Commentary about works in progress, design & creativity
I spent most of the Sunday of MLK weekend working on the latest batch of Pantone blocks. I dug into some old fabric to find good matches.
Pantone has a lot of browns and I am digging deep to find anything that looks close to the colors on the postcards. I found some brown fabrics I had forgotten I had. The exercise is making me think about shades and tones that are missing from my fabric palette.
I talked awhile ago about selecting some fabrics. These fabrics sat on my worktable until last week when I decided enough was enough and I started making blocks.
I forgot to take photos of all the blocks before I handed them over to Friend Julie, but trust me, I did make about 9 blocks. 😉
She proves it, because she sent me a photo of the blocks.
This effort set me on the path I described earlier this week where I made more blocks. I thought I might see Julie on Sew Day and I wanted to have another batch for her, as I mentioned.
Today is the day where we give the officers their gifts.
Carrie, Sue and I spent last Saturday at The Granary, a local quilt store that has a great restaurant nearby.
We bought gift cards for the officers and spent time, in between eating, looking at quilt supplies and wrapping the gifts. It was another fun time with Carrie and Sue.
Even though I need and want to make Pantone blocks, I started on the next Black Strip donation quilt.
Yes, I went with the pink cornerstones. I just can’t help myself sometimes.
This will be a small one, though there is a small possibility I’ll make it larger. Stay tuned.
I was able to finish the grey strip top at Sew Day, then work on the back at home. I am pleased that this top is finished and am already working on the next black version.
With the back, it is another 3 yards used for a good cause.
I have now made 14 of these quilts, with the help of my guild colleagues.
See the other colors on the Color Strip page.
I made more blocks that I was able to give to Julie at Sew Day. I am slowly working my way through the fabrics I selected last week.
You can see some of the blocks I made before in a previous post.
I finally finished the Tula 2-in-1-Case. The binding gave me fits. I am pleased, however, that it came out so well. Choosing a Tula Tiny Stripe for the binding made coordination easy.
The inside is an old feather print I had. I like it and it is light colored so the recipient will be able to see what’s inside. I suppose, however that is not as important with a bag that opens flat?
The back is fairly normal. It is just the back of a bag. There is an interesting bit of symmetry because of the way I cut the exterior panel so that the lady would be centered on the front.
I don’t yet know who the recipient will be. Stay tuned!
Julie handed over a couple more blocks at Sew Day. These give the impression of primary colors to me, though I can clearly see they aren’t.
I am going great guns on clearing out that black-grey-brown scrap drawer. This is the second quilt I have started using scraps to make blocks.
I want to get it done quickly, but vacation is over and work takes time, so I’ll work on it as I can.
I decided I needed to be diligent about the Pantone Project blocks. I put my nose to the machine and started working hard on them. I want to have another group to give to Julie on Sew Day. I don’t know that I will be able to make them all. I can try.
I am in the process of making a second batch. On New Year’s Day, I got all the postcards together and selected fabrics for each of the cards, then, interspersed with sashing the Grey Strip donation top, I started making blocks. I did change out the light blue, Pantone 9044, in the middle on the left. You can see the replacement fabric above in the Peaky & Spike block.
I am selecting blocks to make based what I have already made. I have a sort of plan in mind for the final quilt that requires even numbers of blocks.
I was able to finish this quilt on the 29th. I was happy to get it finished before the New Year.
I probably should have put another border on it, but I was just too lazy. I think it is big enough without one. It just doesn’t look quite finished.
I realize that most of these are black or light grey. This is a result of working through my black, grey and brown scrap bin.
Unfortunately, I was being odd when I first started naming these blocks and so they are all called Dark Grey…. I will probably end up making, at least, two quilts out of the blocks you see. I think I will make a light grey and a black quilt, but it depends on how much light grey I have. The drawer was full when I started and I still have quite a few scraps, though most of the straight strips have been used.
I was able to make so many because I used a strip piecing method and just zoomed them through the machine. I also didn’t have to worry about matching any seams since I trimmed them to the right size once I had a large enough piece.
I have been busy making these blocks. I should have been doing other things, but I wasn’t. I just sewed after work, then sat with my DH.
As you can see, I have enough to make a quilt. I am going to start sewing the sashing on soon.
I am thinking of using pink cornerstones and a thin pink border. I like the black and pink color combination. The problem is that this would be a great boy quilt and pink would ruin that. Red might be a good alternative. I’ll have to see.
I still have more strips and am still working on making the grey blocks. My black/grey/brown scrap draw isn’t empty, but it is much emptier. That is a huge bonus as I can actually close it now.
I finished enough blocks since I last posted on Saturday to look at this top as a rectangle.
One thing I noticed when I was looking at the last donation top I made was that the blue top was a weird shape and I had to adjust it with a border. In this case, the number and arrangement of blocks I have made are the same as that blue strip top. I don’t want to end up with a weirdly shaped quilt, so I need to figure out if I have enough strips to make 5 more blocks of if I should put the top row on the side and save one block for another rainbow version?
I am sure you can imagine that I was super careful when sewing this project back together. After all the ripping I had to do, I hope I learned my lesson.
It didn’t take me very long to sew the top together, but it would have taken me less time if I had paid better attention the first time.
It is now off with Laura the quilter.