Humbling along

It turned out that this was my something else project to work on.  I only have 38 projects (UFO's, PIGS, WIPs), but chose this one.  My Humble Christmas is slowly coming together.  I have to make lists of things to do, otherwise, I will just sit in front of the TV and fall asleep or wander around the house doing something that isn't important.

Great strides have been made.  The red/white striped borders were sewn on and the top has the row of trees sewn together and onto the centre.  The bottom will be easy, as I just have to replicate the top using the same size of tree blocks.  The sides will be another story.  I will have to figure out the math for the sides and see what works.

Now, if I was really smart, one size of tree block would be used throughout.  But nooooooo ... I have to do it the hard way and come up with something different.  :o)

DH and I are still in the renovating mode and that list seems to never decrease ..... ever.

Have a great day!

Schoolhouse is a top ... haunted no more

I have had quite the journey with my schoolhouse quilt and at last it is a top.  Come along and I will show how my borders came to be.

Once my centre blocks were all assembled and sewn together with the sashings, the time had come to decide on the borders. 

Numerous red fabrics were pulled and auditioned along with different versions of stars. This is the final selection for the borders.  I definitely love the two different star sizes.

Once the borders were sewn on, it helped to define the look and to help me decide if I was going in the right directions with those stars.

The more stars were made and pinned onto the border, the more I was falling in love.

 Then, I thought about putting small circles inside the larger stars.  Yes, that will do quite nicely!  :o)

After sewing a few stars on each night, I would pin my top onto my design wall and sit back in my chair and drool and pinch myself if this was real.  Seeing my progress each night kept me motivated to finish the border and this top!

Here is a close-up of the stars:

At last, my top is finished and I am haunted no more.  Haunted?  Read on.

My love affair with this top all started with this quilt below.  DH and I stopped in at the quilt show (May 2005) in Kingston, Ontario on our way from Toronto to Quebec City to visit family there.  We only had a few hours to do the show and DH snapped photos of the quilts while I browsed the vendors and the guild booth.  This quilt haunted me.  Was there a pattern?  Debra was also at this show (before we became friends) and every so often we would talk about this quilt and again asked: "was there a pattern"?  Finally Debra and no-blog Mary asked if I could draft up the block.  Well, yes, I think I can?  It wasn't easy drafting that pattern, but finally it came to be.   You can go here for a tutorial on how to make your own block.

It turns out that the Kingston guild had a blurb about this quilt at the time of the 2005 show.  The quilt that inspired the guild ladies to make this quilt came from Donna Thomas.  You can go here to read more about it.

Then, a few days after I finished sewing the last star onto my top and exactly 2 years after I first posted about this quilt here, an email was received from the designer and copyright holder of this pattern.   Andrea Blackhurst is her name and her pattern appeared in Quilt magazine, fall 1996.  The photo below is how this quilt appeared in the magazine (thanks Andrea for giving me permission to use your photo). 

My version of THE quilt is made and I'm haunted no more!

Now, it is time to get on with another UFO!

Have a great day!

Summer Sweet

Yep, we sure could use a bit of summer here right now.  The winter has been long and cold with lots of snow.  Oh well, spring is on its' way and before we know it, the hot muggy days of summer will be here soon enough.

A number of you were wondering about my top 'Summer Sweet' (that I have been exchanging the sashings with a different colour) and was the block pieced or appliqued.  Actually, both.  Here is a close-up of the block:

 One of the flower stems:

 The vine border:

How I wished that photos were taken of the process of the paper-piecing portion.  There was a gazillion triangles that were spread out on a table and I would pick and choose the colours as needed per arc and there are a lot of arcs in this top.  This was done before my blog days and the thought of taking photos never occurred to me.

The pattern appeared in Quilter's Newsletter magazine, vol. 355 from Sept. 2003.

This is the actual pattern by Linda Neustadt.  As soon as I saw this pattern, I knew that it was one that would be made and it was started way back in August 2005.  The top was finished December 2005 and it has sat in a box on a shelf since then because I just wasn't happy with the way it turned out.  I love Linda'a version but wasn't happy with my version until now.

This is what my quilt looked like with the white sashing:

Once I put this top on the bed for an overall look, I just didn't like it and played around with a medium blue sashing to give me an idea of what it would look like.  Suddenly, this quilt top started to sing to me.  Am I too picky ... or ..... crazy?  I will leave you to decide!  :o)

So, that is my story about this quilt.

Have a great day!

Time to build .....

.... my house blocks. Now that all of my 6-1/2" x 6-1/2" (finished 6" x 6") blocks have all been made, it is time to tidy up those scraps and pieces of paper and take out the sections of my house blocks and start sewing them together. Some of you have asked about this pattern and I am in the process of writing up a tutorial on how you can draft up your own house block pattern (this will not include the smaller 6" finished blocks) and make your own quilt. That tutorial will be coming up in the next week or two. So stay tuned for the tutorial if you are interested. In the meantime, I wanted to show you how one of the more intricate blocks was made. Some of those blocks were so tricky that there was no other way for me to make them except using the English Paper Piecing method. Below, you can see some of the templates that were basted onto fabric and hand sewn together.

This is how the back looks like before being trimmed to size and all the basting and paper templates removed.

This is the block. See, is this not an intricate block?

Have a great day, eh!

