Just use it up

I decided to try to just use what I already have on hand for new projects.  I really have no need to go shopping for fabric except to help finish projects that are on the docket.  And I really don't need to add to my wish list of projects.  Binding fabric seems to be a sticking point in my mind.  During the inventory clearance sale at my LQS today, I just bought batting with the 40% off one item coupon.
 
A co-worker who is retiring this year likes blue.  I showed her a few pictures of fabric and made sure to include mostly what I already owned.  She seemed to like all of it so I decided to break into the Parson Gray stash that I accumulated in the past few years.

And then, since I did not want to put the fabric back away, I kept going and kept cutting.  4 quilt tops later, I have a quart size ziploc bag or less of the remaining Parson Gray fabric.  Here are the quilt tops.  2 are plus quilts, one is a group of random blocks to attempt to mimic the Road Trip Quilt by Cluck, Cluck, Sew but in a bigger size, and one Candy Coated from Sunday Morning Quilts.

The back of the co-worker quilt.  I only had about 2 yards of the navy flannel and managed to just use a strip from Candy Coated that would have pushed that quilt over 90".  I wish I would have kept it all solids on the stripes but I'm not changing it now.

Candy Coated which I think I am keeping.  The first picture has the stripe of 4.5" strips for the back across it.  

 The bigger Road Trip Quilt (6.5" squares, 9.5" or 12.5" blocks).  This will probably end up being a gift for my brother.  It was meant to be fairly mellow and it is.

And the second plus quilt.  I assembled this one in smaller components to not take up as much floor space as I did with the first one.  Oops, not enough value difference in the middle for far away pictures.  I did not look at the overall layout but was concerned with smaller parts so I didn't notice the values until taking the pictures.  I may donate this one to a local school auction if I get it done in time.

Since the majority of my coordinating fabric got used for the quilt tops, I do need to purchase some fabric for binding.  And yes, plus quilts are mighty easy and quick to put together.  There are at least two that are my intended quilts list and have been for multiple years now.  Soon, I will manage to quilt the first two and then progress to quilting the other two.  And probably I will purchase some navy quilter's linen to use as binding.

After the Epic Meet-up this summer, I did not put away the 6 free Clothworks batik fat quarters I received.  Today, I cut them up to make a Starburst quilt from Melissa at Happy Quilting.  No recipient, just a "let's use this up."

Using the leftovers

Sometimes, I make more units that I should because I either didn't bother to count, miscounted, chose to cut out enough for an intended project that has yet to be started or decided that I wanted to have some layout choices.  I've attempted this month to finish a few of those up.

Two of those were in my Giving Tuesday post.  I cut out additional squares to make a second plus quilt and then used up all the extra "layout choice" units from my in-laws quilts.  This time around, I used the second set of charm squares from the Animal Party Charm Square Baby quilt that I made.

This is actually the original one that I gifted to a co-worker.  Apparently, I did not take a finished picture of the second version before I sent it up to get donated at the hospital.  Instead of white sashing, I used the remaining solid from the in-laws quilts and bound it in all the extra blue bindings I could find.

Next up in the leftover pile were blocks from the two Birthday Cake quilts that I made using Acacia.  Had I known how much I could have sold the raccoon prints from this line....I probably still would have made these quilts and donated them anyway.  Kind of like how I saw that one Tula print I had over a yard of sold for $14/ fat quarter and I chose to cut into it.

 So, I had maybe 24 leftover units from these two quilts.  I combined them with units from my first attempt at the Bizzy Kid pattern.  The first attempt had just involved way too many dark fabrics and not enough value contrast.  But, the colors did manage to coordinate really well with Acacia.  The solids of the leftovers and the sashing are not a perfect match, but it is close enough and I was happy to turn the leftovers into another baby quilt to send up.

When these two baby quilts (like the one above) were made for co-workers, I stitched the second line before cutting off the extra triangles.  This left me with 118 HST to press and trim.  I combined those with leftover hourglass blocks (probably from this hourglass quilt below ) and backed the quilt with a little more than  a yard of the blue superhero fabric from Ann Kelle.

Here is the new quilt.

It is backed in the blue superhero fabric and bound with Kona Pacific.  I decided to randomly sew the HST together into four patches.  I was a little more deliberate when I put the hourglass blocks in, but I did not over-analyze and just went with where they ended up with little rearranging.  Much better to get it done than paralysis by analysis.

Giving Tuesday

Today is Giving Tuesday.  I wasn't really aware of that until reading somebody else's post.  Figured I should perhaps showcase the quilts that were dropped off at Seattle Children's Hospital that I haven't talked about yet.

 First up is a stacked coins quilt using a variety of fabrics donated to me by Katie's Comforters Guild or my sister.

The second quilt was made from the leftovers of the two Pacific Crest quilts.  I overbought fabrics because of the wide variety of colors in the pictures my mother in law sent for her two quilts.  I made approximately 80 extra units so I could get the layouts and colors balanced the way I wanted to.  Rather than let the extras sit unused, waiting to be assembled, I threw together this quilt.  My normal layout assistant was a little distracted and chose to have identical units by each other.  I went with it rather than argue.  

The backing was made of other extra pieces from the quilt.  The fabric is from Laura Gunn's Edges collection.  

There was a single block Swoon quilt that I did not snap an additional picture of.

I got to choose a block for my guild's charity quilt bee.  I chose the Birch Tree quilt pattern by Amanda Jean Nyberg.  I made a couple blocks, pieced the guild blocks, made the backing and quilted it.  Binding was hand attached by another guild member.  This quilt got dropped off for Children's as well.

