Catching Up

A very satisfying day.  I finished two of the weekly blocks for the Traditional Tuesday Sampler.

The only trouble I had was trying to follow Jenifer's suggestion about ironing the seams flat to reduce bulk.  After burning the ends of my fingers repeatedly, I gave up and ironed the seams to the side the way I usually do.  Then I pressed the heck out of the blocks (with steam) to flatten the bulky areas as flat as I could.  I can only assume that Jenifer has lovely slender fingers, not the pudgy square ended ones I have.

Proceeded to block # 2 for the Bloggers' Block of the Month .  Pulled out the 2.5" strip bin and got to work selecting fabrics.  I'm using my blue and neutral scraps for the 8.5" blocks.  I see from surfing blogs that many participants are making two of each block.  And I thought, Well duh! Why didn't I do that?!  I don't know why that didn't occur to me, since that's exactly what I'm doing for the blocks of the week samplers Modern Monday and Traditional Tuesday.  I may pull out the bin sometime between now and next month's block and make an extra for each of the first two published blocks.

I used my Easy Angle ruler to cut the components for the Half-square triangles.  It lets me cut the components from the 2.5" scraps and still end up with a 2.5" HST.  I just love this ruler.

My Bloggers' Block of the Month # 2.

I pulled out enough bright scrappy strips to make another dozen 9-patches for my Sister's Choice project, cutting two 10.5" lengths of contrasting colours and one 2.5" square of one of the fabrics for each block, and then cutting up the remainder of each half strip into 2.5" x 4.5" bricks or 2.5" squares.  I've built up quite a nice little stack of bricks and squares this way.  I don't know yet what I'm going to do with them...  When I first started quilting it was a major puzzle to me how the more experienced quilters were so prolific.  Now I know.  You do this long enough and you end up with far more components than you can use and it becomes necessary to find projects to use them up.  A dozen scrappy patches is about my limit time wise.

The resulting 9 patches are really bright and cheery.  The 9 patch count is now up to 31.  I will want 48 to make a big lap size, 56 to make a double-bed size quilt, or 80 to make a queen size.  Still haven't decided which size I want to make and I need to check what size bed the intended recipient has.  This is another one that is going to require strips with sew-n-flip corners.

It feels good to be up to date on the blocks of the week/month.  I hate falling behind on those.

A bit of Sunday Sewing

Today is the first day of the Canton Village Bloggers' Block of the Month  - I'm going to make mine in scrappy blues and neutrals.  There seems to be quite a good supply of those fabrics in all of my strip bins, as well as yardage in my stash.  All the block # 1 components could be made from 2.5" strips and squares.  I'm keeping all the pertinent links for this project on a Blog Page here.

After finding a handful of colourful 9 patches in my 2.5" strip bin, I decided to keep making them so I could use them as the centres of Sister's Choice blocks - it will be a very colourful and scrappy project.  I'll be making these along with my Bloggers' BOM blocks every month.  The Sister's Choice blocks will finish at 10" square so I will probably want to make the quilt 6 by 8 (48 blocks).  I already have 19 nine-patches so only need another 29 before I move on to the next phase of these blocks.

I like the fast piecing method I read about on Quiltville - where to make a scrappy 9 patch you pull two strips plus a square from your strip bin.  As these are being made from 2.5" strips, I needed to cut two 10" strips in contrasting colours plus a 2.5" square of one of the colours.

After sewing the two strips together, and ironing, the strips are then subcut into 2.5" segments.

Then laid out for chain piecing.

 I made another two blocks for my Traditional Tuesday Sampler (blog page on that project is here).  I did determine that my seam allowance was a couple of threads off, but increased the components by 1/8" anyway.  There wasn't much to trim off to make the blocks 6.5" square.

Here's the pile of scrappy 4 patches that were run through as leaders n' enders during today's sewing.  I've found a couple of patterns I like that will use up some 4patches.  One requires 3.5" HSTs and the other 3.5" strips with sew n' flip corners.  Both ideas require some cutting to proceed, which I hope to have done before I run out of leader n' ender two-patches.

I'm making seriously good progress on the 2.5" HSTs I've been trimming.  Here's a pic of the trimmed box.  Amazing how fast it goes, even if only trimming 20 or 30 a day.

And this is all that is left in the "untrimmed" box.  I am on track to be done with this trimming business before the end of October.  I've found a couple of patterns that use a lot of HSTs.  They too require cutting components.

