String Block Update

I have been motoring along when it comes to making my string blocks and I blew past the 208 blocks required to make a 65 x 80 quilt. Once I hit the 238 mark I decided that was a good place to stop.

There are now enough blocks to make a quilt 70 x 85 and I think that is a pretty good size. :) I have started sewing them together into pairs and then sets of four and I have put some of them on my design wall. I think they look pretty darn good. :)

This is the view from the other side of my sewing station - those blocks are piling up but look at my string bins....they are still full!

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday! We had a wonderful Christmas celebration here with family and friends on Christmas Eve but now that all of the visiting has been done, the gifts opened and most of the food eaten I am more than ready to get back to normal routine!!! :)

Pretty Flimsy

I have stitched all of the blue and purple blocks together into a pretty flimsy. I am contemplating whether to add borders of some sort but I think I still need to ponder that one for a bit.

This flimsy actually came together fairly quickly and it was a lot of fun to work on once I figured out where I was going. ;)

The blue aster blocks were a bit of a challenge compared to the Wild Goose Chase blocks because those sneaky hsts wanted to turn about in all sorts of directions instead of staying where they were supposed to. I managed to wrangle it all together and hopefully I found and fixed any of the strays. :)

I was quite the overachiever when it came to cutting the pieces for this quilt! I wanted a lot of variety so I cut from yardage, fat quarters, strips from my bins and even pulled parts and pieces from my parts bins. I have so many pieces leftover that I am not sure if I should just use them as seeds for another quilt right away or stick them back into my parts bins for 'someday'.

I still don't have a name for this quilt - hopefully something will come to me soon.

Nearly There

The gorgeous colours in these blocks are making me feel so happy and so much less stressed. Tis the season! :)

I just love the blues I have used within the blocks and the purple fabrics just give it a nice little pop of colour. I love them together - so yummy!

I have started the process of turning my blocks into a flimsy by sewing the smaller blocks into groups of four and so on. It won't take long before I am finished and then I need to think about whether I want a border or not.

Something else I need to think about is a name for this quilt. Usually by this stage of the process I would already know what it will be but lately names for quilts are just not coming to me easily.

Cheddarback - Block Set 7

I am still plugging away at making the blocks for this quilt and I think I am 'only' three months behind but I will eventually get there.

This set of blocks is supposed to include some alphabet blocks in the smaller size but I am not sure how I am going to proceed. I won't make a decision until later as to whether I make the alphabet blocks or substitute some other blocks in their place.

I couldn't find a large enough piece of scrap in my bins for the tree block so I ended up cutting into full fat quarters for the piecing. It would have been just fine to make the block totally scrappy but I didn't want to mess around with it.

The two smaller blocks are totally adorable!

Ready to Make a Flimsy

Wild Goose Chase blocks - love 'em! 

As soon as I finished making all of the blue aster blocks I moved onto piecing the purple Wild Goose Chase blocks. They were a breeze to make because they are such an uncomplicated block.

I started out with all of fabrics within the blocks prematched and ready for sewing but that didn't last long. Once I started working on them exclusively chaos reigned and I just chain pieced all of the bits and pieces one after the other and they eventually found a place within each block.

This organization didn't last too long! ;)

After all of the decisions, or indecision, that I had with the blue aster blocks I still can't quite believe how quickly all of these blocks have come together. I am ready to start the next phase and can't wait to start sewing the blue aster blocks along with these purple blocks into a flimsy. :)

Donation Quilt Binding

Now that my little donation quilt has been quilted I needed to figure out what to use for my binding fabric.

I was digging in one of my cupboards looking for something that had some blue and green in it and I came up with this one.

Honestly, this one is pretty old. It had belonged to my SIL Wanda and sadly she passed away back in 1998. Who knows how long it was in her stash!

I wasn't able to use up the whole piece but at least some of it has made its way out of the stash. Even though there is not a lot of green in the print it perfectly matches the green in the
sashing on the quilt top and the blue works well enough with the backing.

The backing is another oldie by the way and it came to me from my sister Glenda. The fabric came from a set of homemade curtains that she had found in a second-hand store for a great price and some of it has now found a new life.

I've already machine stitched the binding to the front of the quilt and all that needs to happen is some hand-stitching time to finish it off. :)

Building Blocks

view from hallway

I am making progress on my blocks and I am so in love with what is happening on my design wall. Every time I walk past my sewing room I catch a glimpse of the blocks up on the wall and it just makes me feel so happy. The blocks are very pretty and very feminine and they are a ray of sunshine during these shorter and darker and colder days of winter.

I started out alternating sewing the purple blocks and the blue blocks but then I started making too many mistakes with the blue flower blocks. Keeping the hsts oriented in the correct direction can be challenging - those darn oopsies kept getting in the way!  I decided to work exclusively on the blue blocks and only when my mind is fresh first thing in the morning. My strategy is working and I am making far fewer mistakes and catching myself before actually stitching them into the block. I have made good progress and I only have 6 more blocks to piece and then onto the purple blocks.

The blue aster blocks are being pieced very randomly with lights and darks very unorganized within the blocks and you can see that in the photos.  As a matter fact, those variations are magnified by the lens of the camera but in real life it has a much more subtle effect. I wanted those flower blocks to look very scrappy and not be stagnant or to be a constant repeat of one after the other. I like the variations within each block and I think they work with the less random piecing of the purple blocks. :)