Crop Circles - Mystery Quilt finished

At this year's  Patch n Peace, ( annual quilt retreat I go on) Betty, one of the organisers ran a Mystery quilt. Early on in the year she sent out a list of the fabric requirements for the quilt and I got mine organised really early.

The quilt had been featured in a magazine and was called Fooled By Thelma by Karen Cunningham

One of the steps involved making circles. There were collective moans when this was revealed. We had the choice to make them raw edge applique or to turn the edges. I went for raw edge as I wanted to get it finished as quickly as possible. Usually I use iron on stuff when doing applique and then button hole stitch around the fabric by hand but this time, in the interest of speed I glue basted the circles to the background fabric and then straight stitched around the edge. This was a new technique for me and worked well.

I was pleased to get all 9 blocks completed by the end of the weekend. I didn't get a lot else done but they were finished

The pattern didn't have borders with it. We could finish it off however we pleased. Betty had with her another quilt pattern which showed the half circle motif that we had on the edges of our quilts finished off in the border. I really liked this idea so back home I made more circles for the border and put them on. I wanted the quilt to be rectangular rather than square and to be a size to fit a single beds in the spare room.

I played around with the borders for a bit till I was happy with the result. An extra row of circles on the ends to give it length and using up the half square triangles down the side. These were from the flying geese units in the blocks. I can never just cut those suckers off and throw them away... I always make them into hst and this time I used them up in the same quilt... bonus.



For the backing I used some string blocks that I had foundation pieced a good few years ago. I had pieced them into a rectangular piece that I had never finished off. The colours went well with the leftover purple linen I had (left over from another backing I had made recently). I had some pieced circles, a few more hst and various other orphan blocks and scraps in the right hues.

Kym from PQS long armed it for me. After some messaging back and forth re appropriate motifs we chose Circle Swirl which continued the circle theme into the negative space with a bit of extra added interest. I loved how it came out. I was initially a bit concerned that the extra white at the top and bottom of the quilt was too much and sat oddly but Kym's work meant it wasn't at odds with the rest of the quilt and in fact added a bubbly mix to the whole thing.

I am not 100 percent sure that the binding I chose was the best I could have gone for - not sure if the mustardy yellow was quite right but I loved the pinky flower like circle motif on it and that ties it in. Sometimes I a a bit too matchy matchy so I have been adventurous in this quilt.

I used an old circular doily for the label. Initially this was because I couldn't find the commercial labels I have stashed somewhere but then I decided I really liked the look of it. Its circular with circular flowers on it. The doily is stained but that doesn't matter to me and in fact ties in with the name. Crop Circles. Crops grow in soil so its ok that the label is soiled.

The name came from the fact that the quilt was a mystery quilt involving circles. Crop circles are also a mystery... so Crop Circles it was.

Sunday Stash Report - some big finishes

Very excited to be able to report that I have had 3 BIG finishes since I did my last stash report - which was at the end of June.

My First Finish was a banner for church. I had been sifting through ideas for a few weeks on this one but once I started I was able to get it finished in a couple of days and it is hanging in church now. I wrote about it here. It used up 5m of fabric that all came from my stash - how cool was that (straight profit I say)

My Second Finish was my Scrap in a Box mystery quilts (run by Charlotte Hawks of Scrapitude Quilts) I called mine Scrappy Lattice because it was scrappy and the sashing of the on point blocks reminded me so much of a latticed trellis. (I chose a vine inspired quilting motif for it based on that). I managed to finish it off this week after it returned from the long armer - bound and labelled. I used a lovely doily for the label when I couldn't find my commercial labels in my cupboard and I love how they ended up looking. I have heaps of doilies - some inherited from my aunty, some from my mum and others acquired through op shops. A lovely use for them I thought. This quilt used 7.73m of fabric. (all fabric for the top came from my stash. The backing was made from fabric bought off the silent auction at PnP - plus scraps from my stash)

