Saturday, December 11, 2021

Rainbow Scrap and Christmas Quilt Finishes

We finally got our first snow of the season this week. YAY!! It began on Thursday morning and stopped about noon on Friday. The accumulation here on the valley floor was about 3-4 inches, and about double that up in the mountains at the ski resorts (who’ve had to resort to making snow before this week). We are thrilled. Unfortunately, our snow blower, which had no use last year, has the throttle stuck in the open position. Bruce couldn’t get it unstuck, so we’ll have to take it in for a tune-up. I shoveled the front walkway and some walking paths on the driveway, but our wonderful neighbors across the street (dad Jason, mom Jen and son Riker) came over early in the evening and shoveled the rest of our driveway and sidewalks. We love them to bits! So today we need to get more ice melt and take the snow blower somewhere. Fun (not!)

There was plenty of sewing this week. First, I finished the Christmas Presents quilt for myself. The only Christmas-themed quilt I’d ever made for us before was a jelly roll race quilt in my early days of quilting. It had a red Minky (cuddle cloth) backing and I quilted it on one of my old machines. I used red thread, a big mistake for a beginner. The quilting was hideous and there for everyone to see in glaring detail. Also, the tension was bad in places. But my granddaughter London loved it, so I gave it to her. And almost ten years later it’s still going strong. Go figure. 

So, here is the quilt. The pattern is a free one from Kate Spain called Flurry, after the fabric line she released at the same time. After I quilted and bound it, I threw it in the washer so I could use it asap. Luckily I remembered color catchers (2), because they came out very pink and there were some areas of bleeding on the front. I washed it again in cold with more color catchers and it all seemed to come out. Phew! The quilt is nice and crinkly now, but the quilting, which I was reasonably pleased with, is difficult to see.


Christmas Presents (such an original name, LOL) finished at 54.5” x 58.5” before laundering. I love the smaller size as a lap quilt for me. 

In the four red cornerstones, I stitched large flowers. 


In the center colored strip of the border I just used a serpentine stitch. The white strips on either side were quilted with a meandering vine interspersed with holly leaves and loops. You might need to click on the picture below to enlarge and see the detail.  Also, each “gift” had a different quilting motif (stars, stipple, ribbon candy loops), with only about 3 repeats. 


The horizontal and vertical sashings got either viney loops or viney hook curls. 


With that quilt finished, I moved on to assembling the Spring Star blocks I sewed all during the year for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. This quilt fought me every step of the way during assembly. The blocks had a variance of about 3/8” inch, which means I lost a lot of points in the trimming. I ended up starching the front and the cotton sheet backing before basting to get them as flat as I could. 


At this point, I just trusted the quilting and the washing/shrinking to take care of the rest. I quilted it with loops and it was fine, finishing at 48x60”.


As usual, this will go to Quilts for Kids.  The quilting is a simple meandering loop, and with the fold-over binding from the backing fabric, I was wishing that I’d made those black squares gray instead. But when I started the blocks back in January, I had no idea of what the eventual backing would be. 


Well, I’m late getting this posted on this Saturday morning. My son Ryan came for dinner last night (DIL Kim is in South Carolina visiting Easton in the Navy). Between the snow shoveling yesterday, cleaning the house (sometimes it just *has* to be done) and fixing dinner, I guess I was more tired than I realized!

Linking up to Scrappy Saturday.

14 comments:

  1. Your Christmas present quilt is lovely, Cathy! Looks comfy and cozy for covering up with on a snowy day! Your stars quilt is beautiful, too. Whoever ends up with it is going to love it and never notice those points!

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  2. I love your Christmas Presents quilt. Glad you managed to collect all the red colour seepage with the colour catchers they’re brilliant aren’t they? Your Spring Stars auikts is lovely too don’t worry about the not totally perfect points, only quilters point out their imperfections for others to notice! Nice that your son visited

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  3. Love the RSC stars quilt! And I made that same Christmas presents pattern long ago, though I think maybe the presents were bigger. It's very cute and I hope you enjoy snuggling up in it all season. Yay for snow!

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  4. The stars are bursting from black holes and I don’t think science is in any mood for a quilter to invent gray holes. And I envy your snowfall.

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  5. That Christmas Presents quilt turned out beautifully.. love those multi-colored bow on it...lovely quilting too.
    We had about 2" of snow last Thursday, but it has all melted in our 56 degree weather today and we are bracing for high winds and a cold front to come through around 11 tonight...
    Who was it that said:"If you don't like the weather, wait a minute!" sure is true here in the NE. Hugs julierose

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  6. Congrats on your TWO lovely quilt finishes this week, Cathy!! I still don't have a Christmas quilt. Maybe next year...

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  7. I think both quilts are beautiful! And thank you for the link to the free pattern. I'm adding it to my list of projects for next year.

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  8. Two gorgeous quilt finishes! Glad the color catchers helped with the red on the Christmas Presents quilt. Love the rainbow Spring Stars!

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  9. They're both fantastic! (And now I want to make a Presents quilt, too!)

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  10. Christmas presents is just darling! I love aqua as a holiday color; so fresh and modern. And your quilting looks great! I understand the frustration of losing some of the quilting detail in the crinkle process. Glad the dye bleeding was minor and fixable! Spring Stars turned out really great, too. The diagonal stripe binding is classic :)

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  11. Love the Christmas Presents quilt blocks. Think I may make a couple and turn them into throw pillows.

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  12. I love how the Flurry Christmas quilt turned out! The red & white candy cane border is a great finishing touch. I still have another jelly roll of Flurry I need to use up...

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  13. I like both quilts very much. Both bindings are great.

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  14. I really like the Presents quilt - made me think of the Grinch that I love to see at Christmas time. The colours are perfect.

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