Scrappy Trip Around the World

Well, it has once again rolled around to a new month, and I have been lackluster in my blogging again. But I have been sewing a fair bit. Last time I blogged, I had resurrected some 6-year-old trial blocks for the "Scrappy Trip Around the World." And I kept making them, using my 2.5" strips, until I had a total of the 48 I need for a 72"x96" top.

 Ten

 Twenty

 Thirty

 Forty

48! It went very fast, all things considered. That's what I love about quilting. It's a high-energy, quick gratification thing. Unlike knitting, which I probably need to do to recover my zen after all the blocks I made. Also, I need to clean up my scraps again, but that's a never-ending thing.

 I experimented with a few different layouts; above is more or less an attempt at true randomness, and below is trying to keep adjacent blocks with diagonal paths in the same color/value groups.

 I ended up liking the more random approach of the first time but of course the final layout is different, and I didn't bother to take a picture of it. I did stack the blocks and pin the row numbers on the top in each stack so I can sew them together. That is going to go more slowly, because the long seams of putting a big quilt together are not what I like best, so I tend to put it off or only work in concentrated spurts.

Speaking of putting things off, I put the Celtic Solstice on the frame at the end of 2017, and I am finally getting back to it just today. I'm a little unhappy with how the tension is not quite right... maybe it's subpar thread that is the problem, maybe the machine needs a tuneup. But even with occasional broken threads or tension issues on the bottom, I finished about half of the overall center of the quilt just this morning. I will need to repin the quilt to do the side border quilting. I'm definitely trying to remind myself that "finished is better than perfect."

I don't think I shared this on the blog yet, just on Instagram. This is a test block of "Sand Castles" from Bonnie K. Hunter's newest book String Frenzy. It has a lot of 4-patches I pieced as leaders and enders between the scrappy trip blocks, and some string blocks, and is just going to be really fun.

Also, reporting on the UFO challenge... I haven't really finished any of my quilting or fiber UFO's except for January, when I spun up my autumnal colors batt. I was supposed to do Celtic Solstice, the 1996 Piecemaker's Quilt, and at least 2 other machine quilting finishes so far this year, and for fiber arts, Rosalind, Manu, and more spinning which haven't been touched. The number for June is 10, which translates to the Rainbow Star quilt top, and the On Your Toes sweater which has languished for many years. I may have a good shot at finishing the Celtic Solstice quilting, though. These challenges are more like REALLY broad guidelines, anyway. I have a pair of lacy Sara Elin socks I really want to finish knitting, and I am also continuing cleaning and organizing my sewing area while I work on scrappy quilts and maybe more baby quilts. Happy with the progress on the quilt front this past month, whether I finish any UFO's or not.

En Provence progress

En Provence Mystery link-up is here.  I stayed up late Monday and finished all the units, and then I took pictures of them yesterday to post but got distracted with Christmas stuff, a brief internet outage, and our family trip to see Rogue One.

So I am all caught up with the mystery quilt and I should spend any spare time I have putting the borders on Allietare. But I am dubious because there is more Christmas work to be done, including all the wrapping. And about 7 more rounds of knitting to finish.

When Grandma came over Sunday she brought the quilt top she finished last week with the fabric she picked out recently. She had the center pieced but needed more fabric for the borders, and I think it's really cute. I tried to get a picture of Daniel, home for Christmas and kindly holding the quilt for the picture, but it came out too blurry.

I haven't blogged since last week... and we had a 2-day school-closing snowstorm, rare for this area. I feel for poor Smudge, but he is certainly well-fed, so don't let his pathetic meowing fool you. I suspect he makes rounds in the neighborhood and picks up extra food that way.

North and South, on our street.

And Smudge again, telling me I should give him more food.

Finished Auction Quilt - The Forest of Rhetoric

A finished quilt, donated to the Cedar Tree auction "Belt-Buckle Ball" coming up in a few weeks.  It's called "Silva Rhetoricae - the Forest of Rhetoric," and it has the signature of every single student in the school, K-12.  It's about 66"x78", has a hanging sleeve if you want to display it on the wall, and it's made from scraps and crumbs and backed with a vintage sheet.  I made a similar quilt last year too.  The crumbs technique has made me a much more liberated quilter, and I love the "nothing goes to waste" philosophy behind it.

