Making out with BOB - the end

I don't think I ever showed this one off. But I assure you, it was finished during lent of 2012.
Making out with BOB (Bag of Blocks), made of sundry 'loose blocks' and fabric from stash, supplemented with newly printed Inklingo-shapes to make it all fit together.
There are 6" blocks, 4.5" blocks, old and new, hexagon flowers, triangles, and fabrics old and new.

... and I love it. Frankly, I do. It is simply quilted. Straight lines. On the machine. By me.
And it has become a favourite cuddle-up-on-the-couch quilt for everyone, because it is neither too big to be cumbersome or too small to be useless.

P.S. I used the pink-and-blue bunny-toile for the back. It is over the top and absolutely wonderful.

Making out with BOB - week 3.3

SO, after a few days with no stitching (paid work does interfere with the rest of one's life), I'm back to BOB, and to trying to make something.
And now, the ambition has become, that this one needs to become a finished, actually FINISHED quilt during Lent (and thus, before Easter), so the first stop is : The backing.
I am dithering between two fabrics. Both from stash. One is the 'Princess Diana' fabric, which I - for reasons that are at the present completely unclear to me - rushed out and bought back when the lady died.
The other is a sale-fabric from 1-2 years back.

So now I'm walking around myself, looking at both, draping the 'main blue' of the front across them, and trying to make a decision.
Any input?

Making out with BOB - week 3.2

And I give you : A finished top.
I decided to go with the blue borders, and it looks ... good! Makes the blocks and the pink inner border pop better. At least I think so :-)

Took me just two weeks to get here too!
I can't remember when last I worked this fast.
Of course, all the blocks were there already, and that speeds up the process immensely. Now comes the big question : Can I keep it up until I have an actual finished quilt?
Well, I intend to give it my best. Just not these coming 24 odd hours, because there are things like paid-work which needs doing :-)

 BUT, stay tuned all the same. You never know :-)

Making out with BOB - week 3

 Hard decisions to make : 

Do I add blue corners to make the corners 90 degrees, or don't I?

Do I add a blue border all the way around or don't I?

It will definitely, eventually, be bound by the blue batik, but:

Will there be a border?
If 'yes', how wide?

I find myself at the point where I worry a bit, whether adding to it will detract from it. As a carpenter freind once taught me 'if it gets any better, it'll go to pot'. The trick is to know when you hit that particular point.

So far I am surprised - in the best possible way - by how well it is turning out.

Making out with BOB - week 2.7

Closing in on having a finished top.

Making out with BOB - week 2.6

So, here they are, two rows of hexagon-flowers stitched together. The two strips are not joined to each other, just a mock-up, and ... looking good.

If they don't work with the quilt, I will have a lovely table-runner for spring.

Making out with BOB - week 2.5

 Not much visual difference to the main body compared to previous posts, but the edge has been trimmed, and there is a pink strip added all around.

Making out with BOB - week 2.4

SO, triangles are printed (using the Inklingo 3" Diamond collection), and here's the mock-up.

I think this will work.
Next step : Get the top and bottom strips joined into strips instead of just being a mock-up on a design wall.

Making out with BOB - week 2.3

Don't get too used to see me posting every day, it's just ... I seem to be on a roll with this one, and have - so far - had time to actually work on it, AND take pictures, AND write on this blog.
The really shocking thing about this is, that if you work on a project, it will progress !

The 'Tilde has time to quilt'-thing can change at the drop of a hat, but until that happens, I'll post my daily progress, or, if I think that is too little to merit interest, post 'something else'.

... now ... where was I ... yes ... something to make it longer.

A search through BOB brought forth 16 Hexagon flowers, each with 3" finished sides ... they are remnants of a project I don't remember even thinking of doing, but made with Inklingo (so they are no more than 5 years old). I can see that I used the now sold-out CD-1, but the 1" Hexagons and 1" Diamonds are available as downloads.
They look sort-of nice as they are placed above and below the body of the quilt, so I think I'll print some 3" Inklingo 60-degree triangles, in both the pink and the blue setting-fabric and use 14 of the 16 to make top and bottom borders of this one.

If all goes to pot, or the two elements don't work well together, I can always make a table-runner from the flowers.

Making out with BOB - week 2.2

All together now.
... and I could just end it here.
As is, it is 42.5 x 51". Not a huge quilt by any standards, but ... I think it could do with becoming just a tad taller ... ideally somewhere between 60 and 65" tall ... that would give a fair balance with the 'just over 40" wide' ... I think.
I'll go dig into BOB and see if anything (else) suitable hides in there. If there isn't anything bright and batik-y, I'll end the party here.

Making out with BOB - week 2

AND log-cabining is done, and one half of the blocks has been stitched together.

... this is going to be a cutie of a quilt, even if I say so myself :-) Who would have thunk that BOB hid such cuteness. Not me, that's for certain :-) but it seems it did.
Onward and forward!

Making out with BOB - week 1.5

The first eight 4.5" (and 5") blocks have been log-cabined, setting squares AND setting triangles have been printed and cut, and the mock-up is on the design-wall.

 And the Yep's have it.

Oh, and I've been asked if the cross that is formed by the larger blocks was by design (seeing that this is my personal challenge for lent), and the answer is, that it is happenstance (or serendipity). There were 10 blocks that were 6" square, and this was the way they looked the best (to my eyes).

