A blue scrappy strings quilt

I started this quilt in March/2025, with four small blocks.  I made a sample, just to see if I liked it and check out the sizing.  I know Bonnie Hunter has a free pattern on her site.  I'll have to look it up to see what she calls it.  I am going with my own size, but otherwise the quilt will basically be the same.

I'm glad I did the four test blocks, as I noted that I prefer a longer, skinnier strip of strings.  I also decided that I didn't like one of the background fabrics that I chose initially.  All the new background fabric is cut out and here is a sample of the four new blocks, together to make up one larger block.

There will be two colours for the background that will alternate throughout the quilt.  I will need to make twenty-four smaller blocks of each background.  The quilt layout will be six blocks across by eight blocks down.  It will look like a lattice.  Between my friend and I, we made enough strips to make 20 blocks and on Sunday I added the background corners to them all.

It may be a while before I get the rest of these blocks done, as I have other things I want to get done first, but it was nice working with blue strings for a change from the red strings....lol.  This blue string quilt is only the first.... I have blue strings overflowing the drawer and need to get them into a quilt.

One at a time.....one at a time....

Take care everyone.

Finished all the Rhododendron Trail blocks

Well, as mentioned in my last post, I figured I'd have a full day of sewing yesturday, and I mostly sewed all day.  Other than taking a few hours break to walk to the store in the freezing weather to get a couple of ingredients for making dinner.  It was my turn to make dinner for my son.  He made me dinner the night before.  

My intentions for yesturday was to work on the red string quilt units, to try and finish them.  I worked on everything but the red strings...lol...I guess I had enough of them for a bit...lol...so instead I finished six start blocks for the Smith Mountain Morning quilt. 

What made me very happy though, was that I finished ALL the blocks for my Rhododendron Trail quilt.  Now outside of the appliqué blocks, on my list of required blocks, I only have the Smith Mountain Morning blocks and the Sea Swept paper piece blocks.  I did finish the Sea Swept blocks too for the week, but forgot to take a picture.
 

Not sure if you recall in a previous post, where I spoke about a friend giving me a jump start on some blue strings blocks.  I trimmed them all to size and got those all prepped as ready.  More on those in tomorrow's post.

Overall it was a nice relaxing day with some good progress on a few different quilts.  Today I have the guild executive meeting to attend after work, so no sewing will be happening.

Take care everyone.

A pile of star points

Yesturday after breakfast and cleaning up all the dishes, I headed down to the studio.  Other than a couple of short breaks, I spent the entire day sewing and trimming.

It doesn't look like much, but it pretty much took me the whole day to make these red strip blocks that are for the points of a star block.  Like wow!  I very much under estimated how long that would take me, and I had all the neutral points already cut!

With all of these units done, the only thing left to make are the string corner units of the star blocks.  Then I will be able to assemble the stars.  I now suspect that the string corner units will take me just as long to make as these units did...lol.  I won't be caught off guard this time...lol.  I guess it will be another full day of sewing!!!  Whoohoo!!

I really am trying to get a bunch of my quilts done and off my list.  I am looking to have a more manageable Works in Progress list.

Though I have a little ways left before I can call anything done, some of my friends are working away, trying to get some of their loose ends done too.  This friend of mine, had these orphan blocks that she turned into a finished NICU quilt.  I just put a label on the back for her and it is ready to be delivered to Project Linus.

Take care everyone.  Hope you're enjoying your weekend, doing what you love to do.

Inspiration for using a panel in a quilt (QW)

I have a friend who shared this panel quilt with me.  I think it is so sweet.  This friend is making wall hangings for each of her grandkids.  The last one she made also used a panel.  This wall hanging is going to the newest member of their family.  As per the label on the quilt, Kane was born Feb 15/2026.  LOL...it didn't take grandma long to make this one.  She had it done by the 20th, when she share the picture with me.

She came up with this simple but affective design to enlarge the panel.  The stars and trees mirror the stars and trees in the panel.  I like the fact that the borders are asymmetrical, to add interest.  It's just enough and all that is needed to make this wall hanging stand out.  I am going to keep the idea of the wavey stars, for a possible panel I need to make into a small child size quilt. 

My friend always likes to make her quilts extra special for the people she loves.  In this case, she    made some paper piece animal blocks to go with the animals in the ark.  How cute is that!!  I asked here why she put them on the back though, as they are so cute and won't be seen....her response was, that is why it is so special, because only the recipient will get to see them, when he wants to!  Cute!!

It's Saturday today!  What are your plans?  I haven't been down in my sewing space all week, dealing with this and that....  I'll play it by ear and see what inspires me today.

Take care everyone.

Sew day progress

On Saturday the ladies came for a sew day.  One of the ladies came with this Lady of the Lake block to show and share.  This block is only  5 1/2" square.  Those little half square triangles on the perimeter finish at only 1" square!!!  A labour of love.  She does one of these blocks per week, in different colours.  They are all so cute!

