Scrap Quilting Club

It's been a while since I have posted.  I wanted to post on Design Wall Mondays for the last two weeks but my home internet service has been down.  It's very frustrating when it doesn't work.  Today we were told the the problem is the connection at the pole and they will send someone out to morrow to fix it.

In the meantime, here are the quilts from Scrap Quilting Club last Saturday. The first photo is my yearlong project.  This will go with the field of trees I posted earlier.  I'm actually two rows behind schedule.  I should have a row of ornaments and a row of tree lights completed by the end of June....will not happen!

-------------------------- Type-u-later, http://www.teaquilts.com

Design Wall Monday

I've been quilting a lot lately.  I went on a retreat and got to work on a few projects.  First, this is the round robin I received that I need to add a border by mid July.  I'm still in the "thinking" phase at this point. Trying to decide the type of pieced border I will add.

My goal for the quilt retreat was to work on my Christmas quilt.  I only got 9 blocks made by last Sunday; 6 snow flake blocks, and one each wreath and mittens.  So this past week I made it a goal to stitch on this quilt each day.  I now have 3 of 13 rows completed.  The wreath blocks are 3" finished and there are 16 of  them!  By the end of June I'm supposed to have gingerbread men, ornaments, and Christmas lights blocks added; we'll see.  I have two trips schedule for the month of June and I don't think I'll get much sewing done.  I'm happy though with the progress thus far.

 I went to my friend's house on Saturday to borrow the long arm machine!  I got  two quilt tops quilted.  This one is last year's scrap quilting club's yearlong project.

This one is my drunkard's path string quilt.  I'm so excited to get them both quilted. Now I need to pick binding fabrics and get them off my to-do list.  We'll see if they get completed in the month of June.

To see more design walls, visit Patchworktimes.com.

-------------------------- Type-u-later, http://www.teaquilts.com

Updates for Chain Reaction and Round Robin Border

I'm still sewing on a couple of projects.  I finished the top for Chain Reaction.  I'll decide late if I want to add border to make larger, depending upon the recipient whom I haven't named yet.

The Chain Reaction quilt needed 6 blocks but 1/4 inch larger than half a block.  These were the pieces left over. Instead of dumping them in the trash or letting them hang around in the studio until I decide what to do with them, I sewed them together.  I can quilt as it or put into a future project, like a sampler quilt.  The goal is to do something with the pieces, creating a larger piece of fabric.

 I posted asking for suggestions on this round robin I received but didn't get any feedback.  I kept looking at this trying to determine what the owner wants.  Is it a night nature scene?  I couldn't add flowers because you wouldn't necessarily see them in the dark. Stars could be added; guess that would have been okay.  I wasn't feeling any of that though so I came up with something else. I was thinking that maybe the owner wants a string quilt.  Well, I have PLENTY of those hanging around.  I pulled all values and tones of orange, yellow, green, blue and brown strings from my bin.

Ta-da! This is what I came up with.  I free hand cut the side borders.  For the corner blocks, I used my GO! Drunkard's Path die (3.5" finished  and them trimmed them down to 3" finished.  I really like this quilt top and am looking forward to seeing what the next person adds.

Now, back to working on my charity quilt!
--------------------------
Type-u-later,
 
http://www.teaquilts.com

Design Wall Monday

I'm working on the Chain Reaction quilt again. I have all blocks made and sewn into rows.  I'm nearing the finish line.  Now, I need to find time to quilt.

--------------------------
Type-u-later,
 
http://www.teaquilts.com

WIP Update

I'm still working on my Chain Reaction blocks. I needed 30 more and here are 15 this way....

 And I started the other 15 this way.  I stopped when I cut 4 of them in the wrong direction.  I have very limited amount of the background fabric so I had to do some creative thinking to save the fabric.  I fixed the four I cut wrong and am working on the last 9 blocks.

I also made some more "signature blocks" for a charity quilt.  Here are some possible layouts for the blocks Where I will not have too many seams to match.  The first one has all the blocks facing the same direction; no matching needed for this one.

Making the blocks in quarters and flipping them one-quarter turn can do do things.  This first one has an "X" in the middle with "V's" going out.  Very interesting.  I will have to match seams that meet in the center of the quilt, but not every seam.

This setting, 1/4 turn create squares as you flip the quarters.  Again, I'll have to match the seams down the center of t he quilt.  I think this one is a winner. Now I need to make about 50 more blocks to create the quilt top.

Happy quilting everyone!
-------------------------- Type-u-later, http://www.teaquilts.com

Finally a Post!

I've received some emails and personal inquiries about my lack of blogging.  Sometimes life just gets in the way and disrupt our plans.  I've been a tad depressed regarding my friend's death.  In addition, I was helping the family sort out all of her studio items and being a set of ears to the family when needed.  I was so exhausted because along with that, I still had quilt lectures and workshops scheduled, I've been traveling with my line dancing group and been dealing long distance with family regarding my grandmother's health.  When I did have "free time", I used it to read which is what relaxed me the most, not quilting or blogging.

Well the last few weeks I've been going back into the sewing studio.  I quilted and put binding on 3 quilt tops that my friend had made and gave them to her family.  I absolutely forgot to take pictures of those.  However, I finished two of my quilts that I gave to two cousins in Birmingham, Alabama.  They love them so much already.  The colors in these photos are not true and are bad presentation of the actual quilts but this is all I have.

Peaches and Cream quilt pattern by Judy Laquidara.  Instead of a tone on  tone quilt, I pulled out all the scraps as my cousin specifically requested a very colorful quilt.  This was definitely a joy to make.  The next photo is the back of the quilt.  I found this neat fabric that makes the quilt looks like a two-sided quilt.  I named this quilt Colorful Boxes and started it in January 2011 with the scrap quilting club.  I finally finished it in April of this year.

Another scrap quilting club project that I completed to send to my 2nd cousin, son of the quilt recipient above.  This one I call Rows of Boxes however, the pattern is Awesome Lap Quilt by Jamie Mueller and can be found in Moda Bake Shop.  I started this quilt in 2011 when the pattern first came out.  It had a few direction mishaps so I compensated by adding fabric pieces to the row ends and trimmed them all to the same size.  I've been told that the pattern has since been corrected so you shouldn't have any problems with it if you try it now.





This is the start of April's scrap quilting club project called Chain Reaction published in Quiltmaker's Magazine March/April 2012 issue.  You can see more ideas by clicking Quiltmaker. I have almost 4 of 7 rows shown here.

I have those 4 rows pieced.  Now I need to make blocks for the remaining 3 rows (30 blocks).

Apparently because I just LOVE works in progress, I started machine embroidering the "Names Above All Names" quilt.  I plan to give this as a gift.  I have about 20 more blocks to make. If you want to see all the block names, click this link:  http://www.embroideryonline.com/p-48535-name-above-all-names-quilt.aspx

I want to make a charity quilt with fabrics I received from Karen.  I got out two GO! dies and started making signature blocks.  But wait a second, I didn't make signature blocks.

I used some Kona cotton I had in my stash for the background.  Here are the first 16 blocks I made.  I plan to make many, many more in all colors. I could set them this way but I would have to worry about all those seams matching up.

So, I decided to set them this way.  I think I like the background space in this layout because it's not the norm.  I have about 90 blocks cut but don't have any plan at this time.

I have a lot of scrap quilting club photos I need to upload.  I'll try to blog again soon.  Until then, happy quilting!
-------------------------- Type-u-later, http://www.teaquilts.com