My Spin on Vintage Spin

The top is complete. 

This is called Vintage Spin in Kathy Doughty's book Adding Layers - Color, Design & Imagination. 

There's nothing vintage about the fabrics I used. I'll have to find another name for the quilt...hmmmm...Head Spin, Tail Spin, Whirlwind.   Well, I usually don't name quilts so no matter. 

This is for one of my granddaughters.(Maybe next year...maybe for the hope chests...who knows...I made it with Isabelle in mind).  I'll have to hand quilt it because I'm hand quilting the one (called Petunias even though I don't name quilts)  for the other granddaughter.  They are five weeks apart, both aged 10, and I dare not treat each of them differently! 

Woooohooo! I'm on a Staycation this week. I need to catch up on the gardens - weed the strawberry bed, can spaghetti sauce and tomatoes and bread and butter pickles, freeze green beans, catch up on genealogy files, help husband cut down some dead trees and split firewood, take grandkids school shopping and to lunch, clean up the pop-up camper so we can trade in for new one... Oh, that list kind of makes my Head Spin!  I definitely need to fit sewing in there somewhere. 

Design Wall Monday at Patchwork Times

Itchin' To Do Some Hand Stitchin'

I've really been wanting to do some hand quilting.  

I don't have air conditioning so it gets rather warm sitting under a quilt here in the summer so I usually work on smaller projects in my time off from the paying job and working in the garden and playing with grandkids. 

Lately, there's been some cooler evenings and I've noticed more than an occasional country breeze.  And so I decided to take advantage of some of those occasions by getting this quilt, Petunias, ready for hand quilting. 

I'm not quite sure yet how this is all going to be quilted. I do have some ideas. First, I'm starting with the octagonal rings and quilting about 1/4 inch away from both the inner and outer seams in pink hand quilting thread.  We I shall see how that looks and go from there. 

Now my husband asked why I would go to all the trouble to hand quilt something that is so busy.  

"Good question", I say.  

"If I don't care about quilting each section of each block in a different way or in a way that requires too many starts and stops and turning of the quilt this way and that then I use my DSM and quilt a quilt in an overall pattern of spirals or flowers or leaves or  lines or whatever. Otherwise, I hand quilt."

"Hmmm", he says. 

Slow Stitching Sunday...where others have been itchin' to do some hand stitchin'. 

Now There Are 568 of These Things

This makes 568 of these 2 x 4.5 (finished) things. 

I started making them last year as a project for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge and I'm still at it this year.

They are pretty boring to make. Tedious. A pain in the patooty. (No, I never got into the leader/ender way). 

Pain in the patooty? So, I don't call them lozenges.  I call them suppositories. 

I estimate I need 720 for a twin sized quilt. 

It takes a lot of suppositories to cure the scrap box. 

Speaking of Rainbow Scrap Challenge...this month is indigo or, lacking that, black and/or gray. There's a couple of grays in there somewhere but these are mostly from the black/white category. 

Got Scraps?

Indigo preferred this month. Substitute black or gray. 

Use up those scraps and.show them off each ScrapHappy Saturday. 

String Orchestra

48 x 56

It needs to go into the washing machine and dryer and then into the donation quilt box.

I made 48 string blocks from scraps last year and part of this year as part of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. 

I normally use muslin as the foundation for my string blocks but this time I used paper and made 8 inch blocks. 

Twenty-four blocks was enough for two child-size donation quilts.  

(Yes, every once in a while I forget which way I'm spiraling in case you noticed). 

I quilted it with some spirals on my plain Jane Janome. Binding was attached by machine - not my favorite look or binding method but it is recommended for some children's quilts especially if they are going to foreign countries. 

This was my goal #9     for  Q3 Finish Along with Adrianne of On the Windy Side. 

At the end of the month I will link up to Julie's Binding Blitz. 

In the meantime I'm linking up to: 

Can I Get a Whoop, Whoop at Confessions of a Fabric Addict

and

WIPs Be Gone at A Quilting Reader's Garden

Get Real

Rabbits

"Generally by the time you are Real most of your hair has been loved off and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby."  - Margery Williams, Velveteen Rabbit. 

I've been wanting to make a baby quilt to go into the future generations hope chest with the book Velveteen Rabbit which is one of my favorites. 

I'm not very good at making up patterns so I hinted to Sally (The Objects of Design) that I would like to know how to make an upright bunny and she graciously made a tutorial. 

And so...I've made 5 Rabbits on their way to getting Real.   I didn't see the problem with the top right one until I took the photo. I guess he came down with a bout of Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever and his eye is about ready to drop out.  He must be on his way to Real. Do I fix it? Or leave it? 

One of the rabbits in the quilt will actually be made of this velveteen.  This is an old velveteen skirt of mine I made way back when I made all of my clothes. It's one of those things I've saved because the fabric was expensive and I was poor back then but splurged on the fabric with some birthday money. It hasn't fit for quite some time (because I'm loose in the joints and very shabby) but I've saved it for a Velveteen Rabbit.    The colors of the other rabbits in the quilt are inspired by the colors in this skirt.  I'm going to cut it up for one Velveteen Rabbit for the baby quilt and with the rest I think I will make a little stuffed rabbit.  

So Far...

1718 Coverlet so far. 

I had to put it sideways to fit it in the picture. 

4.5 inch blocks

My challenges: 

I'm piecing it by hand like the original maker did (mosaic patchwork). 

I'm using only solids.

There's a whole lot of applique blocks coming up. 

Joining the tribe at Kathy's Quilts for some Slow Sunday Stitching later on today. 

Butterflies - 47 Down 9 to Go

Indigo is the color of the month for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. If I had any indigo scraps I would probably have used them in January, the bright blue month.  In the absence of indigo we can use black and/or gray.   So, black it is.   I made a couple of 9 inch butterfly (beggar) blocks in black and I found some red pieces I forgot to use in last month's blocks. 

I need 56 blocks so if I make 3 in each of the next month's colors I'll be ready for a quilt. 

I based it on one I saw at Nostalgic Cafe a few years ago. 

Rainbow Scrap Challenge ScrapHappy Saturday