Liberated Amish 2010 Challenge

I found a fun class / challenge hosted by Tonya that I could not pass on.

I will play with solids, Amish inspiration, liberated techniques, and even add some letters and numbers.

So I have been cutting into my precious Cherrywood fabrics, just smaller pieces (7" * 9" from their Scrap bags). It will be a scrappy look...

These are 5.5" blocks. I am aiming for a doll / crib size. There's no bigger pieces of fabric in my stash for borders. I will play a bit with layouts and see...

If it looks like fun, head over to the blog. There's still time to join in!

two years

I started this blog two years ago, today! And I have written more than 150 posts since then. Quilting and blogging is such a great combination, finding and sharing inspiration, participating in swaps and quilt-a-longs and so on.... But you all know that! ; )

Thank you all for nice comments and contributions, making this blogging community a good place, sharing the joy!!!

To celebrate, I have a finish to show you- the spiderweb from last years tutorial is done. It took me some time gathering the strips (half a year), and I ended up using a nice selection of my favorite fabrics.

The back with all seams showing. Since its not sewn on any foundations, no paper to rip away, no extra layer of fabric. Quite happy with this technique, and will use it again!

I pinned this top before quilting. Usually I baste the top. This time I took a chance on just pinning. And it worked like a charm. Its quilted with a small meandering. I used Hobbs 80 / 20 batting and hope it will shrink up a little when I wash it...

Quite happy with the texture and surface...

This is another one in my narrow wall quilt series: Scrappy Spiderweb 29" * 67". I have used all the colors of the rainbow, lots of different prints in different strip widths. The solid is Kona White (Robert Kaufman).

And it is two sided! I made 12 blocks for the front, but didn't like it, too much going on, too busy. So I moved two blocks to the back. It was a bit tricky to center them before quilting. It worked out, and now I have my first two sided quilt!

It is nice having a finish - just one year later! I still love this block and am quite sure I will make some more. Next time I'll probably limit my range of colors, and maybe make the blocks a bit larger, starting with a 15" square.

Hope your week is a good one!

red flimsy

Chain-piecing a checkerboard layout. Fun. Sewing the rows together horizontally first...

Still winter outside. This one feels like lots of girl power. I think Pippi Langstrømpe (Pippi Longstockings) is a suitable name. It's 40" by 54". Maybe I'll add a border, later. We'll see...

And my design wall is empty, again...

; )

Happy sewing!

more options - sketching with my camera

Thank you for all your feedback on my layout options for the hourglass blocks!

I split my blocks into two quilt tops and made both the frame and the on point version. I used Kona Snow for both quilts.

Looking trough my wip/ufo's I found more 5" charm packs. Some are made into half square triangles (hst). So I put them up on the design wall. The picture above is also from the lines of American Jane. I love this layout and plan to make a top using the blue, green, yellow and orange charms I have left.

Also stashed away I found these hst made from Urban Chicks Swell collection. I might expand a bit on these and have enough blocks for a small quilt.

Deciding to keep the color red out of the quilt in the first picture, I started to make a pile of all the red charms from all my 30's charm packs. Using a checkerboard layout I put them up on the wall, only to find out there's enough for this 9 by 12 layout (40" * 54"). I like the "vintage" look of this one!

I have made several quilts using charm packs. They give you a large selection of fabric without taking up a lot of storage. And a bit of a challenge to find different ways of using 5" squares.

So far I have cut them in two halves vertically , used them in 2" hexagons, made shooting stars and other stars, square in a square, tumblers, hourglasses and hst (half square triangles). I am planning to use them as plain squares for the red checkerboard (picture above). I am also using them in my oldest ufo, the double wedding ring.

And I'm sure there is more options out there... What's your favorite use of those 5" charms?

options

Frame

Sashing in white

Checkerboard layout

On bay...

And last but not least: on top....

wip - rainbow hourglass

A look at my "design wall" today. I have started putting together hourglass blocks made from 3 different American Jane charm packs, collected over time. Right now I have 180 blocks sewn together in tiles of 9.

I love the classic block and the colorful fabric. Have to play around a bit more with the layout. All together they are a bit busy. I am thinking about:

adding sashing between the tiles

putting them on point and adding white alternating blocks

using them for a frame around a central panel

Just one more tile to put together, and I can start playing with the layout. I'll also have to fix one tile with a block facing the wrong direction.

What do you think? Do you have any favorite layouts?

a little romance

These romantic tumblers are a nice contrast to the cold winter landscape outside!

They have been gathering for some time in a box, waiting to reach "critical mass" for a lap quilt. I have cut into my Lecien fabric, and found a few from various charm packs, picked some different stripes and plaids - kind of a shabby chick mix...

Bleak winter light on the batting "design wall". I'm using the same plastic template as I did last time for my Vintage Tumblers. The layout is 16 patches wide and 21 rows: about 36" * 58". Love this easy sewing, just paring the two groups together, sewing more than half of the top before putting them up and distribute the different prints in a pleasing manner.

My temporary design wall is making the process so much easier for me than before, cheating the cats out of a lot of fun ... Its nice to se this one coming together, finally moving out of the box.

Anyone else dreaming of spring and summer?

; )