Wrapping Up the Turquoise & Teal Blocks

The last teal/turquoise/aqua block has been added to the June collection for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. This is my 16" Scraptastic Star block.

Scraptastic Star, pattern by Melissa Corey

Here are both of my Scraptastic Star blocks for this month, which will finish at 16" and 12".

I love looking at all the colors of these blocks together on the design wall. Here are my 16" blocks.

Since it is the end of the month, I put all my teal and turquoise RSC blocks up on the wall together. Besides the two Scraptastic Stars, there are two Spinning Boxes blocks and five Country Lanes blocks for the Squared Away sampler. Lots of blue-green loveliness!

I am linking up with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge on Saturday and at Oh Scrap! over at Quilting is more fun than Housework on Sunday. Be sure to check out all of the wonderful projects that everyone is sharing! 

Julie in GA

It's a Finish! Positive/Negative Baby Quilt

Positive/Negative baby quilt
40" x 48"

Some favorite fabrics

This quilt was a rush job to get finished in time for a baby shower tonight (Friday.) Working with all neutrals was a challenge for me, but I hope the parents-to-be will be happy with it. You can read more about the design and construction process in THIS POST.

Quilt back--all flannels

Linking up to:

Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation
Let's Make Baby Quilts at Michelle's Romantic Tangle

Whoop Whoop Friday at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Oh Scrap! at Quilting is more fun than Housework

Julie in GA

15 Minutes and Stash Report Sunday 6/24/18

It has been a busy week with most of my quilting time devoted to a baby quilt that must be finished by Friday. I shared the blocks HERE. I finished piecing the top and made a back for it two days ago. Now I am working on the machine quilting. Today is my last day of vacation; it's back to work tomorrow. I need to get as much machine quilting done today as I can stand!

2018 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                   3.75 yards

Used year to date:                39.5 yards

Added last week:                    0.0 yards
Added year to date:              23.0 yards
Net used year to date:      16.5 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. There has been lots of quilting time over the past week. If I had kept track, I'm sure it would have been totals of hours rather than minutes each day. Vacation time is the best!

15 Minute Challenge:  
6/17 - 6/23              7 of 7 days
2018 Total         168 of 174 days

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate, and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch challenge at Life in Pieces.

Julie in GA

Teal and Turquoise Scraptastic Star

Most of my quilting time this week has been focused on a baby quilt that needs to be done by next Friday, but I did squeeze in enough time to make one of the teal/turquoise Scraptastic Star blocks. This block was made from 2" squares and finishes at 12". I hope to get the larger Scraptastic Star block done before next Saturday.

Scraptastic Star
pattern by Melissa Corry

I am linking up with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge on Saturday and at Oh Scrap! over at Quilting is more fun than Housework on Sunday. Be sure to check out all of the wonderful projects that everyone is sharing! 

Julie in GA

A New Project!

After spending way too much time agonizing over choices for a baby quilt that needs to get done SOON, I have finally made some decisions and gotten to work on it. Everything I have seen on the baby registry has been in very neutral colors, so I decided to go that direction for the baby quilt. It is a new experience for me, but I'm happy with how the quilt is coming together.

Wilmington's "Silver Lining" Essentials

Gingiber's "Catnip" by Moda

I started with two packs of 10" squares that I bought recently in Paducah, Wilmington's "Silver Lining" Essentials and Gingiber's "Catnip by Moda.  I like the colors and the prints, but felt the need to include a wider variety of fabrics, which meant pulling the rest of the fabrics from my stash. I ended up making 32 blocks, 2 fabrics per block, and none of the fabrics were repeated. Only 30 blocks will be used in the quilt top.

I have seen several variations on this block, including the recent Magical Mystery QAL hosted by Libby and the Disappearing Half-Square Triangle by Aby. I started out by making a test block to be sure my plan would work. The first step is to match up 10" squares into pairs with right sides together, one light and one dark. Draw a diagonal line corner to corner on the back of the light square, stitch 1/4" from each side of that line, cut on the marked line, then press to make two large half-square triangles. Trim HSTs to 9.5".

The next part is easiest to do on a rotating cutting mat or a small mat that you can pick up and turn. Cut 2.5" from the outer edges of all four sides of the large HST without moving any of the fabric pieces. My pieces in this photo were moved out from the center so you can see the cutting lines.

All you do now is swap the two side rectangles plus the top and bottom rectangles. This will result in all seams joining the light fabric to the dark fabric, never light to light or dark to dark.

Put the block together like a nine-patch. I joined the horizontal rows first, pressing the top and bottom rows toward the center rectangles and the center row toward the side rectangles. When I joined the three rows together, I pressed the seams away from the center of the block. Each pair of 10" squares will produce two blocks.

I made my blocks in groups of 8, then put them up on the design wall in a random order, as shown in the next photo. 

After switching blocks around to get a better balance of colors, this is my current layout. 

I will look at it again tomorrow and decide if I am ready to sew the blocks together. I have only 8 days until the baby shower to finish this quilt, so I can't spend much time fussing with the arrangement of blocks. There's no time to waste!

Linking up to:

Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation
Let's Make Baby Quilts at Michelle's Romantic Tangle

Whoop Whoop Friday at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Finished or Not Friday at Busy Hands Quilts

Julie in GA

15 Minutes and Stash Report Sunday 6/17/18

I'm later than usual with my stash report, but that is because we just got back from a week's vacation. The main part of the vacation was a trip to visit family in Wisconsin, but it also included a stop at Hancock Fabrics of Paducah. My stash report is taking a hit, but I'm very happy with my purchases.

