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WIP Wednesday - Bits and Pieces

This week has involved a catch-up of sorts on smaller projects.  Spring is the season for birthdays and summer wardrobe sewing and all manner of other things around here, so of course I started a new Christmas quilt. Because I haven’t finished my last Christmas quilt, naturally.

Mostly it was Spring Cleaning inspired since I was organizing my stash bits and “to be done” projects that aren’t far enough along to be considered UFOs.  I’ve been holding on to these two Dear Mr. Claus layer cakes for a while because they are fun vintage prints from Cosmo Cricket. I finally decided to just take the plunge and make giant HSTs out of them.

At the other end of the seasonal spectrum, I just finished my first Fold n Stitch Wreath, which is a pattern from Poorhouse Designs. It’s a dimensional wreath that be hung up or used as a tabletopper, and perfect for my MIL’s upcoming birthday. What I like about it is it could be a great project for scraps and odd buttons.  The sewing is not hard, and I’d recommend it for an adventurous beginner sewist.

I’ve got other stuff going on too, but these are the highlights.

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Monkey Business Tablerunner: Finished!

These little triangles have been lurking around my stash, taunting me ever since I finished the Monkey Butt quilt last year. I knew I would make something with them, and figured that 240 2″ triangle certainly wouldn’t make a large quilt of any size. So I made a tablerunner:

All the little triangely bits fit together, and then I sashed it with some Kona White and a little bit of the knit print I had leftover from the original FQ bundle.
 The backing and binding is a Kona Cocoa solid. It’s straight line quilted, measures 18×55″. And now for sale in my etsy shop!
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Meet Ted (Giant Hexie Quilt: FINISHED!)

Meet Ted:

Ted is made up of two layer cakes of Circa 1934, some Kona Sand fabric, and 2 yards of some weird gold color for the backing.
Why is he named Ted, you ask? Because of this Buffalo Border:
I call this sort of thing “buffalo quilting” because you use up every last fabric scrap, like the Native Americans did with their buffalo kills. Buffaloes make me think of Ted Turner because he single-handedly brought the bison out of endangerment through his ranching and breeding efforts (thank you, Stuff You Should Know podcast!).
Now, since this is a gift for my husband, do I mind him snuggling with Ted? Nope. I’m pretty secure in our marriage.
 Here’s Ted’s backside (that won’t get old!):
It’s primarily “B-roll” layer cake squares (filler prints), a buffalo strip, and a 2 yard piece of that gold-ish fabric that I seem to have in plentiful supply. Seriously, I have at least 4 more pieces of yardage in that gold tone.
That’s another 8.75 yards in the “Used” column of Sunday Night Stash Report!
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A Very Terrible Quilt - FINISHED!

This is a Christmas present for my BIL. I am generally a fan of the Steelers, but not a fan of their QB. I am, however, a fan of this quilt.

It’s a very simple design - the two complicated parts were the logo and the Roman numerals.

The logos are paper pieced based on a sketch of the letters I did.  The team has six Super Bowl wins, so once I created the numerals sections, I had to do some math to figure out the spacing. I, however, love math.
The logo is a set of 3 orange peel blocks, the template I got from McCall’s on their website.  More math and setting triangles, which I need to do some work on.  My current method is to over-size the triangles and lop off the extra. I’d rather be more precise.
I backed the quilt with the team fleece print, and no batting.  There was some bearding of the fleece poking through the top with the quilting stitches, but since it’s a mostly black quilt top with mostly black fleece, it’s not that bad.  If you go this route, I would recommend matching your fleece back color as closely as possible to the quilt top because of this.
The back is very snuggly, though. All in all, I’m pleased with it and it was quick to come together.  Now to wrap it!
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Attack of the Hexies: FINISHED!

I know. I can hardly believe I finished another quilt this week, too. I must have had a lot of pent up productivity after finishing up the Halloween quilt.  This is my entry to the “Attack of the Hexies” point-and-laugh along with Sandy and Jaye (who’s laughing now, Jaye?!?).

This quilt is a Christmas gift for my niece and is called “Monkey Butt” (and hopefully my sister will not let her go on my blog for a bit - not sure she ever visits, but still…).  It got it’s name from the word game we used to play with her when she was little - everyone would take turns naming an animal. Or rather, an animal butt. She learned a lot about animals and butts that way.  The battlecry of “Monkey Butt!” was usually the opening volley. Sometimes we still yell that out and she’s 13 now.
The quilt is about 66×70″.  The hexies are 5 1/2″ cut (so 5″ finished) from a fat quarter assortment of this sock monkey fabric.  They were machine pieced using the technique Jaye had on her blog for set-in seams.  Once I got going they came together quickly.
The quilt needed a nice white stop border, which really helps give the eye a place to rest in the crazy randomness of the colorful hexies.  I love that striped binding fabric, and am sad I only have a 4 inch piece of it left after binding this quilt. Alas.

It’s quilted with an all-over stipple in Isocord thread (except for the obvious straight lines in the stop border).  The back was pieced with leftovers from the fat quarters and a strip from the border fabric, and a piece of red I had from curtains my mom gave me.

I’ll talk more about the hexie assembly process in the podcast on Friday (as well as how I get so much sewing done).  I’m hoping to finish two more quilts this month. I have a backlog!

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Name My Quilt: Rashida Coleman-Hale’s Triangle Quilt

Last weekend I took a class with Rashida Coleman-Hale of I Heart Linen.  This pattern is a quilt she designed and made in a week for Spring Market, and the pattern isn’t for sale yet, so I think I’m the second-ever person to make one!  Since triangles are not in my wheelhouse per se, I stepped outside my normal color palette, too. After I made it, I realized I apparently really like the Miami Dolphins.

Here’s a close-up of the feature fabrics. I picked up a FQ of Rashida’s robot print in linen and of Heather Ross’ Mendocino octopii at Intown Quilters where the class was held. My original inspiration for the color choice was the blue background with the orange marbles on the ropes (below the octopii).

This little octopus was serendipitous as I wasn’t fussy cutting the smaller triangles and this guy just popped up. With his tiny green robot friend.

And here is the back. I mostly wanted to use most of the fabric leftover from the front (hence the 60 degree angles in the big pieces), so I pieced three different long rows and joined them with some more of the Kona Snow which I used on the front.

So, now that I’ve given an overview of the quilt, you can help me name it! Here are the ones I’ve come up with:

  • Serendipitous Octopus
  • Miami Steampunk (because of the Miami Dolphins colors, and that the robots and octopii are references from one of my favorite book series, The Parasol Protectorate, started by Soulless by Gail Carriger. The fourth one, Heartless, just came out!)
  • Steve. Because, really, I might just start giving ALL my quilts random proper names.

If you have another suggestion, leave it in the comments!  Otherwise, go vote in the sidebar.

I’ll talk about the process of sewing with equilateral triangles in the podcast tomorrow.