Last month at Quilt Guild, one of the ladies had a reversible Christmas string quilt. It was pieced/quilted one block at a time, then sewn together with a thin sashing to cover where the blocks joined. Although I’m not describing the technique well, it was added to my list to do “some day”.
For the past month, I’ve been telling myself I don’t need to start a new quilt. I’ve got the Double Wedding Ring, Green & Cream and Compass Lone Star to finish by the end of the year.
So, what did I do this weekend instead of working on the listed projects? I dug into my batting scraps — and I’m not talking about the 23″ x 45″ piece trimmed off a quilt, but rather the pieces which are weird sizes – 5″ on one end and then narrow down to 2″ over the course of 40″ in length (how do these weird pieces happen?). Or the 4 – 8″ HST (no idea where those came from). The bits and pieces which most “normal” people would throw away.
Anyway, i pulled them out and started sewing them together. I ended up with two pieces large enough for baby quilts. Then I started cutting them into 8″ squares to make the String Quilt.
After I had a stack of batting squares I should have stopped and put them away, but no, I pulled out my floral fabrics – light, red and greeen – and started cutting 8″ squares of backing fabric. I don’t have all the backing fabric cut, but as some point I decided I might only want to make a baby quilt instead of a twin.
Perhaps now that I’ve got 4 blocks up on my Design Wall, I’ll get back to business and work on the quilts which I need to finish by the end of the year.
I’m sitting here chuckling to myself…LOL! What ag reat post! And probably much more common course of events than you realize!
I too sew sew the batting scraps together. Mostly with the 10)% cotton ones and have proved to myself and others that you can get all the way to a 54″ X whatever size and once it’s inside a scrappy top, you can’t feel the seams.
I love your idea of the double sided quilt. I’m going to have to explore your method more after the holidays! The strings are great and I like that backing! Sue over at From the Magpie’s Nest is working in a similar “did I just” method…LOL. Have fun! Hugs, Finn
How many days until your anniversary??? 39 days until Christmas… Too funny.
Gotta try the new technique so you can decide it it works, right? That baby quilt will be extra warm!
We did those as a QAYG project for HeartStrings earlier this year. I loved using up all those smaller batting scraps but I don’t like joining them!