Commentary about works in progress, design & creativity
The next block is similar to last week’s block, but with rectangles.
It looks good with five fabrics and I encourage you to select your own fabrics. I would love to see this in some of the new modern fabrics.
Rotary cutting directions for Rectangle Top #39 are posted.
If you have made blocks or a quilt from these patterns, please post a link in the comments section of the relevant block or on the AQ Block-a-Long Flickr group. I would love to see what you have made.
Yes, squares on top. You can cut squares, I guarantee it. And, of course, more rectangles. I think rectangles are definitely underrated in Quiltlandia.
This blocks calls for 5 fabrics, but you could put the same fabric on the two outer bottom rectangles.
Rotary Cutting Directions for Square Top #38
If you have made blocks or a quilt from these patterns, please post a link in the comments section of the relevant block or on the AQ Block-a-Long Flickr group. I would love to see what you have made.
What will you make today?
The BAMQG meeting was yesterday. I was lazy and didn’t blog as much for them over the holidays as I should have. I blame the cold I had. I am having a hard time getting back into the swing.
Thanks for your Service
The 2011 Officers did a great job. I kind of nudged people to get some gifts together. People really ran with the idea, which was great.
A few people made bags and everyone else added little bibs and bobs to create nice gift bags. It was nice not to make all the bags and I enjoyed seeing the different patterns and fabrics that the bag makers used.
I made the purple bag which ended up with Kathleen. The bits and pieces were nice to look at. Rhonda had put together the parts that we solicited from other members.
Some of the things in the bags were pins, fat quarters, needle cases, the Joen Wolfrom Design ratio tool, disappearing pen, grip dots, scarves, machine sewing needles, Invisigrip and many other fun things.
Ruth and Adrianne were really busy and I wasn’t able to get photos of their gift bags. Check the BAMQG blog and perhaps I will be able to post some photos there.
A-B-C Challenge
We have five participants who brought blocks for the A-B-C Challenge this time. Angela was too busy to make her Hawaiian versions, but I am sure she will bring some next time. 😉
Some people brought both G and H, others brought G, some of us brought all of our blocks. Kathleen and I have done a number of the same blocks and it is fun to see how different they look in the different sizes and fabrics.
This is my G block for the A-B-C Challenge. It is called Glacier Bay and is from Around the Block Again by Judy Hopkins (pg.68). It is also a 6″ block and I cut nearly every piece a little bigger and then trimmed. It still came out a bit wonky, but I like the general effect. I think it would make a really cool secondary pattern if I put many of them together.
I don’t remember ever seeing this block before. Lynette has the 501 Rotary Cutting Blocks version of Around the Block, which I thought had ALL the blocks from the three books, but Glacier Bay was not in it.
I am really like this challenge as it allows me to make one block rather than a whole something every month. Kathleen wants to speed the challenge up a bit, so we will be doing two letters each month for the rest of the year. Next month are I and J.
I am resolved to make the blocks sharpish rather than waiting. I have even thought of making the rest of the alphabet all at once and being done with it. I have a sashing idea that I got from Pam. I am thinking about starting adding the sashing as I go along so that I won’t have to do all the cutting at once. We’ll see.
Question of the Month
Rhonda creates the QotM and this month it was: “What are your quilt resolutions?” Most were normal resolutions about finishing and curbing buying, but some were really interesting. I wrote them out as people said. These aren’t my resolutions, necessarily.
Charity Quilts
Art Gallery Fabrics offers a bag of scraps free for people who will be using the scraps to make charity/donation quilts. Contact Pat Bravo for details. I don’t have her email address, but Art Gallery has a page on FB so, perhaps, you can inquire there.
Deborah made a version of Elizabeth Hartman’s Mod Mosaic quilt with scraps (quite large scraps, actually) from Pat Bravo. What a nice idea.
Two quilts were finished. A very large number of the postage stamp kits from the December meeting were turned into blocks and returned. I only took one kit last time, but took several during this meeting.
Schnibbles for Cat Beds
Sadly, Amanda has too many scraps and will hold off taking any more until she has made more cat beds. She said that her garage is being overrun. She really needs help making the actual cat beds.
Angela and I were able to spend a few minutes chatting. I spent a lot of the sewing time chatting and looking at what other people were doing. I couldn’t be bothered putting up a table to work on my own projects, an action I will regret later.
Happy New Year! I hope one of your resolutions was to participate int he Block-a-Long!
