Monday, December 5, 2011

Mystery Monday

The Quilters Club of America hosts several mystery quilt-a-longs each year.  This one, "Worms & Jelly Rolls." is by my favorite mystery quilt designer, Debbie Caffrey.  The great thing about Debbie's quilts is this:  all of her patterns are carefully tested, and if you follow her directions, your quilt will work out!  All the steps for this quilt are on the QCA site at Quilters Club of America, so you can see the finished quilt if you prefer.  But for Mystery Mondays, I will share my quilt step-by-step.

As you may have guess from the title, this quilt is made from 2 1/2" strips (Debbie calls them "worms").


All these fabrics are from my "orange" strip drawer.


I love a mystery, don't you?



Sunday, December 4, 2011

Sundays are for Scraps: Behind the Scenes

I started "scrapping" when my Mom moved into an assisted living center and I inherited boxes and boxes of her fabric scraps.  That year during winter break, I went through all the boxes and sorted out the quilt fabrics, then cut them into usable sizes and shapes.  Here are some photos of how I organize my scraps:

As I cut fabric during the week, I toss it into bins or piles under the ironing board.  That yellow brush is to clean off the cutting mat.

We brought this stacking plastic bin back from Italy in 1981.  Our gatto (Italian for cat) had kittens in the bottom bin -- now it holds the scraps from my October quilt camp quilt.  I think this will work better than just tossing them under the ironing board, don't you?  On the left is my son's 60" LeClerc floor loom. 

This is what the ironing board looks like after I've pressed the scraps from this week.

And here's the other half of the ironing board.  I sort them out according to size -- solids have their own stack, and I've started a drawer for scrappy bindings.


Strips cut to 2 1/2" and sorted by color go in these drawers purchased from Nancy's Notions


The rest go into labelled drawers or Tupperware canisters (you know, so they stay fresh!). I cut my scraps from large to small, starting with 5" squares all the way down to 1 1/2" squares.

Then when I'm ready for a scrap quilt, I can just pull out the right drawer and start sewing!

Saturday, December 3, 2011

Saturday Stash: Hark Hark the Lark

It may be coooollldd outside, but it's never to cold for a little stashing.  Allow me to share my collection of "Lark" by Amy Butler.  Sherry at Ruth's Stitchery put together this yummy bundle for me, and I added a couple from cyber Monday shopping. I have several new patterns from Legacy Patterns and I think "Cheaper by the Dozen" will be perfect.  And easy enough to be the last quilt of 2011!


Country Lanes at last

Whew, finally -- Country Lanes, quilt #51 for 2011 is pieced!  As I posted earlier, this was a Moda University project in 2006.  I had three rows pieced when this little gem went into the UFO-forever bin.  When its number came up for the November 2011 UFO, I forced myself to work on this one only until it was finished.  The finished size is 69" X 87", and the only alteration I made to the pattern was to miter the corners on the borders.  With all those quarter-square triangles in the quilt, I though it deserved a mitered border.  No recipient identified, maybe Camille will like this one?


Quilt #52 is going to be an easy one!

Friday, December 2, 2011

Finish It Up Friday

This yellow quilt has been quilted and waiting for the perfect recipient since early 2011.  A friend from church broke her foot recently, and lucky for me, her favorite color is yellow!  This was the January monochrome quilt and also my leaders/enders quilt for that month.  Leaders and Enders is a way to use up your scraps without dedicating time specifically to a scrap quilt.  Bonnie Hunter explains how to use Leaders and Enders in her book -- details here.


Here is a closeup of my new labels -- they read "Peace Love and Happiness" on one side and "My Aunt Martha Made It" on the other.  They are from a great etsy shop, gutenTAGs.


Now that I've finished something, I'm off to Stash to check out their fabric closeout!

Thursday, December 1, 2011

Farmer's Wife Day

I'm not a farmer's wife -- but I'm a farmer's daughter.  I've been plugging along on Laurie Aaron Hird's The Farmer's Wife Sampler Quilt for almost two years. Karen at High Country Quilts designs a paper-pieced block for the most difficult block each month. Each block finishes to 6", so I'm pleased if I complete one whole block at class.  So far I have 34 of the 111 blocks completed.  On Farmer's Wife day I try to only sew on this quilt. Today I was lucky that the next block is an easy one, #16 Calico Puzzle:

Here are a few of my blocks.  The quilt will have a dark navy blue sashing, but I have a long way to go before I worry about that!

I'm loving watching many of the "modern quilters" making this quilt from bright, modern prints.  I wish I had seen them before I started out with the reproduction fabrics.  But I'm not making these blocks again!  Amanda of Hey porkchop is one of the sponsors of the Farmer's Wife Quilt-A-Long.  She has a button on her blog where you can see many of the blocks in different fabrics.  Go take a look!