A Trio of Quilts

 I finished the last of the Trio of Quilts that I intend to donate to a Gift Shop in town. Its profits go to 

The Samaritans, an excellent organisation which helps so many desperate people.

 

The First quilt measures 38” square

And its pieced backing

The Second quilt measure 36” square 

And its pieced backing 

And the Third Quilt which measures 40” square

And its pieced backing 

All three used Crumb blocks that were already in my stash and fabrics and scraps I had to hand. Some scraps had been gifted to me, others were leftovers from previous projects.

I had to be inventive with the backing as I don’t have too many large pieces of fabric  in my stash.

The turquoise quilt used up a piece of fabric I had acquired several years ago when one of my quilting friends, Helen, was downsizing. It’s actually a Christmas fabric and until this quilt I had never found just the right place to use it. The fabric was not big enough for a whole backing so I added the turquoise solid strip to make it fit which I think ties it in nicely with the front of the quilt.

I had a piece of pretty pink with tiny white spots fabric that I thought would be suitable for the backing of the quilt with the mauve spotted border. Again it wasn’t large enough so I added strips either end of a bright Starry fabric which has been in my stash for years and years! (I still have some left!)

And finally the Quilt with the bright pink spotted border required even more juggling to create a backing. I didn’t have enough of the pink of the inner border but by piecing some of the bright outer border fabric I managed to create a large enough backing. 

I always cut binding fabrics at 2.5” but I already had quite a lot of the outer border fabric cut at 2.25” (leftovers from a previous quilt) so I decided to cut a few more strips at that width and use those leftover strips. I was delighted with this binding and from now on I’ll always use this 2.25” width. It makes a really neat edge to the quilt.

So, three baby quilts, all machine quilted, and ready to take to the shop owner.

Sending a parcel to Australia

 Tomorrow I’ll be posting a parcel off to Jan Mac in Australia. She recently said she was making Library Book bags to give to children so they had a bag to bring home library books. No bag, no book borrowing. Several of her blog followers have already made and sent bags and this past few days I made 4. In order to make the most of the weight allowed I made 5 QAYG String blocks to add to the parcel.

 

 All fully lined so they should last well.

                                                     And the QAYG blocks:

                                          

Donation finish

 I agreed to my daughter’s request to make some baby quilts that a local Charity Shop could sell.

I make Crumb blocks as Leaders and Enders so I had a tin full ready to use. I have made several baby quilts using these blocks and I’m always happy with the result - bright quilts with lots of I Spy opportunities.

I finished hand sewing the binding on this today and I love it!

When I recently sorted out my leftover pieces of batting I pinned a label onto the larger pieces, stating the size. When I came to layer up my flimsy yesterday I checked the bag of pieces and lo and behold there was a piece exactly the right size. 

Then I checked a piece of backing fabric I had acquired when a friend was downsizing her stash several years ago. I’ve never found the right quilt for this piece but I think it’s great for this one. A little too small in the width so I added a piece of the border and binding fabric and I’m so pleased with it. Two more oddments out of my cupboard!

I always liked this piece of fabric, it’s actually a Christmas fabric according to the selvedge but I would never have guessed that. Wish I had more of it - I could use it for more backings for these I Spy quilts.

See what I mean about the fabric not being an obviously Christmas one?

Happy day for me today as I had my 1st Covid 19 vaccine this morning.

Pink Production Line

 RSC 2021’s colour for this month is Pink.  I had a plan for the blocks I wanted to make but then our daughter suggested I make some baby quilts for a local Charity Shop in aid of The Samaritans.

So I’ve made three flimsies, one almost a finished quilt ( hand sewing the binding now) and two flimsies which I think I can say are Pink - definitely girl colours anyway!

These aren’t great photos. I can assure you they are brighter, more interesting colours than these photos show!

The top one has now been basted and I hope to start the machine quilting tomorrow.

One of the blocks I chose for RSC 2021 was small Wonky Stars, finishing at 4”.