At midrange you can see some of the variety of blocks, and how completely improvisational they were.  Leftovers from Orca Bay and Easy street, leftovers from Jack's chain, leftovers from a 9-patch and log cabins, and experiments that I didn't want to take further.  That floral green Thimbleberries print I used for the border and binding? It came from an old maternity dress that I deconstructed.

Closeup of the Tardis block I made for the Senior class.  They like Dr. Who.

I made several blocks with trees, either 6" square or 6x12" tall.  They were my uniting theme in the quilt.  Let the bidding war begin!

Grandma keeps cleaning out her crumbs and sending them along to us.  Slowly, I've been sorting them and cutting some of them into squares:

At this rate I have enough for several dozen more crumbs quilts, but not time to make them!

And on the design wall, there's one more scrappy trip-around-the-world block.  I'm not making these very fast, and I'm not sure whether I want to make a full quilt out of them, but they're fun for their own sake.

Time for another weekly Stash Report;

Fabric:

Fabric used this week: .5 yard for binding for auction quilt

Fabric used year to date: 29.5 yards
Added this week: 0 yards
Added year to date: 17 yards
Net used for 2013: 12.5 yards

Knitting yarn:

Yarn used this week: 0 yards
Yarn used year to date: 5900 yards.
Yarn added this week: 0 yards
Yarn added year to date: 1300 yards
Net used for 2013: 4600 yards

Easy Street Top - Finished!

So I put the final seams in my Easy Street quilt top as the light was fading Saturday...

Closeup of the border, some plain red and Connecting Threads turquoise I picked up at that warehouse sale...

This is a big quilt... about 97" square because I added a smidge on the borders.  It could probably pass as a skimpy King size and definitely a generous Queen.  I was glad to get some nice light Sunday morning, but it was almost too big for the fence:

I am sticking by my opinion that it's not Christmassy.  Not at all.  Just cheerful, bright and modern.  Feel free to tell me that it's not too Christmassy...

We quilters have our moments of doubt.  There were a lot of little pieces in this puppy, and they didn't always match perfectly at the corners, and by the time I was seaming the 3rd row I didn't care anymore.  I do like the way the two blocks create secondary patterns.  I have seen so many pretty examples of this quilt around the internet; it really does work with many different color interpretations.

The groundhog was right... spring is coming!  With crocuses,

primroses,

and violets, all on the way from the fence to the back door.
And because this quilt used so much fabric, I have a stash report to update:

Quilting fabric:

Fabric used this week: (the whole) 9.5 yards according to my estimate

Fabric used year to date: 9.5 yards
Added this week: 0 yards
Added year to date: 3 yards
Net used for 2013: 6.5 yards

Knitting yarn:

Yarn used this week: 0 yards
Yarn used year to date: 880 yards
Yarn added this week: 460 yards (Knit Picks replaced the yarn that felted!)
Yarn added year to date: 910 yards
Net used for 2013: -30 yards in the hole and working hard to finish more

Well, that felt good!  Now to git 'er quilted!  Then I can count even more fabric used for the backing. 

Today I'm puttering in my sewing area, cleaning and organizing a little bit and working on crumbs blocks for the Cedar Tree auction quilt.

Quilting and Sewing Year in Review

These are the finished quilts I produced this year.  Left column, top to bottom: Crumbs quilt for Cedar Tree auction, Play Ball quilt for auction, Aunt Maggie's Quilt.  Center top: Jack's Chain. Center bottom: Feathered Star wallhanging. Right top to bottom: Framed In quilt, Log Cabin, Anita's Arrowheads.  Not pictured is a mini-Jack's Chain made with extra blocks.

Last year I set some goals for sewing UFO's, inspired by Judy L.'s Patchwork Times.  She would randomly draw a number each month and we were supposed to finish our UFO goal.  Here's my list, with completed goals in red:

1. Aunt Maggie's Quilt: finished top, needs machine quilting and binding
2. Framed in Quilt: finished top, needs machine quilting and binding
3. Log cabin... Sew blocks together into quilt top (and quilting and binding)
4. 1996 Piecemaker's Calendar quilt: prepare half of applique for setting triangles
5. " " (I prepared the appliques but the top isn't finished yet)
6. Classical-themed tote bag
7. Feathered Star: make a decision and finish top (and quilting and binding)
8. Bowling-style knitting bag
9. Jack's Chain: piece half of remaining blocks
10. " " (and quilting and binding, and I even wrote a tutorial)
11. Kit for three-quarters bag from Connecting Threads in Whirlwind Romance
12. Pieced blanket of felted wool squares from old sweaters

There were four months that I didn't even bother to do the project: my bag projects got no love, and I didn't do the felted wool blanket either.  But I did quilt and bind three of the tops on the list, which wasn't required, so I feel like I can declare victory and maybe I'll eventually do those bags.

