Neutral strings

I've lost count of the clue number, but the latest clue in Bonnie's mystery is done. My neutral strings are very subdued, but I hope they will play well on the final product. I did toss in a few additional fabrics, some darker creams from my scrap bin, to add a bit of interest.

Check out the latest link ups over here.

Swoon

I went on a couple of retreats this fall, and was scraping the bottom of the pile to pull together projects to take. So I hauled out this quilt, from at least 5 years ago. I taught this pattern at a quilt shop back then, and had my sample pieces all collected with enough fabric to finish the whole quilt. But in the interest of getting it done - and because I have no place for the original plan - I put together a subset of the blocks and a solid border. It will go to Victoria's Quilts after I get it quilted.

This was another part of the sample set, to demonstrated the pieced border that went with the pattern. But I've decided to just finish the block as a quiltie for the children's hospital and leave it at that.

Storybook Rainbow

I picked up a Judy Neimeyer quilt pattern a few years ago. I've never done one, although I have done a lot of paper pieicing. I wanted to try out one of hers, and I found Storybook Pastures at the local quilt shop.  I didn't like her colour choices, but thought if I used brights, it could be a very interesting quilt.

I took it home, and debated colours for ages. But finally a few months ago I pulled it out at a retreat to work on. It took several retreats to get it finished, but here it finally is.  I had it hanging over a chair in my TV room before Christmas, and my non-quilting mother, who is visiting for the month, picked it up and pulled all the remaining papers out for me!

Just need to figure out a quilting plan for this one. It will definitely be custom quilted, so it might be a while before it gets done.

Clue 5

I think I'm having quilter's remorse today. Working away on Bonnie's clue #5, in my colours, I seem to be making Christmas blocks. While that is totally appropriate for the season, it's not the look I was going for, for this quilt.

Here's hoping that as the quilt evolves, this red /green block pile gets muted a bit with some pretty purples.

This is a subset of all my blocks. It's feeling pretty Christmassy right now, especially since my orange seem to be reading as red. That's very strange, because they sure looked different when I compared the fabric selections.

Linking up with Bonnie today, just before the next clue arrives.

Clue4

And the fun continues! I went scrappy and stringy for clue #4 of Bonnie's Good Fortune mystery. Used a little bit of everything from my scrap bag, and only had to cut into my yardage for two strips, to keep the blocks balanced. 

I can't wait to see how this is all going to come together. Maybe tomorrow we'll get to assemble a few bits (but probably not - still lots of time left in the mystery).
I'm linking up with Bonnie - check out what everyone else is up to.

Finishes

I finished these quilts over the summer but never found time to post them.  The first is from a mystery quilt I did earlier in the year.  Peace, Love, quilt was supposed to finish about half this size, alternating hearts and diamond blocks. But because my colours are so muted, I did not like that setting. So, I played a bit, made a pile of filler blocks, and came up with this layout.

Triangle madness is the last (I hope) of these fabrics. Bought many years ago without a plan, I made "Metro Lattice" first. And had a ton of fabric left over.  So I made a couple of other quilts.  And now this one which I think used up the last of most of the fabrics.

Clue 3

And the Bonnie Hunter mystery continues. Clue 3 this week. Bonnie used greens, which meant I got to dig into my orange fabrics this time. Lots of half chevrons, and a double lot of bonus triangles. I love the fact that we are going to get to use these later. But my goodness, the Bonus Buddy ruler leaves you with itty bitty seam allowances.

This post is linked up with Bonnie's linky party, while we all wait patiently for clue 4 to be revealed.

Uh Oh

Let's play "spot the mistake". This is what happens when one rushes to finish a project during class, instead of just taking it home to complete there at leisure.

Some minor surgery, and it will hopefully be good as new and ready to reveal at guild next week.

Clue 2

Bonnie Hunter's mystery continues. Clue 2 this week. Lots of red and white for me. A whole pile of half square triangles finished at our sew day last Friday. Posting just in time for clue 3 to come out tomorrow morning :)

I'm linking up with Bonnie over at Quiltville.  Looking forward to clue #3 tomorrow morning!

Mini Houses

Last year, one of my guilds made house blocks as the block of the month.  Each house finished at 12", and had a 6" block of the quilter's choice inset.  I wanted to participate, but really did not want a quilt of 12" houses. So after looking around for a while, I picked up a package of quilters candy (2.5" squares) in Kona colours that had been in my sewing room for a while, and decided to use it.. 

I picked a rainbow of colours, and each house was pieced from two 2.5" squares of fabric.  Each of my mini houses finished at 3 1/4", with a 1 1/2" pieced block in greys as the inset.  From some of the leftover squares, I pieced little trees to round out the scene.  Then I quilted it on my computerized longarm, by shrinking a snowflake pattern down to scale.

The mini house quilt finished at about 18" x 26".

