Guest blogging again!

 

Hello! I have two more posts up on Kat's blog. She took some nice photos of pieces that I finished for Covered in Love. This first one shows quilts that only needed a little extra work from me: borders, or finishing a UFO.

The second post highlights some pieces that I designed from scratch with orphan blocks. I really enjoy this creative process! I hope you enjoy seeing the end results. Thanks for stopping by!

Covered in Love times six

Time for a quick catch-up post on what I've been working on. These six quilts were finished in June and July and I just shipped them off to Kat. This first one was made almost completely with scraps from Jan of The Colorful Fabriholic. They were leftovers from the very cool piece she made for her guild's Color Spoke Challenge. I grouped them by size and added a few more touches of the magenta. Then I set two quadrants of the quilt in black background and two in white.

The back used up some chunks of black, white and gray fabrics that have been in my stash for a while. I also had some strips with sweet and encouraging sayings on them; that fabric was donated to CiL and I hope it brings some encouragement to a family. 

Fabric designs that are half black/half white like these on the back seem to be very hard to use in piecing for me. I like them, I buy them, but then never use them. If you have any advice on ways to incorporate high contrast fabrics like this, let me know! 

This Star-Fish quilt was made from two different CiL donations that happened to be sitting next to each other on my work surface one day. The 13 free-form stars are made from soft, pretty batiks and came to me as rectangles. I don't know who stitched them, but I love them! The three fish panels with white backgrounds came from someone else, but the colors are an exact match to the stars. That made 16 blocks, hm, a 4x4 layout could wo4k. Then I remembered I had another fish panel with similar colors and could make four more block from that. 4x5 was a much better size and a quilt was born.

The back is just fat quarters in the same sherbet shades as the front. I also pulled those colors from my bin of 2.25" strips for a scrappy binding. 

This fun quilt is made with a combination of blocks from me and Cathy of Crazy by Design. I think her blocks might be from the book Farmhouse Vintage? They include the bee, flower and hand mixer. Aren't those super cute? They ended up as orphan blocks in her stash because they weren't exactly 12.5", and we all know how that goes, don't we? I have my own selection of 12.0", 11.75" and 11.4785726" blocks that are hoping for friends of the same size to come out and play.

I grouped blocks of the same width together and sewed them into columns. Then I offset the columns to hide the fact that each column is a little different height. Your eye sees the stairstep design but can't perceive the slight differences. Of course, MY eye sees my blocks with crappy contrast, so I'm glad Cathy's fun blocks dominate the scene! The background gray is printed with the names of all fifty US states.

The back is a large chunk of stylish ladies on Vespas that I've been hoarding for years. Some of you may know that we have motorscooters that we carry with us on the top of the boat so I love all things scooter-related. Time to get that cute fabric out into the world to comfort a family.

This autumnal piece was donated by Christy and sewn by a friend of hers. It came with a big extra chunk of the red and brown leaf fabric. I'm guessing that it was made in the early 2000s? It is a very complicated design, with most of the blocks being cut on the bias. Blocks that had NO BUSINESS being bias. Maybe it was a mystery quilt along and each piece was so unusual there would be no way to guess the final design? I don't know, but I feel for the gal who tried to make this beast lie flat. The combination of so many bias edges and the super soft plaid flannel made the top wavy gravy. Roly poly. A sea of rumples, kind of like the Maine waters we're cruising right this minute.

I removed the entire outer border to get back to some semblance of flatness, and used the leftover pieces to make the quilt rectangular. Then I "quilted the life into it," as the saying goes! I find that when I'm fighting with a quilt top, or feeling bad that I chopped off some points, or I'm not loving the colors, it really helps to do more extensive and/or custom quilting. 

 

This classic looking quilt started as a batch of Priscilla's orphan blocks. Priscilla's piecing is always precise and perfect. They are also delightfully scrappy, with no one color dominating at all. A little sashing, a few cornerstones, and this top came together lickety split. I think Nicki made the pretty green floral binding, all nicely pre-pressed and ready to go. 

The back is an eBay find that I think was supposed to be a lightweight bed cover. It came to me as a single piece of cotton, 120"x120". 

And finally, some rainbow fun! This quilt was made by me with a batik jelly roll donated to CiL. It's just a simple rail fence, and a few borders, but there's something about rainbow order that always makes me smile. The last batch of donations that Kat sent me contained four jelly rolls, so I'm on the lookout for more good patterns to use them up. Let me know in the comments if you have a pattern you like!

This big chunk of solid orange was also donated and makes a great back for such a bright front. I hope it ends up in the hand of an orange lover.