And finally, since the spirit of today would be giving, here are two that I finished up this weekend but did not make it in time to travel to my sister's house so she could drop them off before their appointment yesterday.  Hopefully I will get these to the hospital before the end of the year.

Pacific Crest Edges Twins

While visiting the in-laws this year, my mother in law asked me to make her two twin quilts using the Pacific Crest pattern from Beyond Neutral.  She liked the pattern and didn't think it would be super difficult.  She then sent a series of pictures that spanned the color wheel.  It made selecting fabrics slightly difficult as the pictures didn't give me a clear, consistent picture of what she was after.

 So, I chose Laura Gunn's Edges Collection paired with Kona Eggshell.  I was unsure what combination of colors I really wanted so I made extra small blocks.  While at the Epic Meet-up, I put together the 12" blocks and found that I was short some 6.5" background squares and had not brought the solid with me.  Some of the blocks that should be only 3 small birds ended up being 4 because I was impatient and did not want to wait until I got home.

 They are two different quilts even if they look the same.  I'm hoping that they are not too rainbow like as I don't think that is the look they are after.  She said that she wasn't in a rush and these did not need to be completed any time soon.

 But then life happened and my father in law had his first detected stroke (his third one apparently).  Outlook on life has changed and the quality and freedom that they had is not there. Being 2500 miles away can have benefits and drawbacks.  They were pretty adamant that we shouldn't fly back, not even their son as they said he couldn't be helpful.  Feeling slightly without a way to be of assistance, these got pushed up the priority list.  They'll get sent back this week with 4 pillowcases.

 The quilts have loopy quilting done by me and the binding is attached by machine.  The power lines are making lovely shadows on the pictures, and my lawn has nearly recovered from letting it sleep during the summer.

I used Google Keep to make a checklist of all the things that needed to be done as I went through.  It was a little intimidating until I reminded myself that I was making two twin size quilts (72 x 84").  They seem a bit small for a twin, but they're close enough.  And checking off double the items as I finished them was pretty nice.

I'm hoping that these coordinate relatively well and sort of fit what she was looking for.  I'm pretty sure that she'll be grateful, as nothing seems to be turning out how she was planning of late.

Black to White PNWMQG Challenge

Sometimes I feel obligated to complete all the MQG challenges or opportunities that come up. I was excited about the Black to White Challenge for the PNW guilds for the Quilt! Knit! Stitch! Show and had a great plan.  I drew out a lovely diagram for stitch and flip HST and cut all the fabric.

Then, I picked up a bit of extra responsibility at work which reduced my desire to fill the spare time I did have with sewing a quilt that had no recipient yet.  I ditched the idea of adding the triangle to the other side of the HST and just went with the value based HST design.

This was not finished in time to submit it and I took it across the country on vacation to bind it.  The binding fairy finished the final side for me.  She also is going to give it to a step-nephew in June when he graduates from HS.  Yay that it is done nearly one year early.

I did a variety of quilting styles along the diamonds but primarily did the wishbone style.  The quilt is bound with a Valori Wells print.  It is about 60 x 70 ".  And best of all, it is another quilt crossed off the WIP list!

Some little things

My guild had a pillow swap.  I waited until the last minute to complete mine.  My partner liked bright colors like orange, yellow, blue and green as well as Tula Pink and Cotton and Steel.

 At the PNW MQG Epic Meet Up, I won a 12 pack of the larger spools of Aurifil from Island Quilter.  Island Quilter had a pop up shop in the hotel and I decided that perhaps I should purchase my pillow fabric at that time.

I have a hard time conforming to some trends.   I've bought some Cotton and Steel prints, but won't say that I love it all.  So....I went searching through the Tula and CS and found the flower Tula print that there are three of in the bottom row (oops).  The print didn't have orange in it, but there were lots of good coordinating prints that I liked a lot.  I thought they were bright or at least not pastel or muted.

The pattern is from Tula's 100 block sampler book.  Someone else posted a picture that I saw using this block and I changed my mind as to what design I chose for the pillow.  Less negative space than the original design.  It was small enough I should have remembered that I wanted to try spiral quilting.  It is bound with the red lazy stripe from her True Colors line.

 I have a bunch of 2.5 inch strips cut from the pillow fabric so I can sew the strips together and make a quilt from Jaybird's Hexagon Quilt-a-long on the Old Red Barn flickr group.  I've wanted to make one like her Neptune quilt since the original quilt-a-long and just haven't gotten around to it.  No excuses when I finish up the quilting of the two Pacific Crests.....

Last year I bought some Notting Hill Home Dec fabric to make a friend a bag.  I finally got around to it last week and made three Spice Market Totes.  I managed to use nearly all of the Notting Hill fabric that I had and did not have to buy anything for the bags.  The bag above is the small size and went as a gift for a friend.  The bags below are the larger size.  I wish I had enough to make a matching exterior on the second bag, but I'll just favor one side when I use it.  The other side of the bag is the poppy print that matches the straps like this first picture below.

The three bags also used the majority of the bolt of Shape Flex interfacing that I bought about 2 years ago intending to make more Spice Market Bags as gifts.  Yay for me that I finally used it.  It makes me happy, those little things like not needing to buy anything to make the bags that were planned at least a year ago......

Pacific Crest quilts

The two Pacific Crest (sort of) quilts for my in-laws.  Rows are now assembled, but not sewn together.  How much could I complete without needing to iron something....

And since I waited a few more days to post things, now both of the tops and backing are pieced, and one of the quilts is basted.  It's not getting quilted this weekend.  Do I have enough pins to risk starting to baste the second one?  hmm....