More log cabins

I'm a bit of a fan of the log cabin block - a fact which I have no doubt will not have escaped your notice if you ever read this blog - so when I feel like making blocks, it's one of my go-to blocks. I didn't sew at all today, as my brother-in-law was down visiting from Leicester, but in the past few days, among other things, I've been sewing these scrappy log cabins. Alex helped me choose what colours to use and then I've been piecing them using small bits of neutrals and blues. As it happens, there are actually 16 of them, but it was easier to photograph 9 together as it meant I didn't have to move the rug!

Now I have a hankering to make more log cabins - I'm thinking about some in another colour scheme, but not sure what yet. Maybe something with green - purple perhaps?

Hawaiian Quilt Finish

I know I haven't finished a lot of things recently - or indeed, worked on a lot of things - but here's one thing I have actually done - quilted and bound this little Hawaiian shirt lap quilt, which is soon off to a new home, but I shan't say where...

Pink and Purple Rectangles

Here's another baby quilt top - this one for my own stash - once again from that great Judy Laquidara pattern, Peaches and Dreams. I have now used that pattern in three different colourways (none of them the original one, of course). And I will probably use it in more before I'm done - I really like it. 

Green and Purple Baby Quilt Top

A simple design to try to thin out some the small pieces of hand-dyes I have in my stash - the solid colours are fairly easy to use, but the funkier fabrics can be a bit tricky.  This colour combo makes a nice neutral baby quilt (i.e. neither overtly boy or girl) to have in the stash!

More bits and pieces

Here's another top, this one made from yet another set of blocks inspired by the block lotto. I have had these for a little while but wasn't sure what I wanted to do with them - there were an awkward number (15) - setting them out 3x5 was too long. In the end, I removed the two that were most similar to others in the bunch and just used 15 in a small top.  The other two can go somewhere else to do something else, someday!

More scrappy blocks

Another thing I've been doing, amidst other sewing, for the past few weeks, is making these blocks. I had the centres for a while - they were some of the smaller scrappy log cabins I made this year from scraps - 6" blocks. I added four triangles to the outside out each block, using small pieces of hand-dyes from my stash of hand-dyed fabrics, to create these colourful blocks. They aren't sewn together in this photo, and I'm not sure if I will sew them all together or sew into two separate tops - it would make quite a large top with them all together, so I might do two.  But for now, I am simply putting the blocks away in my block stash, as the next thing on my list must really be some quilting and some attaching of binding!

Hawaiian Scrappy top

Here's all the Hawaiian scrappy blocks assembled into a top - it's very scrappy, but it think it's fun as well.  This one is staying with me for the moment, though I do have plans for it before too long.

Hawaiian scrappy

Another scrappy pattern from Bonnie Hunter. This time, I decided to use some more of the fabric left from all my dad's Hawaiian shirts. This will be very scrappy, but fun, I think. I have something in mind to do with this one when it's finished (for once), so it's nice to have a plan. 

I started by cutting the required number of pieces from each fabric - here's a stack. There are 24 shirt fabrics (although I have now used one up, so there are only 23 left), which means 24 blocks, which is perfect.

Here's the remaining fabrics - really getting down there now - even after I made the initial 4 quilt tops, this box was totally full!

Slash a stash

This quilt top is from a pattern called Slash a Stash by Susan Fuquay.   It's a fantastically easy pattern involving only 6" squares and 3.5" strips, with blocks then sliced into asymmetric quadrants and re-sewn.  In the original pattern, a limited number of fabrics are used, but although I repeated block centre fabrics (two each in my 20 blocks), all the border fabrics are the same - great way to use some smaller pieces of fabric. I've decided that I like this one a lot - the effect is brillliant - so it will be going on the keeper pile and the pattern will definitely be used again. 

This photo shows my bed quilt under the finished top, so just ignore the purple fabric and the trip around the world blocks!

Little blue quilts

Saw a quilt like this on Joyce's blog, and knew it was perfect for something to do with blue bits for July's Rainbow Scrap Challenge.   Of course, I still have lots of small blue pieces (I think the blue pieces breed baby pieces), but here are two little quilts which at least help thin it all out...

I have also made two flying geese circles in blues (one light, one dark), which I will show tomorrow or the next day.

Rail fence variation

Another little top made in an effort to reduce the strips in my scrap basket. This one didn't use a huge number of strips because it's mostly using the blue stripe fabric, but every little bit counts!  And it did very nicely use up a half metre of blue striped fabric which was looking for a use...

