Scraps Wrangled!

When one talks about quilting… many things come to mind….

Habits and idiosyncrasies about quilters are top of the list…. Especially for me since I know so many quilters.

Quilters are crazy cat ladies….

Really….

I see many comics, etc., with quilters and cats.

In my house, a piece of fabric on the floor – no matter how small – is something to be sat upon by a cat.  And since there’s five of them, not much fabric is missed by them.  My shelves of fabric in the basement just scream “cat bed” to each and every one of them….

Obligatory cat stories:

I laid out a small quilt yesterday.  Small enough that I could do it on my living room rug.  I cut away the extra batting, and left it lying while Chris and I went to dinner.  Sure enough – came home and it was already a cat bed!

I quilted the quilt after dinner and left it said quilt lying on the floor when I went to bed.  Ariel managed to disrupt it from laying flat on the floor, wiggle under it, and was waiting to jump out when Chris came down in the morning. 

And – not quilt related, but still a crazy cat lady story….

We took Bronx to the vet today.  For those of you who do not know Bronx, he is a male Bengal with all four claws.  He was totally unsocialized when we got him that we had to lock him up alone and gradually introduce to the others.  He is also a F1 (First Generation) Bengal.  They are considered the “pit bulls” of cats.  There is a whole group out there that wants to ban private party ownership of F1s because they “will turn on you.”

Yea, right. 

Bronx is probably about 12.  We’ve had him 4 years.  He’s a HUGE baby.  He sits on Chris lap and nuzzles him.  He’s ok with new people, but VERY guarded.

We were a little worried about bringing him to the Vet.  He howled the whole way there.  However, he was VERY well behaved in the store/Vet (Petsmart/Banfield).  He did not attack any dogs.  He did not bite or claw the vet or the vet tech.  He did sit nicely for the exam.  He did not shred any paper in the exam room.  He even actually seemed to like shopping, sat nicely – albeit very attentively – in the cart.  He did not try to hop out and he did not try to chew open the treats or the dry cat food!

Quilting

I have been doing some quilting lately.... I even did some cleaning of my quilting area - that shows I'm serious!

Leave the Quilts Alone

In this post , I posted a picture of the quilt I laid out and made a comment about how it would look in the morning…..

Before:

After:

Yea, anything fabric is to play with….

And, while I am on the subject of this quilt.  At this point… I hate it….

Not really, just frustrated with it.  Very slow going and everything went wrong.

I subscribe to a monthly club for fabric packs.  It varies what size/shape I get each month.  I call it my “inspiration club.”  It makes me think about doing things outside my comfort zone.

I have made this pattern several times and I really like it….

However, this time, everything went horrible wrong.

The Pattern

I saw something similar in a quilt shop, but the directions are all mine.  I will write them up sometime, but here is a quick primer: 

• Take squares of fabric and cute them diagonally both ways

• Cut four strips of one fabric, and two squares of another for EACH cut up square of fabric.

• Assemble to look like this

• Trim

• Assemble all blocks into a quilt

That’s really it.  It is a simple pattern, looks VERY complicated and it is absolutely wonderful for large squares of fabrics - layer cakes especially.  The cross bits are all one fabric, so they tie in the multiple patterns/colors of coordinating packs of fabrics.

I have made this quilt 4 or 5 times already….

The Saga

But this time….  Ugg

I cut out most of the strips of coordinating fabric and realized that they were too short….

I solved that by putting on corner triangles to make a nice look…

I trimmed the first few blocks and completed them, then realized that they were two different sizes in the corners…. I had to redo a few

Cutting the corners just didn’t go nicely

The fabric pack was greens, blacks and whites… some had two, some had three of the colors…. Putting together a pattern was not easy…. The squares were not easily dividable

Speaking of the squares, the person putting together the pack also had an issue with it.  There were all the squares that were supposed to be there, and then there was a shorted piece of fabric (same as another) in the center of the pack.

I laid the quilt out several times.  I would complete a few blocks, but it was time consuming working on the corners and doing some re trimming, so I would leave, the cats would destroy it, and then I would have to lay it out again, which would get me thinking all over again about what was “green”, “black” or “white”.

