V is for Variations

Only 4 more posts after this in the Blogging A to Z challenge. I'm so proud of myself for having made it through. Going to Malaysia in the middle of the month actually was a great help as I knew I had to get myself organised ahead of time and I actually had all of my blogs written before I left. I have done a bit of editing of them as they have gone up... sometimes after the fact when I have seen them "live" and realised that some were a bit clunky. My daughter Fangirl has read them each time and has alerted me (via text) of any spelling errors or typos or other errors that have needed to be edited. I've done the same with her blog. If you haven't read hers please do. She writes a geeky cross stitch blog...you can find her here at Fangirl Stitches



Variation is the spice of life.

Really there are only so many ways to cut up and rearrange fabric and sew them together again to make a quilt. Well really there are only so many patterns in the world but, because of the choices that the patchworker makes with regards to fabric, arrangement, and size of blocks and quilts, it does seem that the choices in patchwork are endless.

Since I got into patchworking in a big way... well bigger way, I have rarely been known to repeat a pattern. As a newbie quilter though I joined in a monthly block swap. They were all nine patch blocks but each month the theme for the fabrics used would change. I am not sure for how long I participated in these monthly swaps but it was for well over a year... perhaps 2. Each month I would make a number of sets of blocks (there were 5 blocks per set I think ... or maybe more. Can't remember now... too long ago) They would all be the same. I'd send them in to the co-ordinator and at the end of the swap I would get that same number of blocks back - blocks made by other participants so they would all be different.

Eventually I had to do something with those blocks. I was so busy making the blocks for the swap that I didn't get around to making any quilts from the sets I got back. I had gone from being a finisher of quilts to a maker of UFOs (Unfinished Objects. Projects begun but not completed and not currently being worked on.) Ultimately I  I dropped out of the swap and made myself work on getting those blocks I had already collected made into quilts

9-patch block named because it is made from 9 units sewn together in the basic 3x3 format.

I made in these swaps.They have been put together in different ways and combined with other blocks and so create a wide variation of quilt tops

One place I see a lot of variation is when our group has a block of the month project where we have a set pattern and colour scheme but participants are free to choose their own fabrics. We get some really interesting blocks then. Sometimes there is a bit of variation in size too which can cause some headaches for the person who puts the quilt together.

Currently I am putting together a quilt for our group made from blocks made by various members. Its been quite challenging!! you can see the same block made in lots of different colour ways in this quilt.

Pinwheel block

The back is made from some "Bonus blocks" These were other blocks we made for other months that were made in the wrong colour. (by me... oops)

At a retreat I attended a few years ago we had a shirt challenge. Participants bought men's cotton shirts from 2nd had shops and these were cut up into 5 pieces. We were put into groups and swapped the shirt fabric between us so that we all ended up with a piece of every shirt in our group. We then had a year to make a quilt from the fabric. We were allowed to use other fabric as well but the idea was to use a piece of every shirt in our quilt. I called mine the Shirt off my Back series and ended up making 4 quilts. The fabric I added was all recycled fabric - lots of it was sheets and other linen from my Aunts estate. We had a reveal the following year at our retreat and it is amazing to see the huge variation of quilts made from the same fabric.

I took photos of the quilts but have to admit that I can't remember which quilts were from my group and which were from other groups. It doesn't really matter though. You can just enjoy them

First of all - my 4 quilts. I called these
1. Sombre Brown

I gave it to my brother in law for his 70th birthday (it was only a year or two late)

2 Sombre Blue. 

This was also a gift for another brother in law, also for his 70th birthday. I was only 6 months late with this one!

 3 Not so Sombre Stars for Derek. This was made for a friend who was diagnosed with Non Hodgkins Lymphoma last year. He had a pretty rough trot and I made the quilt for him.

