Last Scrap Squad Quilt

Two blog posts in one day?!?
My last Scrap Squad quilt has been posted today on the Quiltmaker blog so I had to tell you all about it! It's quite a bit different than my usual style of quilt, but I'm happy with how it turned out.

Which way to go?

I made this quilt for two purposes: 
1) it's my last Scrap Squad project using a pattern that I chose ("Which way to go?" by Nancy Allen) 
AND 
2) it was my entry for my local quilt guild's challenge called "25 shades of grey". I don't like grey, especially in the middle of a cold Canadian winter! But I persevered with the grey fabrics and because of the dramatic red background, it was manageable!



This is the arrow block as it looks on the edge of the quilt. The arrows on the inside of the quilt couldn't be sewn until I knew the exact placement of all the fabrics in the quilt top.

I thought it might be interesting to show the progression as I worked with the pieces on the design wall. 

Rail blocks sewn and placed on the wall 

The darkest and lightest fabrics had to be balanced first, and then I filled in with the mid range grey fabrics

Sewing the quarter square triangle blocks

Once I was happy with the layout, the blocks were sewn together in rows

Once the quilt top was sewn together, it was time for the basting and quilting. These are the Aurifil threads I used for the machine quilting. I used the free motion foot on my sewing machine, quilted with grey in the arrows, and wavy lines with red thread over the seam lines.
The quilt finished at 47.5" x 59".

It has been such an honour and a pleasure to be on the Scrap Squad for Quiltmaker magazine. I made 6 challenging quilts while being on the squad and am delighted that they are all so different. 

If I was independently wealthy, I would fly all the scrap squad members and their quilts to meet somewhere in the world so we could see all these wonderful quilts and quilters in real life. Until then, we will have to enjoy our connection through the internet. A huge thank you to Diane Harris for organizing us, and to my fellow scrap squad members Pam, Emily, Donna, Julie and Keri for all the fun throughout our scrappy adventures together.

Last Scrap Squad Quilt

I have been working on my last Scrap Squad quilt. I am very sad that this wonderful experience is coming to an end, but am greatly enjoying working on my last quilt.

Shades of grey

Here are some photos of my project. 
The scraps I am using are grey. Yuck. I hate grey, so am happy to be clearing them out. Grey is the focus of my local guild's 25th anniversary challenge called "25 Shades of Grey", so I am combining my scrap squad quilt with this challenge. And it is indeed a challenge for me to sew with so much grey. I did have to go to the store to buy a few darker grey fabrics, but this was what I started with. 
The theme is shades of grey, degrees of uncertainty, difficult decisions to be made where there is no clear answer.  The course of a life is the total sum of all of these grey decisions. 
And so is a quilt. When you are creating a quilt, from the beginning to the end, from picking the pattern and the fabrics, to the quilting designs and finishing flourishes, each decision made along the way changes the outcome. 

Be careful!

What doesn't change for me is that I need lots of humour in my life and in my quilting, so I love this grey fabric with the big eyes, and I love this photo of the eyes watching me quilt!

Decisions, Decisions

Be on the look out for the big reveal when all the decisions have been made and the quilt is finished. 

Scrap Squad - Candy Cane Show

I wrote yesterday that my Scrap Squad quilt has been posted over at the Quiltmaker blog. Click here to read more about the quilt.
Four of the six of us on the Scrap Squad wanted to make the Candy Cane Crush because it's such a great pattern. It is so interesting to see the various versions, and so for your viewing pleasure, here they are side by side (or top to bottom)...



The original design from the November/December issue of the magazine is called "Candy Cane Crush". The pattern is by Sandra Clemons and was made in red and white. 













Julie from Idaho made her queen sized version of the quilt in gorgeous purple fabrics and called it "Violets". She also made a piano key border that beautifully frames the design. You can read all about it here.

Keri from Arizona made her scrappy version of Candy Cane Crush using the quilt-as-you-go technique. She added red sashings to match the border. You can read more about how she made her quilt here. 

Donna from Pennsylvania started with the red and white colours and made the most intensely pieced scrappy quilt ever! Even her background pieces were scrappy so the total number of 1.5" squares cut and sewn is 6,699! Can you believe it?!? You can read more about her quilt here.




My version of the quilt has the blocks set on point so it looks a little different, but you can tell these quilts are all related. They are quilty cousins, made from the same genetic material/pattern, and reconfigured in unique ways! If I was independently wealthy, I'd fly all these quilted cousins (and their creators) to somewhere wonderful and we would meet in person and see each other's quilts in real life instead of on computers in blog land.

