Two Colors, Too Fun

It's been a good week. To begin, I finished the miniature blue and white quilt.

I am so happy with how that came out.  I'm really loving that I hand quilted it.  So sweet.

And I made progress on the next red and white. I'll probably branch out with my red and white minis, but to start, I'm pulling patterns from Miniatures in Minutes. This next one is the Everlasting Tree foundation. The red and white print-out is my EQ mock-up.

And here it is with the top sewn up. White fabric. White snow.

I think I'll probably machine quilt this one.  I seem to be on a mission to begin anew and finish the old, so the little pincushion below is the finish of a little five by five block I had sewn up quite a while ago.

And with all the red and white going on, I decided it was finally time to order Infinite Variety. It came this last week. Oh, those quilts. Be still my heart! And look, here's a red and white version of the blue and white mini quilt I showed up above:

I'm pretty sure I'll need a red and white version of my own!  I was playing with this design in EQ and wanted to see if I could work a two-color with triangles in the larger squares. This is what I came up with:

I like that quite a lot. And then, what should I see as I was browsing Infinite Variety, but this variation:

I love that as I play with quilt design, I'm just following the footsteps of all those quilters who came before.  It really is a living tradition.

And because I need to show I haven't forgotten about the GO! Sew Challenge, I have to say my tumbler die has been getting a work out this last week. I've been cutting new and sewing the old. This is only part of the show:

Every bit of progress counts! I do LOVE to start new quilts, but it sure is satisfying to work on the older projects and see them move closer to completion. I have so many unfinished projects, they feel like a burden or a weight of guilt. Working on them definitely helps get rid of that bit of unnecessary emotional baggage. And besides, pretty fabrics, pretty quilts!

What's GO!ing On?

I'm still following my GO! Sew Challenge and this week the GO! has been getting a workout. First off, I finished the little red and white 13-Square miniature quilt.

The GO! has been busy cutting signature patches for a quilt I'll be making for a friend.

And there's some bright and cheerful tumbler patches coming along, too.

And it's March,  which means it's time, of course,  to bring out the miniature Irish Chain quilt.

I wrote about this quilt ages ago -- about my Irish roots here, and how I used the 13-Square foundation from Miniatures in Minutes (the same one as the red and white quilt above) here.

And now that I've finished one red and white miniature, I'm pondering which one will come next.  Let's hear it for Spring Break!

More Progress

It was just so much fun working on the red and white mini, I couldn't stop. I'm hoping I can finish it off this week. Right now, I'm hand quilting the border. For the pieced center, I machine stitched in the ditch.

Here's a few process shots just because.

The patches all added and starting Fold and Sew on the rows:

Once the paper is off, I like to press the seams open so they lay flatter:

At this stage, it is really easy to distort all that tiny piecing. I try my best not to do that, but I almost always need to do a little pressing to get the quilt back into square. I press freezer paper onto an ironing surface and draw a square that allows me to size the block exactly.

I aim to be really careful as I add borders. Still square. Yes!

Yup, that makes me happy.

And here I am:

Not the kind of stitching that's going to win any awards, but it's making me surprisingly happy to hand quilt again. Something I haven't done in ages.

Meanwhile, the sewing room continues to come together bit by bit. My shelf for the wee decorative things.

Oh, some of that goes way back. The little red top was given to me by a beau when I was in second grade. The vintage rick rack and thread bits go back to my grandmother's sewing basket, as does the pincushion on the top shelf. I made the red needle book for my mother back when I was in third or fourth grade, I think -- perhaps my first sewing project. There's a wee ancient Alice in Wonderland that was given to me by a dear friend in college. Add in sewing gifts from quilting friends and a couple Dalmatians in honor of the first dogs my husband and I shared our lives with.

It's what makes a room really special, isn't it? All those bits of history, all the love, and all the connections -- past and present. Every time I look at the bits and pieces on this shelf, I smile.

More practically, there's the cutting table. So clean, too!

It's hard to tell from the photos but the walls are a cream color, a very soft yellow. I'm loving it. In fact, I'm loving my sewing room so much at the moment, I just want to move in food stuffs and a sleeping bag and live there. Of course, I do have other demands on my time. My husband, for one. That's fine -- a nice quiet evening at home with wine and chocolate ahead. I'm not complaining.

Not to mention there are classes to teach, students to meet, and papers to grade. It's nice to know the sewing room is there all pretty and new when I've got the time though.

One last thing: Emmy asked how I hang my quilts on the wall. So, nothing fancy.

In the past, I sewed hanging sleeves onto the backs of my minis. Now I sew triangles (just a square folded on the diagonal) into the binding. There's a lot to like about this method: it's easy and there's no hand sewing. It also makes it really simple to switch between little quilts of different sizes.

I stab two push pins into the wall a little less than a couple inches apart. (I use a level to make sure they are even). Then a narrow little dowel slips into the triangles and balances on the pins. Easy peasy.

For my older little quilts with hanging sleeves I just cut out a rectangle from the center top of the sleeve -- that allows me to still use the dowel and pins. Not a particularly elegant solution, I grant, but hey, it works.

Oh, wait. One last last thing. The latest Westering Women block from Barbara Brackman.  All blues and browns for me with this sampler.

