Finishing A Red, White, and Blue Miniature Quilt

Pieced a few years ago, time to finish the project

This quilt was actually finished last year, but I didn't get it posted until now. The red, white, and blue colors are  timely now.  There are some pretty small scraps of fabric in this quilt. The center of the log cabin block is only 3/8 inches square and the finished quilt is 19 inches on each side. 

Sketching out the quilting

This quilt wanted to be hand quilted, but I wanted to avoid quilting the actual log cabin blocks. The piecing seams were close together and did not need any quilting. I looked for patterns that would fill in the sashing.  The one I landed on is a combination of a couple samples I saw.

Hand quilting started in the corner

I used my 17" quick snap quilt frame to support the quilt, and with that I was able to work indoors and outdoors when weather permitted.

Sewing on binding and trimming excess fabric

The binding was pieced and attached with a machine, but it was then finished by hand.  All of the binding fabrics are from leftover reds in the quilt.

Binding

Finished quilt

The only thing left to do is attach a sleeve on the back for hanging.

Close up

Hanging out in the garden

Golconda Pinwheel Quilt: A Guest Post by Linda Kluss

Scrappy pinwheel quilt

The owner of this blog has a partner in many of her fiber pursuits. She is my daughter, and we both love to figure out sewing and quilting projects. Last week we took our annual “school-is-out-for-the-summer” trip, this time to southern Illinois. We have hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon, we've done mountain trails in Alaska, and this time we chose the serenity of an old lockmaster's house near Golconda on the Ohio River. It was really hot, so we split our time between hiking in the Shawnee National Forest and sewing in our little house on the river. Perfect!

Ohio River in the background

Quilting in the lockmaster's house

I have a number of unquilted tops waiting their turn, so for this trip I chose a little pinwheel doll quilt or wallhanging (haven't decided which) to finish. Some very sensible quilters do not keep tiny fabric scraps, understanding that doing so can quickly cause stashes to grow out of control. I'm not very sensible in this regard, but I do love to make scrap quilts. The fabrics themselves are a visual reminder of past projects, and I love that. It's also just easier to cut little pieces from a little basket of scraps rather than sort through piles of yardage. A complete pinwheel here finishes at 4”, so the two-color squares are each 2” finished. Simple and soothing.

Basted and ready for quilting

Taking a break with a walk by the river

Finishing the binding

The hand quilting went quickly, the little quilt is bound and ready for use, so here is the Golconda Pinwheel.

All the garden colors are in this quilt

Lime-Teal Quilt Part 1: Piecing

The fabric was bought at the end of January 2018. I was finishing up the orange binding on another quilt and this fabric followed me home.

Orange fabric hidden among the pile of new fabric

I started by making pinwheels.  Originally, I was thinking I'd make a full size quilt of all pinwheels.

These colors are not ones I typically work with, but they say spring to me

Blocks finish to 10 inch squares

After piecing 12 blocks, I decided to make a wall hanging instead of a full size quilt.

Pinwheels have been pieced

I planned to do a 3 inch sashing between the blocks and to make that sashing out of an assortment of pieced blocks. I looked online for inspiration and found many suggestions for 3" blocks and others that I could modify to a finish at 3". Some blocks were made in pairs or groups and some were singles. This was a good way to use up scraps leftover from cutting the pinwheels.

Sailboats

Churndash

Log Cabin

Flying Geese

Star

One inch squares

Slowly the sashing came together.

I start filling in the spaces

Lainie prefers this layout

Eventually, Lainie and I agreed on a layout and the sashing got sewn together. I love that there is so much going on here. The eye keeps moving to try to take it all in. 

Pinwheels with sashing

In May, my sisters and I spent a long weekend in Duluth Minnesota.  After piecing a wall hanging for my sister, we spent some time making blocks for the border of this quilt.  I brought my Bernina 730 Record and it sewed beautifully for three days.

Duluth, May 2018

Blocks that my sisters made

Given free reign to design any block they wanted to, my sisters came up with some creative styles.  No scrap of fabric was too small and no pattern was off limits. In a few hours one day, we put together enough blocks for about a side and a half of the border.  Then about a month later, mom and I headed down to Golconda, IL for a long weekend and we finished up the rest of the blocks for the border. Two sewing weekends with my family this spring--that was fantastic!

3 sides done in Golconda, IL

Mom cut all the pieces for the remaining blocks and I sewed on my Bernina 730.  

Picture is a bit dark, but you can see most of quilt

There are about a million tiny pieces in this quilt top and I'm glad I didn't have to cut each one myself. This will be one of my favorites to look at though because I can find so many blocks that I didn't make myself. This was a group effort by the Kluss ladies.  