I have loved being part of the 2015 Scrap Squad and will be so sad when it's over. We have one more quilt to make for the beginning of 2016, and for our last project we can pick any Quiltmaker pattern we want. That's a lot of choice and a bit overwhelming. 

Scrap Squad Starburst

The full story about my lastest Scrap Squad quilt called Starburst has been posted on the Quiltmaker blog - click here to read it. I was tickled by Diane's note at the end (she's the editor). It really is a wonderful feeling when people acknowledge and appreciate the difficulty of a task you've tackled.
I will post more photos tomorrow of all the Scrap Squad versions of this quilt, but for now I wanted to remind myself of my binding accomplishment for November. 

Starburst was my only finished project in November. The perimeter of the quilt is 256" and when added to the total number of inches of binding up until October which was  3,453" ... 

gives me a grand total of 3,709" with one more month still to go in the year. I have already beaten my 2013 total of 3,145"!

Scrap Squad Starburst

My 5th Scrap Squad quilt is finished!

The original pattern is "Candy Cane Crush" by Sandra Clemons. I used the block pattern and then decided to put the blocks on point. To read more about this quilt, hop over to the Quiltmaker blog (not posted yet but stay tuned!) where I wrote about the design decisions, the construction of the top, and the machine quilting.
Even after all these years of making quilts, this one challenged me in new ways. 

These are some of the things I learned in making this quilt:
1) I learned how to painstakingly sew a border on the edge of a quilt with more than 160 blocks that need to be sewn precisely in order to not lose the points of all the squares.

2) I learned that it is a real challenge to make a quilt with so much white fabric. Every single stray thread showed on the quilt. I had to use the sticky lint roller on the backing, the batting, and both sides of the quilt top before basting. And then again after quilting. And still there were threads that were noticeable. 

3) I also learned that it is nearly impossible to photograph a white quilt and get the colour balance accurate.



4) And I was reminded not to try to photograph a quilt on a windy day! Remember when I tried to photograph Easy Street? The problem was that I cut it too close in terms of the timing for finishing the quilt and getting the photos taken for the deadline for writing the Quilty Pleasures blogpost. 

Because it is totally dark outside after 5 pm (when getting home from work) and I have poor indoor lighting for a white quilt (which makes it look yellow) the photos had to be taken on the windy day. Trying to get some decent photos in sub optimal conditions was not fun for me, but was quite entertaining for the neighbours!

Finished Quilt - Long Post

My fourth Scrap Squad quilt is finished! For this assignment I made a pattern called "Blue Bayou" by Kate Colleran. It is from the September/October issue of Quiltmaker magazine.

Deciding on the layout was the highlight of making this quilt. There are so many possible options in setting these blocks together. Of course I tried out all of the layouts in Quiltmaker magazine on my design wall to see what would happen when each block was twisted, turned, and set differently beside it's neighbour.

Option 1 - love what the darker teal/blue is doing but didn't like the light/blah 16 patch blocks that emerged.

Option 2 - a little frenetic for my liking

Option 3 - I like what the red pinwheels are doing in this layout

Option 4 - This is a variation on option #1 and again I don't like the light/blah 16 patch blocks.

Option 5 - This is fun...I just noticed that the top left corner block isn't turned properly!

Option 6 - I really like this layout and it was my second choice.

Option 7 - Fun zigzag layout.

After all the block play, I loaded the photos on my computer and after viewing them several times, finally decided that I really liked option #1 the best. And if I pulled the third and fourth columns down one block, it got rid of the light/blah 16 patch block that I didn't like, and gave it a zigzag look that I loved. Perfect!

Option 8 - my favourite!

Confluence at the confluence

I call this quilt "Confluence" which according to Mr. Webster means "a coming or flowing together, meeting, or gathering at one point". The design is a confluence of two of the possible layouts, and of course I had to do a photo shoot at the confluence of the two rivers in my town.

While trying to get a good photo of the quilt, the clouds started to clear away, and the sun came streaming through which made my camera very unhappy. Makes for interesting photos though :)

And then when Mr Max (the granddog) came to visit, I had to try a photo shoot with him. He had forgotten all his posing skills that I had taught him previously. But just look at this cheeky fur baby - does he look guilty or what?!? And his left eye changed colours to match the quilt... that's kind of wierd!

One last photo - the back of the quilt is just chunks of leftover fabric sewn together to use it up. You can maybe see here that I have adopted 

Martha Schellingerhoud's idea of using the same colour of thread in the bobbin as you are quilting with. I like how it makes the back of the quilt more interesting.

