Friday, February 23, 2024

SAHRR Round 5 “Four”

This round’s directive was given to us by Gail at QuiltingGail. She said the theme this week is ‘4’. We could do whatever we want but it has to have an element of four in it. I decided to make 4-patches, and my first plan was to put them in the four corners. Here is how my quilt ended up:


Read on to find out how it got there.

I also planned to incorporate more of that Northcott watery, bubbly, shimmery fabric I’d used on either side of the fish in round 4. Why not use it as is? It’s got great movement and picks up on the turquoises as well as the reedy pink and brown fabric used in rounds 2 and 4.

The problem is that this fabric is just 10” x WOF strips. I only had a couple left of the three or four Sarah sent to me as a prize one year for participating in Hands2Help. I believe they may be samples because they’re pinked along the edges. I wanted the flowing lines in the fabric to be vertical so on went the thinking (and figuring and calculating) cap. I want this to be a baby-size quilt so with two rounds left and a quilt that measures 29.5” x 34.5” I didn’t want to add more than about 10” total. That would mean about 5" per side for the last two rounds.

Long story short, I went with 4” 4-patches which worked well with the 4” fish and square-in-a-square blocks in round 4. I decided to put two in the centres of each side to help take up inches. I didn’t like the way the 4-patches would look on the top of my SiaS round so I decided to just put this round on three sides only. 

Then I didn’t care for the unbalanced look of the SiaS round at the top with the 4-patches at the bottom and somewhere along the way of ruminating, I thought why not make a heart at the bottom? So that’s what I did, adding strips of the turquoise fabric on either side..


When it came to the vertical sides, I ran into serious trouble. I only had 10” height, remember, and I wanted the flowing lines to be vertical along the sides and no seams. This fabric is ombré, and the set I got is cut from the same repeat so next to impossible to match the lines to hide seams. 
Solution? Put more 4-patches in the centre which took up another 8". Two should do it. Nope. Not quite. Three inches short to be exact. The water fabric would finish at 9.5" times two is 19" + 8" = 27" plus the cornerstone 4-patches is 35.5" and I needed 38.5".
Now what?

I thought of sewing in a rectangle of one of the orange fabrics from one of the big centre fish and started hunting. Nope. Every bit of both is gone. I even looked in my orange and yellow strips bin—nada. But that is where I spied a strip of that fish fabric. Eee! Maybe it would work? It was barely 2.5” wide though. 

On went the thinking cap and pawing through scraps and stash. Aha! Found a scrap of the fishnet fabric in orange. Another ombré fabric that runs from turquoise to coral, this one became pillow shams. Here is an in-progress shot of them from 2016. The post is here if you want to see the shams.

Tidal Lace fabric

I had used a scrap of the turquoise in round 1, the signature block, so I thought this was a perfect find. So I sewed 1/2” on either side of the fish scrap between those side 4-patches. 

So my elements of four are:
The 4-patches in the four corners. 
Four 4-patches along each side of the quilt. 
The pink heart at the bottom is a 4-patch block.

My quilt now measures 37.5” x 38.5”. For round 6, my plan is to only add 2-3" per side. We'll see how that works out!

In other news I’ve been plugging away at my leaders and enders pinwheel blocks and have a set of purple done:
They really are cute, random threads (why don’t you see them until you post the photo?!) and all. 

Xena got her stitches out from the two lumps removal sites on Thursday morning. She was so good but we had to wait 40 minutes as they were running very late! She just has a couple of tiny scabs on the two wounds which will fall  off naturally. She was exhausted most of the rest of the day poor girl. She’s lost about ten pounds in the past seven weeks, not good. She is eating almost back to normal though and has only one more antibiotic pill on Friday breakfast. She will be on her heart meds probably for the rest of her life.  
Dr. Hailey LOVED her pink coat! So does Xena. 



15 comments:

  1. Your Round Robin project looks more fantastic with every round you add! I especially love reading how you solved every "problem" - because that's the spot where I get stuck every time...

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  2. I like how creatively you have built around your center block.

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  3. Love the way you are puzzling the SAHRR and making it work. I love the pieces on the left and right and the heart that allowed you to use the fabric you had. Perfect. Glad Xena is getting a good report and that she is so fashionable when out and about!

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  4. It was fun to read through your thought process on "4"!! It's looking great!!
    Nice to hear that Zena is improving!
    Thanks for linking to SAHRR#5

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  5. I loved reading about your problem-solving to make the luscious wavy blue fabric work, and the other sweet things it led to like that fish fabric which has just the right colors. Quilters are such problem solvers. If only they could take over the world. Xena sure looks cozy in her fuzzy coat. About the pinwheels: they look so fun but I’ve always wondered how to do the centers with all those seams meeting. What techniques do you use?

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  6. Sandra - this is looking wonderful! It is such a whimsical quilt. Can't wait to see it all finished up. Hope Xena continues to get healthier.

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  7. Your quilt is looking great, Sandra. So happy Xena has her stitches out and is doing better. That pink coat is adorable on her! I love those tiny pinwheels too!

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  8. Your quilt is growing so nicely. Some baby will love it a lot. It has been made with love. Those solutions you come up with to work with the fabric you have remind me that we all need to live frugally and use up what we have. So nice to see Xena and hear that she is progressing. 10 lbs. is a lot to lose for a dog her size. Hopefully, you'll be able to wean her off the meds (except for the heart pills) and she will begin to recover fully. Of course, the trauma of it all will takes a long time to dim for her....and you and hubby.

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  9. Your quilt is perfect. I think all that searching for bits of fabric and quilt maths really paid off :)

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  10. I appreciate the thought you put into this round to keep those stripes running vertically. I hope Xena continues to feel a bit better every day. <3

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  11. Looks like you've had a great time with this quilt. Look forward to seeing itquilted. Take care and hugs.

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  12. You found a great solution to the fabric issue on the borders. That's the one challenge with the SAHRR, you never know how much fabric you'll need. Glad that Zena is healing well. Hopefully she's gaining back what she lost.

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  13. This quilt is amazing...great for a child or a wall hanging at the beach house.

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