Back to blocks

I haven't sewn any patchwork blocks for ages, or at least that is what it seems like to me. So, in an effort to remedy that and make some progress on a longstanding UFO, I dug out my scraps and set to work.

One of the first Bees that I signed up for was the Sunday Morning Quilts Bee, based on the book of the same name by Amanda Jean Nyberg and Cheryl Arkison. For the first round of the Bee we made 12.5" slab blocks in various colours.

So, I duly sent off my blocks every month and received back blocks like these

and these.

In the end I had 14 blocks in 7 colourways, Red, Blue, Yellow, Green, Purple, Pink and Orange, which sat in my cupboard, whilst I thought about what to do with them.

Well, the time for thinking was over!

I decided that 14 blocks weren't enough to make a quilt top, I needed another two blocks to make a 4x4 arrangement. As I didn't have aqua blocks and had lots of aqua scraps it seemed like a good idea to put the two together :)

The final two blocks for the Sunday Morning Stash quilt!

Next up, to decide on the layout. After a few false starts this is what I ended up with

I wasn't sure how all of the blocks would look, and was a bit concerned that there might be too much going on in the quilt top but, actually, I think it has worked out fine in the end. There are enough "quiet spaces" in the top that it hasn't ended up a headache inducing mish mash, well not to me at least :)

Now all I need to do is decide how to quilt it!

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts and

Floating up up and away!

Welcome to another TGIFF, the link party that celebrates that lovely feeling of a finished project!


My finish for this week has been a long time in the making, as regular readers will know :)

So, a drum roll please - I have finally finished my Sunday Morning Quilts Bee quilt, Up, up and Away!!!

And here it is!

I backed the triangle strip front with the last of the cotton yardage that I bought in the bedding factory shop in Latvia, which you can see in the photo below.

It was the perfect backing for such a multi-coloured quilt, I found some turquoise fabric printed with triangles in my LQS, so that naturally found its'  way into my basket for the binding.

In the book this quilt was quilted with straight lines across the quilt, but as my points weren't exactly perfect that wouldn't have been quite as straightforward as it sounded :) So, I chose to randomly quilt swirls to remind me of kite strings.

It seemed like a good idea at the time, but one broken needle later and six snapped threads I wasn't quite so sure.

Still, another Bee quilt finished only 2 more to go before all of my Bee commitments are complete.

Now it is your turn to link up your finishes and celebrate with your fellow quilters. Check out the other linkers too, a little bit of applause is always welcome and add the TGIFF link/button (on the sidebar) to your post and spread the celebrations!

An InLinkz Link-up

589 All out!

The title of this blog post could be referring to the Classic Ashes (England v Australia) Test Match of 1912 where England retained the Ashes with a score of 589 all out to beat Australia by an innings and 225 runs!

You will, no doubt, be pleased to know however that this post has nothing to do with cricket, or any other sport, but instead is all about getting to the end of my 589 triangle marathon.

The Up, up and Away quilt top from the Sunday Morning Quilts Bee is finally complete!

The original quilt instructions called for 589 triangles left over from cutting binding strips, well I haven't bound enough quilts to be able to come up with that amount of triangles, so some creative licence was required. As you can see the triangles in my quilt top are various sizes and shapes, so there is an even more random feel to it than was the case with the original pattern. Just under half of the 2.5" squares with triangle corners were supplied by my fellow Bee mates in the SMQ Bee, but I have been religiously stitching, pressing and cutting away at the rest every Monday at the quilt group I joined in January.

The SMQ Bee was the first ever Bee that I joined, although this quilt was from the second round. I am ashamed to admit that the first quilt is not yet a completed quilt top, but now that this one is perhaps there is hope for that one too :)

My fellow Monday quilters were a bit bemused by the way this quilt was being constructed in strips on the diagonal, and I became known as the lady with the triangles, so I am looking forward to showing them that it did work out to be a recognisable quilt top in the end.

Next step, trimming the excess triangles off of the top and sides to give the top a straight edge and then backing and quilting. With all that randomness going on I think the quilting needs to be fairly simple, don't you?

The top is not my only finish this week, but I can only give you a sneak peek of the other finish as it is the embroidery project for the Embroiderer's Guild, which is under wraps for a couple more weeks.

I am so excited about taking part in this project and can't wait to reveal all about it, but this will have to do for now :)

Linking up to Crazy Mom Quilts

Prepping

At the moment, the only time that I get to work on the Up, up and away quilt is my Monday quilt group.

Now that I have used up all of the blocks received from the Sunday Morning Quilts Bee, it is down to me to put together the 180 blocks still needed to complete that top.

So, there has been a bit of prepping going on for the class today.

180 2.5" squares cut out and ready to have their triangles attached!

I only had a Kona white in my stash ( I forget which one) and as the first half of the quilt is made with lots of different whites and white tone-on-tones, I didn't want this second half to be only one white fabric, so a little retail therapy was in order.

I am getting there slowly :)

30 days and counting!

Apparently it is 30 days since Jen started her 100 day challenge over at Quilter in the Closet, so time for the first check in.

For the challenge participants were asked to nominate three projects to finish in the 100 days timescale, you can see my original post for the challenge here

So, has there been any progress?

