Did you see that Bonnie Hunter has posted the fabric requirements for her 2017/18 mystery quilt adventure? The new mystery is called On Ringo Lake. I have sewn almost every Quiltville mystery that Bonnie has offered (my pre-2014 mystery quilts and the 2014/15 finishes). I think the only one I missed was Old Tobacco Road in 2005. This year I finished 2014's mystery called Grand Illusion. I didn't really follow the pattern since I didn't like one of my original fabric choices (a very flat dull green) and so I had to remove the sashing to get rid of the green. Then I lost a few pieces (hey it happens over the years!) and had to change the border, and well... it's finally a finished quilt! This is my quilt top from the 2016 mystery called En Provence. I used mostly fabrics from the Good Neighbours fabrics line by Amanda Jean Nyberg at Crazy Mom Quilts. I enjoyed the method of starting with a package of fabric that I love, and adding scraps and pieces that coordinate as I see how much fabric is needed in each colour. I really, really like how this one turned out and will be putting it on the top of my UFO list to finish in 2018.
So, back to planning for the new 2017 mystery quilt. Again, I am going to start the mystery using a lovely bundle of fabric and then add in pieces and scraps from my stash. This is a fabric line called Blue Sky by Edyta Sitar. I purchased the bundle at Cherished Pieces in Tillsonburg. I think this is the perfect project for using up this treasure! Are you joining in the mystery this year? It's so fun not having any idea what we are sewing! Be prepare for lots of cutting and sewing of small pieces (my favourite!) as well as complex block construction made easy with great instructions! Counting down the days to the start of step #1 on November 24th! I have a few other things to keep me out of trouble until then! LOLOLOLOL!!!
Pinned to the design wall today is a finished quilt! This is my version of Bonnie Hunter's pattern called Grand Illusion. It was her annual mystery quilt that started in November 2014.
The quilting was quick and easy - just a horizontal and vertical grid with the walking foot. This quilt taught me that I really am a scrappy quilter. I purchased new yardage for this quilt and struggled with it the whole time. I learned that I don't want to sew with new yardage because it just doesn't make my heart sing. Why use one green fabric when 10 or 20 greens will make me happier?!? Thank you to Bonnie for another wonderful mystery quilt experience! To see more projects on design walls, hop over to the link up at Small Quilts.
Grand Illusion is closer to becoming a finished quilt. A backing was made from fabric pieces leftover from piecing the quilt top, including the sashings that I removed because they had a green fabric that I decided I didn't like in the quilt. It's much more labour intensive to piece a quilt backing than to buy yardage or a wide backing, but I'm so happy about using up all these leftovers! And it's almost like having a reversible quilt!
The machine quilting will be all stitch-in-the-ditch between the blocks and straight through the middle of all the blocks (horizontally and vertically) using the walking foot. It's boring, but a quick way to finish a quilt.
I thought I might need to invest in a a new pair of Machinger gloves (used for greater control when machine quilting) because the coating on the fingers seemed to be wearing out. But when I compared the old gloves to the new ones, I could hardly believe it! Oh my goodness I was WAY past needing new gloves!
Grand Illusions is on the design wall today and it's a finished quilt top! You can see the Quiltville link up party here from January 2015 to see what the original design was supposed to look like. My version went through a few changes, and I'm still not loving how my corners turned out, but I'm calling it done and ready for quilting.
But first I need to piece a backing. There are a few blocks leftover, including the pieced sashings that I had to remove in order to like the quilt more, so these will be included in the backing. I have Ethel my Singer 301 out and she is getting a good workout piecing all the leftovers into something useable. It's always a fun challenge for me to see if I can transform the remaining yardage into a backing and binding for a quilt. To see more Design Wall posts, hop over to Patchwork Times.
Ta da! My finished En Provence mystery quilt top is finally finished and on the design wall! This is the Quiltville mystery project that started at the end of November. It measures 70 " x 70" which is wider than my design wall, so the left side is pinned to a sheet that is covering the doorway.
