Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) Blocks

Boo Boo Patch

3 x 6 inch

Made with 1.5 inch width scraps.

I now have 168 blocks out of a goal of 260. 

The Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) color of the month is yellow. I don't have many yellow scraps but do have a whole lot of different RSC blocks in the works so I'm spending this month getting caught up on some blocks I didn't get around to making with pink (January) and blue (February).

I call them Boo Boo patches because a long time ago I meant to measure and cut my strip sets for 18 patch blocks like are in my recent finish.  What a big mistake (Boo Boo) that was! But I decided the blocks were cute and have been making them with 1.5 inch scraps long enough ever since. 

16 Patch

RSC color alternating with green

6 inch blocks

made with 2 inch width scraps.

I now have 109 blocks toward a goal of 120 or 130. 

Easy Breezy

6 inch blocks

Made with 2 inch width scraps.

RSC color +1.

I started making these this year and have 29 blocks toward a goal of 120 or 130.

8 Patch

8 inch blocks

Made with 2.5 inch width scraps

I now have 37 blocks toward a goal of 63. 

All of these blocks are going into comfort quilts that will end up close to 60 x 80. 

And sew on...

RSC ScrapHappy Saturday

 

A Windmill Top

Little Windmills

in a quilt top.

60 x 80

300 Little Windmills

made from 1.5 inch width scraps

that finish at 4 inches. 

I think I might have started making them back in 2022. I was making lots of blocks from 1.5 inch width scraps back then and emptied out a bin of that size scrap in November of that year. 

In October of 2024 I met my goal of 300 blocks and put them in a bag and put the bag into the Some Assembly Required (SAR) bin. 

One of the things I'm working with this month is 1.5 inch scraps so I pulled the bag of these blocks and assembled the top and emptied the bag.  

I sewed them together randomly. I don't use a design wall. If I did I know myself well enough to know I would be screwing around arranging and rearranging blocks forever - never quite satisfied with any layout. And I figure these quilts are made for comfort so no sense in spending all my time looking for a layout that appears perfect to me.  Hopefully in the future the quilt will be hugging a person and not a wall.  

 However, if I do have a lot of blocks I divide them up into light, medium, dark and as I web the top together I try to keep the lighter ones on top and work down to the darker ones. And since I'm webbing the top I can see as I web what blocks will be next to each other so I can avoid putting two of similar color next to each other. 

WITB (What's in the Box, Bin, Bag) is the theme in my sewing space for the month of March. I'm wondering how many boxes, bins and bags I can empty.  

With this quilt top I was able to empty a grocery bag of Windmill blocks that was in the SAR bin.

I'm keeping score:

Boxes:

1- Coins

2 - Legos

Bags:

1 - Kaleidoscope

2  - solid 1.5 inch strips for 51 Waffles

3 - 1.5 inch strips for 9 Legos

4 - Windmill blocks

I'll also be working with yellow scraps this month because that is the March Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) color. 

And I don't always follow the challenges issued by the Scrapbuster group but this month the challenge is 1.5 inch scraps. I have some of those! 

And sew on...

Finished Or Not Finished Friday at Alycia Quilts

***

REMEMBER, TREASURE, GROW, READ (my words of the year)

The last few days we have had beautiful weather so I have spent most of my days outside gardening. It is so nice to be outside with my hands in the dirt...down and dirty...yes! I've been so busy that I haven't had time to blog about all my outside fun but in a few days we are expecting some rain so maybe I can catch up on blog writing about GROWing. 

READ - I also finished a book. More on that later. I have to go look up the title.

TREASURE - 

I received kind words, a beautiful piece of fabric with roses and a cute little origami cloth butterfly from Chantal. I think I might have to make a few of those. It is so cute! 

I received a tin of chocolate truffles and dark chocolate pecan clusters in the mail. Surprise! They were from hubby, John. You know...I haven't eaten any chocolate candies in over two years. (I've just never ever bought it for myself).  I forgot what I was missing!

Oh joy! Life is good.

 

It's A Finish!

It's a finish!

18 Patch

42 x 60

I started making these blocks as a Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) project back in 2021. The six inch blocks are made of 18 - 1.5 x 2.5 inch rectangles. They were not strip pieced. 

I finished the top in 2023.

I quilted it with vertical and horizontal lines. I added a scrappy binding. 

The back - polka dots on pink. 

And sew on...

RSC ScrapHappy Saturday

 ***

REMEMBER, TREASURE, GROW, READ (my words of the year)

Treasure - I get a free Iowa Lottery ticket every month. This month I won $1. I could have bought another ticket for a progressive pot for $1 but I decided not to. I was happy enough to have won $1. 