I can see I will have quite a bit of fabric cutting to do to use up some of these components.  Tonight?  I'm planning on handstitching binding and watching television.

9 patch done - sampler blocks done

I finished joining the 9 patches (hooray, wild applause, woohoo!).  It's 60" by 78" and I am considering adding borders to make it a bed-sized quilt....

Getting all those 9 patches joined, means I can go looking for fabrics for the Modern Monday sampler.  This is the view of the bins.  The two on the right hold my UFOs and kits.  The three on the left hold most of my strips.  They are so full, I can't fit the 1.5" strips or charm squares into them.

The 2" strips.

The 2.5" strips.

The 3.5" strips.

Good Grief!  I found more 9 patches - a different size this time.  These were in the 2.5" strip bin and will finish at 6".

I did find some oranges and greens that will work with the fabrics I've already pulled together.

Block 1 of Modern Monday.  I made two blocks.  Then I took a pic and admired them for a long while.  Then I did a little delighted wiggle of joy in my chair.  It's going to look great and it's going to be a lot of fun.

And I found my fabrics and first two blocks a home so they don't get swallowed up in stash and get used for something else.

Then I made a couple of blocks for the Traditional Tuesday sampler.

The blocks came out beautifully, but a little small.  I checked my seam allowance.  It's bang on.  The trimmings were scant threads.  And the blocks came out at 6 1/8" unfinished instead of 6 1/2".

I think I'll try making another couple of blocks with slightly larger components tomorrow.  Maybe my seam allowance is just a couple of threads off.  And of course, I found the second sampler a home of it's own too.

The 9patch from .... (a hot place where they don't play hockey)

It's supposed to be simple!  Take a nine patch, sash it with muslin, attach it to another sashed nine patch and... you get the picture.  I've made far more intricate and complicated quilt blocks and tops with no trouble at all.  My sunflower quilt for example, each block had more than 100 pieces of fabric.  It went together without a single hitch.  What's the problem?

There!  That's the problem.  I finished sewing on the next row of blocks and in ironing and flipping the row, discovered that two blocks containing the same fabrics are side by side.  Arrrggghhhhh!  Now I know that random does not necessarily mean of equal distance from each other, but my only rule has been not to have two 9 patches containing the same fabric next to each other.  I spent quite a bit of time making sure of that with my strips.  But when I unsewed the strips, I must have switched some blocks around somewhere.  You have no idea how traumatic this discovery was.  It's as if the quilt top doesn't want to be made.  Then I noticed these two.

Now granted, they aren't exactly the same block.  After much muttering and considering of options, I decided not to worry about it.  That's right!  I'm going to leave it just the way it is.  This is a huge step for a perfectionist like me.  But in considering all the options I decided I could live with it just the way it is.  If I was intending to give this to someone, or enter it in a festival, I'd be busy ripping out that entire strip of blocks and saying some very rude words while I did so.  But, it's for me and it's scrappy and (let's face it) I've just about had it with this project.  It's certainly not an award winner and it has some strange fabric in it, like the axe-murderer block.  Take a look at the headless chickens and the blood red blocks.  Now if I'm not going to worry about this block, surely having two same fabric blocks next to each other should be no worry at all.

Another problem?  I've run out of leader and ender project.  The box by the sewing machine is now empty.

I finished sewing strip sets of the 1.5" x 6" strips that were in the box with the 9 patches.  Eeewww! There are some really hideous fabrics in here.  I'll be glad to see the last of these.

I ended up with 24 strips (5" x 18") and a about 12 (3" x 12").  I'm still thinking of using them in the String-X or Diamond Strings patterns at Quiltville but I might want them for borders on the 9 patch or the Ohio Star (both made with many of these fabrics).  And I certainly don't want to stop wrestling with the 9patch quilt top to start making blocks with the strip sets.  That would be the chicken's way out... or the headless chicken's way out.

I have to have a leader and ender project.  If I don't, the threads get all tangled and create ugly stump work on the back of what I'm sewing.

So I opened that box full of two-sies and started feeding them through my machine to make four-patches.  I originally blogged about them here.

Which means that overflowing box of four patches and sixteen patches is going to hit critical mass and explode soon.

Am I the only one who has these problems?  Thank goodness tomorrow is Crumb-Along Tuesday and I can work on something other than the possessed 9 patch.

