Sewing a Blue Streak

While the snow is gently falling outside (may I say.... FINALLY!!!), I’ve gathered up my sewing progress pictures for the week and am ready to blog! My supervisor Darla is deftly pacing back and forth here in front of the big computer screen, raising an occasional paw to catch  the cursor. When she tires of it, she will perch on the back of the chair to read over my shoulder. I’m so lucky to have such great support!

Starry, Starry Day is now a completed quilt. YAY!!  

It finished at 72x78”. The batting is Warm and Plush cotton, and the quilting is just simple wavy lines. I did wash it before photographing. I just love how it has a lit-from-within look radiating out from the yellow center.

The binding was a simple orange and white print, and the backing was pieced from random fat quarters and pieces that have aged well (and too long) in my stash. This was a Rainbow Scrap project from 2017 and is my first finish of this year.

I will be sharing this finish and post with Rainbow Scrap Saturday, Oh Scrap!, OMG - One Monthly Goal, and the 2018 Finish Along as the link-ups come online.

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Once Starry, Starry Day was done, it was back to sewing blue scraps.  I made two blocks for the 2018 Rainbow Scrap Challenge Sampler, Squared Away. 

The next block is the beginning of a new quilt for me, and it will combine two blocks; the birds  plus an Irish Chain block. Irish Chains have been on my bucket list for a long time, and I will start off with a single chain in this quilt to create a lattice effect. The background of the quilt is Kona White, and the lattice will be Kona Ocean, the deep blue in the fabric of the body of the bird.

In fact, it is that fabric that I fell in love with. I ordered yards and yards of it last spring to be the inspiration for this quilt. It’s called Maggie Jean and is from the Frolic line by one of my very favorite fabric designers, Tamara Kate. The birds will all be made in coordinating rich blues, greens, pinks, and warm orange-yellows. I found a free bird pattern at Quilting Support, and also ordered the Feathers pattern from The Scrap Basket. I looked at both, but used neither. The Feathers pattern was poorly written and made an 8” finished block. The Quilting Support pattern made a 12” finished block. I needed a 10” block to work with the 10” Irish Chain alternate block, so I drafted my own in a similar style. Half the birds will face right, the other half left. I will show more detail as I complete more birds and chain blocks.  This quilt will definitely be for me. I originally drafted my pattern to be 50x70” plus borders (probably 60x80”), but I may go larger and turn it into a queen bed size. Time will tell.

And then all my blue scraps got sewn into these 12 miscellaneous 6.5” (unfinished) blocks; three nine-patches, one block of half-square triangles, and the others being crumb blocks. They will join all the other 6.5” blocks in the Parts Departments for eventual inclusion into either kennel quilts, baby quilts or who knows what....

And next up on the design board is Hot Rods, a quilt for my brother Steve. The fabrics are all here and I am playing around with them and letting ideas percolate. Lots of accent colors are being auditioned. The larger motifs have been cut up and will be trimmed and framed. This one is going to have to lead me instead of me leading it. 

The only part I am not enjoying is that my dear brother is hovering too much and weighing in on every.little.thing. I know he’s excited, but geez. I know what I’m doing (for the most part, LOL). Anyway, this project may end up going on vacation with me next month just so I can think in peace. 

Speaking of thinking, I think that wraps it up for this past week. Oh! Just one more thing. I often get questions from No-Reply bloggers. Often I am slow to reply, but I do get there. So if you don’t hear back from me, it’s because I have no way to contact you. So be sure to either include your email address in your comment, or update your account. Bonnie Hunter has full information on how to correct your No Reply status HERE.

Another Blue Saturday

It’s been a good week of seeing family visiting from out of town and getting things done.    The weather has been mild (for a mountain valley winter), with highs averaging in the high forties and no snow.

Bruce and I have taken to mall-walking. We love it! Fashion Place Mall is about a mile from our house, and any time between 7am - 10am when the mall opens, you can find lots of people walking. The mall plays great music and there are two coffee shops that are open and a lot of old-timers congregate there afterwards. There are even parents and grandparents walking babes in strollers. And I love when we run into (metaphorically speaking) someone we know! Once the weather is nice, we’ll switch to walking in the neighborhood and at Wheeler Farm, a block from our house.

Anyway, there was also a lot of sewing happening this week. I have linked up to the Scrappy Saturday blog party and you can see lots of great blue happenings there. January is for our light-to-mid range blue scraps. 

These are my two Linked Squares blocks for January. I saw a quilt with these blocks in it on Pinterest, but there was no linked site or instructions, so I just figured it out on my own. The finished blocks will measure 16” and be set 4x5 in a rainbow quilt. I won’t use sashing, so it  should measure 64x80” when done. I’m thinking it will be a great 2018 start and finish for a donation purposes.

Next I tackled my selvages. Selvages reproduce in the dark, you know. They grow like mint in your garden. You can’t get rid of them. So, I made ten 6.5” squares of light blue selvages. The rest are going into a baggie, and at the end of the year I’ll give them away with my other color selvage leftovers.  

And finally I began some 6.5” quarter square log cabins. I had done several of these last year in mixed colors, trying to alternate light and dark colors. It was a failed experiment, and they reside in the parts department where they will eventually find a home in a donation quilt. In the meantime, here are my ten light blue (with some medium blue) quarter logs:

And since the logs and the selvages are the same size, I had to mix them just to see what that looked like. Hmmmm..... Well, they’re not really meant to go together, and this is still just January. My guess is that I’ll have plenty of both blocks by fall to make separate quilts. 

And then this happened this week...... Starry, Starry Day is a finished flimsy that is sandwiched and ready to be quilted. 

I’ll do that on Bernadette (my Bernina 550QE, returned from her annual “spa” treatment) this week. I haven’t decided on a quilting pattern yet, but I’m leaning toward simple lines or even ditch quilting. I think the only thing that would actually ruin it would be too too much (like matchstick) quilting. 

I’m so excited to have this one nearly complete and am planning on the reveal next weekend.