Friday, February 26, 2021

End of the Yellow Scrap Road

It’s been a fun and busy month for sewing, but it’s time to wrap up the yellow scraps for February. I had hoped to get more personal sewing done (namely, finishing the Beachcomber Quilt), but that will have to be pushed to March. 

This week I got my first Covid vaccine, and it was a good experience. I had no reaction whatsoever - not even a sore arm. And while getting checked in at the site, I met a lovely young girl whose name was Naserian. I asked her where she was from and she said “Africa”. I laughed and said I knew that, but what country? She replied “Kenya”. My eyes opened wide and I told her I’d visited Kenya (mostly the Narok area) and LOVED it.  Well, she was born in Narok! “I am Maasai!” she exclaimed. We nearly hugged each other, then remembered where we were and just giggled instead. It turns out she knows my friends Marilyn S and OD (Samuel Ole Dere). We kept laughing about what a small world it is. Needless to say, she and I exchanged info and will be keeping in touch. It made a good day (vaccine) into a GREAT day!! Anyway, I go back in mid-March for my second dose.

This week I finished up the final two February yellow/gold kid quilts for the Salt Lake chapter of Quilts for Kids. This first one is Wild Thing. Remember these quilts are from scraps donated by various ladies (including my own scraps), and are the trimmings and cast-offs from other projects. That is why there is rarely much of any one fabric. I just do what I can to make some sort of semi-cohesive (and sometimes underwhelming) quilt out of them.


Wild Thing was quilted in a loopy design and finished at 39.5”x42”.  The last yellow quilt for the month I’m just calling Yellow Thang because - well, do donation quilts really need names?  It finished at 40.5x44.5” and was also quilted with loops.


Here’s a closeup of the front and part of the back.
 

All four of the yellow February QFK quilts can be seen at my 2021 Quilts page link, above under the header.

Here is a recap of the yellow Rainbow Scrap Challenge blocks I sewed for February. Sewing those yellow 
Wishing Ring blocks (middle left, below) completes the blocks I need for the Wishing Ring Around the Roses quilt. Fingers crossed that I’ll have time in March to assemble it! 


When I started last month to sew along with the Stay at Home Round Robin (SAHRR), I thought of it as a harmless little squirrel - a small side project. Each round only took a little bit of planning and an hour (ish) to sew. Easy peasy. Well, just like kids, chicks, saplings and other things that grow, this little squirrel is now a MONSTER. This latest round took two afternoons of measuring, planning, cutting, sewing, cussing, ripping, recutting, rethinking, more cussing, more sewing - you get the picture.



But this round is done! This week’s hostess is Susan, and she called log cabins. I decided to add little 4” log cabins only to the top and bottom to make the quilt more rectangular. I dislike the navy print I used, but want so badly to use it up. You can see it also on the small plus signs from an earlier round. It’s also a rather visually “mushy” print. 



The bottom row IS straight, even though it is hanging wonky (wonkily?). The top currently measures 42.5” across and 56.5” long.  I’m linking up to Susan’s linky party for this week. Whatever block is called for next week’s final round will likely be done with the red and bolder green prints I have remaining. 

I decided it was high time to get working on my piece(s) for the February Table Scraps monthly challenge at Joy’s blog. I had been tossing around ideas and colors all month. One night, just as I was drifting off to sleep, some fabric popped into my head, and I knew what I wanted to do. The fabric? Some Mardi Gras fat quarters that my friend Angie had sent me a couple years ago. They have cute little masks and fleur de lis on them in purple, yellow/gold and green.

Cousin Kim and I cut the fabric in 4.5” squares and then surrounded them with a 1.5” frame. From the colored “solids” (the yellows weren’t exactly solid, but was what we had) we cut 6.5” squares. 


Our plan was to alternate the solid and framed blocks somehow, but nothing seemed to work quite right. We didn’t want single colored placemats, so this is what we ended up with. We just sandwiched the top and back right sides together and added the same size batting to the back. Then we stitched around, leaving a small hole for turning right sides out and stitched the opening closed as we topstitched the perimeter. Just the same way I make kennel quilts! Anyway, then we took 3.25 minutes to quilt them (hehe). They aren’t the most stylish placemats ever, but they really look nice with my yellow plates sitting on them! Do I have a picture of that? Of course not! That would’ve taken some forethought. 

My last picture is of a possible maybe might happen glacially slow idea that could be a project down the road. Possibly. Definitely not a Squirrel. 

It started when Cousin Kim was telling me that she had an old 2004 magazine that she was recently flipping through that had a pieced quilt project using good old-fashioned chenille  “like they used to make bedspreads out of. Too bad we can’t get chenille like that anymore.” Silly me piped up, “Oh! I have a whole tub of chenille bedspreads and fabric I need to use up! Probably enough for 2-3 quilts at least!” (You know where this is going, right?) 