Judy is doing her UFO challenge in a different way in 2013, I'm probably not going to set yearly goals, but I'm very pleased with how many projects I finished, especially considering some of them were more than 5 years old.

These are my current quilt WIPs/ UFOs.  There's that applique for the 1996 Piecemaker's calendar quilt taunting me still, yes, we're working on our second decade.  Orca Bay is a top in need of quilting; so is the Farmer's Wife.  Easy Street is in process, and on bottom right are some crumbs blocks that I hope will become the next Cedar Tree signature quilt.

Goals for the new year... other than finishing the above WIPs and UFOs, I don't really know.  Here is a list, in no particular order, of the WIPs, UFOs and wannabe projects still hanging around, and maybe I'll be inspired to get to them, maybe not.  I might do my own random number drawing, we'll see.

1. 1996 Piecemaker's Calendar quilt - hand applique, add embellishments, and finish top
2. Classical-themed tote bag
3. Bowling-style knitting bag
4. Three-quarters bag (kit from Connecting Threads)
5. Felted wool blanket
6. Orca Bay quilting and binding
7. Farmer's Wife quilting and binding
8. Easy Street mystery quilt top
9. Easy Street quilting and binding
10. Crumbs auction quilt
11. Hooked Rug in Mariner's Compass design
12. heirloom linen blouse
13. wool stuffed toy cat
14. boxers in 3 different fabrics (at least)
15. Frugal Patch quilt
16. Civil War repro/ pine needles quilt
17. Flannel baby quilts
18. Set up an Etsy shop to help finance college educations
19. the ultimate ongoing project: clean and organize sewing area!
20. and have fun, or everything else is pointless.

Okay, that might keep me busy even if I don't start anything new.

WIP Wednesday and Yarn-Along

Ooh boy, is there a lot going on in the craft-blogging world!  Not to mention Christmas, grading, worrying about the fiscal cliff, and general end-of-year craziness.  Sew Mama Sew is hosting giveaways this week, which will easily take all your time if you let it.  I'm trying to visit all the fellow Easy Street quilt blogs too.

In quilting, I finished my purple Anita's Arrowheads top yesterday.  I'm calling it "Barney" for now.  It's 68"x85" and I was thinking about donating it to the Cedar Tree auction in the spring, but Quarta wants it for her own bed.  That's quite a bit of purple cleared out of my stash.  Funny thing about purple, all four of my kids went through a stage where it was their favorite color.  The boys quickly grew out of it once they became school age though.  The girls are still big purple fans.  I'm really not, although I can't explain why.  I like it, I just don't like it enough to work with it a lot, I guess.

These are for Bonnie Hunter's Easy Street mystery quilt.  I'm really enjoying the colors I've chosen and look forward to the next step coming out Friday.  I could stick with red, gray and white and be perfectly happy, but there will be aqua and lime green added to the mix soon.

I had some extra white triangles so I cut some greens to make another batch of geese, for transformation into trees.  I'm planning to make another signature quilt for the Cedar Tree auction next spring.

I've been digging into the scrap bin and making some crumbs blocks.  If you've been following, it was a crumbs quilt I donated for last spring's auction, and I really enjoyed the whole process of working on it.  In the blocks above you see remnants of the last several quilts I've pieced.  I just need to make enough tree blocks and wonky star blocks to pull it all together, and they make great leaders/enders projects as I'm working on other piecing.  I'm still putting off machine-quilting Jack's Chain.