Black, white and green

Because I've been good lately, finishing required projects like a backing for the batik quilt commission and the bags for end of school, and because I've been putting together more of my scraps blocks into tops, I let myself have a break from all that on Sunday and made a quilt using "real" fabric - i.e. not scraps or block sets which want using.  This is made largely from what's left of a layer cake, which I used in another project a while back.  I supplemented it with a few more greens and blacks, but on the whole, used the remains of the layer cake - and now, the cake is pretty much gone.  Which means that, even though I didn't set out to do so, I've been very successful in using up difficult pieces from my stash. 

Brown and Black String Hearts

I was a really good girl yesterday, and pulled out my basket of lonely blocks once again - this time, I thought I'd tackle the leftover string heart blocks, of which I had 5 black, 6 brown, 3 pink and 3 green.  Well, I couldn't come up with an interesting solution using all those blocks, but combined with some alternate blocks I think it really works with the black and brown ones. So much so, in fact, that I am going to actually put this one into my top stash and take one of the other two string heart pieces out to go to Project Linus in this top's stead.

Busy weekend

With the school summer fair today and Sandown Quilt Show to visit tomorrow, not much sewing time is expected this weekend. I realised I haven't shown this yet - the penultimate border on the batik quilt.  The final border will be in the orange you can see a narrow stripe of already - it has trees in it, which don't show much in the narrow stripe but will show better in the wider border, when I come to it. 

Batik update

I've now managed to attach the next round of blocks on this batik quilt top - there are only two borders left - one a little narrower, one wider - and then it's done. Or at least, the top is done!

Blue and taupe top

Another set of blocks put together into a top. Of course, while putting these together, I was making more blocks, so I'm not sure I've reduced the overall block pile, though I have once again reduced some of the scraps. Never as many as I think I am going to, when I set out, though.

Block sets

I was recently congratulating myself on having used up (or given away) all the sets of blocks I had accumulated over the years from swapping - and this is true, I have!  However, this does not mean I'm without sets of blocks which want to be assembled into quilt tops.  Thought I'd share them with you - lucky you.  These ones above are little - 3.5" - and will probably end up being bordered with something before being used. There are only 16, so they definitely need more happening to them before they can make even a small quilt top.  They were an ender and leader project from a stack of brown squares I had in my scraps. 

These are the 8"  scrappy log cabins I've been making this year to get rid of strings/strips.  I'm sort of not counting these because they are a work in progress, though I do intend to use some up as I go along.  At the moment, there are 91 of them.  I might make some in a smaller size as well - perhaps 6". 

Here are 20, 7" framed four patches - the four patches in the centres were made from blue 2" squares from my huge box of 2" squares; the blue and taupe borders were from FQ or smaller pieces. This will probably be the next thing I use as an ender/leader project - putting these into a top. 

Don't even ask why I had so many of these HST units with the batik stripes - I couldn't tell you. There are getting to be progressively fewer as the months go past and someday, I may even use them all up. At the moment, there are 5 light blue, 19 purple and 38 dark blue. They are 7" blocks.

These are another fairly new addition - 15 of the plaid hot crossed nine patch blocks. I made 9 for the block lotto in April; these were what I could make with the rest of the plaid fabric in my stash (admittedly not much - I'm not a big hoarder of plaids).  Again, they simply need to be pieced into a top and will be done soon.

These are 30,  7" blocks I made today using some of my 4" crumb blocks and some pink and orange hand dyes, where I had small, not particularly useful pieces. Not sure how I will lay them out yet.

These are the last of the 4" crumb blocks I made for using small scraps in the past - there are 21 of them, apparently. They are small, so something will probably happen to them - borders, sashing, something.

This is the last of the string hearts from last year's scrapbusting - there are 19 of them in mostly brown, black and green.   They are lurking because I'm not really sure what I'm going to do with them.  19 is an awkward number.

...and finally, another thing I did today - I took 20 of the log cabins and bordered them with (different) more or less solid hand-dyes - again, using up some smaller, less useful pieces in my stash. These blocks will create a very different quilt top than the ones with the log cabins simply put together side by side - I have a photo of a top done that way which I have yet to blog - soon!

Blue and Brown scraps

Another scrappy quilt to use up bits and pieces, this time starting with some brown squares, with which I did liberated four patches, and framed in various browns and blues. This one is staying in my pile, though, not going to project Linus. For a while anyway - not that I need more tops, but I kinda like it...

Herby squares

Another in the collection of tops I've been making to destash. This one simply features squares of a feature fabric alternating with scrap squares. It was a way to use up 1/2 metre of the herb fabric, most of which I used some time ago for something else - can't remember what...

Brown & green

Another top which I put together from oddments. This started with the brown plaid, which is something I've had for a while but which was quite hard to use in anything - it only seemed to go with brown and green, so I've put it with other browns and greens, also in those awkward browny/olively colours - it's certainly not a quilt for a child, but it works.