Scrap Quilt – Page 2 – Kelly's Kwilts

Scrappy Finish

I started working on this on November 21, 2013. Here it is 2 years later and I’ve finally completed the top! I don’t know why I have this aversion to finishing tops – I have a bunch that just need the borders and they’d be considered complete. This was based on a quilt I saw on either Facebook or Pinterest – who remembers now? – and I changed the applique part to hexies instead of whatever they had – I don’t even remember what it was now. I already know how I want to quilt this, I just have a few quilts that are getting quilted first. Everything was cut either on my Go or my Studio and I’m thrilled that I used up all these scraps! 517 2.5″ squares were used in this quilt and I will use a few more because I’m planning on putting some hexies on the border at some point. I might even wait until after it’s quilted since they will be appliquéd on anyway.

I pulled out a VERY old quilt from 2009 that I want to keep working on to get the top finished – again it just needs the borders finished. Hopefully I’ll have an update on it soon, I know it won’t be tonight because it needs 4 borders and the one I’m working on now is 1.5″ HST! I also might have some news to announce soon!

A New Finish!

Last weekend was my birthday and the hubby got me tickets for the Cavs game on Sunday. Since we needed a sitter anyway, my sister and mom offered to each take one of the kids for an overnight so we could sleep all night and/or do what we wanted without worrying about the kids. So we dropped them off Saturday morning, had a nice lunch out just the 2 of us and then came home where I spent ALL afternoon and most of the evening sewing. Sunday morning I got a little more sewing in and then we headed to the game. They did win and we had a great weekend!

I’ve always wanted to do a cathedral windows quilt, but all the folding and handwork for it seemed daunting. I know I do hexies, but this is a different kind of handwork! I saw a video on Missouri Star Quilting Co’s YouTube page for the Cathedral Window and decided it’d be a nice project for the weekend. In the example they used charm squares and I really should have too, but I just wanted to try out the process and didn’t want to break into any of my charm packs, so I used 2.5″ squares. It’s not a hard process, there’s just a lot of bulk with all the seams. I had the perfect spot in the hallway for this quilt that’s been empty for the last few weeks since I took the birthday banner down after Alex’s birthday. I am happy about the way it came out, and that I had the time to spend working on something for myself.

Now to work on my Red/White challenge quilt for next months guild meeting!

Almost a finish!

I didn’t have time yesterday to start quilting this, but I did get it all pinned up before we left to go to my mom and dad’s for dinner. I did manage to get it all quilted this afternoon, just simple straight line quilting. I first posted about this on December 23rd, and I will be putting the binding on it tomorrow. At least on the front, I almost always hand stitch bindings to the back, mainly because I like the relaxing hand work.

I did a few more rows on my test piece and now I’m seeing the pattern I should see. The group was right, I was doing just fine – I’m good at second guessing myself! So I unraveled the whole thing and put the yarn away, I think I’m ready to start casting on for the baby’s blanket. I have to cast on 235 stitches, that might be all I get done tonight! Hopefully I’ll be posting soon with another finish!

Goodbye 2013!

I’m sitting on the couch relaxing, or should I say recuperating from my glucose test today. Man did I have a sugar crash!!! Yet another thing I have to worry about being pregnant! So far everything is going well, baby feels like she turned, she is now kicking me much higher! Hope to hear by the end of the week if I passed the test or if I need to do the 3 hour test. Here’s hoping I passed!

I’m listening to Alex and the hubby playing upstairs with trains and airplanes. How I love hearing Alex squeal with laughter while he plays with his daddy! He’s been calling me mommy a lot lately, not sure why it changed from mama, but how I love hearing it!

On to the crafting side! I finished the thousand pyramid top the other day, I was hoping to find batting and backing and get it sandwiched before the end of the year. Obviously that didn’t happen! The boys might be going out to play in the snow tomorrow morning, maybe I can get that done and out of the way. I’m planning on just doing straight line quilting, it is going to be used in the car as a lap quilt for Alex. He has one in my car now, but that will move to daddy’s truck and the new one will be used in my car. He’s been asking for a blankie in the car since it’s been so cold lately!

