I have finally sewed all the pairs of quarter blocks together. It took a long time.
I started on Saturday and finished on Sunday. Of course, I couldn’t sew all day both days, but I did spend a good portion of my time on the project.
One thing I can never get over is how much space is taken up by the seam allowances. The spaces in the photo (right) show how much space I gained by sewing the blocks on the left.
Orange You Glad Pairs sewn
Once all of the pairs of quarter blocks were sewn together, the piece looks ‘normal’ again. Of course, I have to sew the pairs into blocks. Then we’ll see the spaces develop again.
I finally bit the bullet and started putting the Rainbow Color Strip Donation top together. Once I finished all the Orange Strip donation blocks, I needed another leaders and enders projects while I put the Orange You Glad quilt top together. I decided that enough was enough and to get busy on this top.
Finished is better than perfect, right?
Rainbow Color Strip top on design wall-detail
As usual, I don’t have a pattern. While I sort of have a plan, it is subject to change based on the number of blocks. At the moment I am going with a width of 7 blocks plus sashing for the center of the quilt.I am reserving the right to make it larger once I can move the blocks to the large design wall and see what I have. I have a feeling I will need to make a bit larger, but I want to minimize making more blocks, if I can.
I don’t have enough space on my design wall for all the blocks I have made (remember most of these except the yellow are leftovers from the other Color Strip donation quilts). You can see the blue blocks and the white blocks in the photo at the top floating around. This is one reason why I feel so anxious about the various projects going on.
Rainbow Color Strip leaders & enders-detail
I need the space on the large design wall for two quilts. The Orange You Glad piece and the Rainbow Color Strip top are jockeying for position in my mind and it is starting to make me a little crazy. This is the point where I usually focus on one quilt, but I can’t (don’t want to??) in this case. I need leaders and enders and the sashing for the Rainbow Color Strip top is great for leaders and enders. And I really want to make progress on the Rainbow Color Strip top.
Putting on the sashing is relatively easy and makes the blocks ready to put together. I may have to add more sashing to the end blocks, if I make the quilt wider, but we will see.
All of this means I am not quilting the Tarts. It is still on my mind, don’t worry. I just need to get through this patch of piecing crazy. This is a great example of why UFOs are really not good for my process. If I had finished the Tarts back in 2010, they wouldn’t be making me crazy as well. It is really hard to enjoy my quiltmaking when I feel pulled in so many directions. Yes, this is a #firstworldproblem and one of my own making.
The Diagonal Nine Patch is finished. I am really pleased with how it came out. Of course, Colleen’s quilting makes it, but my choice of the various white on black fabrics looks really good, too. Even though the blacks have little to no contrast, the variety of prints makes each square stand out well.
I am also pleased with the striped binding. Striped binding is the best and I am glad I am able to use some of the stripes I have been saving.
I really like this pattern. I think it has a lot of potential. I got an idea for one of the Niece-phews quilts I have been meaning to make from making this quilt.
Diagonal Nine Patch back – Finished
I do like the back. That large print on the left is really good. I am also pleased with my use of it. Some prints are great as they are – not cut up.
A number of these prints were leftover from the Cityscape (Black & Red Improv) quilt. I am glad I used them. They have been sitting around for awhile.
I finished the Diagonal Nine Patch just in time. The baby shower is this weekend. I may have just enough time to make a storage bag for the quilt. We’ll see.
I used the trimmings from my bullseye blocks to make some more donation blocks. These started out as the orange Color Strip blocks like I made before. However, the strips were pretty thin and I quickly tired of sewing them together and making, what felt like, no progress.
I decided that arranging the strips vertically would work. I, later, realized this change would be an evolution in the process (or series). Now I have quite a few of them and soon will be able to make another donation quilt.
I am NOT starting it, though, until some of the other projects are off my design wall.
I finally just buckled down and made some yellow strip blocks for the Rainbow Color Strip Donation top. I couldn’t stand that nothing was happening with that quilt anymore. I needed to make some progress towards getting it off my design wall and off to someone who needs it. This was the way.
I cut some strips from yardage and made the blocks. They aren’t as interesting as blocks made from scraps, but in the grand scheme nobody will notice.
I have more of the strip set and could have probably cut two more, but I thought five was plenty. I think the Rainbow Color Strip Donation top will be on the large size as it is.
I made good progress during the week. All of the blocks are sewn together.
