Twinkle, Twinkle And More Twinklers

 A few more Twinkler blocks were finished in yesterdays sewing in my jammies session.  The morning session was cut short for a visit with family. We had a great time at our little pitch in dinner and catching up on the kids new adventures.

They are always up to something, and jaunting off to here and there.  I don't remember my life being so exciting when I was younger.  Well that's because it wasn't.  Being a housewife and raising kids is an adventure but it's just not quite the same as traveling and seeing the world without kids.  

After our family time it was back to the studio to finish a couple more quilt blocks.

My Twinkler quilt block is my design, or so I thought.  It's nothing more than a variation of a variable star block.  The star points are a taller and not made with flying geese.  I thought I was being clever with the points. Many hours were spent searching on the internet and in my books for this block and I came up empty handed.

Well, the internet somehow remembers and helps you out when you least expect it.  The Jelly Roll Illusions video popped up in my YouTube feed.  You can watch the video by clicking on the video below.  The block is a tad bit different with snowballed corners and color placement, but has the same star points.

The maker of the video, Carol Thelan, was making a variation of Moda's FREE Illusions quilt.  Link to that pattern.  Moda's block is larger, has less snowballed corners and the color placement is different.  The chances of there being older versions of this quilt block out there is pretty good.  Anyway, I just wanted to give credit where credit is due and to say I'm not as clever as I thought. BOOHOO!  What a shocker! HAHA!

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Sewing In My Jammies

    It's a good day for sewing in my jammies.  There's a lot going on in Podunk today so if I want to sew it needs to be done first thing this morning.  Wishing all of you a blessed and beautiful Sunday!

See you tomorrow!

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Fuzzy Offenders

Hello Quilty Friends!  The Flea Market Jelly Roll Strips are all cut, de-pinked ready for action.    

Trimming off the pinked edges was a little more tedious than expected.  And OH MY WHAT A MESS it made. A pretty little mess, don't you think?  Am I the only one that admires the bits of scraps in their trash can?  

After tossing the cute little visible scraps in the trash it was time to tackle the invisible scraps.  It's shocking how much lint couldn't be seen but would've shown up on the white background fabric.  A quick rolling with a sticky tape lint brush took care of all the fuzzy offenders.  Now it's safe to start cutting the background fabrics later today.

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Twinkler Test Block ~ Jelly Roll Quilt

Oh how you sparkle and oh how you shine!  So simple and sweet.  She's a little wonky but once in the quilt no one will ever know.  I knew this would be the case for these blocks since I decided not to starch the fabrics.  Starching jelly roll strips can cause shrinkage and waviness during the pressing of the fabric strips.  Not a chance I was willing to take.

Another thing I did to safeguard against  inaccuracy was to layout my block on the mini design board and mark the diagonal stitch lines for the stitch and flip method.  Instead of drawing the line, a small dot was made on two corners of each background fabric for the star points.

You can see the small dots in the image below.  Adding the dots was faster and easier.  Now I could stitch in the proper direction every time. There's very little scrap fabric left on each Jelly Roll strip after cutting for one block.  Not much room for errors, so I want to insure proper stitching and cutting every time..

Because I don't like to waste even the tiniest bit of fabric another line was stitched about 1/2" away from the first line.  Then I cut in between both stitched lines to make the bonus half square triangle.

These will be trimmed to a usable size and stored after the quilt top is finished.  After trimming they will be stored with the thousands of other HST's waiting to become a quilt.

I hope this bowl is big enough for 336 HST's.  Oh my!  That's a lot of trimming! 

Jelly rolls are never the perfect 2.5" wide.  This roll was a little too wide.  Too big is better than too small.  Instead of trimming the excess I centered the background fabric on top of the print fabric as best as I could.

When stitching them together I used the edge of the background fabric as my seam guide as suggested by so many quilters out there on the internet.  I'm sure it worked great for them and I appreciate them taking the time to share the tip.  However, from this point forward I'm trimming off the excess before stitching. Not all tricks and tips work for everyone.

Todays goal is finish cutting is to finish the cutting for all the blocks and piece as many as the day will allow.  

If you would like to make your own Twinkle blocks I'm providing a simple cutting chart for one block.  

Background Fabric

A (13) 2.5 x 2.5

D (4) 3.5 x 3.5

E (4) 2.5 x 3.5

Print from one Jelly Roll Strip

B (4) 2.5 x 2.5

C (8) 2.5 x 3.5

Below is the layout for my quilt and background yardage requirements to make a quilt with

(42) 12" blocks 

 2.5" sashings

 2.5" outer border

 The yardage was calculated by EQ8.  I added a half yard more for mistakes in the program and for human cutting errors.

7 1/4  Yards of Background Fabric

Finished quilt size 

86 x 100

I'm linking up this blog post at the following linky parties.  If you're a quilt party kind of quilter then you'll love all the inspiration.  So hop on over! 

Finished or Not Friday

TGIFF

Off the Wall Friday

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Starting A Jelly Roll Quilt

 There's a quilt partially quilted quilt on the frame and a quilt top almost finished on the ironing station.  Why not start another quilt? HAHA! Yep, this is how I roll.  The other two quilts have been UFO's for years so what's a few more days or weeks?

This Lori Holt Flea Market jelly roll was pulled a few weeks ago during a fabric organizing session.  It was purchased at our local quilt shop a years ago.   These smaller precuts are cute but they take up much needed fabric storage space.  I vowed to never buy another precut smaller than fat quarters.  Again I laugh...HAHA!  It sounds good, but seriously, sometimes you just need a small bit of the cutest fabrics ever.  Since the fabric stash is so large maybe I should vow to only buy smaller than a fat quarter cuts.  We all know neither will happen.  So I'm embracing the fact that obsessions come with impulsive behaviors and that's part of me being a quilter.

