It's Decided

I've taken the plunge - the Double Wedding Ring quilt will be a lap quilt and not full-sized. My intention when picking up Jan's WIP was to make it for Quilts for Survivors and that's what I'll do. It also makes it more of a reality that it will some day be a finish. I haven't let my mind move forward too too much as to just how to finish it yet, just dealing with the bits and bobs in front of me but I'm counting on the quilting gods to have my back.

So I've taken the panel that is all sewn together and ripped out the seam that joins the bottom two rings to the rest of the top, planning to make it 4W x 5H rings.

And I'm left with a piece that looks like this. It may be the start of something else but for now it has helped move me along. I've just parked it in a corned of the design wall.

Then I started puzzling together just how this baby is to come together. I've been referring to Christine Baker 's tutorial and the goal is to have two columns come together in an elongated S seam. But because I jumped into this midstream, instead of having two consistent shapes, I'm working with an interesting combo, like tops of rings...

right sides of rings, and ...

corners of rings (if that's possible...).

I'm just talking myself through it like someone trying to convince a jumper not to jump, but progress is being made....M

My Little Dilemma

Off and on I've been assembling more ovals for the Double Wedding Ring quilt that I showed you in May. Jan left us a full box of bits and pieces before she moved and I'm keen to avoid it being relegated to a life on the shelf, never to be seen again. I decided to put the piece that is assembled up on the wall and see how many more I need to make and then make a plan of action.

This will be a Quilts for Survivors flimsy and they like lap-sized quilts approximately 48" x 64", so if I go that route, I'm thinking I need four circles wide by five long. You can see by the puddle of quilt on the floor that if I make up the entire quilt using all of the bits that have been prepared it would be considerably larger.

It's really quite striking when you get it up on the wall.

After placing two more columns of ovals it looks like I'd need only three to make this work for the lap size, which was a very pleasant surprise as it's proving to be a bit challenging working with pieces that aren't always consistently cut to come out with a good product. The dilemma as to whether I go small or large with this one seems to be tilting in favour of the small size.

So I'm sewing the missing three ovals and hope that a decision will be made along the way.

I pull ovals randomly from the box to work on (many have already been organized and pinned to a small cream oval piece) and it's interesting to see, now that they are on the wall, how so many have yellow in them compared to the circles already sewn together.

Pretty soon I'll have to figure out how to assemble complete circles. If you're old enough to remember, it's feeling sort of like cracking the secret of how they get the caramel into the Caramilk bars 😉....M

Inching To a Finish

It was a bit of a pokey process but Second Hand Clothes has inched its way to the finish line (at least to a flimsy).

I thought that having it in full view in the kitchen would prompt me to get it trimmed up and ready for borders in short order but that didn't really happen. Eventually, as I was cutting a few small squares for my Nine-Patch blocks, I bit the bullet.

The border strips were already cut and sitting in the same bag as I found the blocks in so the next day I grabbed everything and within about an hour they were attached.

It was nicely pressed at one point but this morning I took it to share with our quilting circle at the church, hence all of the folds that you see. Regardless, I am very happy with the final product.

What started out as an excuse to use up that brown border fabric resulted in three quilts like this (two last year and this one) but I can now say, with the exception of a few 3 1/2" and 2 1/2" squares, mission accomplished!

The variety of fabrics in this one really appeals to me. And what looks like a sold cream from a distance is actually a soft print, so a nice accent. You might need to click on the photo to get a good close-up as it is subtle.

All of my Uneven Nine-Patch blocks are hand pieced but recently I came across a quick machine method for making them using four 5" squares, so there may be more of this pattern made in the future. Not that I minded sewing the blocks - it's always great to have hand piecing to pick up - but sometimes there is the need for a little speed 😉....M

Some Slow Summer Stitches

July is always a busy, busy month for us and this year has been no exception, so I'm not sure why I'm surprised that we're closing in on its end. After the blur of the last few weeks it was time to find a deck chair for some quiet hand piecing. Out came my scrappy Nine-Patch blocks. 

I had lots of fabrics paired up so I was raring to go. It should be noted though that a comfy chair on a warm day does make one prone to napping so, as much as I got a quick start, things tapered off pretty darned fast.

Eventually, my first block made it to the finish line.

And just to make myself feel productive 😉I made a second block. Not the busiest sewing day that I've ever had, but certainly a very relaxing one....M