School houses and Klosjes

I'm back to working on this project .... just love how this is shaping up. Just 8 more small blocks to go and the houses can get made up. The small blocks are 6" x 6" finished and the house block is 12" x 12" finished. This quilt will hang on our dining room wall .... but that won't be for a while yet. Mind you, some of my tops get hung up throughout the year. Hand quilting takes a while and I do like to enjoy my tops instead of them being stored away in a battered old trunk. There are only 10 more border blocks to go on my Klosjes quilt. I am so eager to get this done. My label is being worked on and can be added to the back when the quilt is done. Also, fabric has been pulled for a sleeve (my quilts get hung on the wall as well as being used on beds) for sewing onto the back. Soon, my friends, soon you will see this quilt finished. Yesterday, 6 blocks got quilted and today my hands are sore .... so, today I will take a break and work on something else. Probably some more blocks for my school house.

Have a great day!

Red and blue all over

Here are more of my crazy blocks .... love, love, love these colours together and those scrap bins are going down, down, down. This will be for a bunk bed or lap quilt .... not sure which yet. All I know is, these are fun to make.
Have a great weekend!

Klosjes templates

As promised, today I'm going to show you how to make the templates for my style of klosjes (Dutch word for little spools) for those of you who don't have EQ and Block Base software computer programs. It really is very simple.

A - Since my klosjes finish at 6" square, draw a 6-1/2" x 6-1/2" square on a sheet of paper. Draw your 1/4" seam allowance all the way around just so that you can see what your finished size will look like. Draw diagonal lines from corner to corner as shown. B - Make a mark 2" from the top and bottom. Using your ruler, (line up the diagonal line on your ruler to the diagonal line on the paper) continue making your line going from one diagonal line to the other diagonal line. Do the same for the bottom.

C - Again, using the diagonal line on your ruler, line up your ruler and make a 3/4" mark as shown by the arrows.

D - Repeat the same process for the other half of the square block.

E - Make a mark 1" in from any side, take your compass and put the point in the very middle (see arrow) and extend the other arm of the compass with the lead pencil part to the mark and draw a circle all around. At this time, you can make any changes to the shape that you want.

F - Your template is made. I traced the template roughly by hand so that you can see what your klosjes will look like.

G - Cut out your paper templates.

H - Staple your templates onto scrap pieces of paper. Usually, I cut out 4 pieces of scrap paper at a time (any more paper and your templates will get wonky). The edges of the original templates got a coating of orange marker so that I can see where to cut.

i - Cut your templates out and remove staples. I keep the original templates and cut out additional templates whenever more are needed using these originals. My templates get used often but at some point, they just get too many holes from basting and eventually they get tossed out.

You are now ready to start basting away. Just be sure to keep your fabric and templates on the straight of the grain. Have fun!

This is what my klosjes are looking like today. I'm just raiding my stash and auditioning fabrics to make sure that I get a nice colour wash look. I'm making a queen size quilt and need 196 blocks. So, there are lots more to go. At some point, these blocks will have to be transferred to my larger design wall as I need 2 more rows on one side and 5 more rows on the bottom and I just simply ran out of room with this design wall. I can do 3 to 5 klosjes a day, but my fingers are getting a bit sore from the needle, so it is time to slow and work on something different for a few days.

For those of your who celebrate Easter ..... Happy Easter! Stay safe.

Diamond Stars

Once I finished my hexagon top, my fingers needed another English Paper Piecing project to work on. This new project was started this spring but I never got around to showing it to you.

So far, this is half of the diamonds made (it will be queen size). The hexagon fillers are made out of two different fabrics to give it an added surprise. Actually, I didn't have enough of either fabric to use, so decided to use both and I have to say that the look is rather interesting.

I was having a little bit of problem with my star points meeting in the centres, so added the little hexagon to hide them and I much prefer the look.

I want to do something different with the borders, but don't know what yet. Probably applique....

Have a great day!

I Love Stars

This little mini was made a few years ago. For such a tiny little thing ..... there sure was a lot of paper piecing going on to make those hearts and stars. It is hand quilted.

Pattern Source: Miniature Quilts, issue #31 (quilt title: Don’t Tread On My Heart)

Have a great day!

A Little Bit of This and That

…… is the name of my Booty quilt that was sent to Bernadette.

For those 3” squares, I did paper piecing. Did you know that the name of that block goes by these names: This and That, Economy Patch, Thrift Block , Hour Glass? That is what my EQ6 program has listed for that block.

There is both machine and hand quilting in that piece. Lately, I find myself doing both methods on my quilts and I absolutely love the effect.

Have a great day!

Raining Ducks

I thought that this quilt would be appropriate to show today …… yes, it is raining ducks. 5 Little Duckies is the name of the pattern and so perfect for a little one.

Our weather is cool again. We have been having the worst spring so far that I can remember. We have had only a few days of really nice sunshine and warm temperatures and then we are pulling on sweaters for warmth once again

So, to give me a lift, I’m going to have another cup of peach tea. The postman was early delivering mail this morning and in my mailbox was an envelope from Connie. She sent me some tea bags of the most delightful peach flavour. Thank you, Connie! I definitely will have to find a source for this tea. It is so refreshing.

Have a great day!

Pattern source: Quiltmaker Magazine, November/December 2001 issue