Piecing

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[This post brought to you by the magic of scheduled posting, as I am not doing any sewing at all while I'm in Florida this week...]

I have fallen into the trap that so many quilters do: I am forever working on quilts for someone else.  New babies, family members who need a special gift, a commissioned quilt for a friend, and not to mention the bee blocks.  All of the quilts that I have swimming around in my head that I simply want to do seem to get pushed to the back of the to-do list.  I’m trying to integrate some of those designs and colors and ideas into the “have-to” quilts.  And, of course, I only “have to” make them because I’ve said so. I do enjoy making them, otherwise I wouldn’t do it at all.

But there’s something refreshing about making something simply because I want to.  There is no intended recipient, no deadline.  I showed these blocks to my husband, and when he asked “so what are these for?”, I was pleased to reply “for fun!”

Pinwheels - 1:8

I’m making these along with the P.S. I Quilt Pinwheel Sampler Quilt-Along. What can I say? I can’t resist a good quilt-along.

I’m going with mostly stash fabrics (though I admit to buying a few more to add to said stash).  I’m using raspberry/fuchsia, orange, pink, and aqua, with gray (Kona Ash) as the background color.  So far, two weeks completed, I’m loving it.

Pinwheels - 2:8

Hopefully this will turn out as nice in reality as it looks in my head.

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I totally kept up with my Bee obligations this month… go me!

Well, OK, I made the last one at about 3PM on the 28th.  But hey, it was still February.

For One Block Over, Heather sent a handful of brown/green/teal fabrics and asked for big 16″ wonky log cabins. I added a bunch from my stash, and I think this is going to be a very pretty quilt.

February Block for Heather

For Bee Addicted 2, Teaginny had a lovely color palate of brown, tan, cream, and light blue.  She asked for square-in-a-square or rectangle-in-a-rectangle blocks.  These were surprisingly fun to make, and I think will be AMAZING when the whole thing comes together. In the meantime, I may have to steal this idea at some point…

February blocks for Teaginny

For A Piece of Work B, Julie sent three blocks and asked for the Castle in the Air block from Quilter’s Cache, to make a quilt for her son. Cool, huh?

February block for Julie

For Scraptastic, Heidi sent stripes and asked for Kaffe Fasset mitered squares. I loved the way a simple striped fabric turned into such a neat block, and how cutting the same fabric at different points in the pattern repeat could make such different blocks.

February blocks for Heidi

And finally, for Charming Robin, I had Rachel’s Eden charm pack and instructions to make Bento-style blocks. I added a little diamond in the middle to shake things up a little, and made the diagonal quarters identical to each other. Very yummy bright colors.

Charming Robin - February block for Sweatteamom

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I did more than make those two quilts in January… I also kept up with my Bee obligations!  As of this month, I am now in FIVE active virtual quilting bees, which is a little insane.  One of them was on hold this month, though, so I only had four blocks to make.

For A Piece of Work B, Kyra sent batiks and white-on-white and asked for a Dutchman’s Puzzle block:

APOWB block for Kyra

For the inaugural month of One Block Over, Michelle sent some Riley Blake fabrics and solids, as well as a pattern for a neat star block. I followed the directions very literally, though I rather like the blocks made by those who took more liberties with the instructions. Must remember not to always be so rigid…

One Block Over block for Michelle

It was also the first month for Scraptastic, which is my first time being the admin for a Bee. Jenna sent the pink Starling print and asked for improvisational log cabins. I wanted to make a second block, but just ran out of time. Would you believe EVERY SINGLE PERSON in the bee got their block done on time? So impressed!

Scraptastic block for Jenna

And, finally, we also began our Charming Robin bee, which is a round-robin involving charm packs. The package was late in arriving, so I didn’t finish exactly on time, but it’s still early in February and it’s on its way to California for the next person. Sharon sent a charm pack of Clementine and a pattern for the “Basket of Flowers” block from Moda.

January Block for Sharon/Kirasma

Already behind

How is it that I already feel “behind” for the year and it’s not even the end of January?

It feels like I’m really struggling to find time for sewing right now.  As it is, my time is limited to when my kids are asleep, which basically means from about 1-3pm and after 8pm.  Trouble is, I need to do other things during that time, too.  Exercise, laundry, dinner prep… blah blah blah.  Plus, we took a last-minute trip to Florida to visit my husband’s ailing grandmother, so that threw me off, as well.

It could also be the fact that one of my closest friends and my younger brother are due to become first-time parents any second now, and I did not get a start on either quilt before the holidays.  Progress is being made, though.  My friend has the slightly earlier due date, so I worked on hers first.  It’s now just waiting for binding (which has been ordered) and the arrival of one awesome little girl (so I can put her name on the label, of course!).

Baby quilt in progress

My nephew-to-be is due February 6, and I finally got all of the fabric cut last night.  Now to assemble the blocks and get it all together. It’s a bit of organized chaos that I’m hoping will come together well.