In knitting, Wingspan is getting closer to finished, and lookit what fun book I found at the library: His Good Opinion by Nancy Kelley.  This is Pride and Prejudice told from Darcy's point of view.  I'm really enjoying it so far.
Finally, in honor of Sinter Klaas day, here's a story from Holland:  a flash mob in honor of an elderly knitter, Loes Veenstra, who has made over 500 sweaters in her knitting career.  Rotterdam parties in her honor:

Randomday with Wreck-it Ralph

Long holiday weekends are great!  We'll be leaving as a family to go see Wreck-it Ralph this afternoon... and maybe catch dinner out afterwards rather than coming home for more turkey.  That way we'll have just enough turkey to make enchiladas for dinner tomorrow.  We were supposed to go to Grandma's for Sunday dinner, but they are in germ-control lockdown over there so the dining room is not open.  So maybe we can sneak Grandma over to have dinner with us.  Kidding about the sneaking... they don't keep Grandma in lockdown.  I'd like to see anyone try!

Yesterday was more of a Purple Friday for me, as I dug into my Anita's Arrowheads quilt block piecing.  I haven't worked on these since the summer, but I want to clear my workspace for other holiday quilt projects, and that means dealing with the purple and multicolored fabrics that have been covering up my cutting area for months.  I figured out how many I still need to make and have been making them.  I started sewing together the blocks into rows and this is about halfway done.  There are now fewer than 20 remaining blocks to piece, and they are going fast.  All the pre-cutting and starching is done.

I did hit one store to buy white thread for quilting my Jack's Chain quilt.  I stood in line at Hancock Fabrics and everything.  Then I set it down on my workspace, and you guessed it, it got jumbled to the center stratum of stuff and I lost it.  I looked for it for half an hour last night before I finally found it.  I wound bobbins with it this morning, but it's been all purple all day today too.  And I don't even like purple that much.  It's a good cause, though, using up purple from my stash.  It may end up as a Cedar Tree auction quilt.  But purple is Quarta's favorite color.

I finished my 11th shawl of 2012, Citron, yesterday.  And I cast on for my 12th, Wingspan, today.

On Thanksgiving day I saw an interesting bird of prey of some kind, perched in the sycamore tree in back, holding a small bird in one claw.  I think but am not sure that the small bird was already dead.  I think the bigger bird was either a Northern Harrier or Northern Goshawk.

Source: bird-of-the-day.blogspot.se via Katherine on Pinterest

The very tall evergreens in the school grounds across the street have been surrounded with orange hazard fencing, and it looks like several of them lost branches in the recent storm.  At least one stand looks like roots are protruding and they will probably have to come down  for safety reasons; maybe all of them.  It will totally change the way the neighborhood birds interact if so.  The seagulls and the ravens use the highest trees and houses surrounding the park to stake out when it is safe to take over the field at the school; it's like the Crips and the Bloods.  Every once in a while neither of those groups is there, and the regular robins and songbirds are out pecking at the dirt.  Sometimes the disgruntled birds end up in our cedar trees, which are next tallest to the ones at the park.  It's all quite the soap opera.

Cosmology: Creatio ex Foedo



I decided to enter this quilt in the Blogger's Quilt Festival over at Amy's Creative Side.  I made it about 3 years ago as a challenge to use some really, really ugly fabric that my friend Joyce had bought and then thought better of.  It's called "Cosmology: Creatio ex Foedo"  Cosmology is a play on the fabric line Cosmos from Connecting Threads which I used to complete the quilt, and which is not ugly; and Creatio ex Foedo is Latin for "creation out of the ugly."

You can see the ugly fabric in the center of each block and in the cornerstones.  It is this wacky combination of grass green, magenta pink, yellow and orangey-green.  But!  If you combine the ugly fabric with a bunch of pretty fabric and make sure the ugly fabric is cut up in smallish pieces, it works. 

I used a pattern called Glory Bee from a book by Evelyn Sloppy.  The original quilt is in patriotic red-white-blue colors, but I decided to pull fabric in magentas, greens, and golds, including a lot of light greens and yellows as well as darker greens.  I used my collection of fat quarters in the "Cosmos" line and another collection of shot cottons by Kaffe Fassett, plus a whole bunch of other fabrics, and the pretty fabrics took the ugly right out of the theme fabric.  The quilt has an interesting effect of looking like dappled light in a vineyard or a garden because of all the variations of value, and it's now hanging in my dining room.  I think it's funny that the more quilts I make, the less "planned" and the more scrappy I tend to go.  I loved both of those fabric collections, but could never get inspired to use them until I had an ugly fabric to combine them with.

