Quarantine Quilt 2

In 2020 during Quarantine when I was working from home I wanted things that were easy to sew, that didn't require me to think.  I shared pictures of the start of it (here)

When Christine came out in June she wanted to long arm, but I wanted her to try something out before quilting her quilt on it.  So I thought this quarantine quilt would be a good way for her to practice using the long arm before doing her own quilt.

Once I finished the quilt I decided to bind it and gift it to Christine.  She was about to go on a new adventure in her life and I thought having a quilt might be something nice for her to have.

She also had never received a quilt as a gift.  

Because of the timing of it all I did not get any pictures of the quilt before she left.  But I did get one when we visited her for thanksgiving!

I love how much of a design can be made from just light and dark fabrics.  The HST were light and dark, the 16 patches with 2.5" squares I didn't sew them together in any specific fashion.

Flying geese

I am going to go through a quick tutorial on how I make flying geese (without my accuquilt).  I definitely prefer the accuquilt if I have a choice.  

I used a shape cut ruler to cut strips.  The ruler I used tells you what size to cut the strip.  

Once the strips are cut, you line up the ruler to cut it.  The nice thing is how it lines up, it cuts off the top of the triangle. 

Then you turn the ruler to cut the outside pieces.  

This is the one reason I prefer the accuquilt cut pieces.  They cut off both dog ears.  but I managed to make it through without having any of the triangles get eaten.

and ta-da! a finished flying geese block!  I can't wait to share the whole quilt!

What's your favorite method for making flying geese?

Rainbow cats finished quilt

I had actually decided what I was going to do for this graduation quilt last year, before I had EQ, but I used EQ8 to help me figure out how many blocks to do and the borders.  I knew I was going to use muli colored cats, but I kept them blue for the ease of design.

 

The beauty of EQ8 is that I used it to tell me how much fabric I needed for the borders (I, of course bought a little extra just to make sure), but it was nice that I didn't have to do the math of figuring out how much I needed.  The program did it for me!

Generally I try use as much stuff at home as I can, but we are in the process of moving, so most of my fabric is packed! So I did have to buy some to finish the borders.  But I am glad I did, because I found some CUTE cat fabric.

Here is the finished top! I don't know if you can tell, but the outside border is rainbow cat prints!

I just did a simple meander in grey.  With a wide flannel grey back (which I did not get a picture of).  Wide back fabrics are definitely favorite for quilt backs, although soon I will have to sew them together to use as a backing for a scrappy quilts!

And here is the finished quilt! I am so happy with how it turned out!  And the recipient liked it too, which is all that matters!

Rainbow cats 6

Here is a little time lapse of me putting together one of the kitties.  You can see I have some help from Minnie :) I love doing time lapses like this.  Makes me feel a lot faster than I am ;)

 The grey kitty was the last one I had to make.  Ideally I would have liked to make 3 more, to make it just a little wider.  BUT I just didn't have the time. I was on a time crunch to get this quilt done for a high school graduation.

But I actually think it works the way it is, because the young man this is for, I made a quilt similarly with HSTs & 2.5" squares for his sister (here), and hers had 12 blocks, 3x4.  So while it's not quite as wide as I would have liked, it kid of keeps a theme for the family of graduation quilts.  I will use borders to help make it a little wider.

I am happy with the colors I picked.  And while I would have rather just had one of each color, I don't know what other colors I would have done if I only had one green!

One of the things I thought about after putting it up on the design wall, was that I should have made some of the kitties face different directions!

Rainbow Cats 5

I ended up making 3 green cats, I am not sure why.  Green isn't even the fabric I have the most color of (blue is!). I decided to make the brown kitty even though I don't have a lot of brown fabrics (you can see the amount of repeats in this), but I thought it looked the most like a real kitty.

These have definitely been a scrap buster, but I still have so many scraps left!

Rainbow Cats 4

 I was trying to decide which other colors to use.  While I don't have a lot of yellow, I thought it would look nice.  And even though this quilt is for a young man, I didn't think a pink kitty would be too out of place.