Monday Design Table

This weekend was the big push to finish my next Scrap Squad quilt. I gathered up quite an eclectic collection from my fabric stash for this quilt, which will be primarily red and blue/aqua. I love that Kaffe print (called "Plink White") on the left and want to see it in a quilt. I'm not sure that the blue on the right is the "right" blue to go with all these fabrics, but it was the one that had the yardage amount that the pattern requires, so it's in.

I tell you, it was a real "nose to the grindstone" cutting marathon. I didn't cut quite this many pieces, but I did need to replace the blade in my rotary cutter. And I did do my own version of a happy dance when the cutting was done!




The pattern this month is relatively easy sewing, with lots of pieces, and many layout variations. This is what I have to show for my efforts so far. Hmmm... not a very exciting photo to look at. 
Oh well, more progress will be made today.


How do you know you are totally a quilting geek? When you experience pure satisfaction because your 4 patch block is pieced perfectly, so the centre of the seams can be swirled, and press nice and flat. More happy dancing!
Today will hopefully see a lot more progress as the blocks will be constructed from all these pieces, and then a quilt top will begin to emerge.
To see more design walls, tables and floors, hop over to Patchwork Times.

Scrap Squad Inspiration - Six Versions on the Same Pattern

For your creative inspiration (and for my failing memory) I like to post all the versions the Scrap Squad created for the pattern of the month. This is our 3rd assignment of the year, and there were four members of the squad that made this pattern called "Hero's Homecoming" by Janice Averill, from the July/August Quiltmaker magazine. This quilt has a square layout of 10 blocks across and down.

Julie Huffman from Idaho made her awesome version of the same pattern with blue, pink, yellow and green. She called it Dogwoods in Bloom and the layout is 4 blocks across and 6 down.

And then Julie even made a second variation of the same design is red, white and blue for a veteran's organization.This layout is 6 blocks across and 8 blocks down.

Version #6 by me

And as I posted on Friday, I made my Kansas Troubles version from the same pattern. I made a square quilt using 8 blocks by 8 blocks.

Isn't it amazing to see them all together and notice how each quilt appears so different depending on the use of colour and value?!? Yet another reason to totally love quilting!

Scrap Squad Quilt #3

Today is the big reveal of my scrap squad quilt over at the Quiltmaker blog, where you can read all the details about the creative process.
The biggest surprise for me when  making this quilt was how much I disliked it when I was sewing the rows together, and then how much I liked it when it was done! My feelings went from one extreme to the other, and that has never  happened to me before when making a quilt.
The thing about this quilt is that the farther away from it you are, the better it looks. It's true. 
And that's weird, right?
Anyway, it used up almost all of my Kansas Troubles fabric scraps and emptied an entire tote bin.
You know what that means?
I'm going fabric shopping!

I also want to announce the winner of the Cozy Afternoon giveaway from Jacquelynne. There were 89 comments on that post, and the random number generator picked #39, which is Margaret! Congrats to you Margaret, and check your email because the patterns will be emailed directly to you.
Have a great weekend everyone!

Scrap Squad Project

I haven't done a lot of blog posting this week, but I sure have done a lot of sewing. I am working on my next Scrap Squad project for Quiltmaker magazine, which will be posted mid month assuming said quilt is actually finished! 
Somehow I am going to turn this collection of bits and pieces into a finished quilt by then.
Stop laughing... it could happen!
Mostly I am really bored with my colour choices. I wanted to clear out my Kansas Troubles scraps, and am not loving the dullness. If you check out my other two scrap squad projects, you will notice that this one is really not like the others!  But I know it will magically turn into a lovely quilt.
Has anyone seen my magic wand...

Next Scrap Squad Quilt

Two of the six quilts that I will make as part of Quiltmaker's 2015 Scrap Squad are already finished. That means there are four still to come. 
It is my goal to clean out different areas of my stash to make these quilts. The first quilt was made from some bright scraps, the second one was from the blue scrap pile, and the next one is going to be made from my collection of Kansas Troubles fabric. I have all the bits and pieces spread around on the table and am figuring out the amounts I have of each colour and what might work for this next quilt.
The first project I made using these Kansas fabrics was a quilt along with Judy of Patchwork Times in 2013. The pattern was called Sunny Side and I really liked how it was looking. Can you guess when it started heading straight to the UFO closet? That's right - "border time"... there's 5 of them. UGH. One of these days I'm going to have to tackle that.

But until then, I'm going to start a new quilt!
Today I'm finishing 100 gold and green 4 patch blocks. When they are done, I will start some flying geese blocks and some HST's. 
TGIF!