I had to add in a few extra neutral fabrics in the last border, which aren't in the centre of the quilt, but I think it looks okay. Almost all of the fabrics are from Amanda Jean Nyberg's Good Neighbors from Connecting Threads. Now we're ready for basting and quilting.
My version of Quiltville's En Provence mystery quilt is on the design wall again/still. Did you notice that it is all in one piece?!?! I worked hard this week to get this quilt top together because today is the Quiltville link up. If you know the pattern, you will see that I didn't extend the dark blue tri-recs units into the last border because I liked it better without them.
My quilt just needs one more light border and then it's done. The problem is that I have run out of the light fabrics that are in the blocks and in the first border. I really don't want to buy more fabric, so I have been adding in some other scraps that were kicking around the quilt studio. I need about 100 four patch blocks to finish and made a few more yesterday while watching Quiltcam. To see more En Provence quilts, hop over to Quiltville. To see more design wall posts, hop over to Patchwork Times.
On the most recent Quiltcam Bonnie Hunter said: "All I want to do is make really big quilts from really small pieces". Me too! That is a great life, don't you think?!? Well, it would be if you're retired and didn't have to work. But if you do have to work and take care of your kids, your parents, and a home, and fit in some community, church or volunteer work, there's not a lot of time leftover for making lots of big quilts. We all do the best we can with the time we have.
I'm making my version of En Provence smaller than Bonnie's version, but I'm very happy with how it is looking. My layout will use 9 blocks instead of 16 blocks in the original pattern. The pattern will be removed from the Quiltville website tomorrow, so I'd really like to have it done by then. Only one more block to piece and then I can sew the whole quilt top together. In the middle of En Provence is my purple circle of squares block for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. It will come off the wall as soon as the last block is finished. You can see the pieces for it pinned to the right side on the bottom of the design wall. To see more design wall posts, hop over to Patchwork Times.
This is the current status of my version of the mystery quilt En Provence. The pattern will be disappearing on February 1st so I really want to get it mostly done by then, which is less than 2 weeks away.
Most of these pieces are sewn in rows so that I can shift everything one block to the left, hanging the left side of the quilt off the design wall so there will be room to work on the 3rd column on the right. Some of the block pieces for that column are pinned on the right side. Clearly I need a bigger design wall! All the block components are made, organized and counted, and I have everything this quilt needs to be finished except the border 4 patches. It just might be possible to finish by the end of January. To see more design wall posts, hop over to Patchwork Times.
Progress is being made on my version of Quiltville's En Provence mystery quilt. I have made 2 changes so far in the process of working on my quilt.
In my photo from last week's DWM, I had used "background" squares in the block because that's what the directions said. Background to me means neutral fabrics. But in the photo of Bonnie's quilt, she used yellow 3.5" squares.
I tried that out and liked it better. See how the block on the left has background squares and the block on the right has yellow squares? Yep, the yellow shines more, and shining as much light as possible is always the goal! So I recut those pieces and started sewing the blocks together.
The next decision was what to do about those pink stars in the sashing. It was too scrappy for my liking in the above photo. I like scrappy for sure, but that was too much, even for me! So I am grouping the pink star points with the same fabrics together as you can see in this photo. Oh I see one star point on the right is upside down... good thing the sashing isn't sewn together yet.
I am really having so much fun with this project. It's like one big jigsaw puzzle! There is still lots of sewing to do, but it's taking shape and looking more like a quilt. To see more design wall postings, hop over to Patchwork Times. And to see more mystery quilts in progress, hop over to the Quiltville link up.
Did you enjoy a relaxing start to 2017? According to superstition, whatever you spend the first day of the year doing will set the pattern for the rest of the year. I don't believe in most superstitions, but didn't want to take any chances with this one, so I sewed for most of the day!
Bonnie revealed the end of the En Provence mystery quilt pattern yesterday. Did you see it? Her quilt is very beautiful, with lots of movement and complex block designs. I couldn't wait to get a block together to see what my colour choices would look like. I was already two steps behind, and there were even more QST blocks that were needed for step #7. It was a lot of sewing to get to this point, but here's the layout for my first block.