The pink one is definitely one where cutting down fabric can change its look.  If you look at the top left ear, it almost looks blue, because the pink fabric had blue flowers on it.  so when that one was cut and sewn back together it definitely changed the look!  It adds some character!

Rainbow Cats 3

I mentioned that orange was tough because I didn't have a lot of orange.  But I have plenty of purple! I love the purple kitties.  A kitty in a kitty.  The red one was fun to do.  I included dark and light things.

Making the kitties has helped me cut up a lot of my scraps.  I am using my accuquilt to help.  Things that are too small to be put on boards I cut up into scraps with my accuquilt.  

 

Rainbow cats 2

Here are two more kitties finished.  The orange was probably the most difficult for me.  I just don't have a lot of orange fabric.  Nothing against it.  I just don't have a lot.

I love using my accuquilt for the HSTs they go together SO quickly, and I have a large pile of them, some with black and colors and others that are neutral and colors, and even lights and darks.  I have so many ideas of quilts to make with them!

One quilt at a time though.  I need to finish the kitties.  I haven't decided how many there will be.

 

Rainbow Cats 1

In an effort to use my 2.5" squares I decided to make these cat blocks.  I used my accuquilt to cut up the HSTs.  I was able to cut up a lot of variety in them! 

I have wrapped most of my fabric on boards, but some pieces are just too small, so I have been using my accuquilt to cut them up, most in HSTs but also tumbler blocks, kite blocks, 2.5" strips (both with 2.5" x 4.5" bricks and now 2.5" x 8.5" strips).

My scraps do not seem to be getting any smaller, I should probably spend more time sewing and that would help.  But I need to FINISH projects instead of starting them.

I can't wait to finish this quilt!

 

Accuquilt

I definitely love my accuquilt.  I remember when they first came out, I was not interested in having one.  I am glad I waited and got the go big (the electric).

I have been trying to go through my scraps that are too small for a board and cut them up.  I cut a lot into 2.5" strips (I think you will see a log cabin soon :p)

My second favorite thing to cut the fabric up into is HSTs.  I need some for a project (I will share soon) and I wanted to have a lot of variety.

 

 

I wanted something that was kind of mindless to sew, so I sewed HSTs to black HSTs.  They come together pretty quickly.  They are also easy to sew together because the Accuquilt cuts off the dog ears so when I sew it they finish very nicely.

I am sewing some for projects, but some of them will just be saved, and then eventually I can put them together to do some sort of quilt design.  Who knows what yet.  But they are so pretty. I love the contrast of the black and the colors.  I will eventually sew some that are lights and darks so I can use them with my 2.5" squares and maybe even my 5" squares.

Heritage tee shirt quilt

I was approached by someone at a company to make them a tee-shirt quilt to celebrate their 50th anniversary.  Then COVID hit, so that was put on pause.

They reached back out to me this spring.  They wanted it to be large and it would be hanging.

 

 

Because it was so large, I had no where to take pictures of it! It is 56 squares large, so 105" wide by 120" long!

Since they were going to hang it, they asked for grommets to be put on it so they could hang it.  I have done grommets before, but my husband had not, so he learned something new :)

The quilting is kind of hard to see as it was laying on the bed.  So here are two of the blocks.  I basically went around the designs to make them pop.

 

Craft fair

 

This was my second craft fair of the year.  Not as large of a space, but enough room for me to sew & have my tee shirt quilt on display.

I was able to make some more cat kick sticks and cat toys.

Bow ties

I think it's about time to update about the teal bowties.  Last time I posted about them was last year!

When I posted last year (here) I had 113. 

And here they are recently:
 

There are 221 (give or take).  I found one on the floor of my sewing room after I took this picture, and I know I sewed a few more up. 