Fabric cut for nephew's quilt

In the meantime, I signed up for the eighth go-around of the Doll Quilt Swap on Flickr.  I arguably should have said no, but it’s just entirely too much fun to miss out on.  My partner for this round has a rather different style than I do, so I’m trying to come up with an idea that she’ll like, but that I’ll also like making and be proud of.  We’ll see…

When it comes right down to it, I feel like I have more ideas and things I want to make than I really have time to do.  Not a terrible problem to have, as it sure beats plodding through something you don’t feel inspired to do.  It’s just that it gives me that slightly panicked feeling all the time, because it never seems like enough time.  Ah well.

So, how is your new year shaping up?  Feeling fresh and renewed, or already dragging?

Square it up

I’m working on what may very well be my final finished quilt for the year.  It’s another custom order for a friend of mine to give as a baby gift, and I decided to try out the double-hourglass tutorial from Cluck Cluck Sew.  It has been, indeed, quite easy and I strongly recommend giving it a try.

The only thing is that some of the cutting and trimming is a little tedious.  My blocks ended up about 6¼”, so I trimmed them all down to 6″.  I’ve never really done much squaring up like that, mostly because I’m lazy and it’s boring.  But, man, I really think it made all the difference in how the points are lining up (reasonably well) and how the top came together (very nice and flat).  Lesson learned: suck it up, trim blocks, and you’ll thank yourself.

Double hourglass sneak peak

I’ve also been pressing the seams open, which totally goes counter to what I was taught, but I really think is the right choice when there are all of these crazy angles coming together.  On the plus side, even the back looks kind of pretty.

Double hourglass sneak peak

Now, though, I’m stuck.  How on earth to quilt this thing?  It’s small, only about 30×36.  I’m nervous to stipple it, because of the bulky seams at the corners of the blocks, but I’m not sure I want to do straight lines, either.  So, if you had a quilt of double-hourglass blocks, how would you quilt it?

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I was actually super on top of things this month, and got my two Bee blocks done quite a while ago.  Yay for me!

The first was for Wendy in our Bee Addicted 2 bee.  She plans on doing a bento-style quilt with vintage linens.  What that meant for us is that she basically sent three fabrics, already cut, with very clear instructions on what to do.

October Block for Wendy

I’m sure it’s all going to look very cool when it comes together.  But it’s just not my cup of tea. Not just because vintage linens aren’t my thing, but because I kind of feel like the point of a Bee is to have people make things that you might not make, yourself.  I think if the instructions are too narrow, it starts to feel more like farming out busywork than getting some creative, interesting things.  I don’t say that to criticize anyone at all. I had no problem making the block, and I do think it’s going to be a very cool quilt.  It’s just not how I envision the process for myself.  More on that in a moment…

My second block for the month was for A Piece of Work B.  Jennie sent some Amy Butler Daisy Chain prints (plus white) and asked for any kind of log cabin.  I must have had Bento blocks on the brain, because I made a sort of quarter-log-cabin/Bento thing for her:

October Block for Jennie/sunflowerquilt

I was pretty happy with how it turned out.  More or less how I pictured it in my mind’s eye.  Yay!

And, finally, I sent off a whole bunch of envelopes last week, because November is MY month for A Piece Of Work B!  Here’s what I sent:

APOWB Fabric - November

Yup.  That’s it.  A fat eighth of the Alexander Henry Starlings print in neutral, and a fat quarter of bleached muslin.  Two fabrics.

I asked for wonky stars with the starling print in the middle and the white as the main background fabric.  Star points come from people’s stashes.  I encouraged as liberal an interpretation of my “wonky star” request as people felt like taking.  A few have already come in, and they’re all different!  I may make one or two of my own tomorrow.

This is my first time sending out fabric (and instructions!) for a Bee, so I’m crossing my fingers an hoping for the best.  So far, very excited!

New Starts

Don’t you just love starting a new project?  It feels like I haven’t started anything new in a long time, as even the most recent projects were in the hopper for a long time before they got done.  So here I am, with three new stars.

One, a second commissioned baby quilt for my friend Danielle, the same one who wanted the blue & brown coin quilt:

New Starts

Two, a quilt for my sister-in-law, who is long overdue to have one made for her.  When I asked her what colors she wanted in her quilt, she simply said, “rainbow!”  And rainbow, it shall be.

New Starts

And three, a quick foray into holiday novelty fabrics.  Normally not my cup of tea, but I have something special in mind for this charm pack of Spooktacular:

New Starts

And finally, the most awesome news of all, I am taking a weekend all to myself and going to Amanda Jean’s retreat in Colorado!  How frigging excited am I?  Not only will it be great to meet Amanda Jean and learn some tips and tricks, as well as hang out with other quilt-minded folks, but I am simply beside myself with the prospect of three whole days to do my own thing.  You know you’re a SAHM to twin two-year-olds when you’re this excited about a long plane ride to yourself.

