Three Quilts Basted

This has not been a productive summer quilt wise.  I have had too many other things going on.  I had previously held two "basting parties", although it's not really a party if you are there by yourself!  I basted several quilts each time and have them all quilted.  I started that process again.  One basting party was in this post.

For my design wall my One Block Wonder is still there.  Check it out here.

I am trying to get back in the quilting mode, but of course school started and I had to go back to work last week!  Hence, the basting so I don't have to think when I get home from work and there will be a project ready.  I need to do more, but I need to get the bottom one quilted first as it is part of a quilt along.

These are the three quilts I have basted so far.  Two of them are OLD, OLD UFO's!

My younger daughter came to visit for the weekend and brought her 21 month old twins Finn and Remy.  Her husband stayed home to do some house painting.  Much easier to do without toddlers underfoot!  The kids were not totally impressed with the farm equipment.  They each got a truck ride to the field and saw the combines in action.  We have home storage and the truck was dumping food barley in the bin.  It is used to make items like Fiber One granola bars.

I did post a quilt a day on Instagram for August, so if you are not a follower follow me there @julie.huffman .  A very original handle!

Linking up with Design Wall Monday.

Mid Year Quilt Progress

On Instagram there was a hashtag for midyear roundup of projects.  I went through all my photos and put together collages of everything I have finished this year (with some exceptions).  The collages are not in a particular order.

In this collage they were all UFO's except the middle one and the middle right.  Those are baby quilts I started and finished this year.

This collage has five projects started and finished this year.  The bookcase quilt, the triangle baby quilt, the roses baby quilt, the flower wallhanging and Sew Many Strips is a top, not a finished quilt.  It had so much piecing I included it, but it is now a UFO!

 The 4 patch quilt and the pinwheel tablerunner were new proejcts this year, the others were UFO's and a couple of them were OLD.

These are 9 of the 10 quilt tops I made for my friend's quilt shop as shop samples.  Thankfully I didn't have to quilt them!

Now to see what I do for the second half of the year!

Hawaiian Quilt and Christmas Eve Table Runner

I had two complete finishes this week and one almost finish that needs binding. 

Last Monday we ended up with a snow day from school.  It started out as a two hour delay, but was soon canceled.  To hide out from the storm I was in my basement quilt room.  I decided since I had a free day I would tackle quilting my Christmas Eve tablerunner.  The kit was from Shabby Fabrics  I had done the layout and pressing at a retreat in November.

I layered the top and one layer of cotton batting and loaded my machine with Superior Monofilament thread on top and So Fine in the bobbin.   I free motioned around the edge of every single piece on the quilt!  With the Monofilament I could travel without having to stop and start a lot.  I finished that and then added a backing and quilting the dark sky background with swirls and the outer snow so it would lie flat.  Then on to the bias binding and embellishments and it was done!

The next day I started in on my pile of basted quilts.  I quilted a row robin quilt, but it is not bound.

Then I tackled my Hawaiian applique quilt.  This was a long term project.  I hand appliqued the blocks MANY years ago.  My original plan had not worked out and I put together 9 of the 13 blocks into this 54 inch wallhanging.  It sat and sat and sat some more.  I decided to do free motion echo quilting and it's not perfect but I like the effect.  The problem I ran into was I was echo quilting each block individually and didn't have sashing and I disliked how it looked at the seam.  Some were worse than others at looking disjointed. 

I 

My solution was to make a 1/2" strip and topstitch it over the seam as a pseudo narrow sashing.  I used my 1/2 inch bias tape maker my mother in law had given me at least 25 years ago and I had never used!  I used straight grain fabric though since there wasn't any curves.

 Here is my finished quilt!  I love it now!  It has been through the washer to remove glue stains.  All but one came out.

 I am linking up with Design Wall Monday.

Two Finishes

I thought I would have something else to show, but it is taking longer than I expected.  I decided to just show that I have two finishes for January so far!  I got the bindings done on my scrappy leftover triangle tablerunner and this Sparkling Gemstones quilt.