 

Necessary Work and Quilt Gremlins

Housework is a necessary evil - and something I could easily put off, if I didn't share my apartment with a cat and his litter box.  In simple terms, what it really comes down to is a choice over vaccuuming the abode or brushing cat hair off my fabric.  I don't know how I can suck up enough hair to make another cat (every week) and yet my feline room mate still manages to maintain a full body suit of glossy black hair.  It's a mystery!  The accumulation became noticeable when I was adding the solid black borders to my crumb quilt.  Eeeewwww!  That's when the quilt gremlins hit - when I was distracted by the cat hair - I sewed a border on the wrong side.

Lucky for me I was sewing on solid black borders and the wrong and right sides are interchangeable, so I just undid the join and sewed it on the reverse.  There!  Done!  Take that Quilt Gremlins!  I would have hated to have to unsew the entire border.  I eventually did vaccuum.  In fact I spent an hour on necessary housework, even dusting and washing floors.  Once I give in to the task, I am thorough.

I trimmed double my daily quota of those half square triangles.  The trimmed box is filling up quite nicely, even if the box of untrimmed ones doesn't seem noticeably reduced.  By my reckoning, I may be 25% done.

And then I went digging in the "fling-it" bag in the hall coat closet (non-quilting fabrics and old bed sheets I was going to throw out, give to a friend for drop cloths, or donate).  I wanted a very thin cotton flat sheet I knew was in there for cutting up - for string block foundations.  I cut them out at 8.5" square and after slicing up the entire queen-size sheet, I have a stack of squares almost two inches high.

Now I must confess that, normally, a distracted procrastinator like me would have cut out one strip of blocks and started the new string project (just folded up the remainder of the sheet for future cutting). But it occurred to me when I was organizing my stash and identifying my UFOs that it was just this sort of procrastination that results in so many stalled and unfinished projects.  That's why I'm so pleased with this stack of foundation squares.  Now I get to play in the fabric stash for a unifying central stripe - orange or red?  yellow maybe?  I'll be ready to start making my first string blocks on Crumb Along Tuesday (if I can wait that long).  There are surely enough foundation squares here for a couple of string quilts.

While I was digging around in the "fling-it" bag, I pulled out these three items for reconsideration.  The pink and white solids are 100% cotton and it seems wasteful to get rid of them.  Sure solids are boring, but seen in the right light (say as the calming neutral in a scrappy quilt) they might work.  Right?  Yuck, that pink is really really pink!   The tea-dye coloured fabric is another flat sheet (a 50-50 poly cotton) and the frugal unemployed part of me can't help asking why can't I use it for a backing? 

Today was obviously a day for necessary work.  I put a much needed new ironing board cover on my board, put in the screws that hold firm the basket glides in my stash cupboard, and afixed the hinges to the cupboard door.  (No wonder handy men have such well developed muscles!)

I finished unsewing those nine patches...

...then started putting them back together the way I knew I should have in the first place, which is going to ensure the 9patches line up beautifully for quilting.  Notice the black shape under the ironing board?  Now you know why I was picking up cat hair on my quilt borders.  Lucas has a tendency to follow me around and get involved in anything and everything I am doing (except when I turn on the vaccuum cleaner).

And I picked up a couple of those plastic table cloths with the cotton backs to use as design walls.  I acutally stood there in the store agonizing over the colours I wanted to buy, before I remembered that the plastic coloured side would be against the wall and not seen anyway. 

And, there's my nightly stack of magazines to go through.  Tomorrow, I'm going to spend the day in guilt-less sewing.

Donna's String Quilt w/ 9-patches

I keep telling myself I have so many unfinished things I could work on...should work on... but I have an itch - the kind of itch that drives you crazy - an itch to start a string quilt project. I figure that if I make a few string blocks every Tuesday (Crumb Along Day) that it will be a very efficient use of my time, since the strings will be pulled out then anyway..... and I have that set of old faded cotton bed-sheets that is crying out to be used as foundation fabric. (I was going to give them to my friend to use as drop cloths for painting but this would be so much more fun, at least for me.)

My newest project is inspired by a pic of a finished quilt posted to the Stashbuster Group on Yahoo by Donna D. It really called my name. I have a box full of strings and my 1.5" strip box is overflowing (the lid won't close). I love those tiny 9-patches made from 1.5" strips! I sent Donna an email asking her if she had some procedural advice for making this scrappy beauty, and if I could post her advice and the pic to my blog. To my delight, she agreed. Donna's reply is below.