I am making a smaller version of her full size quilt (87" square) with 16 blocks. I am going to make mine 12 blocks and still have lots of sewing to do on block components. Here is my recycled spinach container that holds all the pieces and parts waiting to be made into blocks. To see more design wall postings, hop over to Patchwork Times. Here's the song I was listening to yesterday to start the new year... "leave what's heavy behind"!
It has been totally manageable so far to keep up with Bonnie Hunter's EnProvence mystery quilt since I am only making half of the required blocks for each step posted. These are my blocks for step #4. I didn't have enough of my dark blue fabric (which is purple in the directions) so I added in a small piece of fabric leftover from a quilt I made last year called "Under The Sea". It's the dark blue in the second column of blocks and it mixed in well with the other fabrics. Have I mentioned lately how much I love the TriRecs rulers? These blocks hardly needed any trimming down at all. I enjoyed a relaxing sewing session while watching Bonnie's QuiltCam. You can see that I have my hourglass leader/ender pieces for a new Clarissa block sitting on the bed of the sewing machine just waiting to be put through at the beginning or ending of a chain of blocks.
To see more posts for step #4 of the mystery project, hop over to Quiltville's link up. And to see more design wall postings, visit Patchwork Times.
Step #3 was posted for the Quiltville mystery En Provence which was another 4 patch block to make, which is easy peasy sewing at this busy time of year. In this step we started cutting up some of our other colours. Most people are sewing purples this week, and I am sewing blues. I am wondering about that microdot blue that looks a little purplish. It might not make it into the final quilt, but we'll see how it all works out. Here are all my blocks made so far up to step #3. They are being stored in a recycled spinach container, which is a perfect size to store 3.5" blocks. Hop over to the Quiltville link up to see the thousands of 4 patch blocks being sewn around the world this week!
It's week two of the Quiltville mystery and I am caught up with my blocks. I decided to sew half of the required blocks so that I can keep up with the mystery at this busy time of year. If at the end of the mystery I find out that I want to make the full size quilt, I can always make more blocks.
I love my TriRecs rulers and have had so much use out of them over the years. I use them to make my Alamo Star blocks in a teeny tiny 1.25" size, and even at that tiny size, the blocks are always accurate. Hop over to Quiltville to see what the mystery quilters have accomplished this week. And you can see more design wall postings over at Patchwork Times.
It's a boring looking design wall today. These are the neutral 4 patch blocks for step #1 of the Quiltville mystery. Bonnie recommended that if you want your finished quilt to be a smaller size (smaller than 87" square), it is a good idea to make half the blocks and that is what I'm going to do for this mystery project. So here are almost half of the recommended number of blocks.
I sewed a big pile of blocks without any thread, so those had to go through the machine twice! Don't you just hate when that happens? I can usually tell by the sound of some machines that the bobbin has run out, but I can't notice a different sound on the Singer 301s. I have enjoyed cutting and sewing these neutrals from the Good Neighbours fabric line, but am looking forward to cutting into all the other fabrics and get some contrast going in the next step. Linking up to Patchwork Times and Quiltville's step 1 link up.
I must start off today saying I am quite proud of myself! I have my 2015 Quiltville mystery blocks sewn into a quilt top! And all the lines in the setting triangle fabric are going in the right direction! Woohoo! It measures 73" x 85" at this point and I don't know if I want to add another border or two. But for now, I am just admiring it! This means I am ready to start the next Quiltville mystery called "En Provence". I have my fabric selection well underway and will be ready when the first step comes out at the end of the month. To see more design wall postings, hop over to Patchwork Times.
