I managed to put together this set of blocks, which have been maturing in their box for quite a few years. I just love sq in sq units and these blocks used heaps of them, so I really enjoyed sewing this. (I have another set of thirty in just blue and cream, but I won't mention them now...)

 I've lost the photo of the antique quilt I based them on, and couldn't remember what the border looked like.

I tried a sort of sq on point border, but it didn't do anything for me, and the top has been sitting on the design wall while I tried out different combinations. I think I've finally decided what to do, and I'll start sewing strips tonight with any luck. Stay tuned...

The other night at John's place he was making us a cup of 'proper' coffee, and when he put the cups on the table we discovered... a line drawing of a bottom

and a sort of mythical creature. He swore he did nothing to make these happen- must be his artistic talent coming out in strange ways.

Read more...

 My Bargain Basement top is quilted and bound and ready to put on the bed. I'm really pleased with how this turned out, and it should hide the pawprints and dog hair very well. I've never made a quilt for quite  those reasons before, but I imagine it won't be the last.

I ended up making it 7 x 8 blocks, and then I found a stash of 9 1/2" squares that I cut in half and used as an edge. I really liked the border in Bonnies book, but I'll only go so far for Pippi, much as I love her. If I'm going to put that much sewing into a border, it's not going to be a dog bed!

I thought using the cut down squares for the border was really nifty, because I didn't have to measure anything, just count the corresponding blocks, and I put a square in each corner to even things out. I didn't have to bother finding yardage big enough for the whole thing and the scrappiness suited this particular top. It's an idea I'll definitely use again.

 I used a new panto of Keryn's to test it out and it made a lovely texture over all the scrappy bits and pieces. I sewed three or four old bits of fabric together for the back- no photo- and got rid of about ten pieces of scrap batting from the workshop. I could probably still make four quilts from the pile of batting offcuts, but at least it's a start. All in all, I used a shedload of scraps of every kind, blocks, strips, backing squares, yardage and batting. Very satisfying.Thanks Pippi!

Read more...

 I put my other projects aside and began another quilt out of necessity. (That's what I'm telling myself anyway.)

I've been using my 4-4 Time quilt on my bed, but it's showing some wear because Pippi sleeps at the bottom of the bed. She has her own purple  quilt, but she spends a bit of time every night scratching around getting herself in juuust the right position before she settles down and I decided I needed another quilt to share the wear and tear. Preferably one that had minimal light fabric in it.

Surprisingly nothing already made seemed to fit that bill, so I had a quick scrounge around in my scrap bins and orphan units and made a start on Bonnie's Bargain Basement pattern, from 'Scraps and Shirttails'. I'd been thinking about this design, all I needed was an excuse to start!

It was blindingly quick, because I had a large amount of 3 1/2" strips and some squ in sq units as well as 4 patches in the right size.

 I tried this on the bed, but I want it larger all round, so I'm pulling more medium and dark strips  out to play with.

 It's been terrific fun, and there really is no right or wrong way to lay the blocks out, which I love. I may even make a pastel one to use up all the lighter strips I couldn't put in this.

So it's Pippi's fault I've made another top, and if this one wears out I'll just make another.

 This little face is worth it.

Read more...

 The first time I made these blocks I used 2 1/2" strips, cut at 6 1/2" widths, and a 2 1/2" square as a flippy corner. I still have all the trimmed triangles in a  box and haven't got around to using them.

 These shapes are easy to cut with the Easy Angle ruler. Just square up the end of the strip and then align the bottom edge of the ruler on the strip and cut along the sloping edge.

  Rotate the ruler and line the long edge with the top of the strip, and the sloping edge where you made the first cut. Trim at the side, and there you have two identical shapes, each sloping the right way. Do not flip the ruler over, just rotate it into place.

You can make these blocks sloping two ways and both are right, as long as you are consistent in the way you lay out the strips. Either have the strips ALL  wrong side facing  up, or wrong side facing down. As long as they are facing the same way, they will join up.  I lay a finished block on the cutting mat to make sure I was doing it right.

 I cut the dark pieces wrong side up,

  and also the light pieces.

However the triangles that go on the end of these strips I cut right side up, for the simple reason that then I could line up the points easily.

You can see here that I cut a strip that was folded in half .(I used the Easy Angle for these too)
The piece that faced up will fit perfectly on the larger piece,

but the piece that faced down has to be lined up with the top and sloping edge (no nice little point to match here) which seems more fiddly. Not wrong, as I can use both pieces, but if I can remember to cut them facing up I like it better. It's certainly easier to keep both pieces exactly aligned as you begin sewing, so to me it's worth it.

