Thursday, May 15, 2014

Christmas Scrap Quilt Top Still In Progress

And I love, love LOVE it!

This is my third in Cynthia's Scrap-a-Palooza series, and they are all such fun.  This one was rather serendipitous.

I knew I wanted to do it in Christmas scraps, and I'd kind of thought at first of not having any colour pattern, just throwing them in rounds willy-nilly.

But upon sorting through my scraps, and seeing definite predominantly green,  or red, or blue, and a few multi-coloured, I thought, hmm, maybe I could do a round of each colour. . .  However, I didn't have very many predominantly blue scraps, so thought never mind, maybe alternate rounds of red and green, and end with one multi-coloured, like Cynthia's:
http://quiltingismorefunthanhousework.blogspot.ca/p/scrap-palooza-quilt-gallery.html


Over the hours of cutting, letting my mind wander, (it's very therapeutic, isn't it? a kind of meditation) and remember I was also cutting for the scrap quilt using 3" squares that I have in my head, as well as Cynthia's 5th scrap-a-palooza quilt, that I realized I did have enough blue to at least do the centre.  Then Cynthia posted a few pics of various quilts others have done in her series, and I saw one that had double rows of 4.5" squares... well, the quilt just made itself in my head right then and there.

Musing:  hmm, maybe that is the kind of thing that happens to authors who say the characters just "do" and "say" things in their heads, that they really have no control of their characters.

Regardless,  here is the quilt in construction, with a few tips thrown in as to keeping it all organized.  Apologies for the lighting at times.

Organized Chaos again:


In the above picture you see the blue centre.  I used my "Book It!" method, chain-piecing the first two blocks of each column, and then adding the third, still chain piecing so the entire column stays perfectly in order as it was on the design wall.  Yep, there's my snowmen!!  And yep, there's a 4-patch in there too!  And I even worked in (found them after I'd cut enough other blues) scraps from my Snowman Placemats!!  Yippee!

Piecing each row of 3
Look, ma, no pins!  With pressing each row in opposing directions, the seams butt up against each other wonderfully.  I'm still not cutting apart the rows either.  If the entire column is long enough, I will join the two bottom rows, then the top two, and alternate, so I can continuously feed them.  I LOVE chain-piecing.  Saves time and thread.

Terrific thread for piecing
I try to pick up the 3000 metre cones of Gutermann thread on sale or at JoAnn's (online only) with a 50% off coupon.  I also love and use Aurifil, but I've never had issues with Gutermann, and this is a good buy.  I picked up the dark green which I'm using for this quilt at Fat Quarter Shop half price!  They have notions and thread as well as fabulous fabric.

For the double rows at the top and bottom of each round, I took the squares off the design wall, laying them on my sewing table in order.  With many similar fabrics, as you can see above, and doing the chain-piecing method, AND with my menopausal brain, it is SO easy to confuse the row I was piecing... uh, does the next square go on the top or the bottom?

HOWEVER, with this little trick, I never screw up:  leave the tail of threads on the first two squares you piece.  Do you see it there just below the two squares at the top, waiting to be joined?  That is my first row.  Because I laid out my rows of squares as they were on the design wall, I know the top ones go with the top row (the one that has the tail of thread) and the bottom ones with the bottom row.  Ya, note the huge distance between the top and the bottom rows of squares, all to keep it obvious for me in this annoying neverending interesting stage of my life!

3 comments:

  1. You're so productive! Makes me feel like a slacker! Lol! You do help me get inspired to finish the two quilts that are "almost" done.

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  2. Um, mind wandering? Therapeutic? A type of meditation? Nice cover for your AWOL melon LOL!!
    LOVE the little snowmen <3

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  3. AWOL melon. I like that. Yes, the snowmen are adorable and have spent too many years in a Rubbermaid container!! And think I'm going to go with this therapeutic/ type of meditation spin...

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