So I mentioned last week that I am teaching myself to knit so I can make a blanket for baby. I’ve been practicing with some of the stitches I know I’ll need to use in the blanket and didn’t think I was doing it right. I found a group on Facebook that sounded good and they all say that it looks fine I just need to keep going. So I will practice a bit longer before I actually start working on the blanket. Alex and I stopped at Joann’s and I got 4 skeins of yarn to make her blanket. I found this on Ravelry and loved it. It seems to be pretty easy, we’ll see just how easy it is!

I got an Amazon gift card for Xmas from my BIL and decided to buy a yarn winder. I had started crocheting an afghan awhile back and decided to change to a different pattern. I never unraveled it because I hate winding yarn by hand! Didn’t take too long this afternoon to unravel that sucker and get it into a nice yarn ball. I also had a small piece left from a skein and some sock yarn that I had been experimenting with on a loom that needed to be fixed up. All taken care of in no time!

I hope everyone has a fun and safe New Year’s Eve, we are staying home as usual and I can’t drink so have one for me! 🙂

Boxing Day sewing!

Wow what a Christmas! Had a wonderful holiday with family and was very happy that Alex loved his gift from Santa and mommy and daddy. He has spent most of the last 2 days playing with his new train table. I will do another post later with details on presents made and received, but I wanted to mention that hubby got me the learn to knit kit that I asked for. I have spent part of my day today learning how to knit and purl in order to be able to start working on a blanket for the baby. I relearned to crochet and made a blanket before Alex was born, so now it’s time to learn to knit and make one for little girl. 🙂

I had some time this afternoon to participate in some BDSI (Boxing Day Sew In) sewing. I finished putting the center of my pyramid top together and just need to even off the sides and add a border. I’m thinking about using a solid black border so as to not draw anything away from the awesome colors of the center. I ended up with only 2 of the 100 squares not being used from the charm pack. I should be able to finish the top tomorrow, as long as Alex takes a nap!

Going to log off for now, need to practice working on my purl stitch!!

Design Wall Monday – December 23

I did it! I finally got the 2 borders on scrappy 9-patch! Glad to have another quilt off my in process list, especially since Good Night Irene SAL starts in just over a week! Of course I sat the other day and cut out pieces from a charm pack to make a thousand pyramid quilt. I had bought this 100 piece charm pack during a guild meeting when a vendor had come for our program. It’s a Benartex sampler of Fossil Fern (link is NOT where I bought it just the first link I found, but that is a GOOD price!) – which I LOVE! I had been planning to make a thousand pyramid quilt for awhile, so I bought the equilateral triangle to use on my studio, but it is a Go die. I think I can make this big enough to use as a lap quilt, we’ll see how long it takes to put this together. We are heading back to the MIL’s tonight, so I can’t work the rest of the day on this, BUT I can get some done before we have to get ready to leave. Plus I have most of the day tomorrow, the only thing I need to do for Christmas is make the ribbon jello!

I was just designing my thousand pyramid quilt in EQ in order to decide how many rows to make and how many pieces in each row and I have to say that I don’t like how they determine the counts for each row. For example, looking at the triangles, it counts them by one of the patches, not the top and bottom of the row. This gives you a skewed count of the number of patches needed to complete the row. So using the example to the right, it’s set for 2 horizontal and 2 vertical – yet really uses 3 triangles per row (not including those half patches at the end of rows). I’d rather it count and tell me exactly how many full patches I need to complete the row, instead of needing to count them up and make sure I have the number of pieces I need. *sigh* Maybe some day they’ll fix the way these work.

Better get working before Alex gets up from his nap and we need to head out!

Linking up to patchworktimes – Design Wall Monday.