Scrappy Gemstones is the name of the pattern in the book Jelly Roll Quilts.  It is not the first one of this pattern I have made.  I originally started this quilt four years ago for a teenager who loves pink.  I never got it to her for graduation.  She will soon be graduating from college and I have no clue if she still likes pink!  I will have to do some sleuthing. I quilted a motif in each elongated 4 patch section, but you can't see it!

Sparkling Gemstones

closeup

These triangles were the cut offs from a sampler BOM quilt top I made.  I couldn't bear to throw them away, so I sewed them up last year.  It's a fun tablerunner now!  I just did straight line quilting on the diagonal.

Scrappy Triangle Tablerunner

pinwheel closeup

Basting, Basting, Basting

As I have mentioned previously, I have a LOT of unfinished projects.  A LOT!  I do all my machine quilting on a Pfaff Grand Quilter, no long arm, no mid arm, just stuffing the quilts through and moving them around. Because of that, my quilts need to be layered and basted together with some method before quilting.  I was on a roll this weekend.  I started pulling tops out of my cupboard and picking backings (and in most cases piecing them) and started basting them together with pins.  The two smallest ones are spray basted, not a method I use on bigger quilts or quilts that will be sitting before they are quilted.  I apparently had a LOT of safety pins!  I know I have acquired them from various sources, including my mother-in-law's sewing room when she passed away.

I ended up getting 11 quilts ready for quilting in 3 days (and that was taking time out for being gone parts of two days).  Most of them are smaller and most will end up being donated or gifted.  One of them is from at least 10 years ago.  The top has been sitting unquilted and I have some older than that!

I absolutely LOVE my Kwik Klip!  It is one of my favorite tools.  I am also fortunate I buy backing by the roll!

Now I need to start quilting!!!  Yes, two of the quilts are the same!  The quilt top on the wall is auditioning borders.

 My mom found this fabric in a box in her house and had no clue what it was for so I put it together with some "doggie" backing and quilted it and gave it back to her!  She can use it for some of the donation causes for the senior center she is active in.  I also made her two pillows out of a different dog print.

Linking up with Design Wall Monday.

Five More UFO's Bite the Dust!

Although I still don't have my list typed up, I have it written on paper, I have knocked off five UFO's this weekend!  Admittedly I picked some easy ones, but hey they are done and not in my piles anymore!  We had snow this weekend so it was a great time to hide out and quilt.  The first photo was taken Saturday and that night we had massive wind and it knocked the snow off the trees.  The second picture is a walk in our woods behind the house Sunday.  It's hard to tell, but the snow was about a foot deep out in the open. 

I finished quilting and bound Tutti Fruiti.  It measures 60 X 72.  It was in a McCall's magazine and I used Moda Basic Grey Grunge and Compositions fabrics.

Tutti Fruiti

Here is a closeup.  I LOVE the background fabrics! I free motion outline stitched around the pinwheels and black squares, and the rest is a simple stipple for texture.

I finished three tablerunners.  A few years ago a local quilt shop was really into the 60 degree border print tablerunners.  I made these two out of one length of print, but the orange was pretty intense.  I put them away.  Now they are done!  One will be donated to the senior center fundraising efforts.  The make a bunch of gift baskets every year and raffle them.  The center one was a charm pack and a poinsettia print.  My prints were just really busy, and I set it aside.  Now I like it and it's finished!

 I started this tote bag 8 years ago.  I got bored sewing on raw edge strips and the size was odd so I set it aside.  I finished it in about 30 minutes!  I had the straps made, but not sewn on, and then I just had to sew up the sides.  I was supposed to add a pocket, but I am using it as a quilt carry bag.  It's done!

Not quilt related, but I work in a two room school (although we call it a one room as all the students do have a desk in one room).  I pull the Kindergarten and First Grade students out and we sit around in a table in our second room with the library and play center.  We have a half size gym.  Normally the students bring their lunch every day, but once a month parents cook a hot lunch in our tiny kitchen.  For Valentine's Day the students invited guests and they did the decorating with supplies belonging to a couple of parents.  We practice manners and dress up.

the door to the kitchen is in the corner.  Doors to the hallway are on the right out of view.

the door to the PE equipment storage room is in the far corner.  Doors to the hallway are on the left.

 Linking up with Design Wall Monday and Main Crush Monday and Monday Making.