Fabric And Fun

 Over the last few months, I've been seeing a shift in quilting fabrics, one that I've been waiting to see come around again.  It's a slight shift but it's there none the less and it tickles me pink. The shift is color, bright happy colors. My pallet of choice can be summed up with my Promenading Tulips quilt.

For the last few years colors have been muted or tainted with grey and brown undertones.  And red fabric has been almost impossible to find.  Oh, they would label the color red, but it wasn't a true red.  More often than not the color would be more tomato soup or raspberry.  One good thing about this muted fabric trend is it slowed down my fabric purchases and that made Mr. Podunk very happy.  But look out my dear sweet man, color is coming back!  Just take a look at this new line called Summertime by Camille Roskelley. It won't be available until next April, my birthday month!  Everything I need in one line of fabric.  I've worked with her fabrics years ago. The reds weren't as red as I like but they were pretty close.

The Dilly Dally line is set to drop this December.  Just a couple of weeks from now.  I love 30's floral reproductions.  Santa I've been a very good girl this year!  

This week it took all the strength I could muster to not order this Garden Party bundle from Bear Creek Quilting.  Each piece is 10.5 x WOF, it's the same amount of fabric as a fat quarter but I prefer fat quarters, they are easier to fit into my stash.  So, I did a little search and found a fat quarter bundle on Etsy.  And again, resisted temptation... at least for now. HAHA!

The title of this blog post is Fabric And Fun.  We covered fabric, now it's time for fun.  Yes, I know fabric is fun but sometimes we need to leave the sewing room and live a little.

Yesterday I spent a little time at the Senior Center in our area.  My dad, Jack (78) is a singer in an all senior band.  The band does a small concert once a month at the Senior Center.  Half of the band was out sick or caring for a sick loved one, but they made the best of the situation.  Here's a couple short videos of my dad singing. 

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Finished Or Not Friday

 Hi quilty friends!  Progress is being made on the Twinkler quilt.  The quilting is fairly light with very little ruler work and a lot of free motion.  The quilt police might frown upon skipping the stitch in the ditch technique, but if they think it looks better, they can issue me a citation and move along. 

I'll start quilting row four later this afternoon.   I've got a morning and early afternoon jam-packed with excitement.  More about that tomorrow.

The brown Bow-Tie blocks are also coming along but at a pretty slow pace.

Half of them finished and the other half are almost finished.

Just 300 more Bow-Ties left! Woohoo! I'm eager to see all 900 blocks assembled into a beautiful quilt.

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Twinkler Quilt Finishing Instructions ~ Jelly Roll Quilt

Quilting the Twinkler quilt is underway at last!

Today I'm going to share how I set my blocks and some basic quilt information to help you recreate the quilt.

The first thing you need is a Jelly Roll or (42) 2.5 x 42 strips of fabric.  You can get by with 40" strips or a tad smaller because there's a little scrap leftover from 42".  

I used a Lori Holt Flea Market Jelly Roll plus (2) fat quarters because there were only (40) strips in this roll.  The background fabric is solid white.  I did not do the math for how much I used or what will be needed.  I let EQ8 do the work.  EQ8 says the quilt will need 6.75 yards of background fabric.  If I wasn't working from a full bolt of fabric, I would buy at least an extra half yard for human and computer errors.  So that would be 7.25 yards of background fabric.

Each Jelly roll strip makes one block.  There are (42) blocks.  (6) blocks across and (7) down.

From each jelly roll strip you will need.

B (4) 2.5 x 2.5

C (8) 2.5 x 3.5

Background cutting for the blocks only 

A (546) 2.5 x 2.5

D (168) 3.5 x 3.5

E (168) 2.5 x 3.5

You should have a small piece of scrap left over from each strip.  This is enough for one sewing or cutting error per block.

The star points were made using the flippy corner method.  Place Fabric A and C, right sides together, sew from corner to corner, then cut 1/4" away from stitched line. I pressed to the dark.  Pay close attention to the direction of your diagonal seams, we only have enough scrap fabric for one error per block.

For my quilt the blocks were set without cornerstones.  If you prefer cornerstones, you will have enough fabric leftover from the jelly roll to add them to your quilt.   Below is the sashing and border cutting for my quilt.

Sashing a quilt with no cornerstones isn't hard.  Here's how I make sure the blocks line up perfectly.  Below is row 1 and the first (G)sashing sewn in place.  Now that they are sewn together, you'll need something for making a small mark. I prefer a blue water-soluble pen, but anything will work as long as it doesn't show through your background fabric.  We will be marking on the backside of the fabric.