Whew.

Bits and Pieces, This and That

Let's hear it for progress in the sewing room. There's a lot to do yet, but there are corners shaping up.

I've been having fun deciding what quilts to bring out for a change. Those three quilts above? I don't think I've ever had them out for display.  Now, that's just wrong.

Meanwhile, some things remain the same. Lulubelle is back in her corner.

I've taken squatter's rights to the spare room and a bunch of stuff that used to be crowded in this spot is now out for good. Even my own true love noticed. "Wow, that shelf is a whole lot neater." So, yeah, when even the DH can see the difference, I know it's dramatic.

I'm also working on finishing up some of those little quilts in process. Hand quilting!

I'm also playing with the idea of making a grouping of little red and white quilts. I thought I'd run through a bunch of the foundations from Miniatures in Minutes and see how it goes. I'm starting with the 13-Square foundation. In retrospect, this is the foundation I wished I had used in the book to illustrate the Fold and Sew technique.  It's the easiest of all the foundations. Works like a charm.

An additional plus? It's another foundation I can use the AccuQuilt GO! for as well. Since the patches for the 13-Square are just one inch squares, I use the 1" Strip die. I run a length through once to get 1" strips and then run the strips through cross-wise in order to get the squares. (The ruler just helps me insure I've got the strips at a 90 degree angle.)

Two passes through the GO! and I have two satisfying little piles.

This is how far I got on the foundation tonight before it was time for evening socializing and wine.

So between this, that, and the other thing, the sewing room is a regular beehive of activity. Color me thrilled.

GO! Minis and More Christmas

Well, my swap mini quilt made it to its destination. Whew! I was worried there for a few days. This quilt used the Equilateral Triangles (which I've noted before serendipitously fits the Pyramid Triangle foundation from Miniatures in Minutes). So, first, little triangles:

The challenge was to create a monochromatic quilt. My partner said she liked orange, triangles, and a light touch on the quilting. So, here it is:

The pieced center section measures 7" by 8" finished. I do love minis!

And in order to keep up with doing something each week using the GO! (though I was sick, sick, sick, this last week), I pulled out a pretty Christmas charm pack.

And ran it through the AccuQuilt GO! 3 1/2" finished Drunkard's Path die -- because look at how well the charm fits the die!

Just a wee bit of fabric waste.

It's a start.

Christmas decorations are, bit by bit, making an appearance -- which always baffles Cooper.

But we did get our lovely wooded tree from Festive Tree put up. We just LOVE this tree. Our living room is small -- avoiding the space hogging of a real tree is great. Plus this speaks to my own true love's Scandinavian roots.  It is much prettier than this picture does justice!

 Meanwhile, is it white enough out there?

GO! Pincushions

With Miniatures In Minutes foundations 

Once again I'm using the GO! Equilateral die to cut out patches for the Pyramid Triangle foundation from Miniatures in Minutes. Here they are, cut out and ready to apply to the foundation.

Since I had an odd shape, I marked blue X's on the foundation to show which patches would go down first. 

I placed the first two outer patches of each pincushion first.

Before adding the next set of patches that I could then sew top to bottom on the foundation.

Here it is with all the patches sewn onto the foundation.

At this point I cut the foundation to separate the two pincushions (since otherwise it would be just like me to forget and sew the two of them together). Below, the foundation on the left is trimmed and ready to Fold and Sew. The foundation on the right has its rows sewn together and just needs the paper removed. 

And the result? Cute little hexie pincushions!

There's the Pretty in Purple one:

But my favorite is the Red and White. So cute with some vintage fabrics that go way back.

I've got a busy week ahead, and I'm just not sure I've got sewing time on the radar. I'm hoping though. This GO! sew a week challenge has kept me moving on. Yeah, I'll have to squeeze some time in. Daylight Savings Time Fall Back.  Hey, I gained an hour!

GO! All Together Now

Sometimes I hate having bits and pieces left over from a charm pack. I feel like I need (NEED) to get it all used up.  I didn't quite meet that goal with these, but I came darn close!

Just because I have better pictures now, I'll start from the beginning. First came the GO! tablemat for my office.

Then came using the leftovers and the GO! equilateral triangles die along with the Pyramid Triangle Foundation from Miniatures in Minutes to make a miniature quilt (11 1/2" by 12 1/2").

But after that I still had both a handful of little triangles and a few left over charms. I ran a few more bits through the GO! Equilateral Triangles die and then ran some other little leftovers through with the GO! 1" strip cutter. (Run them through twice and the result is 1" squares, easy peasy.)

So I used the 13-Square foundation from Miniatures in Minutes to make a 7 by 7 Trip Around the World -- that became a little zipper pouch.  Because you can never have too many little zipper bags, right?

Next came a 5 by 5 squares block and the Pyramid Triangle foundation.  Those two became pincushions. (For any interested, you can find a pdf on how I use the 13-Square foundation to make smaller blocks here and here).

So, there it is, two charm packs done! (Almost) no little bits leftover. I'll admit to a couple surviving charms, but I can live with that. I have a little private challenge going with myself: can I work on a AccuQuilt GO! related project every week? How long before the semester swamps me and I'm out of my sewing room for a while? Hard to say, but for now, I'm good.