Congratulations, Tonya!

I regularly buy the American magazine 'Quiltmaker' as I find it has lots of ideas for quilts in it, but imagine my surprise to find in the current edition (Mar/Apr 09) a quilt inspired by Tonya's improvised piecing techniques and called Wonky Town! It credits Tonya (quite right too!) and gives the link to her blog and tutorial. Congratulations, Tonya, on getting into an international magazine!

Here is the quilt made by Brenda Groelz - doesn't the lime green add a certain pizzazz to the quilt? If you haven't yet taken the plunge on free piecing, this article may be just the encouragement you need, as it includes tips on putting the blocks together, and a sort-of suggested arrangement. And, at the risk of being accused of taking commission from the magazine, there is also a pattern for jelly rolls and a very clever method for making use of signatures in a quilt in the same edition. If you live in the UK and haven't seen it on sale, ask your local newsagent to get you a copy from Comag - all newsagents can do this. Good luck!

More orphans

After my recent success at reducing my orphans, I decided to raid my box of little orphan blocks again - well, I had to actually, because I could hardly get the lid closed! I found quite a number of 2 1/2inch sqaures joined together in pairs. They must have been left overs from a four-patch or even nine-patch quilt at some time. I arranged them on the floor to see of they would make anything reasonable.

The answer is patently no! Even the addition of a few half square triangles and flying geese couldn't help. Then I remembered there were half a dozen wonky houses I had made some time ago, waiting in my UFO box. I added them, along with more half square triangles made into diamonds and pinwheels, and suddenly, we have lift-off!

That's more like it! It was quite tricky to join together, but a bit of adjustment here and there and it all went together in a very satisfactory way.

Here is the finished top (alongside some books of DD's waiting to go to the charity shop!) which is bright and cheerful, and joining the pile waiting to be quilted.

And here is my small orphans box, not even half full. A result!