WIP Wednesday - lucky charms pillow

 When I have been tidying my sewing space I have made a mental note of some stash that I need to work on reducing:

• Scraps - an ongoing project
• Black and white fabrics - possibly a plaidish quilt paired with reds
• Linens 
• Charm packs

I don't have any jelly rolls or other precuts but I did buy a few charm packs when I was doing the monthly Schnibbles SAL. I have seen a number of the lucky charm pillows - pattern y Jaybird Quilts on Instagram and when I saw they used the Hex n More ruler and a charm pack, I decided to jump on the band wagon.

Following Jaybird's Instagram video, it took about 20 minutes to cut the half hexagons and I put them away on Monday ready to sew at the October meeting of our Guild. Then a game of canasta scheduled for Monday afternoon was cancelled, so I had an unexpected free afternoon - time to play. I put together the hexagons on my work table and soon realised that I hadn't checked the orientation of my charm squares before cutting so two directional fabrics are not going in the right direction! Time to embrace the imperfect. 

It didn't take too long to chain piece the pillow top together. I found a piece of wadding the right size and put it aside as I had a customer quilt on my long arm. I finished the customer quilt yesterday, loaded up my new favourite digital pantograph - Chevron E2E by Christy Dillon and the top was soon quilted.

I have some red, white and blue Cam snaps which are star shaped on order, so will finish this cushion cover once they arrive. Today I need to press and finish piecing the T-shirt quilt for a customer.

Monday make - Tub family SAL

 

The Tub Family is a pattern by Rosie Taylor from her Etsy store When I saw the pattern photo above, I couldn't help but fall in love with the aesthetic. I purchased the pattern to sew on the Friday night of the Sewing Shindig 2020 with the scraps already out for a retreat class. The fabric is Create by Quietplay from Sewhot.

I bought this line as I admire Quietplay's Foundation Paper Piecing patterns and I love a good rainbow stripe. I raided my fabric basket for the Carolyn Freidlander grey mesh, of which I have a lot, for the inside of the tub.

This is the small size. I want to sew the medium size next and I'm not sure whether to sticky with these fabrics or get out my Tula Pink scraps. The only thing I changed from the pattern was I machine stitched the binding around the top.

WIP Wednesday - T shirt quilt

 

An acquaintance and distant cousin, reached out to me to make a T-shirt memory quilt from her T-shirts. I put together a budget, which wasn't enough to put her off and she duly washed and pressed all of the T-shirts. They have been waiting for me to have a clear day to make a good start on the project. I have never done anything like this before so I have approached it with some trepidation.

That day was today and 5 and a half hours later, all of the T-shirts have been pressed, interfaced and cut up. I have almost equal columns pieced. My maths was a bit wrong on the first column but fixable. I now need to carefully press the seams open, even up the columns and piece it together into a quilt top. First I need to finish a customer quilt that is on my long arm. I made good progress on it yesterday but then my machine started making a noise, so I switched off the machine and will check it out on Friday and get help from my husband with the timing if necessary. 

Monday make - Jeliquilts cushions

Last weekend was the Sewing Shindig virtual retreat and I am exhausted. I did however finish three items with one left to bind, so I am pleased with my achievements over the weekend. I also did about half of the FURY block from the Tattoo quilt from HappySewLucky.

The first class was Foundation piecing with Kelly of Jeliquilts. We had one of the patterns in advance so I may have used it a a leader and ender project over the last two weeks. However I also cut out the pieces for a log cabin pattern which I pieced traditionally. 

For the flying geese pattern, I used a rainbow of handprinted fabrics from my scrap bag. These were printed by Karen Lewis and Lou Orth. The background is Fairy Dust in the Whisper colourway by Tula Pink with a striped binding from the Create line by Quietplay.

 This was made using the Create Fabric line by Quietplay on a background of metallic Essex dyed linen. all of the blocks were cut from scraps. Very satisfying.

I then loaded both cushion panels side by side on my long arm and used my current favourite Chevron Design by My Creative Stitches. Both cushions were finished with a rainbow of Cam snaps to lose. I definitely need to add to my stock of snaps as some colours are completed used up.

This cushion is a little overstuffed so I need to order some 18" cushion inners.

Friday finish - My Small World

 

My Small World by Jen Kingwell was my JMQG UFO challenge for September 2020 and it is complete. Finished. Done. I started this as part of a SAL and had the correct issue of Quiltmania. I even organised a swap on Instagram for the 1.5" low volume squares. I like it now it's finished but for the last few years it has languished and I wished I'd never started it.

