Latest Schnibbles is Taking Shape

July 15, 2013July 17, 2013 Elizabeth E.9 Comments

This is the Schnibbles pattern chosen for this month’s Parade of Schnibbles, hosted by Sherri and Sinta, a design called Lincoln. While I love the red, cream and blue and it is appropriate for July, I had a cute packet of fabrics brought to me by a friend while I was convalescing and it just pushed its way to the front and demanded to be used. So I did, sewing and ironing with my foot up (it’s quite a ~~feet~~ feat).

Think this real estate is getting crowded? I didn’t want to take down the quilt on the left, so just folded it over while I put my quilt up on the wall. In looking at it, I knew the name: Citrus. What else to call a quilt with lime, lemon and bold orange in it?

Sewn top. I cropped it so you wouldn’t have to see my messy pin wall. But I’ve put a tea towel on the back of every Schnibbles so far, and what to put on this one? I thought about going by the Citrus Historical Park, where I thought they may have something. Then I looked on the towel rack in my kitchen (the oven door) and there it was–a citrus-themed tea towel!

My sister brought it to me because my kitchen is yellow, and maybe because we carried a sack of oranges up to her in the snowy mountain west last February, a ray of sunshine from our home town’s harvest. But I hope she won’t mind that I put it into service here. I whipped it off the rack, washed up up and bordered it with fabrics from the front.

One beauty of making small quilts is that I get to piece my scraps of batting hanging out in my closet and use them in the quilt. I lay the scraps side-by-side on my cutting mat, overlapping the sides I want to seam. Then I take my rotary cutter and make a wavy cut in them–a long, slow wavy cut. I butt those seams side by side, and using a stitched-zig-zag in a 9.0 width, I zig-zag the seams closed. It makes a nearly invisible join with no ridges.

Citrus is all pinned up. I’m actually getting some projects ready for our little quilt group (The Good Heart Quilters) is getting together for a retreat this weekend. I have learned that it’s too busy to do intensive thinking, so it’s better to go prepared with projects I can sew while chatting away.

This coming January, our quilt group will have been going strong for about 15 years. We generally meet about 7 or 8 times a year, always on the first Friday of every month just after 7 p.m. When we were all younger, we stayed until 2 and 3 in the morning, but now we’re all packed up and gone by 10:30 p.m. Here’s some photos from June’s get together:

We met at Leisa’s house this time; we rotate where’s we’ll meet.

What I tried to work on–this is when I remembered it’s best not to have too brain-draining of a project to stitch/cut!

Bridget is a new quilter, but look what she turned out!

Laurel finished the quilt she started last fall–a combination of piecing and appliqué.

JoDy showed us her cool round tablecloth, made with a wedge ruler. . .

. . .then flipped it over and showed us the back!

She also finished a reversible table runner.

Caitlyn (L) recently ran a half-marathon with Lisa (R) who is a marathoner. Lisa showed off their medal. ( That’s a pair of scissors on a magnetized disk on Lisa’s shoulder, not a fancy broach or something!) Our retreat will be at Lisa’s house–she did one last year and we had such fun, we’re doing it again.

Of course, we have to have food!

Deneese is coming along on her Chevron quilt.

Lisa showed off a newly completed UFO–it was one of the early quilt block exchanges we did, in patriotic colors.

Lisa G. finished her quilt top–I love that spoon/fork fabric.

Looking forward to this weekend’s retreat!

*****************

Linking up with WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced.

Finish-A-Long, Quarter 3 Goals

July 12, 2013June 10, 2026 Elizabeth E.11 Comments

It’s that time again, time to set out some goals for the next quarter. The rules state that they have to be projects that you need to finish, and since I’ve been laid up with a foot surgery this summer, I’m repeating some of the projects from last go-round, that still need to be finished.

The repeaters are the Hunter’s Star (really, it’s so close. . . yet so far), the Lollypop Tree quilt, and the Friendship Quilt. The Lollypop Tree will require me to be all the way healthy, so I’m not even sure I should put it on this quarter’s list, but I certainly don’t want it bumping into the next, where holiday fun things take time away from quilting. So here it is.

New to this list is my Four-in-Art quilt for August 1st’s reveal and while I’d like to add on November’s Art Quilt to this one, it’s not started yet. You know the rules. I am also making up a little quilt with citrus colored fabrics that Laurel brought to me post-op (to cheer me up), and I’ve had fun making the stars (it’s also a Schnibbles quilt).

I’m also making a quilt with Anne’s Design, from SpringLeaf Studios–the Facets quilt is so intriguing and so fun. She provides multiple ideas for you to create; this is just one of them.