OK, so you know how I said I wouldn’t be doing any sewing because I was so busy tagging stuff for my Moms of Twins Club sale?  Yeah. Well. I had a stressful day today and needed to unwind with my sewing machine instead of my tagging gun. So I finished up my block obligations for the month of September.  I made two of them today, the rest were done earlier.

The first two are for the inaugural month of the Bee Addicted 2 bee.  Linzi sent us some Wildwood and a bit of muslin and asked for improvisational log cabins with muslin as the outer border to finish at 12.5″.  We were welcome to add our own fabric, and pinks were especially welcome.  There wasn’t quite enough muslin to frame the second block I made, but Linzi said she’d finish it up when they arrived back to her.

September Block for Linzi

September Block for Linzi

The next pair are for A Piece of Work BChristy sent some Christmas prints: a main fabric (light green, in my case), a secondary fabric (red print), an accent color (dark green), and some white.  She wanted us to use at least a little of the accent color, but otherwise the blocks were totally quilter’s choice. Oh, and we were welcome to add coordinating solids if we wanted.  The first block was just fabrics she sent, the second block I added some pink (and had barely any of that dark green left, but it’s in there!).

September block for Christy (1)

September block for Christy (2)

And finally, AmandaJean wanted to donate some quilts to Quilts of Valor, and put out a call for some help to get them done.  She asked for a maverick star in red, white & blue.  I hope this works with the rest of her quilt!

Star block for AmandaJean

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I am very pleased to announce that my DQS7 quilt is complete!

DQS7, Finished!

It’s sort of a nine-patch of wonky log cabins, if that makes any sense at all.  Nice, bright pieces from my scrap pile, with a bit of white to give it some space.  The quilting is done in white thread in a sort of square-spiral to mimic the blocks. I didn’t measure it, but I think it’s about 20 inches, square (before washing, haven’t decided if I’ll wash before sending or not).

DQS7, Back

I really like the back, and think my partner will, too.  That big pink floral was in my scrap bin from a previously abandoned project, and I’m glad I got to use a nice big piece of it.  The label might be my new favorite method, courtesy of Sarah’s tutorial.

DQS7, Folded

I thought the crazy colors and sort of wild, almost sparkly print for the binding worked pretty well. I was worried it would be too busy against the front, but I think it’s OK. And it’s only a doll-sized quilt, after all, I think you can get away with it being a little busy and not have it get overwhelming.

Anyways, it’s done! Yay! Just want to get a goodie or two to send with it, and then I’ll ship it off to its secret new home.

In the meantime, I’ve also finished the two ragged-square tops for Marie’s kids, and just need to baste and quilt them. Marie, I hope you like the preview!

Two ragged square tops

I’ve also got two commissioned quilts for baby boys in the works, both of which were requested to have some blue and brown, so I’m actually using a lot of the same prints.  The pile of fabric was just sitting up on my shelf, mocking me, so I finally did all of the cutting yesterday just to feel like I was finally making progress on them.  One will be a small version of the stacked coins quilt, the other will be a zig-zag.

Brown and blue coins

Brown and blue strips

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I’ve had so much fun with the couple of virtual quilt-alongs that I’ve joined, as well as the Doll Quilt Swap, that I decided to jump headfirst into the world of Quilting Bees.  For the non-quilting friends who might be reading, a quick run-down of the differences (as I understand them):

Quilt-Along
This is just a bunch of people making (roughly) the same pattern at (roughly) the same time. The Flickr pools for the nine-patch quilt-along and the ORBCo quilt-alongs give some idea of the immense variation that is possible, even when everyone is technically following the same directions.
Quilt Swap
This is when you make a quilt and send it to someone else, and you are the recipient of another person’s work. Sometimes (as in the case of the Doll Quilt Swap) there is an element of secrecy, such that I only know to whom I am sending a quilt, but no idea who is sending one to me!
Quilting Bee
These usually involve making quilt blocks (not a finished quilt) for each other. In many cases, there are 12 people in a group, and each month, one person sends some amount of fabric to the other members. They request a particular style and size of block, or leave it open to interpretation. The blocks are sent back to that month’s person, and they can make a whole quilt out of what other people send them.

At any rate, in the way that these sorts of things tend to snowball, I have joined three “virtual” quilting bees (virtual in the sense that I’ve never met these folks face-to-face). One started in August, one starts in September, and the third starts in January. I’m trying not to freak out about embarrassing myself with all of the talented people who are in these Bees. Hopefully my blocks won’t be awful!

I got my fabric from Anna for our inaugural month in my first bee, and she actually sent rather specific instructions.  We each got a fat quarter and some scraps in one color (mine was red), plus a bit of white, and some paper templates for string blocks. I had been meaning to try string blocks, anyways, so that was nice, and the very specific instructions at least meant that I didn’t have to agonize over what to do!  So, as soon as I can get a proper mailing envelope, here’s what’s heading out the door. Not bad for a first try! A little wonky, perhaps, but I think it works in a scrappy block like this…

August Block for Anna

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