I started the year with just the sky quilted on my long arm and when the number was pulled, I finished a few other projects and started quilting one building block a day, ten days ago. It is a lovely mish mash of scraps and fabrics from retreat goody bags. I particularly like the red and white striped rooves and the wood like semi circular door.

It is great to have this finished which just leaves me with three projects for the challenge - 

• TQS BOM Sedona Star which I am now going to add to my daily to do list as I still need to remove the foundation papers
• Tate Modern Quilt which needs to be quilted
• Hoffman Dream Big Panel which I need to finish quilting and then I' cutting it up to make into a bag

This weekend starting at 4pm today I am participating in the #sewingshindig2020 virtual retreat so my aim today is to finish a customer quilt so that I can take it off my long arm so that I can long arm any retreat projects when they're ready. There are only two small cushion covers that would need to be quilted and the other two projects are bags. I also plan to work on the lettering in the remaining Tattoo quilt blocks as a leader and ender project.

WIP Wednesday - Chinese Zodiac

I am WAY behind on the Chinese Zodiac SAL by The Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery and I hate being behind. Month six was released yesterday and I haven't even finished month one. I have scheduled in 30 minutes every day to work on this piece and at the moment I am working to catch up on the animals. I am trying to finish on per week and have finished the tiger, and snake so far. The snake was my objective for this week, so I now plan to fill in some of the bottom right fan so I can work on the bottom left fan next week. I want to do this so that I have reference points in the three quadrants that have been released so far.

And I've joined another SAL with Stitchonomy on Facebook. The frame for the 31 little Halloween pictures was released last week and I am almost finished the frame so I can set it aside until 1 October. I just have the top border to stitch.  Visit the Facebook group to see some fabulous hand dyed threads and linens being used for the frames. I a using a plain black DMC thread on a grey linen.

Monday mojo

 Have you found your mojo yet amongst all of the changes brought about by the pandemic yet? At the start of lock down, I as very productive and enjoying the peace and quiet. Currently I have been struggling to find my mojo. I have no excuse not to sew all day as Lizzie is back in Manchester packing up her belongings to move to Aberdeen on Wednesday.

I have joined in the APQS UFO challenge for three or four years and it is only this year when Jersey Modern Quilt Group have run a similar challenge that I've felt accountable to people I know and made significant progress. I have even started adding projects to a drawer ready for next year and they are significantly smaller than some of the projects I had to finish in 2020. 

This month's project to work on for the JMQG challenge is It's a small world by Jen Kingwell which I started in 2016? It has been part quilted for about a year but last week I pulled it out to make progress towards finishing the project.

I have scheduled into my diary to quilt one building per day and you can see my progress so far. Many of us are scared of back tracking over already quilted lines but Angela Walters demonstrates that in the overall scheme of things, it doesn't really show. I have completed four buildings and have three to go so I hope to have the quilting finished by this weekend as I am participating in the Sewing Shindig virtual retreat. I think this will get a machine binding with a hanging sleeve. 

I should finish this before the end of the month and will restart taking out the papers from my TQS BOM 2012 again.

Friday finish - #scrappysummer2020sal

 

And my baby quilt version of the scrappy summer SAL 2020 is complete. I'm not sure my scrap baskets are depleted at all. My daughter has made 40 masks for friends over the last two weeks and the basket is still seems full. However the basket does need reorganising and some re-pressing of the scraps needs to happen.

• Pattern by The Homebody using low volume scraps along with a rainbow of coloured scraps from my scrap basket. 
• Pantograph - Fanfare E2E by Christy Dillon
• Quilting thread - Tiny Tuts by Superior threads
• Binding - Riley Blake designs
• Backing - Wordplay by Windham Fabrics from Sew Hot

I love the texture of the quilting pattern that I chose along with the pastel rainbow variegated thread. I was also pleased to find the perfect backing in my stash of backings. At the beginning of lock down I bagged up my backings with the measurements written on a sticky label so that I could more easily choose a backing of the right size. So far the systems working and I haven't cut into any of my bolts of backing recently.

WIP Wednesday - Peace

 

These blocks are so addictive. Yesterday I did none of the jobs that I had hoped to do but I did some more sewing on the Peace block and I just had to piece a few sections together today. Lizzie left for the slow boat trip to Portsmouth last night and I heard from her at 6.15 am to say she was ready to drive the car off the boat. Two hours later she had stopped outside of Oxford for a break and was about a third of the way to Manchester. I have stripped her bed and tidied everything away and I am feeling like I can conquer most of my long list today. we shall see.