 

Make a mark in the seam allowance at the sashing seams.  Do this at the sashing between each block.

Here I've pressed the long sashing towards the sashing and added row 2 below row 1.  You can't see the marks because they are on the back of the long horizontal sashing.

Now flip row 1 onto row 2.  Line up the pen marks with the sashing seams between each block on row 2.

Of course you want the edges of the fabric to line up before pinning in place.  Pin at each sashing and each mark.  And anywhere else you would like to pin.  I'm a pin-aholic so I added several more to the area with blocks.

Sew the rows together, press to the sashing and TADA perfectly lined up blocks and sashing!  See that's not so hard and it's much quicker than cutting and sewing cornerstones.

Continue adding each long sashing in the same manner then add your borders.

For the backing I chose to use (3) yards of 108 wide backing from my stash.  Since this quilt is only 86" wide, I trimmed off the excess on the sides.

Here she is on the frame and patiently waiting.  There's a lot to do around the house today but I hope to get at least one more row quilted and make a few more Bow-Tie blocks. 

 

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Fabric Pull ~ Old Town Bonnie Hunter Mystery Quilt

Hello Happy Quilters!  Come along with me as I play around with choosing fabrics for a mystery quilt.  

The Bonnie Hunter Mystery quilt along is an annual event.  Yes, it's an event like no other in quilting!  Quilters from all over the world follow Bonnie all year, waiting for end of the year quilt along. The fabric requirements are released on or around Halloween.  The first cutting clue is released around Thanksgiving.  Click here to go to her blog where you can find the fabric requirements.

 Over the last week hundreds, possibly thousands of quilters have been posting their fabric pulls in Bonnies Facebook Group called 

Quiltville's Open Studio (Official) ⬅️Click to go group.  

To view the group, you must join by answering some questions and agreeing to follow some rules.

Bonnie's quilts are generally controlled scrappy.  Sometimes she may use some yardage but it's rare.

 I'm always impressed with quilters changing the suggested fabric colors.  

Here's the suggested colors for the Old Town Mystery.  I like them!

As soon as I saw them, I thought "This is the easiest fabric pull ever".  Just a quick walk across the room and TADA!  I'm ready if I change salmon/coral color to pink and the other two colors to lighter shades of red and blue/aqua.

A few days passed, all the while Bonnies Facebook group is a sea of beautiful fabric pulls.  Reproduction fabrics, batiks, Lori Holt, so many different color combinations.  

I've made three Bonnie mystery quilts. Choosing different colors than the ones suggested in the patterns.  This is the first time that I sort of like the suggested colors, but I feel the need to go rogue.  What on earth is wrong with me? 

 I toyed with the idea of using three different prints/yardage instead of working from the scrap bins.  Thankfully the idea faded after a few hours.  

The whole point of this mystery quilt along is to use those ever-growing scraps.  I need to find a different color palette in my scrap bins.

How did I find a new palette?  I took a look at my scrap bins to see which color had the most scraps then start building a palette around that color.  Blue was the winner.  There are three blue bins, light, medium and dark.  I could make a monochromatic quilt (same color different shades).  Nah, boring. 

Dark blue, yellow and green?  Nah, too predictable.  Let's see if google can help. 

In the search bar...blue color palette 3 colors.

 It helped but not in the way you might think.  The color swatches triggered a memory of a Camille Roskelley line of fabric.  Another google search for Camille Roskelley quilt patterns, and this is my inspirational piece.  The quilt is called Edelweiss by Thimble Blossoms.

My scrap bins are lacking in sage green, so I pulled the bin with brighter greens.  The brighter greens would blend better with a brighter light blue, right?

The only way to know how they will look together is to pull of few of each color.  Bonnie suggests different shades but don't too dark or too light.

And just a few more.  Yep, this will be my colors and there's plenty more in the bins.

For now, they are tucked away waiting for me to decide whether or not I'll take part in the mystery.  That's right, all this work and I'm not completely committed to the project.  You see I typically build a scrappy quilt in the other direction.  Picking a pattern first then find the perfect fabrics.  Choosing the fabrics without knowing the pattern is scary.  The what if I choose poorly?  

Bonnie's quilts are labor intensive because you're working from scraps.  Do I want to take the risk of making a color fail quilt?  Only time will tell.  

How about you?  Are you joining in this fun quilt along with Bonnie?

Here's the three Bonnie Mystery Quilts I've made over the last few years.

The first one was En Provence.  You can see more up-close detail here.

On Ringo Lake.  You can see close ups here. 

Good Fortune.  You can see the close ups here.

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