Design Wall Monday

On the design wall is a finished quilt top made from the Broken Dishes block swap. I received these blocks last year in the swap hosted by Barb in Connecticut. The pattern is from Hyacinth Quilt Designs. 

I have looked at it again in person and on the computer screen, and I think the layout is right at this point. Feel free to tell me if you think there is a twisted block... I'd rather know now than after it's quilted! 

I did not put the blocks on the design wall before sewing them together. I sewed one test block first on my Sweet Baby Jayne 1964 Singer Featherweight (which still sews like a dream). Then I attached a muslin square to approximately half the blocks. 

Then I started to construct the blocks in a 9 patch fashion. The only criteria was "no repeated fabric within the blocks". After all the blocks were sewn, they went on the design wall.

It was a little tricky to get all the blocks going the right way, and the seam ripper was used on numerous occasions. You know how it goes... put the blocks on the design wall, take them to machine, sew them together, press the seams, put back up on the wall, locate the mistakes, unsew those seams, and repeat.

Thanks to Cindy at Hyacinth for the layout design and to Barb for hosting such a fun swap which resulted in these 80 wonderful broken dishes blocks.

To see more design wall posts, hop over to Patchwork Times.

Broken Dishes Swap Blocks

Barb hosted a block swap last month and I had so much fun with the bow tie swap last year, I just had to participate in her swap again this year! This year's block was called 'broken dishes' and we made them using muslin and repro reds. It was a bit more of a challenging block to sew than the bow tie was, but I managed to get them in the mail in time.

Here are half of the fabulous blocks I received in the mail! There is a wide range of interesting red prints and they will make a really great quilt!
I picked out a pattern by Hyacinth Designs to make with these blocks and can't wait to get started on it. But I'm thinking this will make the perfect project to work on at Christmas time so you might not see it in production on the blog for a couple of weeks. Also I want to finish the bow tie quilt from last year's swap before I start the broken dishes quilt. 
Thank you to all the block makers and to Barb for hosting a fun swap for us!
Linking up today to the quilting bee over at Sew Fresh Quilts.

Broken Dishes Update

All the broken dishes blocks for Barb's block swap are finally done and in the mail. Some quilters really dislike sewing HST blocks, but I don't mind it, so the thought of making 320 HSTs in order to sew 80 blocks to swap was not a deterrent. However I must admit that it did take me longer to complete this pile than I thought it would.




Next up is the MOD Bear Paw QAL, which is more of the same. I will continue to sew more HST blocks but in a brown, smaller version to make into bear paw blocks. 

Broken Dishes

Cobwebs might start forming in my quilting studio if I don't get myself more organized and/or find more hours in the day. My sewing table is covered with the projects that are awaiting decisions to progress to the next stage. But I can't deal with that right now.
When I am really busy and feeling overwhelmed, I need something mindless to sew, which means that the projects requiring great concentration, and those requiring decisions get put aside in favour of something quick and easy.

This week in my sewing moments, which have been few and far between, I have been making these broken dishes blocks. Easy and relaxing. No decisions or brain power required. These are for Barb's Block Swap and need to be in the mail at the beginning of October, so it's the perfect project to focus on this week.

I am using my favourite BlocLoc ruler to square up the HSTs, but because I cut the triangles with the Easy Angle ruler, there is very little trimming required. Can you see the tiny slivers that are being trimmed? I wouldn't usually even do the trimming except to cut off the dog ears, but these blocks are for a swap and I want them to be perfect!

Bow Ties

Don't you just love it when you meet a deadline? Even if it's self-imposed, there is such a sense of satisfaction when you accomplish what you set out to do. And I am delighted that I got my bow ties from last year's block swap sewn into a quilt top so that I could happily sign up for this year's block swap.
And here it is on the design wall... my civil war bow tie quilt top. Thank you to Sharon over at Vroomans Quilts for the inspiration for this layout. I really liked the bow tie quilt layout I saw on Sharon's blog last year using the "barn raising" setting, and having a border of half size blocks across the top and bottom of the quilt.
I like that my layout is slightly off centre, just like me :)
Can't wait to get this basted so I can get going on the hand quilting!

Design Wall Monday Bow Ties

The sign up for Barb's block swap is coming up soon, and the (self imposed) pressure is on to sew up the blocks from last year's swap. Deadlines are good motivators for me. Here are the bow ties from last year on the design wall.
Next will be a 1" or 2" muslin border followed by a border of mini bow ties.

Here are a few blocks that I have sewn so far and a stack of pieces cut and ready to sew. The block on the bottom left is one of the swap blocks from last year. 
And see those cute little blue scissors and matching tape measure that Julie sent to me for participating in the Log Cabin Lunatics link up? I am putting them to good use!

To see more design wall postings, hop over to Patchwork Times.

Design Wall Monday

Last summer Barb hosted a bow tie block swap and I participated in the Civil War group. The 82 blocks I received are wonderful and right now I am highly motivated to finish my Civil War bow tie quilt. Why now you ask?!? 
Because Barb is going to be hosting another block swap in August, and I want to finish up the project from last year's swap so that I can be a guilt-free participant this year! 
I went totally scrappy with the layout, pulling the blocks randomly from the pile and sewing each block to the next one in the pile.
(see the blocks I made for the swap here). 
This is a bad photo of the start of the layout on the design wall. Going random does not mean that the colours will be evenly distributed, so there are too many yellow/golds in the upper right quadrant.
I'm not going to sew it that way of course... some modifications are going to be made to this "random" layout right away!
And also I have an idea for a fun border that I want to make. Last year Sharon posted a photo of her bow tie quilt (see it here) and when I saw it, I knew that I would try the same design. I really liked the idea of making smaller bow tie blocks for a border. 
The block swap bow ties are 4", which means the border bow ties will be half size at 2". And it just so happens that an anonymous "angel swapper" sent along two mini blocks last year, so I have two to start and only need to make about 80 of those.
To see more design wall postings, hop over to Patchwork Times.