I spent quite a bit of time during the week sewing as well. I am trying to enjoy this process, but it is hard. It really has nothing to do with this quilt; it has to do with the fact that I have too may projects at the same stage at the moment.
Regardless, I am paying close attention to the blocks and where they go. I am making minor adjustments even at this late stage. The quilt is looking good, I think
Month 13 arrived the other day. I am so excited to finally be able to get going.
Pink Door sent an entire yard of the cameo print! Lindsay and I were speculating on how many bolts of that print they had to buy to send everyone a yard of the fabric. Many bolts!
I snapped the photo and dumped the fabric in the washer. I did forget to wash the small piece of striped fabric, but I have some that is already washed so I’ll still be able to cut and baste the fabrics while I collect more fabrics for washing.
Last week was super busy and one thing I did was visit Golden State Quilting. I mentioned the visit briefly the other day when I talked about the green for the Pantone Project. I am not going to do a full on Quilt Shop Review as I just did one in January and everything there was essentially the same.
Golden State Quilting purchases- August 2022
As I said, they have really good fabric at Golden State. Parisville Deja Vu was not on the shelves yet, but they had an excellent selection of Tula Pink fabrics, really good Halloween fabrics, nice dots and a lot of other fabrics. My mind swam with possibilities. It was hard to resist, but I want to use up fabric. As I much as I love buying fabric, I need to use more before I buy more. I will say that the selection of tone-on-tones allowed me to choose one I needed for one of the beige/brown colors in the Pantone Project.
I decided that I will sew at least some pillowcases for my college bound nephews, so I checked out the Halloween fabrics and bought 3 different ones. The YM will get some that honor my grandcat, Marie.
I still love their selection of rulers. I thought about buying another Quilter’s Select ruler in a different size (I bought a 12×12 (ish) back in January), but decided to save my pennies for now. That brand doesn’t have the 4.5 x 8.5 size that I love – or at least Golden State doesn’t carry it. I think I will get a 6×12 inch version next. Perhaps that will be small enough for me to use more frequently. Julie bought a 4.5 x 4.5 to use for the Pantone Project and I am thinking that I may buy that size as well.
I am not in desperate need of Soft & Stable, but I bought a package anyway just to have on hand. I am thinking of getting Colleen to quilt some S&S for me so I don’t have to do that step.
I also bought some Emmaline frames, thinking I could use them for my Sew Sweetness patterns. One is completely the wrong size. The other is the right size, but has bent ends, so I don’t know if it will work. I can always use the frames.
We went out to lunch after visiting the shop and spent about 3 hours talking!
Colleen sent the Diagonal Nine Patch back. It will definitely be ready in time to head to the baby shower.
I like the quilting she did. The swirls in colored variegated thread look happy. Colleen does a great job and I am really happy to be getting some quilts back in the finishing loop.
Diagonal Nine Patch – back detail
The quilting is more obvious on the back despite the active prints I used.
I also think that the striped binding looks great. I have some time to sew it down while I wait for La Pass Month 13 to arrive.
I want to use this pattern again with 2.5 inch squares, but also one with larger squares such as 5 inch squares.
The other day I talked about using 3/4s of the squares to make a design. Since then I have received the rest of the quarter squares and put them up on my design wall. It is so great to have more options.
I have been rearranging and changing the locations of the quarters every time I walk into the room or look at the design wall. I noticed that we have, mostly, all used cool colors for the first circle. That makes highlighting different fabrics a challenge. It is not impossible, but I have to look carefully to make sure each fabric is showcased.
I want to get to sewing, so at some point I need to stop rearranging and start sewing the blocks together.
The guild Sew Day for August was a Community Quilt Sew Day. Mary C and I collaborated again to make three tops. Normally, I would make a top, then make the back. We focused on tops this time.
Mom Blocks donation top
Mom gave me some orphan pieces and pieces that she didn’t want anymore. I had left them in the car so I didn’t even know what was in the bag. What I found in that bag was some ugly pieces. We also found some pretty nice looking blocks.
The blocks in the top on the left are the ones Mom made and handed over. Once we saw these, we decided we could just put them together quickly and move on to the day’s community quilt pattern.
I had some strips left over from the Libs Elliott class I took at QuiltCon in 2018. Fortunately, we had enough for sashing and borders. The turquoise and pink ones were already sewn together, which made things easier. The blocks weren’t all square, but we squared them up as much as we could.
Mary C sewed and I pressed and trimmed, which worked really well.
I am pleased with how this came out and how we were able to use some of the pieces that Mom sent along. I think someone will like this quilt.