A variety of remnant pieces

Pieces of 1 yard or more

Layer cake of Wilmington "Silver Linings" Essentials

Layer cake of Gingiber's "Catnip" by Moda

The two layer cakes are going to be used for a baby quilt, probably with the addition of another color like yellow. Fortunately, I can offset most of the purchases with a little usage (1/4 yard) and 9 yards given away. The purchases total 13.5 yards. I'm still in the black!

2018 STASH TOTALS

Used/given away last week:    9.25 yards

Used year to date:                35.75 yards

Added last week:                    13.5 yards
Added year to date:                23.0 yards
Net used year to date:      12.75 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. I missed two days during the past week, but spent time hand stitching in the car on all of our travel days.

15 Minute Challenge:  
6/10 - 6/16              5 of 7 days
2018 Total         161 of 167 days

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate, and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch challenge at Life in Pieces.

Julie in GA

Teal and Turquoise Spinning Boxes

Another Saturday means another chance to share my latest blocks for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I made two Spinning Boxes blocks from my teal and turquoise scraps for June.

Spinning Boxes 10" blocks
 tutorial/pattern HERE

I have enjoyed looking at all the different colors together on the design wall. My favorite way to set them is still on point, and I will need to come up with a plan for the setting triangles to finish it off.

I am linking up with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge on Saturday and at Oh Scrap! over at Quilting is more fun than Housework on Sunday. Be sure to check out all of the wonderful projects that everyone is sharing! 

Julie in GA

15 Minutes and Sunday Stash Report 6/10/18

Once again, I missed posting my stash report last Sunday and will be reporting on the last two weeks together. I have been working on a variety of projects, but none have used a large amount of fabric. Around Memorial Day weekend, I pulled out my Moda Blockheads project and finished up some more blocks, using 7/8 yard. I also made a set of blocks for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, the Squared Away blocks that were shared in yesterday's post, using a total of 3/8 yard.

For the first time in a couple of months, I bought new fabric last week. I am trying to come up with a design for a baby quilt for a friend, and grey is likely to be one of the main colors. I picked up two 1/2 yard pieces on clearance, plus a bag of scraps and chunks. I'm counting it all as 1.5 yards added.

2018 STASH TOTALS

Used last week:                1.25 yards

Used year to date:             26.5 yards

Added last week:                 1.5 yards
Added year to date:              9.5 yards
Net used year to date:       17 yards

Kate's 15 Minutes to Stitch challenge at Life in Pieces has us tracking how many days each week we get in at least 15 minutes of quilting time. There have been several days over the past two weeks where my only quilting time happened on the morning train, but at least progress is being made!

15 Minute Challenge:  
5/27 - 6/9            14 of 14 days
2018 Total         156 of 160 days

Check out more stash reports at quiltpaintcreate, and join the 15 Minutes to Stitch challenge at Life in Pieces.

Julie in GA

Squared Away in Teal and Turquoise

I'm always happy when our Rainbow Scrap Challenge color assignment for the month is turquoise and teal. I love playing with those colors, the ones that are too green to be blue and too blue to be green. Unfortunately, quilting time has been hard to find recently, so I haven't gotten very far with my scraps.

I did manage to make this month's Squared Away blocks. Fortunately, it was a very quick and easy block called Country Lanes. I had intended to make only three blocks, but kept wanting to try different color combinations and ended up with five blocks instead. The two blocks at the bottom right share the same fabrics in different layouts. I can't decide which I like better!

Country Lanes blocks, 7.5" finished
Pattern at The Academic Quilter

I am linking up with the Rainbow Scrap Challenge on Saturday and at Oh Scrap! over at Quilting is more fun than Housework on Sunday. Be sure to check out all of the wonderful projects that everyone is sharing! 

Julie in GA

Beveled Blocks is Finished!

I have a recent finish to share--the Beveled Blocks quilt is finished! This was made as an anniversary gift for my husband after his suggestion that it would be nice to have a small quilt over the mantel in our living room. He also suggested that it have a 3D or optical illusion look. Here is a close look at the finished quilt...

Beveled Blocks
37.5" x 45"

and here it is hanging over the fireplace. There is quite a bit of blue in the room, and I chose the tan fabrics to work well with the wall color.

This quilt is based on the Beveled Blocks pattern from Aardvark Quilts. I reduced the block size from 12" to 7.5" to make it fit better in the available space. 

This old Hoffman Fabrics paisley was used for the backing, and all the quilting is in the ditch to help emphasize the optical illusion.

Linking up to:

Needle and Thread Thursday at My Quilt Infatuation

Whoop Whoop Friday at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

Finished or Not Friday at Busy Hands Quilts

Oh Scrap! at Quilting is more fun than Housework

Julie in GA

Design Wall Monday

When I sat down to write this blog post, I was very surprised to discover that my last Design Wall Monday post was from the end of April. Wow, what happened to May?! I've been working on several different quilt projects since then, but never got around to sharing my works in progress.

The Memorial Day holiday weekend inspired me to pull out my red, white & blue Moda Blockheads blocks. This was a block-of-the-week program that started in March, 2017 and ran until January, 2018. Six different Moda designers took turns sharing their block designs. I didn't start making blocks until June of last year, and they get worked on very sporadically. Several blocks got finished over the past week, and I decided to see how they all look together. The blocks all finish at 6".

Moda Blockheads, patterns available at the Moda blog

Blockheads 2 will be starting in just a few days. I haven't decided if I will continue making RWB blocks to add to this group, or if I will start with a whole new color scheme. Check out the Moda blog on Wednesday, June 6th if you want to join the fun.

I'm linking up to Design Wall Monday at Small Quilts and Doll Quilts, Monday Making at Love Laugh Quilt, and Moving It Forward at Em's Scrapbag.  Be sure to check out all of the wonderful projects that everyone is sharing! 

Julie in GA