to keep using up these crumbs and strings, however, most scrap quilts assume you have more than just on strip or square of each fabric, and that’s not usually true of my scrap bin! I remembered a while ago about a scrappy pineapple quilt I made. That should be fun, I thought, so looked out the pattern. It’s a crazymomquilts pattern, and her tutorial is fabulously clear. She uses pairs of fabrics sewn opposite each other, but I couldn’t always find pieces which were long enough or duplicated, so I chose some pairs which were similar. It works for me! But scrap quilts can sometimes look a bit, well, scrappy, so I decided to add a bit of order by using red centres for each pineapple.
On second thoughts, the centres look a bit dominant, so I think I’ll mix it up a bit.
That’s better. Since they are all 9” finished, I’ll only need another five blocks to make enough for a Linus quilt, so I’m nearly done!
Whoops! I got distracted! I found this scrappy design on filminthefridge and just had to try it out! The strips are just stitched and flipped on a foundation, but have a 1” white strip on the diagonal. How clever is that! And, bonus, they only use one strip of any particular fabric. Result!
I love making scrap quilts. I love using up fabrics that people have thrown away, and I love meeting old friends (fabric friends) along the way. I always marvel at how fabric scraps can bring back memories of where it was bought, who you were with, when and what it was for.