I’ve made 6. Happy with them but my favourite with the little pink elephant fabric nearly drove me crazy. It’s the bottom left block in the photo above. I have great problems with spacial  awareness so getting the elephants in each square oriented the correct way was a nightmare! The seam ripper was used so many times, it was ridiculous.

Linking with Angela’s So scrappy RSC 2021 blog.

A Granny blanket for Granny

 Last year several friends in my Patchwork Group decided to make “Covid blankets”, either knitted or crocheted, using up yarn we had stashed away.

I love making crocheted Granny squares and started to use yarn I had tucked away, not a huge amount, which soon ran out. I made each square using two colours, alternating them to make squares 4 rounds big. 

I got so carried away, having to order extra brightly coloured yarn online from the Wool Warehouse.  I never counted the squares, just pushing them into a couple of large shopping bags. Then I ordered a pale cream coloured yarn to make a final crochet round for each Granny square and for joining them into a blanket. When I started to pull all the squares out of the shopping bags I was astonished at how many I had......FAR too many for one blanket! I made one lot of squares into a cuddly blanket which I gifted to our 10 years old granddaughter for Christmas. She really loves it, permanently on the sofa for when she snuggles under it to watch television.

The other squares were then turned into a blanket for me...  Granny blanket for Granny. I finished it a few days ago and it’s already had lots of use. We had some snow and very cold weather a few days ago and I’ve loved putting it over me in the evenings when we were watching television.

And here it is! Just counted the squares, a total of 143 squares. I think Annalise’s blanket  had an extra row, so that used 156. 

And here it is, all rolled up ready for use!

Coming Full Circle

 I wrote my last post a week ago about the UFO I had just finished. I showed it to my Patchwork Group on a Zoom meeting we had last Thursday. Friend Sue asked me who the Baby Quilt was for and I said I didn’t know, had no one in mind to gift it to and I would just be putting it in the cupboard to gift at some date in the future.

Well, it hasn’t stayed in the cupboard for long! On Sunday evening we received a Skype call from good friends, Miriam and Frank who live in New Zealand. We have known them for 21 years and we have been on so many adventures with them, mostly in NZ but also here in the UK. Over the years we have met their family too. The call was to tell us that their younger daughter Amy had just had a baby girl, Aleesha Miriam Jean. I had gifted baby quilts to her two boys so of course baby Aleesha would have a quilt too. And, as if by magic, I had the very one sitting in the cupboard. I embroidered a label and wrapped the quilt up for posting. So yesterday off it went on the long journey to North Island, NZ.

This quilt was sewn whilst we were in NZ in 2019, includes several fabrics I bought at the local quilt shop in Mapua, came back to the UK with me, finished last week and now it’s winging its way back to NZ.

Definitely a case of Closing the Circle!

First finish for 2021

 Yesterday I finished a UFO which I listed as a UFO to be finished in 2020. I think I put it together into a flimsy whilst I was in New Zealand in 2019 because I recognise the fabrics: some were new fabrics, leftovers from a Happy Blocks quilt I made for a young friend Morgan who was expecting a baby. I left the quilt with her before we returned to the UK at the end of April 2019 and baby Izzy was born in August of that year. Other fabrics in the flimsy I know were sent to me at our New Zealand rental address by dear Blog friend Jo B in Victoria, Australia.

When I put the UFO away I added a piece of fabric for the backing and also batting cut to size. That made it an easy one to finish. I machine quilted either side of the seams down the columns and along the rows of the quilt. I love the backing fabric but have no memories of buying it or the piece being gifted to me. However I wish I had yards of this fabrics stashed away because it’s ideal for backing scrap quilts.

The choice of a binding fabric proved a real challenge: I didn’t have enough of the backing fabric left, I didn’t have anymore of the two border fabrics and every fabric I auditioned was just wrong! 

Then I had a lightbulb moment - why not pick out some of the pink and green leftover binding strips I keep and rarely use? And that worked. I’m happy with the result which just adds to the scrappy mishmash of the baby quilt. Here it is, measures 40” square which is ideal for a play mat and then can be used on the cot once baby is old enough for that to be safe.