Nine patch quilt top done

All the sashing is finally done and I love it! My largest quilt top so far, it drags on the ground in my photo spot.

I think I'll try pebble quilting on this as a nice contrast to all those squares, unless I regain my sanity before I start on such a huge piece! For now it will have to wait with my picnic blanket (finally quilted but not bound yet) as I finish up my swap candy corn.

Nine Patch Progress!

Cutting...



I trimmed all the blocks down to 6 3/8" to try to square them up just right. Every edge on 70 squares! But it made a pretty pile, and I got thru a bunch of an audio book while doing it.

Ironing...

I had to push all the playmobile to the side to make room for the layout. I've swapped a couple blocks after this photo and the squint test. Now to join them all!

Whirlygiggles!

Poor picnic quilt kept getting put to the side! Now the top is done.

I love these whirlygiggles. I used the dimensions AmandaJean gave on her blog. I really liked the proportions of her pieces as well as the large size.

I knew the blocks would not be square - even with the seam, one edge is longer than the other.

You end up with extra on all four sides. Which is perfect for me! I lined my ruler up on the mid lines and trimmed 5 3/8" out from the center all around. Happy, square blocks!

I tried to outsmart myself, though and cut a couple of long, folded strips to piece. That works great for the white that doesn't have a right side. But all the prints ended up 'whirling' the wrong way.

I have a nice bag of these for another time now. I was careful not to flip my template upside down, but forgot about the fabric! So beware.

I also finished up my nine patch blocks with a super random group. Now it is onto the dreaded sashing - my least favorite thing.

Keep guessing on my trip! I'll pick the Neptune winner tomorrow.

Week 8 nine patch

And I got out a pretty platter that my Uncle, who is a geologist, gave me for a wedding gift long ago. It is made from a large piece of quartz and holds my waiting pile of blocks and edge squares so nicely.

I'm going to start squaring them up - I haven't done any yet!

Week 7 nine patch

A fun group - they looked like they were floating as they sat on the tips of the grass.

Opposites

Before....regular, never-used china cabinet and plastic bins of fabric with in-progress piles

After....the fabrics were neatly folded in the bins, but I couldn't SEE them. This is better!

I have the pile of fat quarters, some pre-cuts, a pretty display of some Neptune, and favorite novelty prints on the right side.

Here at the bottom are quilts-to-be that I have already pulled specific fabrics for.

One more opposite...the Halloween swap nine patch next to a quilt along nine patch. It looks like a giant!

Fabric fun!

The nine patch quilt along has been so great!

I am happily cutting into fun fabrics, and I am starting to become comfortable pairing fabrics.

I have been surprised by how great some combinations turn out.

I used my new found skills for some fun....I had a grand time making some fat quarter packs with the new contest at The Fabric Shopper. You go to Whipstitch Fabrics and make your own dream fat quarter bundle from her stock.

I made three:

Sugar Sprinkles - like the colored sugar the boys top their oatmeal with!

Cool Lake

Through the Garden Window

Of course, then I couldn't get those pink and oranges out of my head, so I ordered the Sugar Sprinkles!

Week 6 nine patches

But first, I was so excited to find that I had won a Sewn Launch giveaway! This one is from Threads of Conversation. She is going to send me a quilt pattern and some fabric - what could be better than that?!

The Sewn site is up now and I visited this morning. It's awesome - go have a look.

For my nine patch blocks, I took advantage of last week's extra block and have only done six for this week, but I think they are a great bunch!

Week 5 nine patches

....plus one. I tossed in a Neptune square as I was cleaning up. I really like this group - the pink and green ones and that bird peaking out turned out just as I wanted.

I went back and forth on the green Bijoux square a bunch of times before I decided it would be good. Then when I uploaded the photo, I finally saw how little contrast it really has. Thumbnails can be very helpful - kind of like the squinty eye technique. (You know, where you kind of squint and blur your eyes a bit to make sure all the colors are evenly distributed. I used to do this when I was little at Christmas time...when the strings of tree lights were those large screw-in bulbs. If there was too much of one color clumped together after the squint-test, I would swap bulbs around to fix it!)

This was a surprise favorite for me! I've had them cut and been looking for a good pair for those crazy orange, pink and yellow circles for a couple of weeks. I was starting to think they weren't going to work with anything. Once I turned over the final, ironed square I couldn't believe how much I liked it!

