Two Finishes!

My Scrappy Strings quilt grew on me this week as I finished up the quilting, decided on the binding, and threw it in the wash.  Somehow, I have ended up loving it and very pleased with the finish!

Although it is hard to see in the photo above, I think the binding choice made all the difference.  I auditioned several different ideas for a few days, and finally decided it needed to be the tone on tone green that is already in the quilt.  Just this morning, I was reading on the Sew Mama Sew blog that scrappy quilts need to have an "organizing" fabric.  Well, in retrospect, that is what the green is for this busy, bright, scrappy quilt.  I think you can see it a little better in the photo below.

This quilt is going to Tanya, who blogs at Tanya Quilts in CO, for her nursing home quilt drive.  She asked that the quilts be at least 60 x 60 and this one turned out to be about 61 x 61, so should be perfect.  I hope a special senior citizen will get a lot of comfort out of this quilt!

I also made myself a new bag this week!  This is made from the tutorial making a tote bag out of a charm pack from Missouri Star Quilt Co.  I think it is actually three totes from one charm pack, but I only ever make one!  I wanted one with fall colors, and I think this will work. I hate buying new purses, and love the size of this tote bag for what I need.

I modified the original pattern just a bit, and added some divided pockets inside attached to the lining.  I just got a new phone and wanted a pocket that the phone would fit in.  I also sewed in a magnetic snap and love how that works!

Two finishes this week mean that I have to decide what to work on next.  Maybe it will be my Scrap Vortex?  Or start something new?  Probably both!  

Linking up with Quilting is More Fun Than Housework for Oh Scrap!

What's For Lunch?!

In all my years of teaching, and sewing, I never did make myself a quilted lunch bag.  I kept thinking I would last year, and then as it got closer and closer to the end of the year, I decided there was no reason to since I was retiring.  Then, this summer, I joined the ranks of "Guest Teachers" in my district, a fancy word for substitute teachers.  I do need quilting money after all!  So earlier this week, when I needed a quick project for some instant gratification, I decided to see if I could make a mini tote bag that would work to carry a lunch in.  And here's what I came up with!

I've made a couple of larger totes, so I had an idea of how to put one together.  For this size I cut two 12 x 20 inch pieces out of fat quarters from my stash, one for the outside and one for the lining.  I love the number fabric (it's called Game Pieces according to the selvage) and it seemed perfect for this purpose.

This turned out to be just the right size for what I would take for lunch.  I used some fusible fleece ironed to the outer piece to give it some shape and quilted it with straight lines about 1 inch apart.  I squared up the bottom corners so it would sit flat and added handles that are just long enough to loop over your arm for carrying.  So happy with how it turned out!

This week I've also been diligently quilting my String Quilt and it's almost done!  The original 20 blocks I made were about 32 by 40 when sewn together, and I knew I wanted the finished quilt to be about 60 inches square when completely done, so I added some cream tone on tone fabric for borders.

I'm quilting in giant diamonds, loosely following the shape that the string blocks made. 

Although I don't think this is one of my favorite quilts, it has been an interesting one to learn from as I created it, and I combined some of my favorite fabrics with others that I'm not so fond of.  Now I just need to figure out what to use for binding.  Do I have strings left that would work?  Maybe!

This quilt is inspired by Cynthia's Scrap-a-Palooza String Quilt from August of 2014 and I'm linking up with Oh Scrap! tomorrow to share in all of the scrappy inspiration over there!

A Finish for the Week!

This week I was able to finish an older work in progress that I started way back in 2013!  So happy to have it completed!  This quilt is based on a tutorial called Bold Braid by Kelly of My Quilt Infatuation. I added an extra border all the way around the original quilt to make it a little bigger.  I think it is a lovely, calm feeling quilt, and hopefully perfect for my friend's grandbaby boy who was born in May.  (He's only 3 months old, so that's not too late for a gift, right?!)

I pieced the back out of some leftover yardage from my stash.  The yellow plaid comes from the Hello Sunshine line from Connecting Threads that most of the front is made of.  The blue is a fun polka dot that I used to back and bind my Hungry Caterpillar Quilt.  It seemed to fit with the blues and yellows this quilt is filled with.

I quilted it with my usual, straight line quilting along most of the seams.  It made kind of a neat pattern as I followed the herringbone blocks along.

This shows a close-up of the main fabrics in the Hello Sunshine collection that I got.  They are some of my favorite fabrics ever, which makes it hard to give this quilt away.  I did end up with plenty of scraps, though, so these fabrics will show up in other places, for sure!  It really is a good feeling to finish up something that has been in my pile of projects for a very long time!

A Small Finish

It has been quite a time at our house, the last couple of weeks, but my hubby is on the mend and I have had some sewing time again.  Hooray!  Of course I didn't work on any of my bigger WiPs; instead I started something new and it resulted in a very satisfying small finish, which I always love.  I had been wanting to play with the Disappearing Four-Patch block, and this was the perfect way to do it.  And isn't it the perfect backdrop for my bowl of cherry tomatoes?!  I'm so proud of them!

The four patches came from a charm pack of  Handblock Prints by RJR Fabrics and some gray yardage which I really love called Dit-Dot by Jason Yenter for In The Beginning fabrics.  I quilted it very minimally with diagonal lines through the charm square pieces and straight stitching through the smaller pieces.  It resulted in a fun secondary pattern, which I enjoyed seeing happen!

Now, back to work on those WiPs!  Today I'm linking up to Oh Scrap! where I plan to enjoy looking at lots of other scrappy, fun projects!