Well, yes, surprisingly, there has.

Thanks to a couple of sessions at my new quilt group I have a half-pieced top for the Up, up and away quilt from the Sunday Morning Quilts book. There are still lots of 2.5" blocks to be cut and pieced into strips, but at least from here on in the strips get shorter every time :)

The canvaswork centre for my Embroiderers Guild exhibition piece has now been drawn out on graph paper and stitching has started. Of course I couldn't resist using this as an opportunity to purchase some sparkly new threads, so they have been added to the mix too!

And finally, my secret (and very scary!) EG project has also been started. That is my first ever attempt at whipped chain stitch above and I am really pleased at how it turned out. I am keeping my fingers crossed that the rest of this piece will be as pleasing as I think there are going to be lots of New to Me stitches in there by the end. Of course the opportunity to purchase even more sparkly threads couldn't be passed up here either, hence that lovely hand-dyed ribbon for the whipped stitches: )

So, that's my progress after 30 days, I have a feeling that these projects will be going down to the wire, don't you?

Head on over to Jen's to see how everyone else has risen to the challenge.

Linking up to

Slow progress

Well there has been a little bit of progress on one of my 100 day challenge projects.

I joined a new quilting group this week and despite engaging in lots of stitching (and not-so-stitching) related chat, I managed to cut out and piece 120 of the remaining 235 blocks needed for my Up, up and away quilt top. Next up, trimming those 120 blocks and piecing them together in rows. I am really not looking forward to all that trimming, I can tell you!

No progress on the other two 100 day challenge projects, but still some embroidery done.

I have been beavering away at this in my weekly embroidery class. It will, ultimately, be one side of a sewing box, the other sides include ribbon embroidery and beading so this will be the easiest I think. There are about one hundred French Knots to be added to this before the side will be completed, but as these are most definitely not my favourite stitch to sew I need to work up the courage to tackle them :)

I cannot claim any credit for the shading in the roof embroidery as it is a result of using the most beautiful hand-dyed threads from 21st Century Yarns, who are the equivalent of a tempting box of chocolates for stitchers!

Speaking of tempting, this lovely craft book is the giveaway up for grabs for one lucky linker to this month's Ho, Ho, Ho and on We Sew Link Party, courtesy of CICO books . So, if you have any Christmas or Holiday makes to report this month head on over to the link party to be in with a chance of winning.

Linking up to WIP Wednesday

Challenging myself in 2016

Have you heard of Jen's 100 day challenge?

 

 Knowing how many New Year's resolutions fall by the wayside or get diluted because a whole year is plenty of time to complete them, Jen came up with the idea of a 100 day challenge. The thinking behind it is that 100 days is not too long to stay motivated for but long enough to complete a few big challenges. 

So Jen has challenged her fellow bloggers to 

1) Pick 3 specific Quilty/Craft goals - finish some UFO's?  try something new?  make that baby quilt?  declutter/destash?  easy/hard?  Doesn't matter, just be specific.  Specificity helps so we don't justify changing our goals midyear or rationalizing that we generally completed them when we only tried.

Naturally being the caring bloggers that we are there will be support along the way from fellow challengers and just to keep that motivation going, check-ins too. 

So, here are the three challenges that I have decided to go for in the next 100 days!

 

First up a Bee quilt that I said I was determined to finish in February last year! The quilt is Up, Up and Away from the book Sunday Morning Quilts by Amanda Jean Nyberg and Cheryl Arkison. The quilt consists of 589 white 2.5" blocks with a scrappy triangle in the corner. Thanks to my Bee mates in the Sunday Morning Quilts bee I have almost half of the quilt top pieced. I have now run out of Bee blocks so the rest is down to me, which means that I need to cut out and piece 235 blocks! 

You can probably see why this has hung about for so long :) 

 

 

 My second challenge is to complete my project for the Embroiderers Guild Capability Brown exhibition in May. I have the fabric, courtesy of Spoonflower now all I have to do is design and stitch the canvaswork insert! The final piece will be exhibited at Wallington which would definitely be a first for me, so if that is not enough incentive to get this finished I don't know what is :)

My third challenge is also embroidery related but I can't show you a photo of it yet, so have made do with this embroidered card! The project is a request sent out recently from the Embroiderers Guild to contribute to a large banner. I have never done anything like that before, but before I could talk myself out of it I replied to the email to say that I was interested in taking part. I am sure that I will be intimidated by all the wonderful embroiderers taking part, but that is a worry for another day!

So these are my challenges for the next 100 days, they should keep me busy :)

If you fancy challenging yourself too, head on over to Quilter in the Closet to check out the details. 

Dusting off a WIP

I have resolved that this year there will be more finishes than starts, which is very difficult when there are so many tempting new projects around to test my willpower.

However, I am beginning to be embarrassed by the just started, half-finished, almost finished projects that are currently gathering dust in my sewing cupboard. So, having found myself with a couple of 2.5" strips of white solid and a pile of triangles I knew exactly what to do with them.

Turn them into these, which will be added to strips received from my Bee mates in the Sunday Morning Quilts Bee and then added to these.