The back of the quilt was signature squares - messages from family and friends with in our church. The surrounding fish fabric was significant as Derek loves fishing. Again all the fabric in ths quilt was either recycled or came from my scrap basket

4.Sombrero Stars. This quilt went into my cupboard for 6 months and then in February this year I gave it to the minister of a church that is in a community that was hit hard by a cyclone. I have told her to use it however she likes - give it to a needy family, sell it, raffle it... whatever. I am not sure what its final home is yet

The quilts below were made from the shirt fabrics. I am not sure which ones were in my group - at least some of them were :) 

A Few more finishes

I have completed two little projects today. I started them about last Friday or maybe it was Saturday. It was another paper pieced project... well 2 actually. Bek is Fangirl's former house mate and our good friend too. We dog sit for her every day when she is at work and most holidays too. - Digby is her dog. It was her birthday on Sunday. I started to make this little project for her on Saturday and then decided I would make 2 and they took longer than I expected but eventually... I got them done. Bek loves Minions. Fangirl cross stitched her a little chart featuring their song on it. I know nothing or at least very little about Minions. I did know that she, Bek loves them. I googled minion patterns and found 2 paper pieced patterns. I was only going to make her one... but there were 2 patterns and which to choose.... so I made both. I found them on here Tweety Loves Quilting blog. I couldn't post progress photos as Bek is my friend and might have seen my blog or Twitter/Facebook post

The results weren't perfect and I did find that the pattern did have a fault in it (with the mouth) but eventually I was able to fudge my way around it. I also couldn't work out why the top and side white sections were divided into several pieces. The separate bits weren't needed for the construction of the block. They could have been in the one piece

Then I decided that I didn't like the dark blue border as the inner border so I swapped the borders and liked that much more. Then I added the embroidery and trims. I embroidered the other half of the mouth that wasn't quite right as per pattern.

I gave them to Bek this afternoon... only 2 days late. She seemed to like them. 

Fangirl travelled to Sydney this weekend for her cousins 30th birthday. She was able to take with her 2 quilts to deliver to 2 of her uncles who had turned 70. I gave them the first two quilts from my Shirt off my Back quilts, made for a quilting challenge last year. I blogged extensively at the start of last year about these quilts. Calling them Sombre Blue and Brown Sombrero. (for example here. My brothers in law loved them and sent me pictures of themselves under their quilts. Bek's present was only 2 days late. Ted was 70 2.5 years ago and Wayne 6 months ago.... so really in comparison her's was very prompt!!

I completed the next one of the POD blocks, choosing to do the simplest one. The alternatives were to the Deathly Hallows symbol instead of the potions bottle or the Dark Mark on the cover of the book. 

Sunday Stash report

Oh dear oh dear oh dear. I really did have a blow out last weekend. Not intentionally but I ended up with sooo much fabric

Firstly I stopped at Spotlight on my way through Rockhampton to go to the Patch'n'Peace retreat. I needed some more reds for my Black and White with a touch of red. I couldn't find exactly what I wanted but got a few different reds that I thought would work for the centre of the quilt and some more for the binding and borders. I also got some more white with black on it. 4 metres all up

I used up two of the white with back in my half square triangles before I took a photo. I didn't end up using this one as the white was a bit too creamy (3 lots of .2 m total .6m)

The reds that I got for the quilt, some for the blocks and other for the binding and borders 3 metre lengths and 2 x .2 m (one lot got used up before the photography took place) total of 3.2

Then at the retreat itself one of the ladies had brought along the Stash and UFOs of her sister in law who had died in the last year or so. The stuff was for sale, very cheaply with all money raised going to the Cancer Council. I found some black and white fabrics that I thought would go in the quilt I am making either on the front or in the backing. There was a metre of black and white gingham and 3.2m of some that was white with checkerboards on it. I needed some royal blue for the Disappearing 9 Patch with a twist blocks I was working on and there was a metre of it amongst the fabrics that I grabbed for it. There was 2.46m of a beige fabric that I thought would be good for a swap we have coming up for PnP next year. We are making bullseye blocks to swap and raggy hearts. Both require 10" square neutral backgrounds so this will be perfect for that. (I hope. I've not done bullseye quilts before)

Blue fabric I bought from the stall. 1m of the darker blue and 2 each of the pale blue spot and pale blue floral