For the first time, I’m including two handmades on the FAL list, as I see that this is a possibility in the FAL Universe. I’ve had the pieces cut out forever to make this Pleated Tote out of Keiko Goke fabric. Time to finish it up. Likewise Hot Mitts for Rhonda–fabric pinned early in June, but not yet completed. It’s awaiting quilting and construction. Time to get that out of the sewing room and off to Rhonda (it was her birthday present–which was last month–!).

And that’s the beauty of Finish-A-Long (FAL): to get things finished and done and out of the sewing room, as Leanne says. Join up with your goals *here* at She Can Quilt, and get some of your projects finished!

FAL · Finish-A-Long

Finsh-A-Long–Second Quarter Report

July 2, 2013July 2, 2013 Elizabeth E.5 Comments

First, on July 3rd, I’m guest hosting today over at Leanne’s, of She Can Quilt, where I have written a tutorial for making a faced binding on a quilt (used on Kaleidoscope). This tutorial is in conjunction with the end of the second quarter of the Finish-A-Long, which she is hosting this year.

Now that you’re back, every quarter we monitor our progress and check in with Leanne, who is hosting this year’s Finish-A-Long program. So now it’s time for the second quarterly report of how many of our goals we finished. For a reminder, here’s my original mosaic, showing the quilts I was thinking about finishing:

And now the wrap-up:

Hunter’s Star–still in the closet (not finished)

Four-in-Art: Fire–Doloket, finished

Italy Quilt–Take Me Back to Italy, finished

Lollypop Class Sample I–(top is finished, but the whole project is not finished, because it’s at the shop for a sample)

Lollypop Tree Quilt–(not finished, still hanging in the closet)

Lollypop Class Sample II–Christmas Treat, finished

Friendship Quilt, still in the closet (not finished)

EPP Quilt–Kaleidoscope, finished (amazingly)

So that’s four finishes. Not bad. I also snuck in a few more that weren’t listed:

Spooling Around

A quilt for my sister Christine: Christine’s Philadelphia
(We’re in a pastry shop)

One really nice thing is the way that participating in the Finish-A-Long (FAL) keeps me focused on what to do next. So often I can be swayed by what I see on Instagram, or from blog reading, or the latest internet craze, ignoring my own goals and projects. I still have way more ideas and fabrics and projects that I will ever finish in my lifetime, but I like participating in FAL, where I least have a fighting chance of pointing to something at the end of the quarter that I did, that I finished, and that I’m proud of.

Now I need to think of things I want to try and finish for next quarter’s FAL. Hope you’ll join us.

200 Quilts

Village Faire

June 28, 2013August 12, 2013 Elizabeth E.10 Comments

Village Faire, quilt #117 on my 200 Quilts List

A part of the Year of Schnibbles, hosted by Sherri and Sinta.

This quilt reminded me of summer days, of green lawns that you can lay down in and drift off, and of course, pinwheels that spin with the flick of a finger, or by holding them overhead while running. I was also reminded of local faires and immediately thought of Babe, the Gallant Pig, and Mr. and Mrs. Hoggett, cotton candy, ferris wheels.

I started it on the small machine, as the big machine was set up downstairs, quilting Kaleidoscope.

Here’s the original. You can see I changed up the border.

Given the bold prints of my fabrics, I felt the border was too busy for what I had going on in the center, and as we are given license to modify and create and have fun with Carrie Nelson’s patterns, I indulged and put a series of bars along the edges, with pinwheels for cornerstones. I have a fabrics from the Comma collection from Moda and from Thomas Knauer’s Asbury collection, which has summer-time things like bumper cars and soft-serve ice cream cones.

And on the back? Yep–a tea towel. This one is from Wensleydale in the Yorkshire Dales region of England. We went on vacation there a few years back and as we are enamoured of Wallace and Grommit, we knew we had to head over to Hawes and sample some Wensleydale cheese. (Even though it was raining. And rained all day, which explains why England is so green.)

A scene or two from Yorkshire. I can now get this Wensleydale cheese in Costco, during the holidays. Will wonders never cease.

This measures a little larger than the other two Schnibbles designs, coming in at 34″ square. I think this design would morph perfectly into a baby quilt, or a quilt for a child, by adding another row of the pinwheels.

After taking the outside photos, I gimped upstairs (yes, I can walk around now, but not much, and have that lovely blue boot on my foot) and threw the quilt on the guest bedroom bed. I really like these bold colors. Given that we are heading into a weekend of 100+ degree heat, I declare that summer has arrived!

This summer may you find a Village Faire to attend, and a pinwheel to spin with a quick puff of breath.