Done a little sewing

 I haven’t sewed much all summer, too many medical appointments and days when I didn’t feel very well.

I have finally finished the baby quilt called Piccadilly Circus, Jo Kramer’s design. I just need to finish hand sewing the binding and hope to show that soon. I made an extra Star block by mistake so I turned that into a 24” square quilt for the hospital Maternity Unit. That’s waiting to be quilted so I hope to show that as a finish soon.

Our granddaughter’s Dancing teacher was celebrating the 30th anniversary of her Dancing School and my daughter asked if I could make a cushion. She gifted it yesterday.

It is 16” square. I chose the royal blue for the hearts because the students wear leotards and skirts in that shade of blue. Miss Alison loved it, thank goodness! 

I am now making two doll’s quilts for little girls with birthdays in October. Grace, my best friend’s granddaughter who will be 4 and our sweet little Great niece Seren, who will be 3. Busy making some appliquéd teddy bears for those quilts. I’ve got out lots of piles of small blocks, wonky stars, Ticky Tacky houses, some Overall Bill and Sunbonnet Sue blocks and will see what I can create with them.

 Well I’m back to write the first post for ages. Haven’t been well, lots of appointments, a pacemaker fitted etc.

That hasn’t stopped me from following other blogs, seeing some lovely work and great ideas. Watching various quilting related YouTube videos.

I finally finished my yellow Strippy quilt which I’m so pleased with. I’ve used lots of Wonky Stars, some Four patches turned into Economy blocks, little scraps to make the Chinese Coin style strips, and a pretty yard of yellow with sprigs of flowers fabric. All from my stash, also the lemon solid fabric I used for the border and binding. The backing was the last of the gorgeous flower power fabric with a strip of yellow with white spots fabric. Sad to see the end of the flower power fabric, I’ve used it for backings in a couple of other quilts. I’ve kept the selvedge  so I can see if I can find some on EBay or Google.

It measures 43” square and is machine quilted with echo quilting around the stars using Perle Cottons.

A close up of some Wonky Stars. The yellow one in particular shows the hand quilting.

Wonky Stars and the Four patches turned into Economy blocks.

More stars because I love them!

I have watched Jo Kramer’s 3 YouTube videos , tutorials showing how to make her Piccadilly Circus baby quilt. I decided to make this for a baby due at the beginning of September. I’m using the same colours as Jo, blues and greens for the stars. Coincidentally this ties in with the RSC colours for this month. I’ve made one star so far and I like it. I don’t have the rage of scraps Jo does so I’m afraid mine will be a bit more “samey “. 

Off to make another star. All the Crumb squares for the middle of the stars are done so I’m making the star points this afternoon.

Happy sewing.

Linking with Angela’s SoScrappy blog.

RSC Strippy Flimsy

 Having sorted through some of my stash fabrics I found a pretty lemon background fabric with flower 💐 sprigs. I wanted to combine it with yet more RSC Wonky Stars blocks and the economy blocks I had in my stash. Initially I had thought I would make a Coin style top but when I started to try that out I didn’t like it so I decided to cut the flower sprigs fabric into WOF strips.

Then I made strips from the Wonky Stars and one strip from the economy blocks. I also made some piano key style strips by adding them to telephone directory strips for foundation. Then I had fun arranging the strips, adding two deep yellow ones with small white dots strips at the top and bottom to make the top longer.

However, I didn’t think it looked finished and it still needed more length so I used a new piece of lemon solid fabric just added to my stash to make a border, narrower at the sides and wider at the top and bottom.

This looks much better and is a better size, measuring 44” wide and 45” long.

Hoping to make a backing and getting the top machine quilted tomorrow. I’ll do my usual Perle hand quilting round the Wonky Stars. 

Linking up with Angela’s RSC So Scrappy blog.

Inspiration from Cathy K for my latest RSC finished quilt

 Thanks to Cathy K (Crazy by Design blog) for her Creatures from the Deep Orphan block quilts. They all intrigue me and I look at them all intently, trying to pick up tips and ideas.

I had intended to make a green one from some RSC leftover blocks but it all looked rather dull and I didn’t have a lot of green scraps either so decided to inject a bit more colour by using some yellow blocks too.

I love the finished quilt, measuring 42” square.

I always admire pieced backings, a great way to use those larger scraps and avoid adding to the scrap bag.

However, I got too carried away, using far too many leftover blocks and ending up with a backing too similar to the front of the quilt. So much so I confused myself big time. I loaded the quilt “sandwich” onto my ironing board and started smoothing and pinning only to find the backing was far too short all the way round. What???? After a few rude words, which brought my husband into the Utility Room to see what was going on, I discovered I had confused myself and had muddled the front and the backing. 

Eventually sorted out and I’m pleased with the result. No more complicated over-clever backings for me!

This is the backing

I’ve also done a little trimming of RSC Wonky Stars and using some HSTs to make economy blocks for another variation of a Green and Yellow RSC Finish. So, a good week’s sewing. 

Linking with Angela’s RSC So Scrappy blog. 

Improv Green scraps RSC now a flimsy!

 Last week I made the centre panel for my Improv Green Scraps flimsy.

I had decided I needed to make each of the three panels symmetrical- that’s me, can’t seem to be free and easy like Cathy K!

Anyway I made lots of 9 Patches from 2” green strips of fabric, adding a little yellow to some of them to connect with the yellow sashing round the centre of the elephants/ string blocks. Have a few left over which I’ve got an idea for. Oh dear, squirrel alert!