Read - Finished a book! Water From My Heart by Charles Martin. Wealthy loner seeks redemption after disastrous choices, encountering a woman and child whose lives he impacted in Central America. Popular highlight: "Indifference is the curse of this age. We need to hear that. Indifference is evil, and it could not be further from the heart of God." Based on some real events. I've read a lot of Martin's books and have loved them all. 

I Built A Top Of Legos

Legos

52 x 78

It's a top!

I used Lynn's tutorial at Klein Meisje Quilts. 

When I pulled my project box out the other day I found 15 blocks, a little box with 1.5 x 2.5 inch rectangles and a few rows for a block.  

I wanted a quilt of 24 blocks so needed to make 9 more blocks. Each block takes 78 rectangles so I needed a total of 702 rectangles and that little box defintely did not hold enough rectangles. 

So, remember a few blog posts back when I mentioned I sorted two boxes of 1.5 inch width scraps into different categories?  Well, one of those "categories" was a baggie of 1.5 inch width scraps greater than a 1.5 inch square and less than a 5.5 inch width.  Well, that is what I cut into 1.5 x 2.5 inch rectangles as well as some 1.5 inch squares.  The baggie is now empty and I had enough pieces to make nine more Lego blocks. 

It looks like I started making blocks back in 2021. 

It was slow going because I was using 1.5 inch width scraps in several other quilts and was always running out of rectangles for Lego blocks. 

I like to give quilts with lots of small pieces and things to look at to folks in the hospital, hospice or extended care. It gives them something to look at and sometimes sparks conversations with visitors over what they see in the quilt. 

WITB (What's in the Box, Bin, Bag) is the theme in my sewing space for the month of March. I'm wondering how many boxes, bins and bags I can empty.  

With this quilt top I was able to empty a bag of 1.5 inch scraps and a box of Legos

I'm keeping score:

Boxes:

1- Coins

2 - Legos

Bags:

1 - Kaleidoscope

2  - solid 1.5 inch strips for 51 Waffles

3 - 1.5 inch strips for 9 Legos

I'll also be working with yellow scraps this month because that is the March Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) color. 

And I don't always follow the challenges issued by the Scrapbuster group but this month the challenge is 1.5 inch scraps. I have some of those! 

And sew on...

Finished Or Not Finished Friday at Alycia Quilts

***

REMEMBER, TREASURE, GROW, READ (my words of the year)

Yesterday I sowed some poppies and forget-me-nots, wild strawberries and tall thimbleweeds. They are mostly surface sown and like cooler temps for germination so it is okay to winter sow those seeds. I usually winter sow in pots, milk jugs or bags but poppies don't like transplanting and I don't think the other flowers do either.  And today it is snowing great big snowflakes so they will get watered in!  For labels/markers so I don't forget what I sow where I buy paint stirrer sticks and write on them and then to seal them spray them with blasting freeze hairspray for a lasting "spiky cement finish". 

Waffles

Yesterday I finished fifty-one 6 inch Waffle Blocks. 

It all started because awhile ago someone gave me eleven 6 inch Waffle Blocks. 

And the other day I sorted a very large men size 13 shoebox of 1.5 inch width scraps and...

...a small box of of about the same size of 1.5 inch width scraps into different categories and widths. I'm hoping this month to greatly reduce and maybe even empty those two boxes of 1.5 inch scraps - most given to me over the last year by different folks. (Thank you, all!) I actually measure the width of most small scraps I receive. 

So, anyway, now I have bags in boxes so now I can start emptying bags. And then before you know it I'll have empty boxes! 

I just emptied a bag of long solid scraps making those 51 Waffle blocks. I cut what was not long enough for three strips for Waffles into 1.5 x 5.5 and 1.5 x 2.5 inch rectangles and 1.5 inch squares. Those will now join others of the same size. 

And now that I have 62 Waffle Blocks I decided to make a twin sized comfort quilt with either 120 or 130 blocks.  I'm now making this a Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) project. I have a litttle box of solid scrap chunks in all colors so each month will cut a 1.5 inch piece off of the scraps in the color of the month and make more blocks.  I might even empty a bag of 1.5 inch squares (postage stamps) in the process. 

And now I have emptied a bag. 

WITB (What's in the Box, Bin, Bag) is the theme in my sewing space for the month of March. I'm wondering how many boxes, bins and bags I can empty.  

I'm keeping score:

Boxes:

1- Coins

Bags:

1 - Kaleidoscope

2  - solid 1.5 inch strips for 51 Waffles

I'll also be working with yellow scraps this month because that is the March Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) color. 

And I don't always follow the challenges issued by the Scrapbuster group but this month the challenge is 1.5 inch scraps. I have some of those! 

