Commentary about works in progress, design & creativity
I had time this week to work on this donation top. I was able to finish putting the blocks together into a top.
The top is a weird shape – kind of long and skinny. I probably should have put the top row of blocks on the side to make it more square. I didn’t, however, so I will put a larger border on the sides than on the top to see about making it more square.
The pink cornerstones add a little spark to the top.
I am ready to put the Blue Color Strip blocks together. I have made all the blocks and laid them out on my small design wall, ready to sew. I hope to get the quilt ready to hand in on Sew Day in July.
I looked at the previous quilts and didn’t want to do the same thing, but also am not up for a lot of fancy piecing.
It came to me in a flash to add some pink cornerstones!!
I started, sort of, the next Rainbow Strip donation top. I finished the first one in September of last year. Mostly what this means is that when I am delving into a scrap bin and come up with strips, I make a Color Strip block from it.
Recently I have been making blue strip blocks and I have a lot of them. I think I will have to make a blue Color Strip donation top.
I don’t know if I will use all of these since 6 is a lot of any one color. We’ll see.
This group adds to the yellow, green, grey and pink blocks I already have.
Hooray! I finished the Pink Strip donation top and back. It is a serious pink explosion. It is very fun, though and I do like it.
It looks like Alison might quilt it then donate to an organization in her area. I am thrilled that she has taken an interest. We’ll see.
I used up some pink on the back as well. It didn’t make a dent in my collection of pink, of course, but every little bit helps.
On to a Spiky 16 patch.
I moved all the blocks to my larger design wall after Who Am I? went into the ‘to be quilted’ bag. While I was little lazy about walking across the room to use the donation blocks for leaders and enders, I finally put the quilt top together and put the borders on.
I got inspiration from the Red Strip donation top I made a few years ago. I really liked the cornerstones and the way the white sashing separated the blocks so viewers could see each one distinctly.
This one is larger than the Red version. I did end up adding a column to the quilt, but I still think it is a weird shape. I didn’t do any of the ratio math I suggest my students do to make their quilts the right shape. I plan to put more borders on, so maybe I will make the vertical borders a little wider than the top and bottom borders.
So far so good and I am on track to bring it to Sew Day or the next meeting.
I am making good progress on the Pink Strip Donation top. It is VERY pink. I am enjoying working on it. It doesn’t feel like a must do project. I do want to get it done, however the pink is so cheerful that it is a joy to work on. This one will definitely not be gender neutral.
I did a big clean out and organization of the scraps in my pink bin, which was required to finish enough blocks to make a reasonable sized quilt. It looks a little skinny, so I am debating adding another row.
This quilt came back to the guild last week at the meeting. This is the quilt I made from the trimmings off the Orange You Glad blocks. I couldn’t find a post about it, though I am sure I must have taken photos when I finished it, though maybe not.
Anyway, I don’t know who quilted it, but they did a great job. Roz bound the edges and it looks great. I love a striped binding.
I have some leftover yellow color strip donation blocks on my design wall. They were leftover from the Rainbow Strip donation quilt. Apparently, they were lonely, because I started making more in different colors. I started with the green ones, because I had some green strips laying around. I suppose I intended to make another Rainbow Strip donation quilt, but then I started in on pink. Now I think I’ll make a pink Color Strip donation quilt. I haven’t made a pink one and my pink scrap drawer is full to bursting. No surprise there.
It’s a good start for my 2023 donation blocks effort.
The Rainbow Color Strip donation top has been stalled, mostly. Since the last time I posted about it, I have added some blocks, but the top is not done. I haven’t made much progress, which is frustrating.
I blame yellow.
You might remember I finished the Yellow Improv donation top in April. When I made that piece, I used every speck of yellow scraps in my yellow scrap drawer. I don’t always use a lot of yellow, so that was years worth of yellow scraps. Since April, I have cut only a few, oddly shaped yellow scraps. In order to make the above blocks into a true rainbow quilt, I need yellow.