For each block you need the dark strip with a light triangle at the end, a 4 1/2"  dark/medium strip with a 2 1/2" square sewn on to one end and a light strip with a dark triangle at the end.

 Pretty easy if you've got them all sloping the right way.

When I press the strips I make the seam allowances go towards the small triangle. I don't care about pressing towards the dark fabric because I'd rather the seams nest at that point when the blocks are joined together.

Each block measures 6 1/2" unfinished and four of them together are 12  1/2" unfinished.

Now you just have to make dozens and dozens of these and play with the layout, they really are so easy to sew it's hard to stop.

Read more...

Remember Keryn's Half and Half quilt, from 2009? This is such a simple block, a sort of split nine patch in construction. She sashed and rotated her blocks and they make a wonderful pattern across the quilt, full of movement.

I was testing her instructions and decided to set my blocks together in groups of four which is a more recognisable split nine patch.

  I loved making these, and they used up a power of scraps from the 2 1/2" strip bin. The resulting quilt was donated to the bushfire cause, and I've been meaning to make another one to use up more strips.

  However I began  playing around to see if I could simplify the block even further, and came up with this.

  I started off making the pointed ends using 2 1/2" squares, flippy corner style but I quickly tired of that. I admit flippy corners have their place, but I can't throw away the cut-off bits and I have buckets of them already, so I don't need more.

I found a way to use the Easy Angle to cut this block, and I'll post some photos tomorrow. Even though this started out as a quick scrap quilt, I've also been playing with settings for the blocks.

 They can be used in any configuration that the log cabin uses, and I think I'll have to make a heap more to try them all out. I'm so easily sidetracked it's not funny....

Read more...

Bonnie was talking about log cabin quilts and I remembered this pile of blocks from about 1989. My goodness it feels strange writing that date, what a long time ago it was.

I had ended up with a large box which contained all our remnants from our dressmaking eforts, and some of Mum's as well. I decided to make a log cabin quilt, perhaps two, and send one to Keryn as a way to remember all these bits and pieces.

I became utterly obsessed  and every day I was at the machine, sewing these in batches of five or so. I couldn't stop and I had such fun going round and round adding to each block. Some of the fabric was terrible quality, but each bit held a memory and I was too frugal in those days to throw any scrap out, no matter what.

In these two blocks I can see fabric that were leftovers from a 'brunch coat' of Keryn's, two shirts, a halterneck dress and a skirt.

This sprigged fabric was a halterneck top that Keryn and I wore to death, but it was quite a coarse weave while the spotted fabric next to it was a dreadful chinese cotton that was so thin you could see through it.

 This block contains two beloved dark browns, the outer one was a skirt and the William Moriss type one was a dancing dress of mine from the '70's. It was a slightly brushed cotton and is one of my very favourite fabrics of all time. I still have the dress, but it is impossibly tiny and will never be worn by me again, sigh.The red check is from Mum's stash and was a skirt from a little dress for us.

The green was a wrap around dress of Keryns, the purple on the edge a dress that was never finished and the turquoise was from Mum's stash too. I think Keryn made a shirred dress from it, but it's a gorgeous vintage print I'd love to have more of now.

Matthew was about eighteen months old and he got pretty sick of me sewing all the time. I had a big old wooden chair with arms, and I used to let him climb up behind me and stand looking over my shoulder. He was quite safe there, away from the pins and scissors and he amused himself by turning me into a truck and driving me noisily around corners, jigging up and down and singing, brushing my hair into strange styles and sometimes even going to sleep leaning on me. Once I wondered at how quiet he was, and found that he'd been able to reach my container of bias binding and had unwound all the little strips and let them fall to the floor then stacked the cards neatly to one side. That took me a while to fix, but it had kept him occupied for some time, so it was worth it.

I sewed and sewed until I had 83 blocks ( the strips are 1 1/2" finished) and then tried to put them together. It was then that I found out that log cabin blocks can start twisting as you sew them, and you have to be really careful about squaring them up. None of the corners were 90 degrees and they were all decidedly skewiff. I tried nibbling away at each side but I was just making things worse so I had to stop. I didn't have a square ruler in those days so I put them all away in a drawer until I could find some way to fix the problem.

Now I have my big ruler I know I could have these trimmed down in half an hour, but the desire to finish these quilts has been put on the backburner and other more pressing things take over. Still, I've enjoyed looking at these fabrics, and I'm glad that I turned that big box of scraps into these blocks, even if they've been in the drawer ever since. Their turn will come...

