Showing posts with label Crumb Along. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Crumb Along. Show all posts

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Crumb Quilt top finished ... almost

This is the top created as part of Jo's Crumb-Along.  It's got a bunch of the blocks she suggested we make, along with orphan blocks that I received in swaps or donations, or made as tried new techniques. (Example:  the wonky log cabins at the bottom.)

I'm going to have to sit down tonight and do some frogging. The whole left side - the one with the numbers - is messed up. I couldn't figure out until I took the picture why it was ruffly. Turns out I measured something wrong, and had forced it to fit. If I just take out one piece it'll fit perfectly.

But here it is!  Voilá!

(The English teacher in me wants to point out that it's NOT "walla" or "wa la."  It's voilá.  It's French.)

Once I get that side sewn on correctly, I'll sandwich it and probably hand tie it. I'm going to be house-sitting for a friend for two weeks beginning November 10, and can take that with me to have something to do while I watch TV. 

Sunday, October 30, 2011

Evidence of a busy weekend

Except for a few breaks to eat lunch, I had two busy days at the sewing machine.

This is the beginnings of my Crumb-Along quilt. Today I made the entire alphabet - it's stacked on top of everything.  I sewed them into "words" of 4 or 3 - and found myself singing my ABCs all day!  In addition to the blocks I made following Jo's directions, I've added about a dozen "orphan" blocks from the orphan basket. Not in the photo are several dozen small stars from which I'll make a couple more rows.  Then I'll add a red border like Jo did, then the alphabet and any other stars needed to fill in the blanks.  I should have a flimsy completed by Tuesday!



This is the October blocks for the Bloggers' Block of the Month.  This one comes from Vicki of Field Trips in Fiber. The process was a bit different - no HSTs to cut, and therefore a bit of waste. But I put all the waste HSTs in my HST bag (which is getting stuffed - another project to do!)


These are the 68 5.5" string blocks I made earlier in the week, waiting to be trimmed.


Done.  Trimmed to 5.5" and ready to be used in yet another project.

Tomorrow:  Water aerobics, then lunch, then work on my Crumb-Along quilt.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Log Cabins for Jo's Crumb Along

For this step of the Crumb Along, Jo asked us to make log cabins. I went through my crumbs, sorting for color, and had enough to make one in each of four colors. These will go, as Jo suggested, at the corners of the quilt.

Wednesday, October 5, 2011

Blocks and more blocks

I thought I'd do a post about some of the blocks I've made lately, as I continue to have a good time going through my stash and using as much of it as I can. I joined the Yahoo group Stashbuster, where the focus is on not buying more fabric, but using your stash. I clearly fail at the first part, as I even bought more fabric today, but I think I do a good job of making things out of my stash.  I like to use as much of my fabric as possible - anything larger than 3/4" square gets used.


These are 10.5" blocks made from strings. I started with 5.5" squares of phone book pages, sewed the strings (alternating between light and dark) at a diagonal, trimmed up the squares, and sewed them together in groups of 4 to make the 10.5" blocks. This stack has 57 large blocks in it, from 228 smaller ones.  I keep my strings in photo storage boxes (the ones that are the size of large shoeboxes) - and those boxes are overflowing again. So I need to make more string blocks, wonky log cabins, and crumb blocks!


I wrote about these in a previous post.  I've gone through my scraps, and used the solids or tone-on-tones to make up a bunch of what I call "kits," and then use them for the bases of these stars. I have a basket of 3" squares along with other scraps that make up the star centers and points, and I assemble these while using them as leaders and enders.  The above picture has 40 stars in it already, and I made 3 more just today while working on a couple of blocks for Boomerang.  I've got these planned for two  "mish  mash" quilts - one is for Jo's Crumb Along,  and the other is a medallion quilt I started based on ideas from Bumblebeans 15 Minutes Play.



These are some assorted blocks I've collected using up even more scraps. The Shoo Flys were made using up a bunch of leftover HST squares and some 4- and 9-patches I'm using for the centers.  They, too, are now set up in "kits," so more of them will be on the way as I continue with other projects.


More spare blocks, most likely destined for the two mish mash quilts.



This is a basket of 280 9-patch blocks. For a long time I was using 1.5" squares as leaders and enders, sewing them into 9-patches.  Every time I made 10, I'd pin them together and throw them in the basket. I guess that's enough for a quilt. I haven't decided how to do them - sashing or not, alternating with solid blocks, etc.  I welcome any and all ideas!  Half of them have light corners, and half have dark corners.

Tonight I have a meeting at our local community center - the main purpose is to discuss how to continue using the center and raise money to keep it open. I'm on the agenda to propose a quilting class making all the stuff above.  There are so many classes at the local shops about traditional projects, and some of my guild members have expressed an interest in learning how to use up their stash doing some of the things I do.  I'll report later how that proposal goes.

Sunday, September 25, 2011

Hearts for the Crumb Along

An additional part of this past week's Crumb Along was to make two heart blocks. These were pretty simple. I made two flying geese for each one, then added a large square and two triangles. Then I added more strips to make each block large enough to trim down to 6".

Saturday, September 24, 2011

I think I've got the hang of it! Stars and stars and stars

15 stars so far.  This is addicting, and it's using up my scraps, so I have no idea how many I'll end up making.
After spending all day Thursday on flying geese that ended up being used for something else, I finally got the hang of them for the Crumb Along.

I set up a "star factory."  I went through my boxes and trays of fabric, and made a bunch of what I'll call base sets.
A base set has four rectangles cut 2 1/4" x 1 1/2" and four 2 1/4" squares.  I made sure that these base sets are either solids, tone on tone, or small prints.
 This is just a few of the base sets, ready to start adding star points.

Next, I cut lots and lots of multi-colored triangles from 2 1/2" squares for the star points.  This allowed me to not only use up a lot of my scraps, but I was able to make a dent in a basket of squares I've acquired from a two-year-long square swap. 
This is just a part of the pile of triangles.  As I'm assembling the stars, I make sure that no fabric is repeated on a star - it has 8 different fabrics used for the star points. 

My next step was to create a small pile of the center squares - again, all different fabrics.  I used a lot of the swap squares here.  These center squares are 2 1/4" as well.



I then began assembling the stars, and was able to do a lot of chain piecing. These are semi-wonky, as I just used scissors for trimming once I started sewing.

All my squares measure from 4 1/2 to 5 1/2".  Jo suggests adding strips to them to make them 6", but I'm going to hold off on that until I see what she intends to do with them.  I've got plenty of strips to use - two shoeboxes full.

Sunday, September 18, 2011

Crumb Along, Step 1

On my Liberated Quilting Yahoo Group I saw a post that linked to Jo's Country Junction and her announcement of a "Crumb Along."  Since I'm into scrappy, liberated quilting, I knew this one would be fun.

The first thing we are doing is creating two blocks using some flying geese.  I had a bunch of triangles left over from making African Violets for Block Lotto, and decided I'd use those. Since they were all dark, I made the triangle part of the flying geese white and cream.

I dug into my white/cream scrap tray and cut dozens of rectangles, 1 3/4" x 3".  Then I put together about 50 wonky flying geese.


Jo says her sewing area looks like a bomb went off -- mine, too! 

Since my initial white rectangles were 2" x 3", my flying geese are a bit odd. But I don't care. Continuing Jo's directions, I sewed strips to the sides of the flying geese units and then squared them up to make the 6" squares she said to make.


These are all the extra flying geese.  She said to make several more sets of 4. I ended up with 7 sets plus 15 other unmatched ones. I'll be able to use these in a border.