 

Someday, they will all become a quilt :)

Linking up for the first time in a long time to WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced

and

The Last Blocks

It seems like a very long time ago I joined my first ever Bee, the Sunday Morning Quilts Bee where we were making blocks based upon the book of the same name. In Round 1 we made rainbow coloured slabs.

 To my shame this is as far as my Round 1 blocks have progressed!

In Round 2, each Bee member was asked to pick a quilt from the book to which her fellow Bee members would contribute blocks.

 

These are the blocks that I received when I was a Queen Bee in May.

This month is the last month of Round 2 and as our August Queen Bees went AWOL, the Queen Bees for September were able to get ahead of themselves and post their requests early. 

A couple of weeks ago I sent off these blocks for Jennifer's Up, up and away Quilt, which left only two blocks to be completed for Denise.

Denise asked for 2 x 10.5" blocks in low-volume fabrics for the quilt which the book was named after.  I am never quite sure if I have hit the mark with low-volume requests, so I am keeping my fingers crossed that these fit the bill.

And these are the last blocks for this Bee.

It has been fun being part of the Bee and I have certainly tried blocks and fabric combinations that I would never have otherwise tried. If I can get the last of the Star of Africa Bee blocks done and dusted, which is a much taller order (!), I might even make some progress with those Round 1 blocks :)

Linking up to

Blocks of Iron

I am getting way behind on Bee and BOM blocks so as the end of yet another month approaches it was time to try and catch up. The emphasis is on the word try :)

Fortunately I am due to receive blocks this month in the Sunday Morning Quilts Bee, so I only had one block to make for this one. The request from Jenniffier, my fellow May Bee recipient was for a block for the High Five quilt in the Sunday Morning Quilts Book. Jenniffier intends to hand over the quilt from the Bee blocks to a little boy who has been very ill, so I really needed to get this block off to her sooner rather than later.

We were asked to either make a block with 16 5"x5" blocks or one with 12 5"x5" blocks and one 9.5"x9.5" block. As you can see I went for the latter. I was so pleased too to use as the centre of the large block, one of the blocks I received before Christmas as part of Quiet Play's Say Cheese Polaroid Block Swap! I knew it was worth hanging on to the extra blocks after I had made the Doll Quilt for my niece.

And speaking of Quiet Play, I still hadn't tackled this month's block in Kristy's And Sew On BOM, so that was next on the list. I am already one block behind on the BOM, so I really didn't want to go 2 behind or I might never catch up.

This month we are tackling an iron and ironing board for the Keep Calm and Press On block. Kristy hosts a link up for the BOM blocks every month and having seen some of the lovely blocks already completed I was encouraged to get my act together and get mine finished. The lure of prizes in the link up might also have had something to do with this sudden burst of energy :)

 

Of course it wouldn't be a paper-pieced block if I didn't have some (self-inflicted!) problems. This time I managed to completely mess up the only piece in the block that didn't require any additional piecing, the triangle in the top right! I have no idea how I managed to cut out the piece in such a way that it was a wedge of fabric short at the top, but I did :) 

Fortunately it was not difficult to fix.

If you have tried paper-piecing for the first time, or anything else new this month there is still time to link up to the May 

We have had some great projects posted already this month, so if you are looking for something new to try you should definitely check them out.

 Linking up to

Two out, three in!

I have been on the road in the last couple of weeks, both North and South. Before I went South I managed to post off both of my blocks for April in the Sunday Morning Quilts Bee.

Grammie Q asked for a strip block with aqua and a hint of orange applique for the Gumdrops quilt she plans to make.

This block couldn't have been easier, as the applique will be stitched down during the quilting I only had to stitch the shapes down along the bottom of the strip after they were fused!

Tessophia is planning to make a rainbow quilt so asked us to sign up to make a slab of a particular colour. I chose blue as it is the biggest bag of scraps I have.

 Having made over a dozen of these blocks for Round 1 of the SMQ Bee this was another quick block to whip up. Next month it is my turn to receive blocks and I will need to get my act together soon to decide which of the many lovely quilts in the book I would like my Bee mates to contribute to.

In between the road trips, I received the first of my blocks from the Star of Africa Bee. I had seen the blocks in the Flickr group but the photographs definitely do not do them justice.

I have asked the Bee members to make a block on the theme of houses, as I have always wanted to make a quilt based on the Schoolhouse block, but never managed to get around to it. Being the creative bunch that they are the interpretation of the theme has been great fun to see.

Benta has traveller families living near her village so stitched up a traveller caravan complete with open campfire for her block! Isn't it wonderful?

Patti sent me a block to represent the barns and silos that dot her prairie landscape. Check out that large green cat at the window!

 

Look at the block and matching pincushion that arrived from Janine, isn't that the cutest thing?

I am a month behind on this Bee as the request for a block based on trees in March has challenged my creative juices! As ever I have an idea but the hard part is translating that into a quilt block :)

In between flitting about I have managed to sign up for the Texty Charm Swap too. You can never have too much text fabric :)

Some Summersville is my contribution to the swap! I really like this fabric so I might just have ordered a bit extra for me :)

Off to catch up on all the posts that I missed.

Linking up to