Pages

Monday, February 21, 2022

Round Robin #6 - Shoo Fly

Can you believe that it's already the final round of the Stay at Home Round Robin!  Or final host is Chris of Chrisknits and she chose Shoo Fly. A great traditional block to end on!

After the applique round, I had already added a small border.  I figured out how many 6" Shoo Fly blocks I needed and sat down to figure out fabrics.  I was running out of background (Cat Scratch in S'more) so I needed to be careful.  I ended up choosing to use the same centers for all the Shoo Fly blocks, and it was the same center that I used as the center of the Friendship Stars.  I used a light print from Fancy Feathers line for the HSTs as kind of a second background fabric for these blocks.


So here is my top after all six rounds!  It needs an outer border, but I am completely out of my background fabric now, so I'm not sure what to do.  Substitute a similar-looking fabric and hope it's not obvious?  Skip a border and just bind in dark purple?  Other suggestions?  I'd love opinions!  


 


Have you been sewing along?  I hope you've had as much fun as I have!  Chris has the linky this week, and we'll be back on March 21st for the Stay At Home Round Robin Parade.  Finished top or finished quilt, or even still in progress, all are welcome!  Thanks again to Gail for coming up with such a fun event, and to all my other co-hosts.  Be sure to visit them all:

Monday, February 14, 2022

Round Robin #5 - Applique (or Rail Fence)

Welcome back to the Stay At Home Round Robin!  This week, it is up to our mastermind Gail of Quilting Gail what we add to our quilts.  And for the first time, there are two official options for your row!  Gail initially chose applique, and then later we added an option.  So you choose: applique or rail fence.

You may recall that after Wendy's signature block round, I left my corners open for this round.  It's not a big space, but I have room for some applique flowers.  I used a new-to-me Accquilt die that I got for Christmas to cut the flowers.  All fabrics are from Island Batik's Fancy Feathers collection; there is a dark turquoise in the collection that I used for the leaves.  


In preparation for our final round, I did add a border.  It finishes off this round nicely.
 


If you are sewing along, Gail has the linky this week for your applique or rail fence round.  And be sure to check out each of the hosts:

Tuesday, February 8, 2022

Round Robin #4 - Signature Blocks

Welcome back to the Stay at Home Round Robin!  This week we turn to Wendy of Pieceful Thoughts of My Quilting Life.  Wendy to tell us what to add.  She picked Signature Blocks.  Here's where I left off after last week's star round:

I knew that mathematically, I probably needed a border before adding the next round.  When Accuquilt dies were on deep sales just before Christmas, I bought both Companion sets for my 8" Cube.  The Angles set has a shape for 4" (finished) signature blocks, so I knew that I would use that, and therefore my needed to be divisible by four, which helped me figure out what size to make my border.


Then it was on to the signature blocks!  I decided to use the same fabric for all the corners.  I have a limited amount of my background fabric so I'm trying to conserve it. The purples are all from Island Batik's Fancy Feathers collection and my background fabric is Island Batik blender Cat Scratch in S'more. You will notice that I don't have corners on this border.  I decided to leave the corners open for the next round.  If you are worried about your quilt getting too big, using corners for a different round is one way to keep it from growing too fast.  


Be sure to check out the other hosts to see how they used signature blocks!  We are now halfway through the rows--though if you count the center, we're a bit more than halfway through. 

Monday, February 7, 2022

Busy City - Row by Row blog hop (plus giveaway!)

Welcome to my stop on Island Batik's Row by Row blog hop!  Our challenge was to create a row by row quilt, with the following prompt: Row by Row quilts are quilts made up of rows of quilt blocks or components with each row distinct from the others. The Row by Row quilt can be any theme, any combination of blocks, and can include appliqué. I was sent the collection Citified, designed by Kathy Engle for Sherry Shish of Powered by Quilting. Citified is a beautiful mix of oranges, blues, purples, and whites.

 

The products featured in this post were given to me by Island Batik, Schmetz, Hobbs, &Aurifil,

 


I was inspired by the name Citified to make a city. The first row I thought about was a construction site. Every growing city has lots of construction! I knew the wide variety of oranges would be perfect for construction trucks. I used printable coloring sheets to get the basic shapes I wanted. I have a Crayola light-up pad that I use whenever I need to trace anything and it was really helpful! I can't trace or cut a circle to save my life, but luckily my Accuquilt train die has circles; I used those for the wheels of my construction equipment.

 

Cities also have traffic, so I made a row of cars! I got the Cute Car die for Christmas (Thanks Mom!) and this was a perfect time to use it! I love this die and know I will use it lots in the future.


Of course, people live in the city, so I needed some houses. There are lots of house patterns out there. I used the Missouri Star Quilt Company tutorial for Jenny Lane, but only made enough houses for one row. This was my only pieced row; the others are all applique.