One of the activities at PnP is a Silent Auction. Donated items are arranged around the room and each item has a sheet of paper next to it. The auction runs for an hour and during that time you can bid on the items. To bid you write your name and how much you are willing to pay for the item. The next person who wants to "bid" on that item writes their name below yours and then writes how much they will pay for the item. The amount has to be at least 50c more that the previous amount. At the end of the bidding time who ever has written their name down last on the paper (with the highest bid amount) gets the item (once they pay that amount) We all bring along items to go in the auction. People bring all sorts of things and frankly a lot of it is pretty junky. The lady who organises the items puts things together in groups so that their is usually something desirable in amongst the junk. I actually think that they would get more money for stuff if they didn't heap it together. A lot of people just didn't want to have to deal with the rubbish stuff. Then again... one woman's trash can be another woman's treasure. I always try to bid on everything at least once to push the prices along a little bit. Inevitably it means I get stuck with some stuff I don't want as well as some stuff that I do. I missed out on one piece of fabric I would have dearly liked (black and white) cause I had to go have my massage before the end of proceedings but I did "win" a number of lots. As well as fabric I ended up with quite a few patterns, books and old magazines

The beige/grey on right I bought from the stall, the other two I ended up with at the auction

The white and the red on white I won in the auction. They were fabric I was going after. The two black and white ones I bought at the stall

 And then there were the gifts. On Saturday night we had our retreat dinner and all got dressed up to fit the theme "Bedazzled" We sure sparkled. There was a gift exchange too and I ended up with a parcel containing 2 fat quarters of very sparkly fabric and 3 lovely cotton fat quarters. And lastly on our last day the organisers presented us each with a little gift bag containing one more fat quarter.

The rolled up fat quarter was my gift from the organisers of the retreat. The other fabrics were my gift from the exchange

All up I took in a whopping 27.23 metres of fabric. Ouch

Then there was the rest of my loot!

                                                      

The books and magazines that I scored in my auction wins. I have given Fangirl the book of fairy tale cross stitches

Some of these patterns I bid on deliberately, some were part of a bundle and some were given to me by other participants who ended up with patterns they didn't want in their bundles

Apparently you can knit this stuff into scarves. I don't knit. I wonder if I could crotchet it?

This was my most intriguing purchase. Apparently it was so you could do quilting on your machine without a walking foot. I have never seen anything like it but will investigate it some more and report back

4 glass dishes I bought cause I like all things apple. 

As to Fabric out report. I washed all the fabric I got from the stall or the auction and the white with the red print on it ran terribly. I washed it again with run remover but then some of the red went orangey. I gave it another soak in hot water and no more dye came out so its probably safe but have decided not to risk it but to give it to Op shop

Then the grape pattern fabric is just too unsuitable for quilting... too light and flimsy and I just don't think I'll use it so that is off to the Op Shop and someone else might be able to use it. So that is 4.6m gone for a start

I have used about half a metre of the dark blue fabric in the Disappearing 9 Patch with a Twist. I have also used up .4m of the white in the half square triangles along with a about 1/4 of the red fabric I bought... maybe a bit more. The white and checker board fabric will go into the back of the Black and White with a Touch of red quilt and I have ear marked the beige so a lot of it will go... but I just have to get a few quilts finished to be able to count them

I have had a couple of finishes this last fortnight. I participated in two one day workshops with my own local group and finished off a gorgeous little bag with Tumbling Blocks Block. I love it although I haven't worked out what I shall actually use it for! Total fabric used .66m

My other finish has been the Not So Sombre Stars for Derek. I got it quilted yesterday and finished off the binding and the label today. I'm not overly pleased with the quilting. Having pieced back as well as front... having two important sides - two tops really it was hard to quilt. I decided to just ignore the signature squares and to quilt the Stars side. Probably should have just done an all over design but instead I quilted each star individually, choosing different designs. My style is not sophisticated... naive might be a polite way of describing it. Anyway... done is better than perfect and I just wanted to get it done. Not sure when or how I will give it to Derek. Not sure if I should do a presentation at church next week so everyone gets to see the finished article or give it to him privately. Will think about it. Dimensions of this quilt 192cm x 192cm Total fabric used 8.46m

Not So Sombre Stars for Derek - Stars

Messages for Derek Side

Continuous stars for the border and 

So my stats for this last fortnight

Added this week                                                27.36m
Used this week/given away                                13.72m


Year to Date Used                     79.37
Year to Date added                   65.67
Net Used                                     13.70

Linking up with Stash Report @Patchwork Times