I love how this quilt looks.  I especially love this one because it's got both of our fabrics in it.  Christine uses different colors than I do.  I am not exactly sure how big I will make this. At least close to the size of mine.  My quilt was 24 blocks by 28.  So 672 blocks.  So only 400 more to make :p

My quilt took 6 years to finish.  At this rate I will definitely finish Christine's sooner than that! It helps that I have two people contributing scraps.

Making masks and having my cricut has helped! Since I cut out masks with my cricut there is some waste, but I can set it so that in the negative space it cuts out pieces for the bow tie quilt (2 - 2" squares, 2 - 1.25" squares.)

 

S family memory Quilt 2 - finished

 Jordan likes red, so we added a red border to her quilt, used red for the backing AND red for the binding.

Here is the binding being sewn on.  This is a 99 I gave to Jordan so she would have a sewing machine to use.  I would like to update it and get her a machine that has back stitch.  I shall keep looking.  But it's been a good machine for her.  And I showed her how I back stitch by turning the item around and taking a few stitches.  Not the easiest, but it's a work around.

And here is the full quilt all finished!  I love it.  And the best part is that Jordan loves it!

S family memory Quilt 2 part 2

 

Jordan did a great job of figuring out exactly how many squares we would need for the hearts and then the background. 

While I was at school she laid them all out on the design wall. 

I love her placement and patterns. This is one of the reasons I’m so glad she was able to help work on her own quilt. If I would have done it, the squares with stripes would not have been going the same direction. I would have made them more random. But since she is helping she got to lay them out in the way she prefers. 

 

I chose to sew this a little differently than I have in the past.  Before I would have sewn each row individually, then sewn them together.  I chose to do something called webbing.

So I sewed the first two rows together.  Then I added the third row to it, so they were all connected.  It makes it big but then also kind of easier to put together.

Monthly sewing check in

Here is my month of March colored in.  I was able to do some sewing almost every day!  Course it doesn't hurt that the end of March is my spring break :)

Most of March has been sent working on a tee shirt quilt (which I cannot share yet).  It's really large. So to make the tee shirt quilt:

* I cut the shirts

* I put interfacing on the shirts

* I trimmed the blocks so they were all the same size

* I sewed the blocks together

* I quilted it

I am now working on trimming and binding it.  But like I said, it's a large quilt so I spent some time this week cleaning up my sewing room, putting some fabric away that I had just been piling up.

I did take a little break from working on the tee shirt quilt to help Jordan with her quilt (more about it later this week).

This weekend is my first craft fair, and I have been slacking on making my microwave bowl cozies!

Here is a pile I started!  I don't know if I will get 30 made before my craft fair on Saturday.  My goal has been to make about 10 a month, which would give me a good number for my craft fairs.  I have a wide variety of patterns, sports teams, colored fabrics and some that are more specific like the musical instruments at top.

I personally love listening to audiobooks while I quilt, either that or movies I have seen a million times and don't have to watch.  But I listened to 2 new audio books.

Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo

The face of deception by Iris Johansen

Both were good.  They are both a series, I did not listen to more of Bardugo's because it wasn't online and I hadn't looked to see if the library had it.

Johansen's I started the second one tonight.

April will definitely be me showing some more finished things! I have Jordan's memory quilt & my really big tee-shirt quilt that I will have pictures to show.  I have a few other tops I just need to get on the long arm.

S family memory Quilt 2

Jordan came out to visit for her spring break this year.  She has come out a few times, I definitely enjoy the one on one time her and I get.

We decided since she was coming out we would get started (and hopefully finish) her memory quilt.  When Becca & I did hers, we first cut up all the clothes, then put them in four piles for the each of the memory quilts.  So that part was a lot easier when starting on Jordan's.

We also had a box of left overs from Becca's quilt so Jordan was able to pull from that too.

Originally when we were designing the quilts she had wanted a big heart, which would look nice, but the issue would be that there are so many different colors of clothing, one big heart wouldn't work well, so we decided on multiple hearts.

We chose 4" squares, we had thought about 5" squares, but then it would have made the quilt too big.