This is the first block of the New Year! Another simple block with rectangles. Yes, I am definitely continuing my rectangle love.
It looks good with four fabrics and I encourage you to select your own fabrics and not try and match mine.
Rotary cutting directions for Big Stack & Square Line #37 are posted.
If you have made blocks or a quilt from these patterns, please post a link in the comments section of the relevant block or on the AQ Block-a-Long Flickr group. I would love to see what you have made.
I find it fascinating how many blocks can be designed using squares and rectangles. This is another block that uses squares and rectangles and five great fabrics.
The Stacks & Line #36 rotary cutting directions are straightforward.
If you have made blocks or a quilt from these patterns, please post a link in the comments section of the relevant block or on the AQ Block-a-Long Flickr group. I would love to see what you have made.
I couldn’t think of a good name for this, but Floorplan came to mind and it kind of fits. This has more pieces, but is still pretty straightforward and I am providing the Floorplan rotary cutting directions.
This block would look good with five fabrics, but you could also use four.
If you have made blocks or a quilt from these patterns, please post a link in the comments section of the relevant block or on the AQ Block-a-Long Flickr group. I would love to see what you have made.
I think that this would be a great corner block. I think it would frame or point to other blocks very well.
This block would be great with three fabrics. I have the Sashed Squares rotary cutting directions.
If you have made blocks or a quilt from these patterns, please post a link in the comments section of the relevant block or on the AQ Block-a-Long Flickr group. I would love to see what you have made.
This is my ‘F’ block for the A-B-C challenge. There were a number of blocks with names beginning with F that were appealing, so it was hard to choose. I might do another one.
I really like that blue. It comes out a little darker on my screen than in real life, but is a very calming color.
Kathleen did the same block, but in black and white. It it always fun for me to see the same blocks done in different colors and sizes. As I have said many, many times, that is one of my joys in making blocks.
I saw Kathleen’s Electric Fan at the last meeting. Even though ‘E’ blocks were due last month, I really liked this block, so I decided to make one. It gave me the opportunity to try and figure out how to use the triangle technique for a block from Around the Block. I didn’t make the Flower Pot that I posted, but am seriously tempted. You can just have one basket block in a sampler quilt!
I like to use fabrics at least three times in a quilt and preferably in odd numbers, if I use them more than three times. I looked at the total fabrics I had used in the previous blocks and used some I hadn’t yet used as much. I used the Empire Gold in another project so it was out, so I used that. I also had only used the yellow-green in the Basement Window block.
Heirloom Challenge
These are the log cabin blocks I made for the Heirloom challenge. I added the Empire yellow solid from the Pat Bravo Art Gallery line. I think it goes well with these fabrics. I think the one flower fabric with the pink and burgundy reminds me of the Flea Market Fancy line.
I meant not to do this challenge as I don’t like making log cabin blocks. They are a bit too…fiddly for me. I am not sure if fiddly is the right term, but not a lot of bang for my buck, I guess. Still, I signed up so I stepped up. I tried using the technique that TFQ uses, which is to cut the strips the width they need to be rather than cutting a longer strip and trimming later. That worked ok.
Zoom in to see the variety of log cabin blocks that people came up with within the log cabin format. Amazing!
There were a few blocks that I particularly liked. The wave one (far left) would look great in a quilt with a variety of its fellows. I wouldn’t make it, but I would admire a quilt made with such blocks quite a lot.
The block on the bottom left has lovely graphic quality. The block ont he right looks like a doorway and I really like the fussy cutting.
December Secret Swap
This is a small detail of one of the ribbons on one of the gifts. I love the idea, but would never make it-at least to put on a package. 😉
Above are the members who participated in the Secret Swap. I just couldn’t commit to the time to make a gift and boy am I glad I didn’t participate, because these ladies are a hard act to follow! Everyone really did their best work. I was impressed and pleased to see such care.
Kathleen received this gorgeous pillow. The thing I like about it was how full it is. No matter how many pillows I make, I feel like they aren’t very full.
Show and Tell
There was a lot to tell and many quilts and projects to show. Sewing Time, despite all the other business was quite productive as well.
Elections
The “new” officers are:
President: Adrianne
VP: Kathleen
Secretary: Amanda
Treasurer: Sara
Thank you very much to Ruth, founder and 2011 Secretary, who will be leaving the board and taking over the challenge coordinator position.