A peek into the process

Those first three ideas for rows came pretty quickly, but then I wasn't sure what else to add. After thinking about different options, I decided my city really needed a park!  There was a really great light blue with dots that would make a fabulous pond, and I could put fish in the pond. And of course the park needed trees and a playground. I kept thinking of things I could add, like kites and dogs. I traced or free-handed most of the park elements, though the trees were cut with my Accuquilt. 

 

Pond with fish

Every park needs a playground!

Doggies!
 

The sashing is my absolute favorite part of this!  I knew a city would need roads.  I also assumed this would be a kid's quilt, so roads would make it a perfect play quilt.  I used my son's Matchbox cars to decide the width of the roads!  I saved one of the orange fabrics from the collection, Cheerios in Cantaloupe, for the dashed line in the road and paired it with the dark gray solid.

I'm told that the top row is experiencing rush hour (not a traffic jam)

I named this Busy City, inspired by Richard Scarry's Busytown.  We read a lot of Richard Scarry books and a family favorite is Cars and Trucks and Things That Go.  In that book, Goldbug, a small yellow bug, is hiding on each page for readers to find.  In a further homage to Richard Scarry, I added Goldbug to each row.  Can you find him??


All twenty fabrics from Citified are in Busy City, plus several of the the always-available Foundations fabrics.  The background is Sky, Goldbug is Mustard, there are trees of Chameleon and Pine Needles, Large Netting in Sand for the dirt piles at the construction site, and there are wheels of both solid gray and black on the various vehicles.


Busy City measures 45" x 48".  With so many different fabrics in the applique rows, I used a lot of different Aurifil threads!  I count twelve different colors, not including the 2615 Aluminum used for piecing and 2770 Very Light Delft used for the quilting.  Schmetz super nonstick needles are fabulous when I've used fusible web, which I did for all of this, because they slide right through the fabric and do not get gummy at all. The batting is Hobbs bleached 80/20.

Regular readers will not at all be surprised to learn that Fire Monkey, my 8-year-old son, has claimed this quilt.  He frequently plays with his cars & trucks after bed time as a way of quieting himself down for sleep, so Busy City will get lots of use!


To celebrate the Row by Row hop, I am hosting a giveaway.  I have three Stash Builder Rolls to give away.  Each roll has four strips of 5" by WOF beautiful Island Batik fabric.  That's a total of 1 2/3 yards of fabric! Leave me a comment to enter.  Comments can be anything, but if you need a prompt, tell me what in your city or town you would add to Busy City.  Entries accepted through the end of the day February 24th.  Additionally, Island Batik has a giveaway each week of the hop, check out their blog for the most recent, and check back each Friday for the new one.  

 
Be sure to check out Quilted Delights today to see what my fellow ambassador Leah made with Citified! And you can find the full hop schedule on this post.  


Wednesday, February 2, 2022

Row Row blog hop

This week marks the beginning of Island Batik's Row by Row blog hop.  Each Island Batik ambassador was sent one of the most recent fabric collections, arriving at fabric shops now, and was tasked with making a row by row quilt to highlight that collection.  The hop kicked off Monday.


I was sent the Citified Collection, designed by Kathy Engle for Sherry Shish of Powered by Quilting.  I will get to show you what I created next Monday, February 7th.  I'll give you a hint: I was inspired by the name of the collection!

Island Batik does a weekly giveaway during the hop so be sure to keep an eye on their blog for the newest giveaway.  They change each Friday.  Many of the ambassadors also have bonus giveaways, so be sure to look for those as you visit everyone!  Here is the full schedule:

January 31:

Jennifer Thomas, Curlicue Creations
Denise Looney, For the Love of Geese 

February 1:

Pamela Boatright, Pamela Quilts
Andi Stanfield, True Blue Quilts

February 2:

Megan Best, Bestquilter

February 3:

Maryellen McAuliffe, Mary Mack Made Mine
Brenda Alburl, Songbird Designs

February 7:

Emily Leachman, The Darling Dogwood
Leah Malasky, Quilted Delights

February 8:

Suzy Webster, Websterquilt
Connie Kauffman, Kauffman Designs

February 9:

Reed Johnson, Blue Bear Quilts

February 10:

Brianna Roberts, Sew Cute and Quirky
Sandra Starley, Textile Time Travels

February 14:

Michelle Roberts, Creative Blonde
Jane Hauprich, Stitch by Stitch Custom Quilting

February 15:

Claudia Porter, Create with Claudia

February 16:

Anorina Morris, Samelia’s Mum
Preeti Harris, Sew Preeti Quilts

February 17:

Elizabeth DeCroos, Epida Studio
Gail Renna, Quilt Haven Threads

February 21:

Gail Sheppard, Quilting Gail
Jennifer Fulton, Inquiring Quilter

February 22:

Mania Hatzioannidi, Mania for Quilts
Lisa Pickering, Lisa’s Quilting Passion