Julie and I went out the other day to Golden State Sewing. We usually meet for lunch and visit the Granary, but I suggested we change it up. They have really good fabric at Golden State. More on the visit later.
One of the things I wanted to do was look for fabrics for The Pantone Project for the cards with which I was struggling. We also chatted about ‘good enough’, which is de rigeur for this project. We agreed that neither of us want to buy a lot of fabric.
Pantone 350 choices (green)
I finally crawled up into the fabric closet and got down the cool solids bin and pulled out the greens I remembered. Neither were exactly right, but Julie and I decided that two of the three fabrics would work.
We think the Tula Pink Tiny Dots is the right color, but lighter. We think the top right solid is dark enough, but doesn’t have that black (or brown?) tinge to it. We agreed that either would work.
One strategy I haven’t tried is comparing the postcards to the color cards I have. As I said, though, I don’t want to buy a lot of fabric; I’d like to use what I have.
I talked about finishing this bag back in May. The problem was that the zipper wasn’t working right. The bag is supposed to open wide, but the double zipper I had installed was preventing it. I don’t have a photo of this problem on my bag, but I do have a photo of what it was supposed to do. You can see from the photo of Mom’s bag that the whole bag is accessible. Mine didn’t do that.
Apparently, my subconscious was working on this, because one night last week I kept waking up in the middle of the night dreaming/worrying about this damn zipper. I didn’t even remember thinking about it during the day, but my subconscious was clearly dealing with the problem.
I shouldn’t even really call it a problem, because I could still use the bag. I wasn’t, however, actually using the bag.
Take a Stand – zipper tab removed
After that night of dreaming about zippers, I looked at the zipper on the bag. If I needed to remove the zipper completely, which I didn’t want to do, it would require a lot of ripping. I thought I could take off the zipper tab, remove one of the zipper heads and put one zipper head back on.
I don’t know why I put two zipper heads on. I didn’t do that on Mom’s Take a Stand. If I had, it would have had the same problem, but you can see from the photo above that it doesn’t
Take a Stand – zipper tab removed annotated
During Craft Night, I started by removing the zipper tab. Then I removed both zipper heads. I could have just removed one, but they were not in the right orientation for one zipper head. I, then, followed my zipper head tutorial. I am so glad I wrote that tutorial, because I always forget I have to put the head in the towel holder** upside down and insert the zipper tape upside down as well. This was a little challenging since the zipper tape was already attached to the bag. I had to do a bit of wrangling, but eventually got the zipper head on.
It works perfectly!
Now I just have to sew the zipper tab again and we should be in business.
**Obviously, you should shop at a local quilt shop. However, I use affiliate links and may be paid for your purchase of an item when you click on an item’s link in my post. There is no additional cost to you for clicking or purchasing items I recommend. I appreciate your clicks and purchases as it helps support this blog.
I made a journal cover for a friend. I meant do this task before she left her job (with the same team I was on) and started her new one, but that was a particularly busy time for me and I just finished last week.
She received it the other day and was totally thrilled. She loved the pink, which was great. She told me she likes pink, but I wasn’t sure if this was too much pink. Apparently not, which is great!
Kristin’s Journal Cover -whole cover
I really like this journal cover and would have kept it for myself if I hadn’t planned to give it to my friend. On the plus side, I made a lot of extra ‘made fabric’ in the process of getting pieces big enough to cover the journal. This means I have almost enough to make another journal cover for one of my journals that doesn’t yet have a cover.
Kristin’s Journal Cover – Inside front cover
Kristin’s Journal Cover – Inside back cover
It is so odd to be in touch with former work colleagues. Somehow we formed a bond and I can feel it is fragile, but still there, which is heartening.
I was super excited to receive quarter squares from Julie the other day! I am eagerly anticipating the receipt of Adrienne’s quarters as well. Once I get those I can seriously start scheduling time to finalize the arrangement and sew the top together.
Orange You Glad – my and Julie’s quarter squares
In the meantime, I interspersed Julie’s quarter squares with the mine on the design wall. Because I was so excited, I forgot to take a picture of the quarters received. I took a photo of the ones I hadn’t yet put on the design wall (photo above). Aren’t they fun?
The photo, right, shows my layout in the process of being rearranged on the design wall.
Orange You Glad – my and Julie’s quarter squares – complete
What I have with three quarters of the blocks looks pretty good. I am thinking that I will keep them as circles, but there is one other layout I want to try out first.