The Third Finish was Crop Circles,  my other mystery quilt, from the quilting retreat Patch n Peace that I went to on the 2nd weekend in June. It too came back from the longarmer this week (Both quilts were in the same parcel. What an exciting opening that was. My friend Kym Colgrave of Professional Quilting Service does an amazing job. She has an excellent eye for quilting design and whilst she insists that I need to choose the pattern she is great at guiding my choices. For this quilt Kym and I chose a pattern called CircleSwirl and it looks great. This quilt used 7.96m of fabric. (again all fabric for the quilt top came from my stash and the backing was made from fabric bought at the silent auction at PnP plus scraps from my stash)

I am going to do a more extensive blog post about these two quilts -soon.

And I have had NO fabric purchases so its all straight profit for this past fortnight - SWEET

So my stats are

Weeks 27 and 28

         Fabric Used                     20.69m (I think this is a record for me)
         Fabric Added                   0.00m

Year To Date
         Fabric Used                    91.00m
         Fabric Added                  35.35m
         Net Used/Added             55.65m        

Linking up with Judy at Patchwork Times

WIP Wednesday

Beanie

Having finished off Boyo's beanie (which has barely been off his head since I made it. As I write this he is wearing it) I started work on one for Beast. He wanted black. I found a tutorial on the net for one using a different stitch. 

However it didn't work out properly and was ugly so just before I finished off the ball of wool I decided to unravel it all and start again. I'm making up a pattern now and like it better. My attempt didn't look at all like this. Not sure what I did wrong but I'll have another go at it...perhaps using a thinner wool

Kombi Boy wants a beanie too. He's asked for dark grey which I don't have any of so his will have to wait till I get to a wool shop, hopefully tomorrow when we are in Rockhampton

POD Block Challenge

I am up to date with my blocks from this having made this week's one. There are only 4 blocks to go in this challenge. I have at least one I want to redo because when I wrote the name on the books I had the block upside down at the time. Doh. I regret writing the names on the books. It is so time consuming to stitch the names on and I have often been in a rush when writing the names on to embroider over and my printing isn't as good as I would like it. I am not going to do any more and hope that the ones that I have done won't make the rest look out of place

 New one released tomorrow which I won't be able to work on till after the weekend as we head out tomorrow lunchtime for a Chrysalis Flight.



I finished a banner for church this week... so its not a work in progress. I got it made between WIP reports. I wrote about it in my last blog (here) Today I took it up to the church and hung it. 

Unfortunately its hard to get a good photo of the banner in situ but the light streaming through the banner gives a rather special affect and I am starting to think about doing a sort of stained glass banner utilising this light... stay tuned.

Playing with Nine Patches quilt - a pattern by Charlotte from Scrapitude. I've got the top together. I put a golden yellow border on it and I think that will be all I will put on it. However I am still thinking about it. I might yet do something more spectacular with it.



 My friend Tina has finished her quilt She pieced the back completely from squares. Isn't this cool? She's upped the ante on this one. I am going to have to do something special for the back even if I don't do anything crazy special with the borders.

  

My friend Kym has finished quilting both the quilts I sent her last week - That's Scrap in a Box which I reckon looks like a lattice so am calling it Lovely Lattice and Crop Circles. She is posting them back to me tomorrow so should be here early next week.

Speaking of Crop Circles. It was a mystery quilt from the Patch n Peace weekend I went to at the beginning of June. Another lady, Vivienne, has finished hers and put photos on our Facebook page. Hasn't she done a lovely job. I love her border and have already warned her that I might be appropriating it for one of mine. Perhaps this is what I can do on Nine Patch

Black, White and Red Charity Quilt

My friend Lindy and I are working on putting together blocks made by our group in a block of the month challenge we had going earlier on in the year. As well as the 9 blocks that we put into the centre of the quilt in a basic 9 patch configuration, we had some 5" and 2.5" black and white half square triangle blocks and some 2.5" and 2" black and red hst that we are working into a lovely border. We haven't finished the border yet but made good progress on it today.

