Finished! I Spy Scrap Quilts

I've been using the Jelly Roll Race pattern when I have various lengths of 2 1/2 strips of I Spy fabrics leftover.  In the process of making several, I've decided I don't actually like this pattern for using up scraps and I plan to try something different as my next batch builds up.

In the meantime, though, I had this one in progress and it is now two quilts and both are finished!  My friend Snow gave me a big bag of 2 1/2" strip scraps, most of them I Spy.  I sorted them into two  piles, mostly just separating out anything on the girly side and anything with several scraps of the same fabric.  The first I finished at the end of last year, leaving the one with the girly-er fabrics.

One of the things I don't like about the Jelly Roll Race pattern with scraps is that it is hard to get the finished size and proportions to work out.  That was one of my issues with this one.  I thought about just cutting off the last few rows and using that bit to start another one, but at that point the disorganized look of the JRR was getting to me (my second big issue with JRR) and I wanted to be done with it.  So I ripped the center seam to turn this one into two quilts.  They were a bit small, so I added borders.

Since the fabric I used for the setting squares was purple and sparkly and also all used up, I found a nice purple in the donation pile at a Project Linus meeting and used that for one of the quilts.  I used an aqua floral for the other, also a PL donation.  I hated that floral fabric!  I should have realized it wasn't 100% cotton and it frayed like crazy.  I donated the leftovers back to PL, maybe someone else will have better luck with it!

I did straight line quilting between the rows of the aqua floral quilt, then tried a free motion quilting design I've been doodling in hopes of mastering on the border.  I'm not satisfied with how it looks and am still not sure that FMQ is something that I am going to master.

I'm much happier with the quilting on the purple quilt.  I used the wave stitch on my machine down the lengthwise rows, and used a variegated thread with purples and pinks in it.

These two will be donated to the Charlotte chapter of Project Linus at our June meeting.  This was project #10 on my list of Q2 goals for the finish along with global hosts.

I will also link up with Cynthia's Oh Scrap! at Quilting Is More Fun Than Housework.  (Ain't that the truth!)