Saturday, January 16, 2021

Back in the Pink - Three Finishes

So, for all my moping and dark moodiness last week (I figure we’re all allowed that every now and then, especially when there’s been an attempted insurrection on the Capitol), I’m much more cheerful this week. I finally decided that walks in the all-too-rare winter sunshine, plus more fruits and veggies (and less comfort food), along with a good dose of “pull up your Big Girl panties, girlfriend” self talk would do the trick. And it did. Everything isn’t all roses and rainbows, but there sure is a lot of pink and teddy bears, bunnies and happy scraps in this week’s sewing effort. So, I’ll be joining up with the sewists of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge’s Scrappy Saturday to share my pink progress.

The first thing that happened was the quilting and binding of this pink sock monkey quilt.


Pink Sock Monkeys, like all the quilts I’m showing today, are pink scrap quilts headed to our local chapter (Salt Lake City) of Quilts for Kids. It was quilted in a large stipple, backed with more pink monkey fabric and bound with a pink scrap. It measures 42.5x47”,


Last week I showed the finished flimsy (top) of this teddy bear and bunny top along with some stars. This week it too was quilted and bound.


Bears and Buns (hehe) was quilted with a stipple again and finished at 41x48”. The binding is just folded over from the backing. The backing is a pink and white stripe that looks great as binding at the top and bottom, but not so great on the sides. Oh well.  


Since these are relatively small child-sized quilts I tend to baste, quilt and bind them in groups. The third quilt finished this week was the one below with Raggedy Ann and Andy. I had a bit of a fussy time with the companion fabrics. Everything my stash that “matched” up close did not look good from a few feet away. It’s one of those cool pink prints where I couldn’t pull out the pink floral elements, the blue of Andy’s pants, or the red stripes of their socks. It just looked jarring (making the red in the sock monkey quilt above look tame by comparison). So, I stuck with pinks. I guess that’s why companion prints are so popular.


The whiteish print with large pink polka dots is a Tula Pink fabric from her Tabby Road collection. The problem is that it was printed REALLY off-kilter, which I learned when I cut the fabric for width-of-fabric strips between the darker pink sashing. Um.... it looked nauseating. So, Plan B was to cut them up into 6.5” blocks so I could straighten them up (much better!) and add some unobtrusive yet sorta-matching pinks. It worked well enough. 

This one was backed with the same striped pink fabric and quilted with hearts and loops to echo the hearts in the print.  It finished at 40.5x46.5”.


There are two more quilts that will be made from pink scraps this month. Right now they’re either a flimsy or just pinned on the design board.  Here’s the first one - the flimsy. It consists of 4.5” squares (except the two center blocks which were in the Orphanage and unused in last year’s Creature From the Bubblegum Factory quilt. 


And then finally, I had a lot of 6.5” (unfinished) string blocks and a few other 6” blocks. But I needed a few more, so with all the scraps and strips from the above quilts, I was able to sew up six more string blocks and added them to the mix. This is what I’ve got up on the design board for now.


There are 9 total “other” blocks mixed in - the four corners, then three 4-patches, a square in square of HSTs, and a plain 6” patch. After this, I don’t know if I’ll even have enough crumbs left over to do any crumb blocks! However, I do have some Wishing Ring blocks planned, and I made the first one.


The fabric is a rose print that I’ve had for 15-16 years, and I love it. I’m calling it pink, but it has green, yellow and pale peach areas as well. The cut of fabric that I have will make about 12 of these blocks (made of 2.5” squares, so it will finish at 10”). I’ll need other soft colors to go along with it, so as we get to yellows or peaches or pale greens or whatever, I’ll make companion blocks. No specific plan yet other than to just keep making these and see where it goes....

I still plan to make a couple pink (or pink and red) placemats for Valentine's Day for Bruce and I to go along with Joy’s Table Scraps Challenge.  I’m thinking of participating in the SAHRR (Stay at Home Round Robin), using this old orphan block as my center:


And when I say that I’m thinking about it, it means that in my more lucid moments I will definitely NOT be playing along. But the crazy moments seem to outnumber the rational ones these days, and I’m thinking “why not?”. It’s not like I have anything else to do! hahahahaha.  So, we’ll see. This may be the first and last you hear about it. Or the clue for the first round of blocks may just suck me in even deeper.... and it will be a good way to get rid of some of those red/green/orange Bonnie and Camille cuts I have that don’t play well with too many other things....

And there is one more sew-along having to do with linens and hankies that I’ve started on (very underwhelming start, I might add). I may or may not continue on that at the present time, although it should be a higher priority than the one listed above. But we’ll see how much I can get done of all the other stuff in the second half of the month. Am I getting tired of pink yet? Um, you could say that. But looking on the bright side, I am no longer swimming in pink scraps!!

Have a great (and peaceful and healthy) week, friends!