I can just cut some from yardage, right? What’s the problem? That is definitely the problem. What is holding me up from just cutting a few strips from yardage and making the dang yellow strip blocks?
I have no idea, but that time is coming to an end. I want these blocks off my design wall and into the hands of a quilter in the guild. I need the space for another project.
As a side note, I don’t put these donation tops on my UFO or WIP or to do list. I only work on one at a time, mostly, and I never take them off my design wall until they are done. You are probably thinking “hey, what about the American Jane Plus top and the Ends n.14 (Typewriter) top?” Yes, I made both of those while this Rainbow Strips top was on the design wall. That is why I said ‘mostly’.
I talked about this quilt after I put the design walls back up. I haven’t made all the colors in the rainbow for the Color Strip & Chunk donation quilts, but I have made several. I thought the rainbow quilt would be the crowning glory, but the reality is that I have a lot of stuff on my small design wall and I want it gone or finished. The blocks that were hanging around are now having their turn.
Over last weekend I starting making more strip blocks as I was working on the Cha3 table runner and the Missouri Star donation top. I made a couple of black blocks, the purple blocks you see and that one red-violet block. I am not working on more greys, thought I don’t know if I will need them. I need some green and yellow blocks as well.
I decided to use the leftover improv strip blocks for one donation quilt. I just slapped them up on the design wall so I could see what I had. I will definitely do some kind of colorwash effect in the final layout.
There area lot of colors missing, so I will make some more blocks in the missing colors. I think I need about 28 total blocks to make a reasonable/useful sized quilt.
Over the weekend, I finished the Yellow Strip Donation Top (and back and binding). This is another in my Color Strip Donation series.
I did sort of rush this along, but I was piecing like mad on Scrap Dash, so I couldn’t help it, really.
I had to put Scrap Dash on the back burner briefly to add borders, make a back and a binding.
Since I put on very plain borders so the quilting would show up, I decided the quilt needed a dark binding. I made a gold binding.
I am pleased with the back. I didn’t have to piece too much and I got to use up some prints that have been around for awhile.
I don’t use tons of yellow, so these prints have been around awhile. I think they are good choices: fresh and upbeat. I suppose this quilt could be for a boy, but perhaps not with the flowery back.
The whole package is ready to go to Peggy.
I spent some concentrated time on this donation top and back and was able to finish it.
I did something a little different with the borders. Since I had an extra sashing strip, I added it to the left side after accidentally sewing one to the right side. Then I added another border all the way around using a different fabric. There is no first border on the stop and bottom. I think the piece looks ok like that.
I will say that this top looks more like a column quilt or Chinese Coins quilt than the other Color Strip quilts I have made. I think the sea green I used for the sashing didn’t have enough contrast. However, I kind of like the difference.
Work has been busy and I am tired at the end of the day, so sewing has not been going as quickly as I would like. To add to the drama, the SD card in my phone failed, so I lost a ton of photos. It’s my own fault for not backing them up, but it still means a few posts I had in mind can’t happen. There is some hope that one of my nephews will be able to resurrect it, but we will have to see. Thus, my blog is being slightly neglected. I don’t want to post junk, so there may be some skips.
I am working hard on this next donation top. It is not as satisfying to finish these tops since I can’t really show them at meetings. Still, I am motivated enough to clear out scraps to continue making them, so I continue.
As I said before my blue scrap drawer is still pretty packed so I wonder how many blue scrap quilts I will make. This is the second with this type of block. The first had a yellow border and yellow sashing, so it has a very different look. After I finish this one, you will be able to compare the two on the page where I am posting them all.
I have some quilts to send to one of the members to be quilted and I plan to send this one along with that group. I’d like to send everything on Tuesday, so we will see if I can finish this piece by then.
I cut up the fabric I found the other day into sashing strips and had been waiting for some miracle to sew them together. I found another piece of a similar colored batik and was able to move forward yesterday. I sewed sashing pieces to the tops of all of the blocks and am now sewing the blocks together into rows. I am not adding corner stones so I am not chunking.