I have now finished the Peace block. It was the most difficult of the blocks so far for pressing as there were multiple seams meeting in the small peace cranes. I think the pops of Tula Pink patterned fabric is working with the plain Kona fabrics.

My plan for Saturday, when stitching these blocks is actually scheduled into my week, I'm going to add the borders and take out the paper from the back of the blocks. I have a virtual retreat in two weeks time, I think and I plan to use the banners with the wording in the large central block as a leader and ender project when doing the foundation piecing class.

Today I am going to quilt the third of five quilts for a customer. The first two were trimmed and collected on Monday. I also want to press my Techno Garden quilt top ready for the next video which is released this evening.

Monday Make - almost a finish

 

I am so close to finishing this project. we have had a busy weekend with meetings on Saturday and a group swim and family lunch on Sunday to remember my mum on her birthday. We ate turkey and the last of the red cabbage from her freezer. Her version has always been better than mine. However I did manage to get the project quilted little by little.

I used a digital pantograph called Fanfare by Christy Dillon and I love the texture it's given the project. Now comes the tricky part, choosing the binding. I love a rainbow stripe, but not for this project. I am leaning towards the black and white Riley Blake stripe or the black and white Carolyn Friedlander screen print.

Freebie Friday - chain piecing nine patch blocks for #scrappysummersal2020

I thought I would share with you today, my system for piecing the nine patch blocks for the #scrappysummersal2020 Pattern by The Homebody. I start by laying out multiple blocks on my home made design boards (tutorial by Lori Holt). These are so useful and I have them in multiple sizes from 12" to 18". I even pack a couple in my suitcase when I go on a sewing retreat.

I then take the top middle square and place it on the top left hand square and stitch a quarter inch seam to the right of the squares. Without cutting the thread (essential), I then add the pair from the second row and then the third row. 

Then I repeat for a second block. I then cut off the first set of three.

I then repeat the same process to add the remaining square for each row. In my example the turquoise block is always in the middle column and if it's not, just turn the set 180 degrees. Remember not to cut the threads yet.

Your set of three rows will then look like this, joined by threads.

I press my seams open for ease.

Then it's time to stitch the rows together and because we haven't cut the threads, they should still be in the correct order.

Now is the time to cut the threads which are little loops at the top of each column. I keep the rows right sides together and cut the loops. I then press the seams open again.

I now have all of my 100 blocks sewn and on my design wall ready to piece together. If I focus today on just this project, it should be ready for quilting this weekend. I have five large quilts to quilt for a customer so my plan is to quilt them during the working week and quilt my own projects at the weekend. Let's see how that pans out.

 

WIP Wednesday - tattoo quilt

 

I completed the hope block ten days ago and it is the August block for the sewalong. I added the Tula fabrics for the background and the body of the birds to the solids kit from Sew Hot.

I had planned to start on the big central block last wee but changed my mind and stitched the courage block which is the block for October, I think. Again I swapped two of the plain fabrics for Tula Pink patterned fabric and used the fairy dust in the colour whisper for the background. I should receive my order of more of the background this week and my plan for next weekend is to just add the borders to these four blocks.

September WIP update

I started August with 14 UFOs and finished with 11. I have added one more project into the mix but I have not included projects that I can't finish this quarter and so the list doesn't include the Tattoo quilt with @happysewlucky, sewalong with Karlee Porter, Chinese Zodiac SAL with @thefrostedpumpkinstitchery nor my Bonnie and Camille stars. 

My daughter will be heading to Aberdeen University next week to do a Masters in medical sciences, so in theory I can work a bit more efficiently on these UFOs. Items 7, 9 and 10 should be fairly quick finishes along with whatever UFO gets chosen to work on this month for our group challenge. If it's one I've already completed, I will work on taking out the papers of my TQS BOM which has been neglected recently.

1. TQS BOM 2012

2. My small world from 2016 which is pieced and partly quilted. 

3. Tate Modern quilt which was our challenge March project which is now ready for quilting.

4. Hoffman Dream Big Panel - I have started this and took it off the machine to work on customer quilts. I think this will be made into a bag once quilted.

5. Linen dress

6. Libs Elliott sewalong - quilted and bound but it just needs some ends sewn in.

7. 1985 Prairie Schooler annual Santa

8. The light by Barbara Ana designs

9. 1987 Prairie Schooler Santa

10. Spellville by Barbara Ana

11. Spring sampler by Durene Jones

12. Scrappy summer sewalong