Read more...

 I was going through some tops the other day and found this one all folded up. I hadn't seen it for a while so I hung it up and examined it with great fondness. I made this one long summer school  holidays, when we lived on the farm.

I had great fun piecing the blocks, and most of these fabrics are long gone from the stash.

 I liked the two colour blocks, they're nice and clean looking,

 but I also loved using scraps for some of the pieces just to make it interesting.

 I made a Sister's choice using similar fabrics, thinking they were nice and masculine, but the boys proclaimed them too "girly". No pattern of any kind was permitted apparently, so both tops were relegated to the drawer for years and years.

 I didn't put a top border on this, because the boys just wanted quilts to come up to the pillow and this was long enough already. But it always looked a trifle unfinished to me and I was slightly dissatisfied with it.

When I got it out the other day it happened to fall onto a fabric I was considering for another backing, and it looked really good, so I think I'll put a strip of it across the top and piece some into the backing for this. It might even get quilted after all these years- perhaps one of the boys won't be so fussy now and be glad to give it a home.

Read more...

I'm still plodding away on these blocks, but I got a bit bored and relegated them to leader-enders for a while. So the pile of nine patches grows, but I'm working on other things as well.

 I've sewn heaps of them into these 36 patch blocks, which makes them easier to arrange on the design wall, and I have 25 made (100 ninepatches) and about twenty units ready to sew. I'm getting close to the amount needed for the centre of the top, so I'll need to set it all out soon and just see where I'm going.

Remeber my pumpkin patch from the summer? Here's what's left of my produce after giving away some to family and cooking a few over the last months.

 I grew the yellow spaghetti squash, butternut pumpkins and these strange Turk's Turban pumpkins. I bought the seeds from a seed savers stand at a market, because I'd read about them and wanted to see what they were like. I know people used to eat them, especially in the Depression but they were a disappointment flavour wise, in that they had none.

When we were young Mum used to serve up a homegrown vegetable called Trombone, so called because it was very long, and like these Turk's Turbans they were very prolific. The flesh was  similar looking, yellow and  a bit stringy and very watery when cooked. Not all was lost though, because Pippi ate it all up when mixed with her food (it's very good for dogs) and the others I'll enjoy just for their appearance. This year I'll be growing some other large pumpkin like a Queensland Blue or something I can actually like eating.

Read more...

I've started another scrap quilt in a very controlled palette of blue, apricot, tan and cream, based on an english quilt I saw on a blog. It's an antique in a small museum, but I can't find the post to link to it at the moment. I have a whole heap of these colours in the scrap bins and they keep getting passed over in favour of others, so I thought it would be brilliant to use them all up in one fell swoop and then cut some yardage to finish it off.

However to my consternation, the scraps seem never ending, and even though I've made over 80 ninepatches













 and the strip sets for another 50 or so,

  there's still a pile left.













 I'm beginning to think I'll make the centre of the quilt without ever having touched the yardage drawers, and there will still be a smattering of scraps lingering around to taunt me.

Depending on my mood, I can either rejoice that I'm getting a whole new top for seemingly nothing- "it's totally made from scraps!!", or it can depress me - "It's made completely from scraps. I'll never get to use the yardage in my stash...sigh.."

I started off in the first mood, but now as I look at the heap of fat quarters I pulled out, hoping to whittle them down, I'm slumping into the second mind frame. Even if I cut a 2" strip from all of them I'd have too many and it wouldn't make much of a diference to the overall pile. I've already decided the back will be pieced and there might be more than the one pieced border I'd planned. Surely after all that I'll be able to see a gap somewhere?

 Back to the magical scraps that never end....

Read more...

It's been a quiet day here, with John and Liz having lunch at Keryn's place to celebrate Mother's day. I'm not one to make a big fuss over what seems to have become over commercialised occasions, however it was lovely to catch up.

I was reading an Eleanor Dark novel years ago, and one paragraph struck me so much I copied it out so I could remember it. And when all the ads are screaming about what you 'deserve' for Mother's day, I think of this...

"And she said sadly  " Parents are very selfish creatures Tom."
He protested indignantly "Selfish? Nonsense! Give up their whole lives to a pack of ungrateful brats! Get nothing in return! Selfish be damned!"
She shook her head. "There's nothing we ever do for them that gives them half the joy they give us,- just by existing."

from "Return To Coolami."

Becoming a mother was the making of me; thank you my boys...

Read more...