Shirt Stripe Boxes - we have a finish!

Back in 2012 I started making blocks for Kaffe Fassett's Shirt Stripe Boxes quilt from his book Passionate Patchwork, using recycled shirt fabric. You can see the original blog post here

Gradually over the next few years a few more blocks were made here & there as the mood struck until eventually at last in 2014 all the blocks were finally done

Then they just sat there,with the backing fabric squares also cut out all ready waiting to be quilted.  I planned to construct this using the Quilt As You Go method with some plain royal blue sashing

Then last month they were pulled out again, simply quilted with straight lines on my trusty Singer treadle & all assembled into a completed & quilted top

This last weekend the binding was attached & I made the most of a beautiful day in the garden to finish hand stitching the binding down & ta dah......we have a completed quilt, finally!

So pleased to cross another WIP/UFO off the ever increasing list! 

Hexagon Fun

Although I wasn't going to embark on any new projects this year, I couldn't help being drawn into making some of these Glorious Hexagons based on the patterns from Katja Marek's book , after all, who can resist fussy cutting Kaffe Fassett & EPP?

There are quite a few Facebook groups working on these as weekly/monthly projects, but you need the book for the templates to make the individual blocks:

Glorious Hexagons by Liza Prior Lucy & Kim McClean

Katja Marek's Quilt with Me  - you can join in the quilt along from her website here

Katia Marek's Fussy Cutting/EPP workshop - administered by Lisa Rinn Palmer

January

February

Wanting to do my "own thing" as per usual (I can never follow patterns), I decided to frame my 3" hexagons with shot cottons & tonal prints & drafted a framed diamond to join them all together

A black & white photo of the layout is always good to check tonal balance

March

March

The rows are growing!

April so far, gradually enough made to add another row to the top

Whilst making the above hexagons, I got a little side tracked with the idea of using up some recycled shirt scraps, which led to these below.....

So that's already 2 new projects started this year, there's no hope for me! 

Happy stitching

A productive 2014

In no particular order, here's my 2014 round up -  this little quilt was commissioned for a baby due in December whose parents farmed & loved tractors......hence the choice of fabrics used.

Hand applique & hand quilted using perle cotton 8

Earlier in the year I was given this huge pile of fabric which had been used as wedding bunting & asked to make a memory quilt for the young couple

The fabrics were a varied mix of cottons & polycottons 

So this was what I created in order to try & use as many of the fabrics as possible

Thought it was best to keep the design simple & also constructed this one using the quilt as you go method with narrow sashing.

the back

Then in December, their first baby was born & this was made for the happy couple still using fabric from their wedding bunting.

I also finally finished the recycled shirt fabric sampler quilt for my son, so far this is one of my favourite quilts, it was just so much fun to make and put together like a puzzle. I blogged about the construction here.

Back showing the hand quilting

Other projects completed last year included these 3 tops:

EPP hexagons using Saltwater range fabric by Tula Pink

Japanese boxes using Kaffe Fassett scraps - EPP

(the triangle border on the right has now been removed)

Depression block - Scrappy half square triangles
 machine pieced

2 more quilts which I've blogged about in previous posts were also completed:  Easy street, a Bonnie Hunter mystery quilt was hand quilted & bound. Then in October I  finished the modern Oakshott cotton quilt which I wrote about in my previous post here

All in all, a pretty busy year :)  More to come for 2015, I have so many projects on the go it may be time to seriously take stock & complete these before starting anything else.

What do you do to control the urge to keep trying new patterns, techniques etc? 

Scrappy Shirt Tails

I have a quilting angel......... a dear friend called Sandra who lives in Georgia & spoils me by sending me wonderful surprise  packages of recycled shirt fabric. 

Inspired by a quilt in one of Bonnie Hunter's books, I started making these star blocks, quilt as you go method. But........ you know me, after about 7 or 8 of them, I just got bored and  started playing with the fabric & making a mixture of different blocks, whatever took my fancy at the time.

Union Square

Sister's Choice

Ohio Star

Some are traditional & some just made up to fill the gaps where required. Not much maths has been involved in this process as I tend to get it wrong!

Beginnings of a layout

Planning another row to be added on the right

Of course, quality control has to be monitored at each and every stage!

Progress so far

For the "Quilt as You Go" sashing & backing, I'm recycling a cotton double size duvet cover that I picked up at a local charity shop for £2......good value or what?

The back

I'm trying to be as accurate as possible, but there are already and no doubt will be more missing points off stars, geese loosing the tips of their beaks etc, but I'm not too fussed about this as, after all, quilting is meant to be fun and not stressful. 

Whatever you're making, enjoy the process, 'till next time, happy stitching :)

PS. Apologies for the formatting on this post.....blogger's just not playing ball tonight!

February catch up

1. Well February went by so quick & I missed the New UFO link up party as I just haven't really felt like blogging, would rather be sewing! So what did I get done?

I did actually get the Sue Spargo Bird Dance BOM started & need to crack on with this as this is only as far as I've got, Feb's kit has arrived & before long the March one will be on it's way!

2. A lot of 1.5" strips were cut in preparation for these........

I've been wanting to have a go at making some of these scrappy log cabins for a while & inspired by Kathy at Inspired by Antique Quilts post here, decided to dive in and make some. These are not as small as Kathy's but fun to make, we have 40 so far.

All the scraps left over & too small to make logs are cut into 1.5" squares & made into scrappy 4 patches by being used as leaders and enders. A few others have also been trimmed to make these mini flying geese which are a mere 1.5 x 2.5 inches. All this is really good practice for me as machine piecing has never been my forte!

3. and finally I played around with some old recycled shirt fabric for some mindless sewing........

...............which is going to evolve into a baby quilt of some sort, after adding some applique to this background. So what did you get up to in February?

Keep on stitching :)