Showing posts with label Jelly Rolls. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jelly Rolls. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 7, 2016

It's Okay to Try Something Different

It's so much fun making a baby quilt, especially if you don't overthink things. I dove into this one with a jelly roll that was given to me oh, sometime last year? The colors are so bright and fun looking. I decided to slam the {I-hate-one-line-fabric quilts} part of my brain off and just go for it. Jump in and just see what might happen!
Jelly Roll quilt
I trolled the Net for jelly roll patterns, almost bought a pattern, and then thought, 'why'? I love 9-patch blocks, why not start there? After some quick lay-out auditions, I settled with the rows of blocks idea. They were supposed to be vertical instead of horizontal but well, these things happen when you're in a good groove and not firing on all cylinders. Something about working late into the evening.

Anyway, in the hunt for a great, cohesive looking background fabric {everything I had was busy, busy} I somehow ended up with this cheddar low-key print. It's not quite as solid as the pictures make it appear, but cheddar? For a baby quilt? I know, I know. But the thing is, it absolutely made the all the other colors 'pop' and sparkle like nobody's business. Nothing else even came close. How to pass that up? And now I'm squirming over the odd colors of this quilt even as I'm doing the little victory dance over how much I really, really like the finished product.
Simple organic straight line quilting...
So now you know why I never, ever make quilts for other people. My deal is --make them for myself and then occasionally the finished quilt will get gifted to a likely suspect. Uh huh. No need for squirming/fretting or wringing my hands over whether or not that 'someone' will actually like it, because hey! I was just trying to please myself.*wink
Trying to balance the color
Don't you just love how quickly a quilt can go from strips of fabric {above} to a lovely finished product though? The jelly roll thing is definitely a great beginning for certain 'wanna make in a hurry' types of quilts. No hard strain-the-brain measuring stuff at all. No dumping all the stash totes out and lamenting the loss of enough of one certain piece of fabric.... I am starting to see the appeal, yes indeedy and will hold this idea in reserve for future baby quilts. Lots of leftover blocks too. Probably enough for the beginnings of another baby quilt sometime in the future? I like that a lot.

In the meantime, I grabbed up three un-used blocks and made a fast little pillow for the older sister. Threw some of that leftover Minky {from my first ever Minky receiving blanket!} onto the back to make it super soft and also quick-stitched a sweet little heart on the front. Big Sis. needs some lovin' too and hopefully this will make her feel a little less left out.
Enough blocks for a pillow and my first Minky blanket
There's also another finish in the works recently, just forgot to post a picture. My vintage block wall hanging is done! I hand stitched the entire thing with lovely Perle cotton in about two weeks or so. Nothing too complicated so I'm not going to show a close up. It's lovely and sweet, a great little memory of our trip to Oklahoma in 2014 {middle block was bought on the trip}. And it makes me want to do some more medallion work. Which is good because I have two more medallion projects currently in the works. It just never ends does it?
Vintage block wall hanging finished!
The good picture thing is a total loss anyway. My daughter says I'm hopeless at taking pics and winces at everything that gets posted around here. Boohoo. So sue me,  I'm a quilter, not a photographer! This sweet little wall hanging is currently hanging on a wall in our upstairs bathroom. Trying to make that one look more girly these days-- a little less 'boys dorm meets mounds of unwashed laundry'.....

Thursday, September 1, 2016

September Quilty 365 Linkup

Here we go! Another month of circles to show off. Wowsers, are they getting tedious! I had to raid the stash totes for this month because the scrap bin was just making me want to gag!
August Quilty 365 all accounted for!
I am sooo sick of those particular fabric choices.--feeling limited and boxed in. But I am getting excited about nearing the end of these circles. Loving that tippy stack of stitched circles in my tote! At the end of August I have a total 311 circles stacked up and ready to go. Woohoo!

This month also found me digging into the 'Make It Mighty Ugly' book. All about creativity. The process, the things that stop us, the things that get us through. This is the first book of this type that I've actually done the exercises instead of just reading or skimming through. Yeah. I'm that person. But this time I put my head down and forced myself through all the hard stuff. Ughh. Who knew I had so many ugly 'voices' in my head? 

And my 'ugly voice' guy just makes me laugh. Look at his hideous clothing choices and big fat mouth! He's kind of deceptive 'cuz he's much uglier on the inside than the outside. Such a know it all when really he knows nothing. My daughter clued in right away. How can I possibly have respect for someone with a mullet? hehe  I'm only about a third of the way through the book, but it's giving me lots to think about. Next up will be the pretty one representing the 'good' voices. Uh huh. I'm ridiculously scared to start that one. It feels harder than 'Mr. Rain-On-My-Parade', so named because the book tells us the creature needs a name. Okay, A little bit weird, but strangely fun in a why-am-I-so-negative-about-my-fabulous-hobby? I'm still scratching my head over the idea that I willingly spent time making a ahem!, ugly doll......

Weird creativity stuff
And then my older daughter bought me this book. One I've been dying to read since it first came out. It's a great {applique-type} quilting book by 'Margaret Sampson George', my thing as many of you well know. Such a wonderful birthday present, full Margaret's thoughts and ideas and not just a cookie cutter pattern book! I'm going to be browsing through this one many, many times I'm sure.
Birthday present
And just to make life interesting, I also started in on {another} new quilt project. My sister-in-law had a sweet little baby boy just last week and yep, I'm doing it. Even though I said only one baby quilt per sister/sister-in-law no matter how many kids, I just can't help it. These are the fabrics from a jelly roll so really, it's practically sewing itself. Right?
9-patch blocks for a new baby quilt
Okay, enough about me. Who's still stitching along with the circles? Go ahead and link up so we can cheer each other on, say 'Rah, Rah! You can do this!!'

Please link up!  We really want to see...  Link a thumbnail picture to a current post on your blog detailing:
  • What particular day you happen to be at now {such as 'day 270'}
  • A picture of all your August circles whether they are stitched to the background fabric or not
  • A link back to this post
  • Any thoughts or introspection you might want to add about this particular project


   

    An InLinkz Link-up
   











Wednesday, April 20, 2016

Looking Ahead

As always, I'm looking ahead, wondering which quilts will be in the hoop next. Is it possible to do a combination of machine and hand quilting on anything? That's always in question these days as I am trying to speed things along. These four quilt tops keeping grabbing my attention, so I suppose you'll be seeing one of these 'in progress' by early next month.
Quilt tops
Maybe earlier if I put the peddle to the medal with the stitching. haha  I've also been talking to a friend of mine about doing a bit of long arm quilting for me. She's wanting to get started in the business and I have a couple quilt top I've decided I don't want to bother hand quilting or actually even try to stitch on my domestic machine. They are much older quilt tops, quite large and my heart just isn't in it to spend a million hours each on them. It's expensive though as I certainly don't expect my friend to do this for me out of the goodness of her heart. And that's why I'm thinking maybe two this year. Maybe a couple more the next?
Jelly Rolls
And these Jelly Rolls keep looking at me from the corner of the quilt room, probably wondering if I have even noticed them hanging around. Two are identical so I suppose together they could make a lap sized quilt. Anyone have any incredibly wonderful jelly roll patterns they could point me to? I always pre-wash my fabrics so I'm nervous about combining these strips with anything from my stash. They were all given to me in the last year, so I'm not out any money {thank goodness}, but I can already see this is an odd way to approach quilting for me. Not in my wheelhouse at all.....