Quilting and Stuff by Knitnoid

Category Archives: Crossword

This Just Might Work

Tuesday’s Progress

Wow!  With the Go! Cutter I was able to cut all of my strip sets in about an hour.  Now I’m ready to sew!

Monday’s Progress

It doesn’t look like much, but I spent all evening sewing the red strips into strip sets.  Next they’ll get run through the Go!  I don’t know if I’ll get it done tomorrow or not.  My niece’s band concert is tomorrow evening.

What’s on my Design Wall

This week I have my Turning Twenty Again that I’m calling “Summertime”.  Several years ago during a FQ sale at my LQS I picked up a bundle of Venetian Glass.  At the time, I thought “What was she thinking, some of these are ugly.”  I LOVE how they all work together.  I guess it’s true you need some “uglies” in your quilt to make it sparkle.

I finished the quilting on this Sunday afternoon.

I’m not sure how well you can see the quilting.  It’s pretty basic quilting — wavy diagonal lines.  I was having the worst time finding something to mark the quilt that I could see.  Then I decided to use painter’s tape.

I put several lengths on my cutting mat, then cut both sides using my wavy ruler.  Then I put it on my quilt top and quilted around it.  Worked like a charm — and no marks to wash out!

Now I’m working on the binding.  I normally machine stitch my bindings down, but this one simply wasn’t working — so at the moment I’m stitching it by hand.  No telling when I will finish it, except it will be before June 18th.  This is one of my 7 10 by June quilts.

So, up next is the quilt is the crossword puzzle quilt.

I bought a few more reds at the quilt show yesterday.  Since it was right before closing, they let me pick the FQ from two different bundles.  This is what I have so far:

Not all of those fabrics are FQs — some are just barely F8s.  I think that piece on the far left of the bottom row is going to have to go.  Other than collecting the reds, I’m at a standstill on this one.   My friend V is letting me borrow her Go! and I’ve ordered the 7″ Drunkard’s Path Go! die, but it hasn’t gotten here.  I don’t want to start cutting the fabric until I have an understanding of the die.  I’ve got a great visual in my head of this quilt, so we’ll see how it translates to fabric.

Don’t forget to check out the other great design walls by following the links over at Patchwork Times.

Must Have Lost My Mind

I started off the year with a bang, but here we are a bit over 10 weeks into the new year and I have 3 quilts completely cut out — 2 with the borders!  This is cannot be good for the UFO count.  To further illustrate that I’ve lost my mind, I’m planning on taking all 3 of them with me this weekend to a sew-in.

The bag on the left is Bonnie Hunter’s Fun With Bricks.  This started innocently enough as a leader/ender project in January.  The bag on the right is the Dragonfly quilt.  The middle is a red, white & blue scrappy twin size version of the Mystery Quilt I wrote for the April retreat.

Add to this that my husband has just convinced me that I need to quilt and bind six quilts before the end of June and now I know I have lost my mind. This does not include anything which is on my UFO list or any other project I want to finish sooner than later.  At least four of the quilts are completed tops.

Here they are:

Pattern - BQ2

Quilt #1 – 54 x 70.  I have enough fabric to make a second identical quilt and bind them both in the purple.  I may use the fabric to make the backing.  No idea on the thread color or quilting motif.

Pattern Old Tobacco Road

Quilt # 2 – 70 x 100  When I started the quilt in Purple, Green & Yellow, I was thinking “Mardi Gras” and purchased either 1/2 yard or yard of Mardi Gras frogs.  I may look for some more Mardi Gras fabric for the back.  The purple binding is made and tucked in with the quilt and frogs.

 

Pattern Victoria's Rose

Quilt # 3 – 68 x 86.  I have a  piece of the border fabric left in the stash.  The floral, pink and green fabrics, along with a stripe and a small floral print were part of a bundle.  I found more of the floral on-line, but don’t think I there is enough for the backing.  My spreadsheet says I have ‘binding fabric’.

Oh, my.  I just thought of something.  I really want pillow cases to go with each of these quilts.  Have I mentioned I’ve lost my mind?

 

Pattern - The Chain Event

Quilt #4 – 74 x 88.   I thought I had backing fabric for this quilt top, but when I inventoried my quilts tops and UFOs last year, I discovered I only had binding fabric.

 

Pattern - Disappearing 9-patch Variation

Quilt # 5 – 60 x 76. It’s a variation because I’m not making 9-patches and I’ve changed the size of the pieces.  It just worked better for the size quilt I wanted to make.  Fortunately I have the backing fabric – a great dragonfly print I found on-line and the binding has been cut, just not made.  So, if I finish piecing the top this weekend, this will be the first quilt I get done.

 

Pattern - Crossword Puzzle

Quilt # 6 – size unknown.  The size is unknown because this is still a work in progress.  I have about 1/2 of the letters made.  This one is going to the April quilt retreat.

I think my husband wanted to suggest a 7th quilt, but quickly left the room before I could throw something at him. Good thing I put the following qualifier in my UFO Challenge rules:

There will be occasions when a quilt will need to get moved to the top of the line regardless of the # pulled for the month. In those instances, I’ll either swap the #s if they are on this list, or if the quilt doesn’t have an assigned #, but is on either tab as of January 1, 2011, I’ll substitute it for the current # drawn. After all the goal is to get quilts off the UFO list.

What’s on my Design Wall

Thanksgiving weekend I discovered I didn’t have anything really portable to take to a sew in.  I’m working on the Cream & Green quilt, the Double Wedding Ring and No Blue Geese — but currently it’s all in the hand work stage and rather large to tote around.  Not wanting to start anything new, I pulled down my box containing this quilt –well really just the letters and prepped about 1/2 of my letters.    This project can’t be completed until sometime in May, so I’m sporadically working on it.

In the meantime, I’m still working on my Double Wedding Ring —  Started the 6th row last night.  I’m also working on No Blue Geese.  I quilted a large pleat into the backing, so I’m having to stitch it down by hand.  Once I get that done, I’ll put the binding on and post a photo.  The Cream and Green quilt is still waiting on some handwork as well.

Check out other design walls for more inspiration by following the links over at Patchwork Times.

Shopping the Stash

I have a new project in the works which needs to be finished by next summer. Due to circumstances, there will be a mad rush to finish it.  Since it is going to require appliqué, I thought I’d start working on it sooner than later.  Tonight I remembered a length of light fabric I bought based on a tiny swatch. It’s perfect for my project.  Then I spotted some black fabric in one of my bins.  Turns out it a big hunk as well.  I need less than a yard for the appliqué, so if it turns out I need this fabric to set my Black & Bright Swap blocks I should still have plenty.

In addition to the fabric, I need freezer paper and fusible webbing.  It turns out I have both in my stash, along with a spool of black thread.  So, I think this quilt top will come completely from stash.  Check back with me next summer to see if the backing comes from stash.