Well lets get back to these lovely fabrics and the plan for using them.  The quilt will be 42 blocks.  A 6x7 layout, with 2" sashings. 

The Flea Market roll has 40 strips, so a couple of Lori fat quarters have been added to the mix.  I choose red because it's my favorite quilting color.  A simple solid white background fabric to allow the prints to shine in all their glory.  The bolt of white has been hiding in my stash in the plastic for 4 yrs!  I bought it wholesale before closing my pattern store.

Today I'll make the a test block using the cutest fabric in the roll.  The adorable little crossing tulips on this strip make me smile.  After making the test block the rest of the blocks will be cut in preparation for a chain piecing marathon and hopefully a quick finish.

Want to see the pattern? Awe, sorry.  You'll have to wait until tomorrow when I'm sure my math is correct.  Okay, I'll give you a hint.  I'm calling this one Twinkler.  Any guesses on the block?

I didn't plan to make this quilt for National Sew A Jelly Roll Day.  But after seeing a video yesterday it made me think, why not start a new quilt.  I told myself to sleep on it and see how I felt in the morning....And here we are!

  

 Anyway, National Sew A Jelly Roll Day is on September 21, 2024.  Moda has hosted Project Jelly Roll for a few years.  I like to follow along every year for  fun and admire the creations. 

I've added the video below.  If your looking for Jelly Roll quilt inspiration this video is for you.  It's fun even if you don't like making Jelly Roll quilts.  I watched it several times yesterday while eating supper and again this morning.

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Testing New To Me Hand Needles

These Lori Holt Binding Needles were purchased almost a year ago at the Nimble Thimbles Quilt show in Franklin, Indiana. Somehow the cute little needles were shoved in my notions drawer and forgotten.

Leave it to Lori to make a needle cute.  They have pink paint on the top of each needle.  The pink means it's a binding needle. She has needles with different color paint for different uses.  Some reviews say the paint makes them easier to thread. We'll see about that shortly.

In my last blog post I found a few quilts needing labels.  This is the perfect time to give these needles a test run.  

First lets compare them to my go needles, Bohin.  I've been using this brand for a couple of years.  They were part of a Fat Quarter Shop Sew Sampler  subscription box.  

I was skeptical because I've used many brands over the years but always went back to John James needles due to they glide smoothy through the fabric.  Cheap needles are not as polished and don't glide well.  Cheap needles also bend easily.

Not only do the Bohin seem stronger than John James. I also like the booklet style packaging.  The booklet makes it easier to remove the needle and it has each needle label by size and suggested uses.

As for the packaging of Lori's Nifty Needles, it gets two thumbs down.  What pain in my keester to find the right needle and put them back in the little container.

But after doing some research I found that she also sells a variety pack of needles.  

And it's pretty cute! I could frame this little work of art!

Back to the test.  I grabbed my favorite Bohin needle and tried to find a Lori needle that was the same size.  This was the best I could do.  

The eyes are very different.  All of the Lori needles have shorter eyes.  The eye also looks a tad wider.  Maybe its an optical illusion?

Was it easier to thread?  It took four tries to thread the needle the first time.  That's pretty normal for my old eyes.

As I sewed labels to four quilts and had to rethread again and again, it was about the same as any other needle.  Try and try again....

A couple times I had to resort to using my favorite needle threader, The Hummingbird.  In the picture below the needle is a Bohin because I wanted to test the threader on both needles.  And just as I suspected, it was easier to use this threader with Lori needles due to the wider eye. With the Bohin needle it will take two or three tries to get the thread to pull through.  This is my third Hummingbird threader.  Each one was a different brand but the all worked the same.  No noticeable differences.

All four of the quilt labels were stitched in place using the Lori needles.  Should I ever need to buy needles again I would buy the multi pack Lori needles shown above. Not just for the cute packaging...HAHA!  But because the larger eye seemed to have an advantage over Bohin or John James.  Lori's needle passed the smoothness test and they didn't bend. In all fairness, bending of a needle only happens for me when I stitch the binding to the back of a quilt. 

There's two more labels to stitch in place and I'll continue using the same Lori needle.

By the way, do you add labels to your pillow covers and table runners?  

When I first started quilting 30+ years ago I never labeled my quilts.  Remembering to add a label is has been a struggle for years. Adding them to the backing before the quilt is quilted makes them harder to remove.  But I would say about 50% of the time I forget the label until after the quilt is quilted.  Maybe   I should write a note on my longarm where the quilt is pinned to the frame.....GOT A LABEL?  That should solve the problem! HAHA!

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Time For Fall Quilts

I may be jumping the gun a bit but I'm ready for the leaves to change, no weeds to pull, campfires, and sweat free living!  

So to kick start the fall season this weekend was spent washing the summer quilts and bringing out the fall quilts.  Below is my stash of seasonal quilts.  The boxes with stars are not full of quilts.  They are mostly decor with only one quilt shoved in one because I'm running out of space.  The plan is to someday put shelves in the closet and do away with the totes.  Then what would I do with all the totes?  More fabric!  HAHA!

My fall quilt stash is small compared to all the other seasonal quilts.   There was more but I gave a garbage bag full to my son and daughter in law. They like the darker colors and use them all year.  All O have left is the tiny little stack in the picture below.  And while digging for them I found a couple quilts in need of labels.  Might as well put a label on them while they are out of the boxes.

And as I was folding up the newly washed summer quilts and preparing them to be stored...I found two more with no labels.  Guess what I'm doing today?  You guessed it! Making and adding labels to these quilts.

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