17 comments:

  1. WOW--you are really ahead of the game with your pink RSC this month...lovely string blocks...I cannot seem to get into pink (other than the hashtag blocks) this month...just not jellin' for me...;((( [deep into my LCL blocks I guess] hugs, Julierose

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  2. I love all your fun pink projects, Cathy! Pink is a color I'm often low on - but now I want to sew pink string blocks... I am with you that the crazy quilter moments outweigh the rational ones these days, because why not join in another QAL?! So I'm going to do the round robin, too!

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  3. I had to look back to see about your grumpiness last week, but I think you were spot on. If you can't be upset about insurrection, what can you be upset about? I love all your pink projects, especially the strings, and that pale floral in the wishing ring block is just lovely. Hang in there! Only a few days until we turn the page.

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  4. Such a wonderful selection of donation quilts, havet you done well. And I love your pretty Wishing Ring block, such lovely soft colours.

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  5. Congrats on using up so many PINK scraps, Cathy!!! Three finished quilts and two quilt tops in PINK is pretty amazing. (And thanks for playing along with the TABLE SCRAPS Challenge this month!!!)

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  6. Congratulations on all your finishes, and all your starts! It's going to be a good year for quilting, I'm sure of it. Hang in there!

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  7. Sock monkeys! Love the fabric, you did a lot in a week.

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  8. You have had another very busy sewing week. Love your idea to add nine “other” blocks to the pink string blocks. It worked out so well. You’re obviously having fun being creative with those donated scraps.

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  9. Beautiful pink blocks! I love your string blocks, these are going to be a lovely quilt

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  10. Stay at home Round Robin--do it, do it! It's super low key and there really aren't any rules, so what do you have to lose? That will make a great center!

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  11. You've been busy this week. My daily pep talks don't seem to be getting me off my computer (blogs and news) or phone (IG). But you've provided some inspiration today. That Wishing Ring block is calling to me and I have lots of soft florals that might do well in them. Maybe one to see how it goes? I firmly tell myself not to get involved in the Stay at Home Round Robin and so far so good. What I really have to do is finish sandwiching a quilt top and start quilting it. I looked up the website for Quilts for Kids and find that the nearest chapters to me are 1 to 2 hours away. Maybe there's none locally because we have Linus Project. Before I worry about that, I need to actually make some.
    Pat

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  12. For feeling kind of dull and morose you sure churned out some darling little donation quilts!

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  13. I certainly "get" the funk-y feeling this week passed. I stopped looking at the news altogether. I have enough anxiety ridden things going on here at home, no need to add the nations problems right now. Although I am still concerned about the near future happenings, I just don't want to be overly involved)
    I have yet to start sewing pink. I still have a half a month, but the rest of the month will be interrupted by an absolutely adorable puppy coming my way on the 23rd! I bought a Rat Terrier from a breeder in Texas with the goal of breeding them up here. We have far too many varmints here, eating our car and heavy equipment wires, not to mention dirtying up the places we work and play in. UGH! My two big boy indoor cats were relegated to the shop where they live in the lap of luxury and hunting. We also added a new barn cat to the mix yesterday. I tell ya, the rats are BAD!!!
    I have been spending loads of precious time in my sewing room. My grandson's daddy installed my pegboard (which I have had ready to go for months). I set to loading that up and have been enjoying it immensely!
    I finished the flimsy's of two SAL I did from Fat Quarter Shops books. I was getting so frustrated with the blocks until I got the new machine. I never realized how bad of shape my poor old Brother was in until I used the new machine! What a difference!
    I cute out a second block for another SAL I joined in on from Pat Sloan. She has a fun video every day but Sunday. She is fun to "visit" with.
    Okay, enough of me babbling about me, me, me...
    Great finishes on those QFK. I absolutely LOVE the quilt with the two Creature Blocks. It as great pink combinations. And the block with the soft colored roses, so romantic! I always love your string blocks. They are all such happy blocks.
    Take car, have a wonderful week, keep your eyes on the quilting and let the politicians straighten out their mess before rejoining the news!

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  14. Oh - your pink Quilts for Kids make my heart sing! Thank you for putting my fabrics to instant usefulness! BTW, I happen to adore sock monkeys, so that one gets some love from me, too! I whole-heartedly endorse your self-talk. I've done it myself the past week and it definitely helps. Reminding myself to put on the Big Girl Panties always gets me going...not always with a smile on my face, but it comes along eventually!

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  15. I think that we tend to forget how effective a big piece of a print can be in a quilt. (And good ways to use up fabric!) I like 'em all, Cathy. (Glad you're feeling more upbeat, too!)

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  16. Cathy, you're hysterical -- in a funny way! Three donation quilts quilted & bound? One more a flimsy and another ready to be put together? WOW! And I totally love that rose fabric too. It's quite romantic. Glad you've shed that funk from last week. Look how productive you've been! "Chin up" is my motto when the going gets tough!

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  17. You've been a busy girl once again! Must say that I'm liking that rose fabric too and admit to a teeny little bit of 'covet-itis' going on because it would go so well with my current project. I did find a piece of pink odd-ball fabric I am going to use, even though I will have to cobble it together with something else. It means I will definitely have to hand quilt - daunting thought!

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