Paisleigh Handkerchief Quilt

At the end of the year, our LQS had a huge sale of retired fabrics. I really tried hard to control myself and even delayed visiting the sale in hopes the fabrics I'd be interested in were already gone. But...you know how it goes. When it comes to fabrics, I can always find something that's irresistible.

When I got home with my purchases, I was so excited about them I had to get right to work. Of course, nothing goes as smoothly as you hope, right?

The fabric is called Paisleigh by Maude Ashbury. There was a panel and a series of corresponding pieces. I only got the panel and figured I'd cut out the blocks, add some sashing and be done. No such luck. They weren't perfect squares (off by 1/2") so after much a-do I finally trimmed them down to make them squares and used the beautiful periwinkle for on-point diamonds.

I got the large blocks pieced together, but it was too small and narrow and I was out of periwinkle. Luckily my Mom had bought the rest of the bolt, so I was able to use some of hers to create borders. I decided to go more modern with the a-symmetrical layout and cut smaller blocks out of the remaining pieces from the panel. I've done this type of layout before in my ZigZag Quilt and I like it. Kinda fun and different.

Now that the top was done, I started work on the back. The pink chevron was another sale fabric I picked up at the same sale, but it wasn't quite big enough. Sooo...

I got creative and pieced together the last of the scraps from the panel and added periwinkle scraps to each end to make it long enough. I was kind of proud of myself for coming up with this as a solution. Using every scrap and saving money at the same time; felt like a win-win!

The last piece to this puzzle was the batting, and I had just finished my roll. Once again, I was piecing scraps together to make a full sheet of batting to use. This quilt is truly a patchwork project from start to finish. I felt so frugal and efficient. It was a fun little challenge. The finished size is 55x67, so a nice lap quilt or wall hanging.

I wasn't thrilled with the quilting, but I'm reaching the point that I just want to be able to get my quilts finished so I'm doing what I can until I have a machine that can handle the type of quilting I really want to do. A basic meander in the periwinkle and we're good. It would have been fun to do something more like some paisleys similar to the ones in my Cowgirl Quilt (which needs better pictures, I need to get on that), or practice some feathering, but not today. Not on this one.

Overall, I'm super happy with how this one turned out.  It was a lot of fun figuring all of the scraps out and the colors and prints are just so much fun to look at. Love it.

I'm linking up with Needle and Thread Thursday on My Quilt Infatuation and Finish Friday at Crazy Mom Quilts. Come on by and check out all the great projects fellow quilters are working on.

Clip it to Keep it

I know I've blogged about this before, but it is something I am constantly working on so it keeps coming up. Now that my daughter is in preschool 4 days a week (this mama has separation anxiety apparently) I fear her loosing and/or damaging her implants. So I came up with these little straps...

Then I decided since she always has both on, I'd put them both on one clip. It took a little adjusting for her. If one fell off she needed to put it back on rather than yank on it because yanking pulls the other one off, too. They work great though...

So, now that I have a design I really like, I've decided to celebrate the seasons with clips. Why not have fun with it, right?!? She loves to dress up, so this is just one more way to dress it up. I made hearts for Valentines Day (see the picture of the double clip above), green ribbon with glittery shamrocks for St. Patricks Day (now she's guaranteed to have green on this holiday), and a soft purple for Easter. I also starting making some red/white/blue ones for upcoming holidays like Memorial day and the 4th of July.

They are just a lot of fun. It was quite challenging getting the clips to do these; order issues. But now that I have them again, and I can go to town. Until I ran out of snaps. Well, it's back to the craft store for me. Not a bad place to be.

So Pretty

I just can't stop looking at it. I love these colors, these swirls, and of course the black fabric to make it all POP!

I couldn't find this pattern so my husband got a little distraction with some number crunching. I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE how this turned out. Maybe it will be my next tutorial on the blog? Possible...

I've actually already completed this top. Now all I need is some backing fabric and binding so I can wrap this bad boy up.

I admit, my quilting ability has been shaken and therefore I am collecting quite a pile of finished tops. I wish I could find, and purchase, a nice inexpensive long arm. I don't know where I'd put it, but man it would be awesome.

Minor Changes and I'm Done

I am preparing to finish up my BOM quilt top, but I wanted to make a couple changes to some blocks before I make it permanent.

Before

After

This first one was a block I just completed last month and blogged about here. As soon as I finished it, I knew I wanted to make some changes, I just didn't know what. I was thrown off my game when I realized I didn't have one solid piece for the longest section of the block. After that, I was scrambling to put something together. I thought more about it and added some triangles to create a drop look on the sides. I feel much better about it now. 

Before

After

The other one is the very first block I completed as part of this project, and blogged about here. I knew from the start I wanted to add something to this block, and I figured it would be pink (I mean, who doesn't love pink). I finally got a little color splashed in there. It creates just a dash of pop.

Here are all the blocks together. I am now ready to find some sashing and borders and put this guy together. Trying to decide if I should go with a garden-look batik or something more ocean like; it is supposed to be a Hawaii-inspired quilt. I could also do something with a green, but I worry it might clash with the other greens in the quilt. Oh, so many choices. 

What would you do? Leave a comment and let me know what you think...

I'm linking up with Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday. Love to hear from you about the final settings. Now I'll go see what everyone else has been up to.

Last BOM Block

I finally made it to the end! I went to the last class to get the fabrics and pattern and I admit, I wasn't thrilled. I immediately loved the pattern; lots of smaller pieces offering all sorts of flexibility and opportunity. The colors were a different story.

Everyone has their fave colors, and I wish I liked orange (and yellow) more, but I'm just not a fan. And this wasn't a soft orange like this last set.  This was a bold tangerine orange, along with a lighter sherbet orange color.

As I sat in the class wondering what on earth I was going to do with these colors, or how I could minimize how much I used of each in the pattern, I saw one of the examples go up and it clicked! Just because it's a flying geese pattern doesn't mean it needs to match on both sides. And then it came to me...SUNFLOWER!

It was perfect! It couldn't have been any better! What a fabulous way to finish the BOM! I was so excited to get this one done; I got right to work. It didn't work out exactly like I wanted; I would have preferred the darker orange be the center of the flying geese and the lighter orange up against the center yellow square as well as light orange triangles in each corner. But I had to work with what I had, and I'm super happy with the results.

Now I am ready to lay out my flowers with some sashing and finish this bad boy up! There are a couple of changes I want to make to a couple of the blocks but that should be quick. I told myself I wasn't going to do the next BOM, but they sucked me in. I am already envisioning the bold colors of the Ombre fabric line set on black. It's going to be amazing!

I'm linking up with Freshly Pieced for WIP Wednesday. Maybe I can wrap this one quickly? Yeah...that would be awesome!