I got confirmation from Kat yesterday that she received the big box containing these quilts, so soon they can go to work doing the serious business of comforting grieving families. I have a batch of baby/toddler quilts to share with you next, so stay tuned! And thanks for your understanding while I was on blog hiatus.

Gift for S&D

This quilt was given as a gift to boating friends S and D. S was really thrilled with it, and posted it on her Facebook page. I'm not on FB, but Sean shared all the sweet comments from that post with me. 

Well, most of the comments were sweet. One person said, "Those aren't the colors I would have chosen" which I thought was quite snotty. I mean, really? S said that she loved it and someone disses the colors? That's so rude to S, and rude to me. And even if they chose different colors, I wouldn't make them a quilt anyway. So neener neener neener.

I really like this combination of black and white and brown and gray. It feels sophisticated and modern to me, as sophisticated as quilt with a tiny fox on it can be. I did different FMQ motifs in each section: wishbones, swirls, and stipples.

The back includes a big chunk of this odd map fabric featuring the East Siberian Sea and the Soviet Union. I told them not to use it for navigation when they take their boat out this season.

And here it is in their home in Maine. It looks great in this cozy under-the-eaves room!

Mod hodge podge

This quilt was a bit of a failed experiment that turned out fine in the end. I had a rather random assortment of orphan blocks that each had at least a little bit of turquoise. The puzzle was how to deal with each of them being a different size. The largest is 12" finished and the smallest is 4" with some oddballs in between like 9 7/8". I decided that making each one the bottom left corner of a block with scrappy cream backgrounds could work, with the quilt getting lighter and more open toward the top.

I think the top half works pretty well because the differences between the blocks are large enough for your eye to see a gradation. At the bottom, though, 12" and 11.5" look pretty much identical! But those larger blocks do give weight to the bottom, allowing the small blocks to float above. So I'm calling it good enough to podium in the Orphan Block Olympics, if there were only four contestants.

The back also didn't quite live up to my vision. I like the column of extra blocks against the cream, but filling out the rest with turquoise scraps is...clunky. It's fine, it's the back, but...meh. I also put the Covered in Love label on smack in the middle of the cream section. Hello? Why? I don't remember!

I very much enjoyed working with all the cool blocks, however. Isn't this pickle dish block neat? And the crumb block is particularly complex and fun. I often wonder what project the blocks were originally part of and hope it turned out well! Meanwhile, I'm calling my results "mod" because of the negative space and "alternative gridwork." That's fancy talk for, "It didn't really line up the way I expected it to." But it's soft and snuggly and perhaps someone's favorite color and that's what counts.

Finishing touches

Hello, friends! Welcome back to my quilt odyssey. We've been chugging slowly north, moving away from the hurricane zone and toward pleasant summer weather. And I've been putting together quilts for Covered in Love, using donated orphan blocks and fabric.

Today I'm sharing five quilts that all came to me as large-ish groups of blocks, making for quick assembly and easy finishes. First up is this piece with a Christmas flair. The 25 blocks in the shape of gift boxes all have holiday themes like reindeer, wreaths and ornaments. They were donated by Christine. So cute! But not quite enough for an entire quilt. 

The colors are the standard red, green and gold, with quite a bit of black mixed in. I noticed the same colors in a bag of strip blocks donated by Priscilla. I think they make a vibrant border, and the black binding helped tie it all together.

On the back, I used a big chunk of this "cheater" fabric, printed to look like antique applique blocks. It even looks like the madder reds have "bled" a bit of dye, but nope. That's printed right on the fabric. The last of Priscilla's blocks stretched the backing just enough, and this quilt was in the bag. Or the box, since that's how I ship quilts to Kat.

The next quilt was even easier to put together, since there were plenty of blocks for the entire piece. I don't even think there was one left over! I'm not sure who made these fun 16 patches, but I love the mix of bright colors against black.

And such a great variety of fabrics, too! There must be over a dozen different black background designs. It inspired me to pull out similar pieces from my stash, and use them to create the backing and binding.

They look a bit of a jumble in this view, but in person it has a kind of I-spy feeling. I hope it starts some interesting conversations and offers snuggly comfort to a family.

And moving from black to brown, this quilt came to me as a small flimsy, not just individual blocks. All I had to do was add a few borders to bring it up to size. The darker brown inner border and binding are made from donated fabric. Kat receives not only orphan blocks, but yardage, precuts and premade binding, too.

I love the mix of fabrics in this! Very rich and interesting. It looks like it might be a disappearing nine patch pattern.