The annual Quiltville mystery is starting at the end of the month (click here to see the intro and fabric requirements). The fabric selection process is always the most challenging step. Some years I have followed the recommended colours (Easy Street and Allietare) and some years I went right off the rails (Orca Bay, Double Delight, and Carolina Crossroads). If you are a beginning quilter, I would recommend following Bonnie's fabric choices exactly as outlined. But if you're an experienced quilter and have a stash you want to use up, have some fun and pick your own colours. I love all of my Bonnie mystery quilts and I know that whatever fabric I am inspired to use, I will have lots of fun AND her patterns will produce a great quilt. I did discover in making Grand Illusion that I do not enjoy sewing quilts using yardage. In my heart I am a scrap quilter, so I don't like to use 1 yellow fabric when I could incorporate 10 different yellows! More = more fun! Bonnie said: "Let your quilt make a statement that is as uniquely you as your own handwriting is."
And so... drum roll please... I present my fabric selection for 2016-2017 En Provence. I really wanted to use the Good Neighbours fabric line by Amanda Jean Nyberg, which is a bright and happy grouping of primary colours with an amazing selection of neutrals that I love. I did remove the red fabrics out of the project in favour of the dark pinks. A few other fat quarters have been added to some of the colour groupings. Dark blue will be the purple, lighter blue will be the lilac, green is the green, pink is the magenta, and I can't decide whether the orange or the yellow will be the yellow. The yellow looks like it might blend too much with the neutrals. But the orange might compete with the magenta? What are your thoughts?!? Are you playing along with the mystery this year?
Bonnie Hunter posted the fabric requirements of the new mystery quilt this morning! Click here to read all about the next quilt I'll be starting with Bonnie and thousands of other quilters around the world.
I have been working diligently on getting last year's mystery quilt finished before the new one starts... well, the quilt top at least.
This quilt has fifty 12" blocks to sew together in diagonal rows with a lot of seam matching requiring the use of pins. I'm not a fan of pins, but there is just no other way to get all these seams to match up. But this is one of the things I really enjoy about Bonnie's quilts - complex blocks with lots of small pieces which make an interesting pattern. So I'm not complaining... just working hard! Are you joining the mystery fun this year with En Provence?
The push is on to finish Allietare (Bonnie Hunter's 2015 mystery) before her 2016 mystery starts in November!
I want to at least get the blocks sewn together. I didn't sew the setting triangle blocks and have decided to use a black Jo Morton print instead. I have all the setting triangles cut and the blocks are going up on the design wall. This is how it is looking today. Yum!
I was at the London Friendship Quilters' Guild show on the weekend and saw a finished Allietare sewn by Maureen Haynes. She even made the scalloped edges! Seeing this quilt totally inspired me to finish mine. SO I put aside the Circa challenge, and am throwing myself into Allietare this week. I'll be over at my sewing machine if you need me!
To see more design wall postings, hop over to Patchwork Times.
As my blog followers know, I am a huge Bonnie Hunter fan and look forward to sewing her annual mystery quilt. I have sewn almost every mystery quilt pattern she has written and you can read more about those quilts here and here. For the past few years the mystery event has started on the American Thanksgiving weekend in November.
I really wanted to have my 2015 Allietare mystery blocks together by the time the new mystery starts. I got the blocks out of the UFO closet and started sewing them together in pairs. Allietare is another on point layout and I've already been struggling with my Circa quilt layout this week, so I don't want to start working on this actual layout until Circa is off the design wall. Also I didn't make the setting blocks as the pattern outlined, so I will have to figure that out. But for now I'm at least making a bit of progress and that feels great!
On my design wall today are the finished star blocks for the Allietare mystery quilt. And when I look at the photo on the screen, I just have to say "there is one in every crowd"!! Oh brother :( Where's the seam ripper? It sure is a big quilt and this is only half the blocks taking up my whole design wall! The other half of the blocks are also sewn and you can see them here. To work on the layout of this quilt, I'm going have to build my bigger portable design wall. I think I might take this project to work on at quilt retreat this month. To see more versions of Allietare, Bonnie is hosting a link up over at her Quiltville blog. I am amazed at how many of the mystery quilts are already completely finished! Happy Groundhog day!