As I thought, last week I made two mirror image panels for the top and bottom panels,  using up some scraps completely which is great.

It’s now a flimsy and I’m pleased with it. Just enough pops of yellow to lift the green.

My intention is to make a pieced backing, using up more bits and pieces. That’s for next week.

The story of the little Pink RSC scraps quilt continues!

I loved this little Pink quilt, happy to use up some scraps, already made Wonky stars, borders added from the few pink pieces I had and even using the trimmings from basting the quilt to use for the binding.

Having offered it to my neighbour for any baby girl she knew of (No) I kept it. Earlier this week I had a visit from my Pastoral Care lady from church. She updated me on her family - her daughter who lives in Australia, her wedding which they attended and her granddaughter Florence now 3 months old. And their daughter’s family’s trip back to the UK for Easter. After she left I thought of that little Pink Quilt. I made an embroidered label “ Welcome to the World, Florence” and will gift it tomorrow at church, Easter Sunday. I’m thrilled  - something told me to keep it and here’s the reason.

Happy journey back to Australia, little quilt.

Another follow up to last week’s post was Helen’s visit with Etta on Monday.

I gifted the Twinkler Star quilt to Etta and her reaction when she took it out of the gift bag and spread it out on the carpet was simply amazing! She shrieked, lay full length on it, exclaimed at different squares in the blocks, found some scraps of fabrics in her baby quilt and got us all playing I Spy! As my husband said after they left “You couldn’t have wished for a better reaction “. True. John took a couple of super photos of Etta lying on the quilt with a grin from ear to ear. I’m not putting one here because I’m not happy to put photos of children into my blog.

Then upstairs for Helen to choose a Playmat quilt for her friend’s one year old son. I had two piles of quilts for her to choose from: definite ideas for Playmats (including the one I made especially last week) and others I felt were girly or Project Linus quilts. Helen dithered between the new Playmat - although she didn’t know I had made it especially- and another with lots of green fabrics because her friend likes green. Etta chose for her - the new Novelty fabrics Playmat.

Here are the quilts ready for Project Linus donations:

And in a pile:

So, I feel this has been a successful week for sewing and gifting. I’ve finished lots of scraps, used some of my blocks from RSC blocks stashes and felt happy about the destination of three of my quilts. Nice feeling. Onwards and upwards - my school house motto!

Joining with Angela’s RSC So scrappy blog.

2 finishes and developing green scraps/blocks top

 Two finishes this week. I finished the playmat, bound with a lovely red and white striped binding.

Measures 42“ square.

Now I have to see if Helen chooses it tomorrow. The rest of the quilts I’ve sorted out will go to Project Linus as soon as I can arrange that.

Next I finished the pretty pink quilt. I used a lot of my pink scraps, a few Wonky star blocks and even managed to use the trimmings of the quilt sandwich to bind it. I had only one narrow strip left which has gone into my strips bag.

It finished quite small, 33” wide and 35”” long but it’s so cute! I’m  keeping this ready for the need of a baby girl quilt.

 I also made progress with the green centre I started last week making use of some 3.5” squares from my stash of that size squares.

Today I added extra sides until it measured 41” wide and 19” long. This will be the centre strip of the quilt. 

I am trying to use up collections of blocks from my various stashes and I remembered  I had some 

4 patches made from 1.5” squares so I picked out the ones with green squares and turned them into Economy blocks for the one set of borders.

I’ve started to make some 9 Patch blocks from 2” strips and these will form one row of each of the top and bottom sections of the top. I got the idea of making such a quilt from Cathy on her Crazy by Design blog with her Improv Creature Quilts but I’m not able to be “free” enough. I found it  had to be symmetrical so what I put as a border on the left I had to do the same on the right! The top and bottom parts will probably be mirror images of each other. That depends on what I make for one row from the various bundles of blocks I find in my stash. It’s evolving. Good fun and I’m using my maths skills too.

Linking with Angela’s So Scrappy RSC blog.

Using up scraps and stash

 I have been busy in my sewing room this week, trying to use up scraps and stash.

I used my newly invented ironing board method to sandwich the playmat I am working on. It worked brilliantly! Completely flat at the first smoothing and pinning so this is a winner. As I’ve decided I’m only making small quilts from now on I will continue with this method,

I worked hard on the playmat and yesterday I sewed on the binding, using new fabric I bought online. I thought a red and white stripe would show off all the different novelty squares and I’m pleased with the result. I watched TV last night and hand sewed a lot of the binding which I should finish today.

I hand quilted around a few more stars on the Pink Scrappy quilt and I love how it’s coming along. A neighbour popped in and saw it and loved it! I think I’ll ask her if she knows of a new new baby girl she could gift it to.

As it’s green for RSC this month I got out all my green scraps - hardly any. I cut a few more strips to make some Strippy blocks, then saw Cathy’s post yesterday (Crazy by Design) which gave me an idea for a centre section for a Green Scrappy quilt.

Here’s my start:

I’ll be adding some yellow to mine to bulk out the green scraps and use some more of my stash of Wonky stars. I’m loosing count of how many quilts I’ve added those to! Probably make some 4 patches with green and yellow and see if I can work those in. It will be like a puzzle to work out as I go along.

I’ve also been leader and ender sewing some 8 patch rectangles I had put in piles by my machine ( an idea of Cathy’s, Sane Crazy Crumby Patchwork blog ). Hope to show a few finishes next week.

Joining with Angela’s So Scrappy RSC blog.