For the outer border, I used this caramel map fabric that's been marinating in my stash for a while. You can see the loopy quilting that I started with. I usually quilt the borders first and then work my way to the center. That's backwards from what is often recommended, but it works for me because it keeps the edges from flapping loose and getting caught under the needle. The loopy motif gave me fits on this, so I switched to a plain old stipple once I got out of the outer border. No one will ever notice!

For the back, I pieced together some fun horses in browns, browns, and more browns. This fabric was made into curtains, probably for a child's room, and I bought it on eBay. Yards and yards for just pennies. Score!

The fourth quilt is another one made from two different sets of blocks. The central section is 12 blocks that I think are called Crown of Thorns. Set together, they make some interesting secondary patterns. Do you see 12 blocks, or 6?

Here's the 13th block on the back to help you see the underlying design. Hard to see on the front, isn't it?

And here's a closeup of some of the fun fabrics Priscilla used to make these blocks. I chose a deep red for the border to help accentuate the red HSTs.

The back is a nice panel that features wildlife scenes and picks up that same deep red from the front. I think it adds a masculine touch to the whole piece.

And finally, here is a photo from Kat's blog of an all-cream quilt made by Meg and finished by me. I couldn't take even one decent picture myself, so pop over to this post on KatAndCat quilts for a better look. I added the outer border, thin gold flange and matching binding, plus some fancy-schmancy quilting. 

Which quilt do you like best? Is it the pattern or the colors that catch your eye? Let me know in the comments!

More little quilts for little people

Baby and toddler quilts are just the most fun to make, aren't they? Here are three more that I finished recently. These penguins on parade were made with orphan blocks that I won as part of another blogger's give away. I'm sorry to say I can't find her contact info, alas. So let's just concentrate on how stinkin' cute those blocks are! I added scrappy blue and yellow strips and bits to fill in the background.

Here's a close-up of one of the dapper little guys and a peek at the back of the quilt. This one will probably go to Little Lambs as part of the Hands2Help challenge.

The next two quilts have both been sent off to Quilts Beyond Borders. This one is made from charm squares and a little orange background fabric. That same orange is the binding, too. The bright fabrics feature butterflies and various smiling bugs, giraffes, and peapods. Yes, peapods.

The back uses up some older yellow and green fabrics. I include the backings, even rather uninteresting ones, to help me remember what they look like. Sometimes the charities will share photos of children with their quilts, and all that shows is the backing, so it's helpful to document them.

The third quilt started with some HSTs that were given to me by Jan, The Colorful Fabriholic. The pretty browns and golds reminded me of a Laurel Burch horse panel I had tucked away.

I've loved Laurel's works for years, wearing her jewelry designs back in the 80's. I had no idea she also designed fabric until I became a quilter! I've been hoarding this panel for a while, and needed a little nudge to use it up. Many thanks to Jan for providing the blocks that inspired this little piece.

This fabric covered with horses is perfect for the back, don't you think? I scored a large lot of it that had been sewn into curtains. After unpicking a few seams and trimming off some faded areas, I ended up with several nice chunks. I hope a horse loving child enjoys this quilt!

Three for Covered in Love

I'm still catching up on quilts I finished in late 2020, and today's group are all for Covered in Love. I made them from orphan blocks, many sewn by Priscilla. This first one is made with blocks that I believe came from a tutorial over on Jo's Country Junction. Priscilla made 98 of them, and I added two more for a 10x10 layout.

I thought the colors looked good with some strips of train fabric I had in my stash, so I used that for borders. I couldn't figure out a good way to make the trains go around the corners, so I fussy cut a different fabric for cornerstones.

The backing is a big chunk of dark brown with a holly leaf motif, plus strips of the last of the trains. I hope this brings comfort to the family of a railroad enthusiast!

The second quilt started with a big pile of scrappy nine patches made by Priscilla. There was no particular color that stood out as dominant, so I did a little experiment. If I added purple and beige half square triangles, would it make the over all quilt extra purple-y? I think the answer is yes!

For the back, I pieced together a number of flannel fat quarters that were donated to Covered in Love. If you look closely, several have a bit of purple in them, too. It's very soft and cuddly with all that fuzzy flannel.

And finally, this quilt is made with the last blocks from a block drive from several years ago. I think this is called a Barn Raising layout. I put the four blocks with solid blue and green fabrics in the middle, and surrounded them with the softer florals. That made a square top a little too small for Covered in Love. It sat for a long time before I had the idea to add the strips of blue striped fabric at top and bottom to make a rectangle. I like the way it picks up that central bright blue, too.

Chunks of cream with a tiny red star, solid red, and the rest of the blue stripe make a rather modern backing. A solid red binding rounds it all out and gets these lingering orphan blocks to work spreading love and comfort.