I really like this block. This block, along with last week’s block, are two of my very favorites. I am tempted to make a whole bunch of them. I think I just like the rectangles and the turquoise.
Rotary Cutting Directions for Many Rectangles.
If you have made blocks or a quilt from these patterns, please post a link in the comments section of the relevant block or on the AQ Block-a-Long Flickr group. I would love to see what you have made.
If I put the two blocks together to make a quilt, it would look like the quilt below.
It occurred to me sometime in the distant past that making 6″ LeMoyne Star blocks using stripes was a good idea. I started out using paper piecing. I decided that I don’t much like paper piecing and stopped working on the project. Lately, since I have continued to buy stripes, I have picked the project up again. Creating the tutorial for the LeMoyne Star for my sampler class got me back in the groove as well.
This 5.5″ unfinished red and black cutie is one of the new ones, which I just pieced normally using the method I discussed in the LeMoyne Star tutorial. It is a bit smaller than the blocks I made with paper piecing, so I will add some sashing to it. It is too cute to toss out.
I have some more diamonds cut for other blocks and need to cut the backgrounds and then sew.
So much to sew and not enough time….
Here is another four patch type block, so if you want to make a kind of four patch sampler, you have a few blocks to use.
This block is very similar to Squares and Rectangles. Actually, when I saw Squares and Rectangles again, I actually thought the design was the one I am posting today. The fabric in the upper right hand corner was a stripe that made that patch look split. When I looked closer, I realized it wasn’t but COULD be. And here we are. 😉
Again the directions for cutting are pretty easy. Here is arotary cutting worksheet for the One Squares & Rectangles block.
If you have made blocks or a quilt from these patterns, please post a link in the comments section of the relevant block or on the AQ Block-a-Long Flickr group. I would love to see what you have made.
The BAMQG blog does not seem to allow uploading of PDFs, so I am posting this here for members (and those of you that want to play along) who need a pattern for the A-B-C Challenge. This is one example of a block that starts with ‘F.’ There are multitudes.
PDF Rotary Cutting Directions for the Flower Pot.
Another in the series of Double Four Patches. This block may not be original. It looks familiar, but I wasn’t able to find it in EQ7. If I find it, I will correct the name.
I have been using my color wheel a little bit to choose colors for the blocks. I am gearing up to research the color section of the Design Principles and Elements podcast that I do with Sandy over at Quilting…for the Rest of Us, so I am trying to get into the habit of using it.
Again the directions for cutting are pretty easy. Here is a rotary cutting worksheet for the Double Split Four Patch block
If you have made blocks or a quilt from these patterns, please post a link in the comments section of the relevant block or on the AQ Block-a-Long Flickr group. I would love to see what you have made.
I want to make another Anna Maria Horner Multi-tasker tote.
“But, Jaye,” you say “you have so many works in progress, don’t you want to finish them before you start something new?”
I did finish something!!!!
The top for the Stars for San Bruno #3 is pieced, the back is pieced, the binding is made. All the parts are hung up and waiting to go to the quilter.
I feel like I have made a significant step in the Stars for San Bruno Project. it feels SOOOO good to say: All of the piecing for all of the quilts in this project is COMPLETE!! Yes, I finished the piecing for Stars for San Bruno #3 on Sunday. I also made the back and binding.
The back took a lot of time. I have mostly used up the value of blue fabric that I planned to use in all of these quilts, so I spent a lot of time piecing bits of fabric together. It was soothing in a way, but as you can see, some of the fabrics are not blue. They were in the blue bin, so I counted them as available to use.
Also, a note on the photos. My quilt hanger’s wingspan is smaller than the quilt, so the photos aren’t terrific. Hopefully, you get the idea and will come back and continue to read and not be horrified by my terrible photography skills.
So, everyone, do a happy dance. The end is near.
After last week’s block, I thought I had better post a regular Double Four Patch. I should have posted this one first, but wasn’t thinking and had in my mind that I already had. I know you can handle the out-of-orderness.
Looking at this block and last week’s block, it makes me want to do a sort of Double Four Patch Sampler. I think I might get bored, though, with just two small blocks, but it would make a good Leaders and Enders project. Alternatively, I can think up some other Double Four Patch variations and have a variety to work with.
Again the directions for cutting are pretty easy. Here is a Rotary cutting worksheet for the Double Four Patch block
If you have made blocks or a quilt from these patterns, please post a link in the comments section of the relevant block. I would love to see what you have made.
Have fun!