This friend brought her scrappy blue string quilt to work on.  My mom and I are also making this quilt.  My mom's is going to be blue and white as well, and mine is going to be burgundy with sand coloured background.

These are the two blocks that got completed during the day.  

Another friend was working on assembling a quilt top for the guild, however she could only go so far, as she forgot to bring some of the outer blocks.  

Fortunately for me, she wanted to work on something, so I pulled out my blue strings that I am making into a lattice quilt.  Once I sorted her out, she managed to make a total of twelve strips.  Yeah!!  This was helpful.  It gave me a jumpstart to my measly little four blocks that I did some time ago....lol.  They were part of my test block to check out sizing.  

Don't they look pretty?  Sunday I saw them sitting on my table.  I hadn't put them away yet.  They inspired me to move a little further with this quilt.  I finalized the sizing and needed to add a couple more inches to these, then I trimmed the corners and they are now ready to go.  I also finalized on the two background fabrics, to make up the side triangle corners, to finish off the blocks.  I'll show all of that in another post when I really set in and start working on this quilt.  

It won't be long now, as I am making progress on some of the other quilts and the basket case blocks are all done.  I think this one will be next.  My friend did twelve strips, I had four from before, and this quilt requires forty-eight altogether.  That means I need to make thirty-two more.  It may seem like a lot, but these strips are what I consider mindless sewing.  You sit there and just pull a string and sew it on.  Very calming.

Take care everyone.

A small baby quilt - Eeyore panel

There is a set of four panel blocks of Winnie the Pooh charactors.  They are plain with no colour.  This block is the only one with colour and it is only the background.  I'm not used to blocks with no colour.  

I had a mind to colour this in, similar to the crayon blocks I shared in an earlier post, however Eeyore is grey with a flesh colour snout.  So that won't work.  He'd disappear into the background.  The only colour he has is purple for his inner ears and a pink bow on his tail.  At least that was the original version.

I hadn't planned on tackling the panels just yet, but I was washing some donated fabric and dumped it all on the table, on top of the panels.  When I saw how well this fat quarter, outer border fabric, matched the Eeyore panel, I just couldn't resist.  

In my earliest memories, the only colour I associate with Eeyore is purple, because even though the original version of Eeyore is two tones of grey, my memories remember the blueish grey for his back (similar to the background colour) and a pale purple belly.  This is why I did a purple inner border.

I know this little quilt is very simple with just the two borders, but the gloomy, pessimistic, melancholic and depressed Eeyore didn't inspire me to make him fancy.....lol.  I took the description directly from google....lol.  I would have just left it at gloomy....lol....but I didn't know if I had it right, so I looked it up.  Google went on to say, he has a cynical outlook and low energy....lol....I can still hear him in my head in his monotone drawn out voice.

The other block panels are of Winnie the Pooh, of coarse, Tigger and Piglet.  I'll try to be a bit more imaginative with those ones....lol.

Take care everyone.

Basket case top completed

I last posted about this quilt back on Aug 16/2025.  This pattern is called Basket Case by Cluck Cluck Sew.  I modified my version to use up what I already had on hand.  The scrappy strips I started with are only 2" wide.  Once I got the rhythm or order of assembling it, they went together pretty quickly. 

Basically, I opened my drawer of 2" strips and pulled out colours at random, and I really mean at random.  Don't over think this one.  Just pull two colours that you like together that have enough contract to allow the block design to stand out.  Otherwise anything goes.  I chose to do my background in the same cream colour to allow the weave design to stand out.

During Saturday's sew day, I worked on assembling these blocks.  I needed a total of 30 blocks (5 across by 6 down).  I had all the fabrics cut out into kits from a cutting session I did during my vacation last week.  So I really only needed to sit and sew.  

It sounds easy.......the only needed to sit and sew......lol......but I get so caught up in having the ladies over, doing the show and share things, all the chatter and the various projects everyone is doing, that by the time I actually sit and sew, it's time for lunch.....lol.  Can I just say that it's pretty easy for me to get distracted with all the quilting stimulation....lol.

So needless to say, my goal of having 16 of these blocks done by end of day was very ambitious...lol.

I did eventually get the blocks done and the quilt centre assembled, however most of it was done after the ladies left....lol.  By the time I closed down for the night, it was 9:50 pm.  Long day, but I was so energized.  I'm sure I've said it before, but worth saying again, having the ladies over, fills my cup to overflowing.  I always look forward to our Saturday sew day!!

Do you like it?  I still have the border yet to put on, but that will be another day.  Today I think I am going to iron some recently washed fabric and play with some plaids.  I really need to start processing some of my scrap fabrics.  The quilt above is a good start, though it hardly made a dent in the drawer!

Take care everyone.  Have a great day!