It's quilted in an allover squiggle pattern with variegated green thread.  It measures 60"x74", so would be a twin-size quilt if put on a bed. 

 

Be sure to check out some of the other quilts in the Festival!  It's a great chance twice-yearly for quilt bloggers to show and tell.

 



 

Finished Log Cabin UFO; Stash Reports

Here's what's on my design wall / clothesline: Log Cabin Quilt Top, blocks circa 2004.  My July UFO is now a FO!  I had it seamed into a 48" square, and then Saturday I decided to add an extra row at the top and bottom.  I did have to use some of the blocks I mistakenly made with larger red centers, but it's really not noticeable  So now the quilt top is 48"x60", just about right for a lap quilt.  I usually make bigger, bed-sized quilts, but I just did not have the willpower to piece more.  So now it joins the queue waiting for machine quilting.  I love the huge variety of scraps in it.

We discovered a surprise in that overgrown rhododendron bush in the background a few weeks ago:

Very vigilant robin parents with three younglings.  The nest is empty when we check now, though.  They must be off enjoying their summer.

Stash report:

Fabric used this week: 3.5 yards for log cabin top
Fabric used year to date: 53.5 yards
Added this week: 0 yards
Added year to date: 28 yards
Net used for 2012: 25.5 yards

Yarn used this week: 1000 yards (estimate) from Lady MacBeth shawl
Yarn used year to date: 4406 yards
Yarn added this week: 0 yards
Yarn added year to date: 3503 yards (all handspun, not purchased)
Net used for 2012: 903 yards (whew, in positive numbers again after the Tour de Fleece!)

I'm enjoying keeping track of my stash used.  My goal is to not buy any yarn at all this year, but I am allowed to spin new.  I shouldn't buy spinning fiber until after I've used up what I have, either.  Doing pretty well there.  On fabric, I'm buying what is necessary to finish projects but not trying to enhance my stash.  I seem to collect lots of scraps from sewing friends and family members too, which I love.  When I finish a scrappy quilt top that is densely pieced I multiply the dimensions in inches to get the square inches, and then multiply by 2 because of all the seam allowances.  Then I divide by 1584, which is the number of square inches in a standard yard of fabric.  I don't multiply by 2 for less densely pieced quilts, maybe 1.5 depending on what kind of piecing is in it.  And of course, these are all just estimates.  But the progress in using up stash this year has been encouraging!

Farmer's Wife at the Farmhouse

I am so very seriously excited to share my finished Farmer's Wife Quilt top. Here it is on my outdoor design wall/fence. I was thrilled that the morning sunshine cooperated for a nice photo shoot.  I have a white picket fence and a 100-year-old farmhouse for such a time as this.

All 111 blocks are in there to make the queen sized version of the Farmer's Wife Quilt, about 83"x103".  All of the blocks were made from my scraps, with a special emphasis on vintage and upcycled fabric.  I did buy fabric for the sashing and borders because I needed that blue to tie it all together.  And it did!  I really love the way the colors all harmonize, even though there's a little of everything in there.

I'm figuring out how to quilt it... I'm pretty sure feathers will be required for the borders and setting triangles.  But no way am I marking it; it will have to be freehand.  True confessions: the sashing strips and cornerstones do not all match up with perfect corners.  And I am not at all fussed about that, either!

A bit of a different angle to try to capture the Veronica blooming on the stone wall.  I will be linking up this post to Facebook, Flickr, Pinterest, the Patchwork Times, the Homestead Revival Barn Hop, Crazy Mom Quilts, Sew Many Ways, and Confessions of a Fabric Addict.  I am just so happy to have made it to this point.  I love the book and the patterns, and I love the way this quilt celebrates my rural and thrifty heritage in a way that is very "me."

Stash report

Fabric used this week: 8.2  yards (estimated for FWQ top; there are a lot of seam allowances in there!)
Fabric used year to date: 31.8 yards
Added this week: 0 yards
Added year to date: 27.2 yards
Net used for 2012: 4.6 yards

Yarn used this week: 0 yards
Yarn used year to date: 1956 yards
Yarn added this week: 0 yards
Yarn added year to date: 492 yards (all handspun, not purchased)
Net used for 2012: 1464 yards