Past Bonnie Hunter Mysteries

I'm SO excited for this year's mystery. Clue one has come out, and the fun has started already.  In prepartion for this, I tried to finish up some of my previous mysteries. The tops generally get done, but quilting sometimes gets pushed to the bottom of the list.  This summer, I finished a couple of recent ones.

First, En Provence. This was the 2016 mystery. I used Bonnie's colours, although I went with single fabrics rather than her scrappy choices. I did pull in a second neutral, so that I could play with the 4-patches she filled the background/borders with, and I'm glad I did. It really adds to the quilt.

Last year was "On Ringo Lake". I decided to do this one in Christmas colours, so I found a great fabric with colours I liked, and based my colour selections on that. Once again I did not do scrappy, and when she pieced the background, I stuck with a single fabric. I did make a minor change to her outer border, because I wanted the green squares to look finished. Other than this, this first quilt is as she designed it (in a smaller size). I wanted a throw that could be in the living room for the Christmas season.

The leftover blocks went into a second quilt, which will be donated to Victoria's Quilts. The colours are not "in your face" Christmassy, so I hope it will be loved by someone all year round.

I have 3 extra blocks after all this. One will be the pocket on the bag for the donation quilt. And the other two are going to be pillows to match my quilt.  The pillow fronts are done, just need quilting and then I can assemble the pillows.

I have done every Bonnie Hunter mystery since Orca Bay in 2011.  I stumbled onto her mysteries through a Monday Design Wall linkup that year.  For some reason, suddenly at the end of November everyone was doing the same quilt :)  So I checked it out and jumped in with both feet.  I have done them all since then. And the original is the reason I bought a longarm, so I keep it as a reminder of that.  Here are my quilts - one (Celtic Solstice) is missing because I donated it, but I've kept the rest.  Only Easy Street still needs quilting - the rest are complete.  From left to right: Orca Bay, Easy Street, Grand Illusion, Allietare, En Provence, and On Ringo Lake.

Good Fortune Clue #1

Bonnie Hunter's new mystery, Good Fortune, started on Friday. The first clue came out after weeks of anticipation. I resisted playing with it all day, because I was going out to my sew group that night to work on the clue with friends.

Finally time rolled around and we got to start! Lots of cutting, and lots of sewing later, and all of my blocks are done. Sewing with friends sure makes the time go fast, and it was so much fun seeing everyone's colours.

I used purple in place of Bonnie's red, and switched around the rest of her colours. You can see my choices here 

Now the wait begins for Clue 2 :)  Whatever will I do with myself until then?  I know, I know - finish up all those customer quilts waiting for attention.

Check out Bonnie's linkup for what everyone else has been up to for clue #1.

Jacob's Ladder quilt

Another finish from this summer's challenge.  This quilt has had quite an adventure, and is now (I think) 2 years old. A couple of years ago I attended a guild retreat, and I won the block draw. Everyone made one block - it was a 1/2 square triangle using a Kaffe Fassett print and a white-on-white.  The winner (me!) received all the blocks and the batting/backing to complete the quilt.  I looked at the quilt design, and while it was nice, it really was not me, and I knew I would not keep the quilt if I made it that way. So I took the blocks home and started thinking about how I could redefine them.

I realized looking at my big 1/2 square triangles (approximately 9" square) that I could cut them into 4 pieces and I would have 2 smaller 1/2 square triangles, one white square, and one Kaffe Fassett square.  Which I could then put together into one of my favourite block formations. It's not quite a Jacob's Ladder block, but similar, with two 1/2-square triangles and two 4-patches.

It took me a while to cut into those lovely triangles, but I did it, and started sewing 4-patches from the result. Then I found a layout I liked, and started putting together the blocks. About halfway through, I suddenly realized that I needed to put my blocks together in two different orientations (one with HSTs pointing in, and one pointing out).  A quick count, and I ripped out 3 blocks and put them, and the remaining bits, together for the alternate blocks.

I went hunting for a border fabric - which of course had to be Kaffe Fassett. The backing ended up different - something a little calmer than the rest of the prints. It's "Just Right" by Michael Miller, and was indeed just right for this quilt.

mini giraffe

This sweet giraffe is from Violet Craft.  I paper pieced one back when the pattern first came out, for a shop sample. But he was SO cute I knew I wanted to make one for myself. However, the quilt is almost 60" square, and I didn't want one quite that big. So I downsized the patter pieces to 50%, and made a version for myself. This little guy is only about 24x30", and just as cute as his big brother.  I had to redraw a couple bits of the face, because it just became too small/too many pieces to work with at this size, but overall he came out quite nicely.

The quilt has actually been completed for some time (a year or two at least), but I finally figured out how I wanted to quilt it and got it done over the summer, as part of my guild UFO challenge.

PEI Mystery #2

This quilt was one of my summer finishes.  I joined a guild UFO challenge for the summer and put 12 quilts on the list.  10 were completed!