 This was the photo I took today to show Lindy (who was sick today) how far I had gotten with it. Also we were trying to decide whether to use red (as in the bottom left corner) or white (top right) to fill in the spaces. We've decided on the red. Might call this quilt Newspaper Mama (Its Black and White and Red (read) all over)

 

WIP Wednesday Lots of Progress made

Another busy week.

I eventually got the mystery quilt from Patch n Peace finished off after I added another border to it, complete with yet more pieced circles to make it a good single bed sized quilt.



  I then made a pieced backing for it as well. It took ages cos I made some blocks out of left over bits and pieces. I had made more circles for the purple border than I needed so as to have some variety in the patches which meant I had a good few left over to put onto the back.  I also used 24 string blocks that I had joined together into one piece some years ago but had never done anything with. This was the perfect project to use it in.

I've come up with a name for the quilt - it was a mystery quilt and had circles in it.. mystery circles.. crop circles. So Crop Circles it is.



On Monday I parcelled it up along with Scrapitude Scrap in a Box which I also finished off recently and they are on their way to my friend Kym from Professional Quilting Service to be quilted. She does such a lovely job.



With Crop Circles done and out of the house I was able to at last get down to catching up on my POD blocks, from the Fandom In Stitches quilt along. I was 3 behind. With the blocks coming out every week it doesn't take much for a person to get well behind. Anyway - I was able to get all 3 of them made Monday afternoon/evening. I was pretty pleased with how they all came out. I didn't choose to do any of the variations - just stuck to the basic block. I am tempted to do the dragon egg variation for block 25 but we'll see.



Block 23



Block 24



Block 25

A recent discussion on a Facebook page dedicated to The Project of Doom Quilt along centred on what people were going to do  with their finished quilts. Most of the makers were planning in them being used. My daughter Fangirl has determined that its going to be hers... not sure if that is going to happen or not but we'll see

Charlotte, from Scrapitude Quilts, released a new quilt pattern Playing with Nine Patches. The lucky few of us who visited her website in time were given the PDF pattern free.

 It required 82 nine patches... thats 732 squares. The pattern gives 3 variations for 2", 2.5" and 3" squares. I worked with 2.5" squares and can tell you that I didn't have to cut any squares. I had that many (and more) already cut ready in my scrap usage system. (I sort of use Bonnie Hunter's system, adapted for my own use). I started working on it this week

 and have got all the nine patches made and pressed.

Next I have to cut the 6.5" pieces from the background fabric. The pattern called for the background fabric to be cut into 6.5" squares but some of the pieces are actually 3 squares together so wonder if I could just leave them as one piece. Seams a bit silly to cut them up and sew them together again.

Today at Patchwork Group Lindy and I worked on the black,white and red blocks that we as a group had made. We had 9 blocks (supposedly 12.5" blocks but as with any block swap there was a bit of variation in size)

 8 of which were the design we were supposed to have made and one which was different... I made a up a different months block. Oops.

However we put it in the centre of our quilt and it looked fine.

 Last week Lindy and I had played around with some half square triangle units I had left over from my Sunburnt Zebras quilt made last year and worked out a border design. Today we sashed the 9 main blocks in white and then put together the square in a square design we had worked out with the hst. It looks good.

We had to leave it there and will work on it more next week. We have decided that we want to put  in a narrow red border next to the white border before the hst border. We are going to augment this border with some pinwheels made from hst units left over from the blocks. These are smaller than the ones we have made into the square in a square block and are black and red. Its a rather organic process designing this quilt as we are making it up as we go along, working with left over bits and pieces. We didn't have any red with us to do the borders. I've found some plain red in my stash that I think will do the job although there may not be enough to do the outer border and binding as we had planned. We will see!

Just to mix things up a little I have also been making Boyo a beanie on my knitting loom. I got it finished this afternoon and I don't think he's taken it off since!