Quick nine patch update

Before I have to post two week's worth, I better show my week 4 nine patch blocks! I actually have a full yard of that yellow Michael Miller with the appliances and jello - I'm strangely drawn to it and hope to find a good use.

The long weekend was busy, but I wanted to share what a 6th grader looks like when his parents are yelling and cheering as he marches past in a parade. It's hard to hide behind a trumpet!

Week three 9 patch

My third week's nine patch blocks. It is getting harder to decide how to create them, and I was even more worried when I realized we have seven more weeks to go!

As I wonder if all the blocks will 'go together', I think I will have to start trusting more in the magic of the white sashing.

I've also started my Aviary quilt. Those are honey bun strips in sets of three. I must say I was quite proud of myself when I measured the center strips and they were actually 1" wide! I think my seams are getting better.

Liz, over at Teeny Tiny Quilts, asked what we listen to while quilting. Becket took a kid-sized view of my spot in the front room that shows my iHome back there.

I usually listen to various NPR podcasts (This American Life, Planet Money) and The Moth podcast. Nothing I'm doing right now is rocket science, so it's fun to let my mind wander. It actually seems to help when I'm free motion quilting - the result is more organic and prettier if I don't over think it. I have to use the earbuds when actually quilting a top, though. Otherwise you miss all the funny stuff to the hum of the needle. What do you listen to?

Pressing Issues

I had a little experiment going yesterday while working on my 9-patch squares. I usually press all my seems open - I like how neat and flat the blocks turn out. But, being pretty new to the exactness of quilting, I often get corners like this:

Lame, shifty squares. I pin, follow the presser foot, try to rotary cut perfectly - nothing seems to help 100% of the time if I have to match up more than one seam across. But see how nice and smooth those seams are? So I tried a couple of blocks pressing the seams to one side or the other, then nested them.

Ooohh, pretty corner. But look at that huge cliff on top of the orange dots!

That awesome dotty fabric was sent to me by my new internet-friend, Chen. Happy, Fun mail!

I did a few more pressing to the side and all ended up nicely aligned, but lumpy. Sitting back and thinking on which thing would annoy me less, as well as what would show less once quilted.

I decided to go with side pressing - but opening up the final seam, since they are all going to be sashed and not directly joined. As I go along with more experience, I may change my mind, but this seams (couldn't resist the pun) best for now.

And also, thanks for all the nice comments about my finally-hung quilt! I think I may make a few specifically for hanging. They make the wall look so happy.

Week two 9-patches

My second week of 9-patch blocks were a Free Spirit fest. I have been hording Park Slope - I'm strangely drawn to it. It was fun to actually use it! The pebbles are my favorites, though, and I have them in all three colorways.

I also tossed in some cute Heather Ross fish to add to the fun!

I was going to do a block with the solid pink and Mendocino mermaids, but I didn't think the scale was going to work.

I finally hung my first quilt, and I'm so happy with how it looks on the wall. I was motivated to do it one morning, and it was just me and the 3 yr old. I had him take a picture while I held it on the wall so I could decided on placement. That actually worked out really well. I only had to mount the holders to the wall once!

Finishing is good

I was indecisive yesterday - nothing seemed right. So I went to flicker and opened this - I really love her color sense - then made an online visit to the Fabric Shack. I'll be sure to share that nice package when it arrives!


Motivation finally moved me last night and I got the binding sewn on the Neptune quilt. Becket declared it 'Beautiful, it sure is'.

Big up side to actually getting things done, is I now have a tidy little pile of the black tone-on-tone left over from the binding ends! Since I cut my binding strips 2.5" wide, I was able to quickly chop it into squares for my 9-patch blocks.

Speaking of which, I'm having a FreeSpirit fest with them this week. These are some more of my favorite fabrics that I had not been able to cut.

First 9-patches

My first week's worth of 9-patches for the One a Day Quilt Along! I think these gnomes and hedgehogs will be my favorites of the whole thing. One gnome block is fussy cut - the other is the remnants of those cuts, but I liked how it seemed as though they were hiding in there.

These were my indecisive blocks. I wasn't sure 4 or 5 mushrooms per - and pink or green birds? So I did them both. I'm not sure if I love the mushroom blocks.

As I was looking over the stash bins and the few scraps I have, I was trying to figure out what I will put together for future blocks. I have a nice Park Slope set for this week - not sure on many others. And then I was trying to decide how everything was going to relate to each other at the end. I finally decided that when the end came and I was laying out all 70 blocks, any blocks that were totally out of place can go on the back!