Quilt with Ohio River in the background

 Now, on to the basting and quilting.  Will this be a quilt that gets completed in 2018?

Bomber Jacket

Bomber Jacket

This is the free Floral Bomber Jacket pattern, size 2T,  from Sew A Little Seam. I have a new niece or nephew due in June and I know that a size 2T will not fit for quite awhile, but I had an ideal combination of remnants from other project to use I was looking forward to trying out a new pattern.  There are five different fabrics in this project and they're all scraps leftover from previous projects.  Since I do not know if the intended recipient of this jacket with be a boy or a girl, I opted for a very neutral color palette. The gray knit on the front and back and the black sleeve cuffs are from two separate hoodie projects, the black waist band and collar are from a recent shirt dress, the white and gray stripe lining is from two shirts, and the print fabric on one of the sleeve lining is from a long-sleeved shirt.

Some of the fabric selections

The pattern was a pdf that was easy to tape together and cut out. I opted not to add pockets to this version, but I do like how they look in the pictures on the Sew a Little Seam website.

Cutting the lining

The gray that I chose for the body was reversible and I chose to go with the side that had the more noticeable stripes.

Back side of fabric

Front view, fabric right side out

Serging seams 

Most of the seams were done with my serger and I am pleased with their finished look.

Sleeve and side seams

The bottom band was clipped on and then the seam serged as well.

Adding bottom band

I did not have quite enough striped fabric for the lining, so one sleeve does not match. No one will see that inside the coat.

Mis-matched sleeves

Lining ready to be attached to coat

After installing the zipper and adding the collar, the instructions for attaching the lining to the coat were straight-forward.  When attaching the lining at the sleeve cuffs I was not able to get all of the fabric under the serger foot and ended up sewing that on the machine.  The lining was attached to the collar with hand sewing.

Lining at collar

Collar

 I really like the look of the standup collar on this jacket and I hope it will be comfortable for my niece or nephew to wear.

Finished jacket

Finished jacket: back

Four different fabrics in this pic

I was very pleased with how well this pattern went together and will probably make it again when I have a good selection of fabric scraps to use up.  Right now, I only have the one pattern size, but it is available for sale on the Sew A Little Seam website as the Ollie Bomber Jacket in a pdf pattern sizes 12 months to 12 years.  If I purchase the pattern I could use it for the next several years.

This was a fun project to work on and I would be happy to sew another one.

Baby Blocks

Blocks, view 1: fabric from Aunt Marlene's pillow, Grandma's shirt, Aunt Courtney's skirt

This project was so fun to put together. I was looking for something new to try as a gift for my niece or nephew who will be born in June. Before starting, I read several different tutorials online for various types and sizes of fabric blocks and then set out to make a set of my own. I used a wide variety of fabrics that were left over from previous projects-- items of clothing, upholstery, quilting, weaving, etc.  I started by sorting through my fabric stash and then pulled from Mom's stash as well. There are all sorts of patterns, textures, and colors mixed in to the blocks. Some blocks were fussy cut to get a specific pattern, some were pieced from multiple scraps, and others were just eked out of a smaller scrap.

Pile of fabric waiting to become blocks

The blocks were sewn together on my Bernina 717. This machine handled the range of fabrics beautifully. Ten of the twelve seams on each block were machine were sewn. The last two were left open so that I could put in the foam later. I intended to leave myself fabrics that would be friendly for hand sewing at the end, but I did forget and leave one leather/lace piece that would have benefitted from being sewn by machine.
I had planned to purchase foam from Joann's, but when I went to check out their selection one of the sales people said that she was sure I could get a better price online. They had very large sheets of foam, 3-6' in each direction, and it was going to be costly to cut off the smaller size I would need. I was able to find a smaller piece of foam online and it was sent to me in about 4 days.
When the foam arrived a friend offered to share her electric knife so that I could cut it into blocks.

Classic avocado green

The blocks were measured at about 3 7/8" square so that they would fit in the 4" cubes. The knife cut the foam like butter and I was able to get 9 full blocks cut with some partial pieces leftover. After inserting the foam into the block cases, I finished the last two seams on each block by hand. Most of these fabrics have a story or project associated with them and I had great time with the memories they invoked. It will be some time before my niece or nephew is able to appreciate the fabric stories but hopefully, he or she will enjoy the colors, patterns, and textures before then.

Blocks, view 2

Some of the fabrics included above: denim from Dad's jeans, Grandma's pants, sleeve placket from Grandpa's plaid shirt, chick from Aunt Courtney's sewing machine cover.

Blocks, view 3

More fabrics included: Uncle Phil's boxers, Aunt Marlene's upholstery fabric, Aunt Courtney's dress