Making out with BOB - week 1.4

And then I remembered the mostly pink batik with butterflies. Whatever block colours that are not found in the mottled blue, are, most definitely in the pink.
And I remembered that Linda Franz has two collections out with HST (Half Square Triangles) and QST (Quarter Square Triangles) the size that works with 4.5" and 6" blocks set on point.
I'll use the 6" On-Point Triangles for this one.
This too will work.

Making out with BOB - week 1.3

I think this blue batik (which was bought to go with Sunflowers, but seemed too washed out when it arrived and said Sunflowers were laid upon it for scrutiny), will play nicely with all the blocks.

Most of the block-colours are in there anyway :-)
But since these blocks are in all sizes I'll start by log-cabin'ing them.
Log-cabin / border strips, cut at 1.25" wide should work.
... or I could just print them with Inklingo. I've got the 0.75" wide Log Cabin collection that will make the 4.5" blocks into 6" ones.
Yep. Inklingo 0.75" LogCabin collection will do the trick.
... I'll cut the squares, all on my own.

Making out with BOB - week 1.2

10 Dear Jane and Dear Hannah blocks, all 6" finished size.
2 Jeanna Kimball applique blocks, both 5" size
A single Heart and Hand applique-block, 4.5" size
17 Dear Jane and Dear Hannah blocks, all 4.5" size
... now, if I can find the right fabric with which to set them, this could become an ... interesting quilt ... I think ... hope ... um ... well ... I'll go looking through my stash.

Making out with BOB - week 1

Lent starts today, and lasts until Easter (April 4th)
Well, it does in my corner of Christianity.
And traditionally, one 'gives up something' for lent. The eating of certain food-stuffs. A minor (or major) indulgence one usually allows oneself.

So, what about a quilty lent? I used to be a proponent of not buying any new quilty stuff during lent, but really, the economy can do with our business, so I won't suggest that. But seeing that lent is also about being frugal, about meditating on what has and has not been done, about facing one's failings and shortcomings and trying to do something positive about it, that is what I plan to do.

In a corner of my sewing-room, I have a bag, which is bursting at the seams. Really. Bursting!
 

It is full of odd blocks. All different sizes, fabrics, styles.
And for a short, mad, moment, I considered making a list of all of them, and publish the list here.
I gave that one up. When I hit 30 different styles/types of blocks, I stopped counting.

BUT, here's a small selection:
Quite a few of them are Dear Jane and Dear Hannah (and similar) blocks. Christmas-swap blocks (25). Signature-swap blocks (123). Various "I'll try making this a different way" blocks (42). 6" mostly-Jane blocks made with batiks (10)

There are Quilted Diamonds (28) that never made it into "The Advantages of Natural Folly" or, indeed, into the "Two inches wide" quilt-let.

There are Nearly Insane blocks (5), which were made to test if I could do them on a sewing-machine (I can, but I don't like to) ... there is just about any and every style, size and colouration block you can think of.

SO: My challenge to me, this lent, is to make something of as many blocks as possible that are currently languishing in BOB. Finish something from it !
And I'll be using my sewing-machine to do it.
I will.
Really !
Wish me luck.

A Finished Quilt !!!

Yes, dear Reader, I am proud to tell you, that I have FInally finished my TeaRoses.

Quilted by Sue Baddley of Summit Creek Quilts.
And as of a two days ago, it now also has a binding :-)

AND as of today, there's even pictures :-)

Front of the quilt

And the pieced backing, using remains of the collection I used for the flowers

A corner-view

Sort-of close-up of the quilting. I chose an all-over, because I don't like my quilts too stiff. A good custom-job would probably be extremely beautiful, but also make the quilt really stiff and unyieldy. I like it as it is.

Sunflowers on the Design Wall

SO, I am stalling at 21 Sunflowers. Yes, yes, yes, I know there are only 19 in the picture, but that's because the two not in the picture are not on the design-wall right now :-)
And, as you can see, the Sunflowers are separated into two different groups.

The differences between the groups isn't as clear on the pictures as they are in real life, so you'll have to take my word for it, that the (so-far) smaller group is very ... clear cut, compared to the (so-far) larger group.
It isn't that one group is beautiful and the other is not, it is just that ... one (the larger) is much more ... fuzzy in the lines.

What I'm thinking right now is, that I'm looking at two small/ish quilts, both with 12 blocks. The ... clear-cut one to be made with a white/neutral background, the more fuzzy-around-the-edges one with the many-coloured green I bought for background for the Sunflowers.

Hit and miss

Well. Sometimes I learn old things. Things I knew (if I stopped to think), things that I should have considered. With this block, the lesson that has been taught (again) is : when using small-ish bits to make a block, don't use fabrics with a large-ish pattern ... at least not if you want the bits to 'read' right.
I like the Sunflower proper here. I do not like the outermost triangles. They don't really work with the rest. After seeing it finished and on the design-wall, I actually considered frog-stitching the outermost row of triangles and setting something else in there, BUT, they stay. I don't mind that my quilts are not picture perfect, and that stupid choices and teaching-blocks are visible.
And let me tell you, it looks a lot less messy on the picture compared to real life.
The magic of photographs ...

Sunflower # 20

I like this one. Really like it. The blue innermost triangles work well here (me thinks) and the general brightness of the block ... what can I say. Love it :-)