I finally assembled it, and decided it was going to get DONE.  I quilted it right away and went to do the border.  I had neither a green nor a black that would coordinate…. Not even a plain black!

I have THOUSANDS of yards of fabric and I did not have ONE that would work for the binding….

ARRRGHHH

Went to Joann’s today and got plain, black broadcloth… on sale for 40% off at least.

Twin City Quilting Block of the Month

In this post, I showed the picture of the completed Block of the Month for last year.  I also showed a picture of the quilt that I made from partial blocks, mismade pieces and other scraps….

And, in this post, I showed what I did with the LAST of all the scraps.

In between those – the large “left overs” quilt, and the final use of scraps, I also had a few more partial blocks and big enough scraps to make more so I made these two runners/toppers:

So, now, that project box is empty!  And nothing to put on my stash shelves…

*Happy Dance*

Textile Center Garage Sale

I went to the annual Textile Center garage sale.  I went the preview evening and paid my $25 for the pleasure of going through other people’s rejected items before the general masses… one person’s junk is another person’s treasure, right?

On top of the $25, I spent another couple hundred and got a TON of stuff…. Ok, a quilter’s ton, not a measurable ton…

 I bought some yardage, but mostly bought smaller bags of fabrics.  I did buy a couple of the “expensive” packs.  One person had donated a bunch of fabrics that I recognize to be Australian and had them neatly organized into bags.  There were about 5 times what I would call “garage sale” pricing, but still less than the store – probably half to a third what I paid in Australia for some similar, and definitely not available here or common.  I bought some beads as well.  I got some neat pieces, and sorted them into my collection.  Nothing earmarked for a projects

The Seven-Dollar Quilt

Amongst other packs of fabric that I bought, I bought a zip lock of 2-inch squares.  I think it was $1. 

Not the best buy…. Pricy for the few squares it was… someone else’s choices, cutting, etc.  Basically a bag of scraps…

Bag of Inspiration!

I started sewing the squares together.  I formulated my plan as I went, and even then, did not know until the very end what it would be.

I also bought three bags of beiges.  Larger scraps… some long, some wide, some about the size of fat quarters, a couple pieces close to a yard.  All different patterns, but all around the same color… beige, tan, ecru, sand…

How many other names can you come up with for basic beige color?

Here is the end result!

I am going to call it “City Scape”.   Can you see the city in it?

Also, look at the one corner…   There’s a reason for it.   

Basically, I made blocks that looked like this:

And assembled them into rows like this:

Notice the “Built in border” on the two sides?

I added border to the other two sides:

And used a four-patch in the very corner!

And, of course, I had a couple pieces left over…..

Scrap Tamers

I also finished the top for the Scrap Tamers mystery quilt.  Remember, I ONLY used scraps on this!

Glass

I have not been to the studio lately.  I missed three Fridays because of:  The Studio closed for a special event, mini retreat for my quilt group and last weekend’s Wisconsin Dells trip (in that order).  So, I got there as soon as I could this past Friday… I made a couple small pieces, then I set off to work with my 104 COE glass (millefiore, canes… etc.) and made this special display piece for myself:

The main idea behind this was to showcase some of the smaller bits of glass that I work with.  I am going to try another one, but after I get to the torch work studio and make some stringers and other things that I can work into the design.

It has got some geometric designs, but I also branched out (no pun intended) and made a couple stylized designs:

A flower:

The leaves are trimmed from glass sheet, the flower is millefiore, and the stem is actually copper.  It will be interesting to see how it color changes in the kiln.

An apple tree:

The tree trunk/branches are also copper like the stem in the flower.  The leaves, apples, etc., are millefiore.  I cannot take all the credit for this – I copied something from Pinterest!

Using Plates

No, this isn’t a quip about my barbarian family learning to use utensils for the first time or something…. They are generally quite polite (we won’t mention burping… on the part of several of them!)

Anyway, we are beginning to use my fused glass plates for regular dinner service in the house.

This is Chris’s masterpiece of dinner tonight… meatballs balanced on the opposite corners… basil leaf illustrating the food….

And on that note - good night!