Bowtie Block Swap

On my design wall today are the Civil War print bowtie blocks from Barb's block swap. There is such a wide variety of prints in these blocks that I received from the swap, and none of them are the fabrics I have in my stash. How can that be possible?!?
I like this circular layout because I haven't made one of these yet. You can see some of the other bowtie quilts I have made here.
I plan to make a few more of these blocks to be able to make a lap sized quilt and this will be a project to work on over the winter.
To see more design wall postings, hop over to Patchwork Times.

Civil War Bowtie Swap

I signed up for the civil war bowtie block swap that Barb organized for blog land quilters. I'll bet you're not surprised that I couldn't resist.


My blocks are sewn and ready to pop in the mail. Bowtie blocks are fun to sew, but it's an added pressure when they are going to other quilters, and they needed to be the exact right size. So my quilter's OCD kicked in and I measured every single block. Blocks that were too big or too small are staying here to be in my quilt. 
It's been a long time since I've worked with my collection of civil war reproduction fabric. My favourite civil war quilt was the one I made for my son - click here to see it.

I am already starting to think about layout possibilities for these bowtie blocks, which won't be swapped until October.
I have made a few bowtie quilts previously:

 * a 30's reproduction quilt which has the blocks in a ring/circular layout with a striped sashing. The blocks are 6" and it is one of my favourite quilts.

*a mini bowtie quilt with 2" blocks in the ring layout (that was won by Deanna in a blog draw a few years ago).

* a 4" bowtie block project (which is in UFO closet) that I worked on last year at Quilt Camp. It's not finished yet, but it has the blocks in a straight set.

I wonder what layout these blocks will prefer? 

Bowtie Swap

Did you catch QuiltCam last night? If you missed it, you can watch it anytime from the archives. This is where I was sitting while I worked on 4" bowtie blocks.

 
These are for a block swap that Barb is hosting. We are exchanging blocks made from muslin, and civil war reproduction prints. These first few blocks are looking kind of dull. I must add in a few cheddar blocks, or maybe some red ones to spice it up a bit. I finished about a dozen, so I only have about 70 more to go!

9 patches mailed

Back in July I signed up for Julie's Celebration 9 patch block swap and wrote about starting to sew my first blocks on this post.
My blocks were finally finished up this week. I strip pieced my 6" blocks (click here to see a tutorial on this method) but since I am easily bored and needed to sew 130 blocks, I decided to use a different technique to sew the 3" blocks. I was going to write up a tutorial but why reinvent the wheel?   I found a great tutorial for this technique made by Trisha - click here to see it. I am already dreaming about how I'm going to set my swap blocks together when they return...do you have quilting dreams?!?

Starting something new!

Okay...I admit that my sewing room is a mess and I can't remember what I was working on before the big anniversary party, so I am starting something new!
Julie is hosting a 9 patch block swap and I couldn't miss out on this fun, so I signed up. We are to use 1800's reproduction fabrics and this made it even more appealing for me since I was planning to make a reproduction quilt in honour of a little trip that my husband organized this past spring.
He took my father and my son to Gettysburg this year and they had a once-in-a-lifetime experience learning about the history there.  I hope my son especially will always treasure his memories of this special adventure. He took a lot of great photographs and this is one of them.

Part of this quilt will be made from these reproduction 9 patch blocks from Julie's swap.
These are the fabrics that I bought specifically for this quilt.
I am cutting off the selvages to keep of course and have started to work on 9 patch production...6" blocks and 3" blocks. I have to make more 6" blocks for the exchange, but I enjoy making the 3" blocks more!!!

I know it doesn't look like much so far, but just you wait...this project is just getting started!

Quilt Rotation

It's time for quilt rotation...every month I change the quilts hanging in my home. I have taken down the January ones and put up the Valentine's theme quilts. This is still one of my old favorites that I called "Heart Patches"...a very simple miniature quilt with 1.5" 9 patch blocks on point, with hand quilted hearts. It is hanging in the dining room.
On the left is another old favorite from my days of block swaps. In the centre are 6" swap blocks

from a Valentine's Day exchange in 1997 and around the outside border are 3" blocks from a "Nine patch Niblets" block exchange in 1998. It took me a long time (years!) to put this wallhanging together and was my first experience with the large range of measurements in the quilting world. A 6" block to one quilter is a 5.5" or 6.5" block to another! I finally figured out to sash the 6" blocks to make them go together, and the 9 patch blocks I just trimmed liberally and made them fit. This quilt is hanging in the living room.

I really learned a lot from my block swapping days in the 90's and it was always lots of fun to get the "squishies" in the mail. I still have lots of blocks sitting around my quilting room...everything from the hourglass and 9 patch block exchanges, to beautiful star blocks. I had to stop participating in the swaps because I just couldn't keep up with using up all the blocks and getting the projects quilted...too many UFO's accumulated.

This week I am starting to plan which projects to take along to a quilting retreat coming up at the end of the month, and I'm sure at least one of those projects will involve using up some of my blocks from internet swaps. At last year's retreat I stressed myself out by setting goals that were too ambitious. I think I took 9 projects to work on, and tried to do some work on each of them. This year I am taking fewer projects and focusing more on the relaxation part of the reatreat. I hope February passes quickly!