Hi Michele! So glad you liked my string quilt.


As far as how to proceed: first you collect a hundred jillion strips. Mine ranged in width from 1" up to 2". Most were 1.5" or larger -- the 1" strips can be interesting but don't add much width so it takes a lot longer to finish a block. The strips don't have to be even; if they are wider at one end than the other it can give an interesting wonky effect. The black strips in the middle of my blocks were all 1.5 inches wide.


My foundations were cut 8.5 inches because that was the width of my ruler. I used CHEAP muslin, which I starched, or the ugliest fabrics from my stash -- how did I end up with that fabric? Surely I never bought anything that ugly!


Start sewing! I lay the center strip down on top of the center of the foundation square, then grab a strip, lay it right sides together over the black strip, and stitch away! I like to make a batch of 5 or 6 blocks together so I can chain piece. When I've sewn a strip to one side of the black strips in the batch, I cut them apart and sew a strip to the other side of the black strip. This way I sew two strips onto each block at a time. Then I get up and press them all and repeat the process.
When you get to the corners of the blocks you can use triangles, or your wider strips. Try not to use narrow strips on the very corners or it will make for very thick seam allowances.


Every 20 blocks or so I would stop and make the Rail Fence sashing blocks and the mini 9-patches. If I leave them all for the end it gets too boring.


I highly recommend this tutorial for the mini 9-patches: Making Mini 9-patches Tutorial


Using this method you make them bigger, then cut them to size, and they come out perfect every time! I know 9-patches sound easy but when each little piece is only 1.5 inches they slip & slide and I couldn't get them all the same size to save my life. Bonnie's method saved my sanity.


Hope this helps! Write back if you need any more help, or if you want to share some pics!


Donna D

Agonizing over the 9-patch Mess

Before I could proceed with cutting the long sashings I found myself discussing the whole sorry mess with a pal - who pointed out that it would take relatively little time with a seam ripper to go back a step or two.  I would only have to unsew 70 short seams... not 130.  And wouldn't I feel better about the quilt top if I did?

Aaaarrrrrggggghhhhhh!

So now I'm in a quandry, see-sawing between my perfectionist tendancies and my dislike for seam ripping.  While I make up my mind, I've moved on to cutting and sewing on the borders of my crumb quilt.

And making the binding.  And pulling the fabrics to make the backing.

When you know better but do it anyway.....(sob!)

It's that ol' getting into that boy's car at the teen dance cuz he was cute thing all over again!  You know when you start out to do something not quite right that it's only going to end badly... and you think to yourself why? or why didn't I listen to that inner voice?!

I mean, well - sure it's a cute quilt, and sashing between blocks isn't so bad - but long sashing strips between rows (or columns).... Really!?

You see?  The problem is not with the quilt design or instructions.  Oh no!  The problem is with me.  I made these blocks over time and on different sewing machines (i.e. different seam allowances).  They aren't exactly the same size.  Some are a sixteenth or almost an eighth of an inch smaller (or bigger as the case may be).  Not necessarily a big problem really, just a smidge here and there that you can easily stretch to fit as you sew a block together.  But if the Quilting Gremlins have their way, and they did, you might just put all the smaller ones in the same row....  You know where I'm headed with all this hand wringing and whining don't you?

Ahuh! Some of the columns are a tad shorter, and by a tad I mean more than a half inch. I'm going to have to have to pin the sashing strip to each end and stretch it out as I sew, which also means my blocks aren't going to be perfectly straight as they go across the quilt... not that I expect anyone to lay a ruler across the quilt to check.  Sigh!  But I still like the quilt.  I think it's very sweet.  And after I finish wrestling with the strips and muttering under my breath, I'll like it even more.

You know what I should have done?  What that little quilting voice in my head told me I should do?   Sash two sides of each block, then join them into rows.  Then I would have only have one short edge and one long edge to add a muslin border to... and I wouldn't be in this predicament.

But it's not all bad.  I need sashing strips three inches longer than two yards, and decided to cut them from the length of muslin I had left... rather than across the width and joining strips.  Would you believe it?  The muslin piece I have left is three inches longer than I need!  Had it been too short, I would have joined cross cut strips.  At least this part worked out.  More luck than good management, I assure you.

I wonder what ever happened to that boy at the teen dance... whether he ever got around to fixing the passenger door handle... he's probably balding by now.