So, we dropped everything, raided the bin, selected our colors and block size and started cutting. Within a half hour my studio looked like it had snowed. Fuzz everywhere. This is not going to be fast, or even necessarily fun. I predict all sorts of issues sewing thick layers. And quilting it? Oh, I don’t even want to think about it. But we’ll tackle another pile of cutting next week. And I’ll be doing a lot of vacuuming.

18 comments:

  1. Wow Cathy! So many great yellow things happening here. and the cats are darling .

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  2. I love your squirrel moments! And I can just imagine the fuzz all over from working with that chenille. I have two bears to make and I'm resisting starting them because I KNOW everything will be covered with fuzz.

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  3. It's so inspiring to see the Quilts for Kids projects each week - you go, girl!
    LOVE the placemats - so simple, but so effective!
    Have fun with the chenille. I know what you mean about using stuff up, even if you're not super-excited about the project. See: t-shirt quilts. ;-)

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  4. My goodness, Cathy! You were SEW productive this week (month.) Fun surprises were mixed in with those YELLOW quilts, too! You and Cousin Kim did a good job with your TABLE SCRAPS Challenge project. SEW much fun to work with a friend (or relative!)

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  5. I love your Yellow Thang! Such a study in what can happen when you use up parts and pieces with a bit of thought to balance and shading! Fantastic! I’m looking forward to the wishing rings quilt! Ps..thanks for the yellow bits that you sent!

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  6. Ah Chenille! the only thing worse is minky! Having discovered the cats like to nest in it I got a couple of yards and made them several basket size mats and a couple of throws for round the house. They love them but oh my, the fuzzies are everywhere!
    I had to vacuum out the bobbin area and behind/under/around the sewing machine only to have DDH ask, what all that was on my sweater a few hours later! foo!
    It's like finding kitties favorite secret spot at the back of the towels and its all covered in a mat of furz.

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  7. Yellow Thang looks like it was planned that way. You definitely have a talent for putting orphan blocks and leftovers together. Better make sure you clean out the bobbin area of your machine each time you sew the chenille. It's likely to fill up fast. And I can celebrate getting my Covid shot this morning. Totally unexpected since most folks around here are waiting more than a month using the State website if they can even got an appointment. I won't bore you with the details, but I'm certainly relieved to have gotten it done.
    Pat

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  8. Cousin Kim sounds like my kind of friend! Come on over and give me a hand on a project and then, before anyone knows it, down the rabbit hole with another (even larger!) project. What fun! Enjoyed the ride on this post, Cathy! Have a good date with the vacuum! Tee!Hee!

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  9. What an amazing amount of yellow quilts, blocks and placemats you have made. You have been very creative using the yellow leftovers donated for your Quilts for Kids. Don’t envy your latest project with the chenille bedspreads. We had those at home when I was growing up - along with eiderdowns.

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  10. Beautiful quilts for a great cause, you did an amazing job! Congrats Cathy!!
    Love the yellow blocks you made during February, well done!!
    You and Cousin Kim did a good job with the table placemats.

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  11. Your quilts for QFK are so fun! I love zooming in to see the fun scraps you've put in them. I so agree about the round robin project - it has taken a life of its own at my house, too, and I slowed way down on the most recent round. Good luck with the chenille project, Cathy and Kim!

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  12. Hi Cathy! I am outright laughing at the MONSTER project you've created. And for the log cabin block to give you such a headache and be a PIA. I know you aren't thrilled with the navy fabric . . . but I think it looks fabulous. I love how you wrangled it into a more rectangle shape (that was my PLAN originally, too), and totally agree with the next round needing more of that pretty green. {{Hugs}} I think this monster project is turning out just great. You might even say easy peasy. ~smile~ Roseanne

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  13. Oh dear - I'm picturing the kitties after a quiet stroll through all that chenille floof... (Static is not our friend)

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  14. What lovely yellow blocks! You had a productive month.

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  15. Well, those solids with the zigzag black/white are the squirrel you've sent across my path today. I'm in the mood for something modernish.....The Yellow Thangs turned out very well....And I love the small world story!

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  16. I love seeing all your yellow projects...so happy and sunny! Be careful with those chenille quilts. You know the cats will claim them in all their linty softness. And how fun for you to meet a Maasai lady in the vaccine line! The world is small, indeed :)

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  17. Applique works well with chenille. I top stitch on turned edge applique and the stitching disappears. I’ve made some small rugs (panda and bunnies) this way. meanwhile, I left a comment for the other Cathy and she probably doesn’t expect anything I say to make sense anyway.

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