And sew on...

***

REMEMBER, TREASURE, GROW, READ (my words of the year)

"I count myself lucky, having long ago won a lottery paid to me in seven sunrises a week for life" - Robert Brault.

How about that! I won the same lottery!

 

A Kaleidoscope Top

Put on your sunglasses!

It's a top!

Kaleidoscope

40 x 56

I started making these blocks in 2024 as a Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) project. I didn't have many small yellow scraps or even much yardage that was yellow. What I did have was quite a few yellow "chunks" - pieces less than a FQ but greater than a 6 inch square. I decided to use them as background for a kaleidoscope quilt. I figured there would be enough for a child sized quilt. 

Last year I ended up making twenty-two 8 inch blocks. 

This week I pulled out a little pile of multicolor 4.5 inch width scraps I had set aside for kid's quilts  and those yellow chunks and made 13 more blocks...  

...And then I put them together into a top. 

And now I have emptied a bag. 

WITB (What's in the Box, Bin, Bag) is the theme in my sewing space for the month of March. I'm wondering how many boxes, bins and bags I can empty.  

I'm keeping score:

Boxes:

1- Coins

Bags:

1 - Kaleidoscope

I'll also be working with yellow scraps this month because that is the March Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) color. 

And I don't always follow the challenges issued by the Scrapbuster group but this month the challenge is 1.5 inch scraps. I have some of those! 

And sew on...

***

REMEMBER, TREASURE, GROW, READ (my words of the year)

Many many years ago I bought the book To Our Children's Children. Remembering Family Histories for Generations to Come. by Bob Greene  for both my Dad and John's parents hoping they would write about some of the prompts in the book. No one ever did. When John's parents passed away I got back their copy of the book and have always been meaning to do some prompt answering myself and put them in a journal. 

To Our Children’s Children

The House of Your Growing Up

1.      What did your home look like? Was it a house or apartment? What color was it? Was it stone or wood? One story or two?

I was in third grade, the eldest of five kids, when we moved to the house I grew up in. It was a white wood two story located on a very busy one-way street. A big backyard with a sidewalk lead to the garage and there was an alley behind the garage. We were separated by lilac bushes and peonies from the quiet elderly neighbors on the west side and separated by a chain link fence from the nosey and very cranky old lady we called Nosey Agnes on the east side. We had two big elm trees in the front boulevard until they had to be cut down due to Dutch Elm disease.

2.      Can you remember the view out of any of your windows? What did you look out on?

We really didn’t have a “view”. The front of the house looked out on to a busy one-way street. Across the street on the corner was the Salvation Army in a building that used to be a movie theater. The rest of the block was houses. The windows in back looked out on the backyard and alley and the houses across the alley. I already mentioned the neighbors next to us. 

* I remember the address of the old house and found a photo online of how it looked a few years ago which is pretty much how it looked when I lived there. I also saw that the house was built in 1920.

 

A Coin Top

Coins

60 x 78

It's a top! 

I think I started making these in 2024 to use up some long 2 inch width scraps/strips. Last year I also cut a lot of quilt back trimmings into 2 inch width strips to use in these. 

I strip pieced these. I sewed together 2 strips 2 inches in width and length divisible by 3 and then cut them into 3 inch sections. The resulting strips are variable lengths. 

It sounds easier to make than it is. I decided the top should be 24 rectangles across and 52 rectangles down. Since all segments were variable in length I sometimes had to cut a segment shorter and then use those pieces in another column. I don't use  design wall so I knew some colors were going to end up next to each other. That doesn't bother me. And I also tried to start each column with yellow or orange segments so those colors are all at the top of the quilt. 

I tried to keep all of the darker colors at the bottom of the quilt. 

WITB (What's in the Box, Bin, Bag) is the theme in my sewing space for the month of March. I'm wondering how many boxes, bins and bags I can empty.  

I'll keep score:

Box - 1

I'll also be working with yellow scraps this month because that is the March Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) color. 

And I don't always follow the challenges issued by the Scrapbuster group but this month the challenge is 1.5 inch scraps. I have some of those! 

And sew on...

***

REMEMBER, TREASURE, GROW, READ (my words of the year)

It's been a rough couple of days here with all kinds of mishaps; however, I'm trying not to let things get me down. Dreaming of spring and flowers to come sure helps!

I finished a book - The Key to Midnight by Dean Koontz. He originally published it under the name of Leigh Nichols in the 1990s. It's not the usual Dean Koontz type of book; however, it has the same underlying theme as in all of Dean Koontz books - good vs. evil and good wins.  A woman is hypnotized and her memory purged of her life's memories and she is given a new identity and false memories. Eventually with the help of a nice man she finds out the truth.