Jordan was very excited to start putting up blocks as soon as she could!  I had her do the ironing (of interfacing), and then I cut blocks for her to put up on the wall.  I had only cut a few but she wanted to start deciding how to lay them out.

Then as we continued we had enough blocks that she could put up a test heart block.  I can't wait to see how this quilt turns out when it's all finished!

Monthly sew check in

Here is my month of February colored in! Not bad.  We got busy towards the end of the month so I was not able to sew as much.

I did not finish any quilts in February but I was pretty busy!

I was able to go to my friend, Christine's house, and I did some sewing there.  It was mostly masks.

I made masks for my many of my family members.  I had found some nose pieces on amazon that were stronger than the twist ties I had used.  I also found some elastic that is able to be sized with a bead of sorts, so it can fit more people.  It's a little easier on me so I don't have to use different lengths of elastic for different people!

While sewing masks I also made some more bowtie blocks.  

I finished 29! Which I am happy with that number!  I need to put them on my design wall to see how many I have.  I know I am no where near being done.  But I like to get progress shots!  

Since I had seen Christine, she also gave me some left over fabrics she had from her making masks to add.  This quilt is going to have a lot of variety, since it has fabrics from her sewing projects and from mine.

I will need to do another full count of blocks soon.  I don't think this will take quite as long as my Bowtie quilt did, but it will still take a while.  

round robin 2020

My round robin group in 2020, had 4 people.  

This is the first block I received.  I wasn't sure what to add to it, which colors to pull out from the star!

I chose the black and white border to make it a little larger, then pinwheels in teals.  I thought there was a lot of mustard in the star already, the teal would help make it pop.

This is the second block I received.  I liked the straight lines contrasting the triangles and diamonds.

I noticed in the second round it didn't have any of the blue, so I added that.  I went completely different for this.  I did a kite block.  I like the movement it adds.

 

This is the last block I received.  I love the framing on the house, and then the squares on point around it.  I picked out the colors I wanted to use, but had no clue about what to do.

 

Then it came to me, flying geese! If I wouldn't have been so in love with the fabrics I picked out, I probably would have made them all green, and to look like trees. I think they kind of look like they are flying around the house. 

And last but not least, my lovely cat quilt block that came back to me!  I actually got this block when I was doing the monthly block swap.

I LOVE the borders!! I cannot wait to add some more to mine to make it a full size quilt!

 

 

Bow ties 2021

Here is a stack of 2” blocks that will become bowtie blocks.

I did not use my accuquilt to cut these, because I do not have a 2" strip die, but I LOVE my Shape cut ruler that my mother in law got me from Jo-Ann's.  It allows me to cut a lot, really quick.

I have been cutting up left over fabric from making masks. The left over pieces work really well for these little blocks. 

I generally use these bowtie blocks as leaders and enders.  Leaders and enders are blocks you keep under your presser foot.  They are great for a few reasons.  1) you don’t have those long strings to cut. 2) you get two (or more) projects done at once 3) For me, at least, it seems like it’s easier to sew the blocks when I am chain piecing instead of starting new each time.

I actually used to use a scrap of fabric to keep something under my presser foot.  But ever since I heard of leaders & enders, I was hooked.

The other thing that is nice about the bowtie blocks is that it’s sewing 3 times and then the block is done.

I have actually been using these as blocks that are not leaders and enders, but just as something to sew.  With school being so different this year, I have not had as much brain power for my quilting as I would like.  So having these ready to go are nice.

This bowtie quilt will be for my friend Christine.  She is saving some scraps from things she is working on, and I save stuff from mine.  So in essence her bowtie quilt will not take as long as mine did.  Mine took 6 years.  If I make hers the same size as mine, mine had 672 bowtie blocks, 24 blocks by 28 blocks.  I currently only have about 115.  Which means I have A LOT more to make.

This pile of 2” squares will end up making close to 200 bowtie blocks, which is not quite enough to finish the quilt, but definitely enough to keep me busy for a while!

I need to get them up on the design wall again so that I can count how many I have!

D9 all done!