Sunday's Stitches

Happily, my 'candy bowl' is starting to fill as the quilting for Candied Hexagons has started to gel.

Now that there are a few more blocks quilted I'm getting a better sense of what things will look like.

There are a couple of hexies stitched in the same star pattern which I really like and I think that it will be dominant throughout, but I'm still going to mix it up here and there.

I've also solved the puzzle of what to do in the mauve triangles. The notion of starbursts popped into my head and this is where I've landed.

It adds a real sparkle to the quilt and also frames the hexies nicely.

All of the diamonds around the edge of each hexies are quilted a quarter of an inch in from the seam.

So now that the planning is complete the quilting can get under way in earnest. There will be more experimenting with patterns to use inside the hexies, but at least I have three or four patterns that I can fall back on....M

190!

Remember my 'clean-up in aisle five' a couple of weeks ago? Well, the sewing continued and, believe it or not, I ended up with 190 2-inch four patches in red and white/gold. 190!!!! That scrappy pile just didn't come close to looking like I'd get that many out of it, but I did.

And because I found a few fabrics that I wanted to include in the mix - like this white with tiny red squares and a couple of polka dots - I cut a few strips from my stash...

... and added 56 more to the tally.

I'm toying with making either a sofa quilt or possibly even a full quilt in a pattern that I made up into a table runner a few years ago (don't ask if it is quilted yet...). The four patches would alternate with a variety of green squares and then the whole thing is bordered with 4" saw tooth stars in red, but I just don't know if there will be enough interest in the centre to make it work. It might work with a smaller quilt.

In the meantime, everything is pressed and stored away until I feel like cutting my greens and working on it again....M

A Slow Start

Wow. Last week when I put Candied Hexagons into the hoop there were times that I felt as though I had never quilted before; it was almost painful. For starters, I was still puzzling through how to quilt it but I figured if I just put it in the hoop the inspiration would come. Not so fast...

After much noodling I decided that I'd just loosen up a little and try something new. These hexies are all different and, true to the pattern name, remind me of a huge handful of candies so I'm going to play a little bit and quilt each one differently. Well, maybe not all different designs, but enough variety to mix it up a bit and make it interesting.

The second criteria is that I didn't want the quilting to be predictable, but the patterns needed to be straight lines - no curves - because I don't want to have to deal with marking it. More head scratching.

Eventually the first pattern appeared but there was a fair bit of undoing before I had something that I was happy with. There were other challenges too. For some reason I seemed to have found the one needle in the pincushion that had the world's smallest eye, and, since I was working in poor lighting, blue smoke could be seen coming from my chair as I continually failed to thread it. I finally traded it in for a better model and set myself up with a better lamp, both of which were game changers. Whew!

So now I've got a rhythm back to my stitching and I'm starting to get an idea of how it might come together. I'm looking forward to making some progress on it during today's football playoffs. Fingers crossed that it will be a more relaxing experience than last weekend's....M

A Little More Play Day

Before finishing up our play day last week Anne and I took a stab at trying a new block - the Disappearing Four Patch. They are fast and easy and would make up into a quick baby or child's quilt. Here's a quick tutorial if you would like to give them a try.

We sewed a four patch block using two white and two blue print 5" squares.

Once it's pressed, cut 1.5" on either side of the centre seamline both vertically and horizontally (the instructions said 1" but we went a bit chunkier).

Switch up the centre strip pieces moving them left to right and top to bottom and sew that together.

And before you know it you have an 8" block. When I left Anne her design wall looked like this...

but she's been cutting and sewing since then and has a few more added to the mix. She says it takes about 10 minutes per block which isn't bad at all.

I like the plaid effect that you get and am contemplating cutting one myself, possibly starting with a 6" block and making my centre seam cuts 1" and see what that looks like. So many possibilities!....M