Design Wall Monday – December 2

Well I’ve been very busy working on the applique blocks this last week. Finished up the last sets yesterday while Alex was napping. I’m about halfway done with this quilt already! I’m putting it aside for awhile so I can finish putting together the guild challenge quilt for the next meeting (Dec 12th) and so I can put the borders on the scrappy 9-patch quilt. I have the borders cut out/put together, just need to attach them to the 9-patch quilt. Not sure when I’ll get around to quilting it, I don’t think I even have a backing for it! But at least I know I made a quilt 100% from my stash of fabrics. Not 1 piece was bought for it!

I keep forgetting to mention that I’ve been asked to teach EQ classes for another guild in my area. Classes will be once a month for 2 hours starting in January. Obviously I’ll need to take a few months off once the baby is born, but they are aware of it and maybe I can do some lessons they can work on independently while I get the house back in order here. We’ll see what happens. Now I need to get started on lessons!!!

Hope to be back with an update this afternoon on the scrappy 9-patch, it shouldn’t be too hard to get it finished while Alex naps this afternoon.

Linking up to Patchworktimes.

Applique update

I haven’t done much work at the machine this week, with some semi-sleepless nights and running errands getting ready for the holiday (both requiring afternoon naps) I just didn’t have time. I have managed to get 11 of the 12 flowers appliqued down to the background blocks. I love how they all look! Now to start working on attaching the scrap blocks around the flowers! I have all of the 3 block pieces ready to go, hoping to get them all attached today and then hopefully start working on the 5 block pieces.

Accuquilt has had some nice sales the last few days for Black Friday and yesterday was the sale I was waiting for! I found the 4.5″ square multi die on sale so that I could use rewards points to buy it and only pay $8 for shipping! Now once I get the fabric I can start getting things ready for the Good Night Irene SAL that starts the first of the year. Not that I should be working on that one yet, I need to finish the other 3 quilts that are in progress! Or at least finish the guild challenge top and the scrappy 9 patch – both just need 2 borders added to them!

Lots to get done today, worked on some Xmas presents (not sewing related!) and still have a few more that need to be worked on, but tonight we are meeting my cousin and her kids to go to the Holiday walk in the Metroparks by us. We took Alex last year and he had a ball!

Design Wall Monday – November 25th

I seem to be flying on these applique flowers. Finished the last of them last night and got the first 2 prepped for applique. I got one of them finished this morning while Alex watched tv and started on the second one. I had thought to add the 2.5″ squares that go around the white block, but it seems to be harder to applique that way. So I’ve prepped the rest of the flowers on just the white block and will add the squares once the applique is finished. I will work on those as I work on completing the border for the scrappy 9-patch quilt. I am hoping to get the applique completed no later than Thanksgiving – Even if I have to take them to my mom’s to work on.

I have barely thought about quilting on either of these quilts, but I am pretty sure that on the scrappy 9 patch I’ll just do straight diagonal lines through the 9 patch blocks and the 4 patches in the border. Still not sure what to do in the solid black squares though. Scrappy 25-patch will probably be more diagonal lines and just some stitching around the applique to make them pop out. Here’s what I can’t decide – should I cut out the background from behind the applique or leave it? Since I’m going to be machine quilting I’m really tempted to just leave it there. Anyone have some thoughts??

I’ll be back soon with updates, I only have 3 quilts in progress 🙂

Busy, busy, busy!

I have been busy sewing this weekend! Friday I had gotten all the pieces for the hexie flowers basted and ready to be put together. I took this picture earlier today, at the time 6 flowers were ready to be appliequed and I was working on the other 6. As of right now I have another 4 flowers done and hope to finish the other 2 while I watch shows with the hubby tonight. They go pretty fast, so I don’t know why I can’t get it done.

I spent yesterday and this afternoon putting together the scrappy 9 patch center. I haven’t taken a picture yet, by the time I finished it was getting dark out and I didn’t have a good enough spot to take a picture. I need to put on a small black border and then the pieced border that I started putting together while I worked on the center, but there’s still a lot more to do on it.

I still need to cut out and attach the borders for the guild exchange quilt, hoping to get that done this week as well. I have 2-3 weeks to have it finished, but with the holiday weekend I don’t see any reason it won’t be ready. Off to work on hexies!