 I finished my first PEI Modern Guild mystery quilt on time back in May, but this one sat around for a while waiting for a chance on the longarm.  I had grand plans for custom quilting, but time passed and I finally decided to go with an all-over pantograph just to get it finished and out for donation.

This was my more modern version of the quilt. Neither conformed to the suggested layouts, because I had a particular size requirement, but I used all the blocks (and made a couple extra blue ones for this quilt).

Bonnie Hunter Time

It's that time of year again. Bonnie Hunter's mystery starts this week and I am so excited! I've done every one of her mysteries since Orca Bay in 2011.

I pulled a bunch of fabric when she announced her colours. Just to be confusing, my red is her blue, my purple is her red, my orange is her green and my green is her orange. And not shown here are my neutrals, which are all shades of cream. I'm a bit surprised there's no black this year - but looking back I see there hasn't been any since Allietare.

Here is a photo of all my previous Bonnie mysteries, all lined up. Only Celtic Solstice is missing, because I was not happy with my colour choice that year and I gave the quilt to charity. I'm debating a rerun of that mystery, so I'll have the complete set.

A new challenge

I'm about to take a plunge that I've been thinking about for some time.  I LOVE mystery quilts, as you may know if you've followed my blog in the past.  And I like designing, although time is always at a premium so I don't do as much of that as I'd like.  Well, I was just handed an opportunity to combine those 2 loves, and design a mystery quilt for one of my guilds!  Little did I know when volunteering to be co-program director, that we were also responsible for the annual mystery, but so it is.  And I am thrilled!

I came up with 2 designs, tweaked the one that I think will be more interesting to work on, and am about to start drafting the pattern. The only catch is, the first meeting is in 1.5 weeks!  Good thing mysteries can be drafted a piece at a time :)  I'll have the fabric requirements for the first meeting, and hopefully all the steps ready for testing by the end of the month.

Ready or not, here we go!

Another mystery

Continuing my mystery obsession, this was a mystery quilt last year from Love Shack Quilts.  I finished all the blocks, but was not happy with the layout due to the muted tones in my quilt. So I switched up the layout, made a bunch of background blocks, and created this giant heart from all the heart blocks.

Guild Mystery

This quilt was a mystery from one of my guilds in 2017/2018.  There was originally a second background colour, but because it was a mystery and the location of fabrics was not specified at first, I made a *really* poor choice for that fabric.  See this post for the blocks that I ended up rejecting from this quilt. Never fear - they didn't go to waste. The rejected blocks became lovely bright quilties for the local hospital.

I remade the corner blocks with the same background as the rest of the quilt, and I'm much happier with the new result. Entirely made from stash, including the backing, I'll donate this to the guild's charity program this month.

The backing was made from some fabric I had in my stash. It wasn't quite big enough, so I pieced all the leftover bits of my fabrics together and included them.

One Block Wonder

I've been working on a new quilt. A one block wonder from a panel this time. I thought I'd try something a bit new. Layout is now complete, and I've finished appliqueing where the blocks intersect the panel. Building rows now, so it should be a top shortly. I haven't decided if it needs borders or not.

July Finishes

I managed to squeak out two finishes last month. I finished my Bonnie Hunter "En Provence" quilt - this is my second of two, using the blocks I made.  The first was a charity donation last year. This one I'll keep, and I finally found a chance to get it quilted and bound.

After that it was coming down to the wire, but a final charity project off the longarm and  that was number two.

And now it's time to look ahead at August UFO plans. Patchwork Times tells me UFO #3 is up.  And APQ has picked #8. The good news is that I finished #8 in March, when Patchwork Times drew that number. So I'll set my sights on #3 - my Kaffe Jacob's ladder quilt - and see if I can get that one done this month.

Turquoise

The top of my turquoise quilt is now done!  And boy is it turquoise. I love that colour, but this is perhaps a bit of overkill, even for me.  I'll tuck it away in the quilting pile, until I figure out where its new home will be. And in the meantime, I'll keep my eye open for some (less turquoise) backing for this. I have a flannel I had planned to use, but I think it's just too much at this point.

Canadian Backing

This is the plan for backing my 150 Canadian Women quilts.  This is for the large quilt - I just need to add one more column on the left side to bring it up to the required size.  The pattern is "Glorious and Free" by Quilter on Fire. I enlarged the blocks for this version. The other (smaller) quilt gets a regular size, but with 2 extra columns to make up the width I need.

The fabrics are from various years of Northcott's "Oh Canada" fabric line.

June UFO finish

I managed to sqeeze this finish in, just under the wire for June.  I think this is the 3rd quilt I've made using most of these fabrics, and I am happy to finally see the end of them.  6" left of the light fabric I used for binding this quilt, but that's it. It started in 2015 as a sample for a shop demo about 60 degree triangles, and how to combine various sizes. Then it sat.  And sat.  I finally dug up the rest of the leftovers and got the top finished last year.

The adventure started with Metro Lattice, way back in July 2014 .


Then "Triangles" which I posted the other day used up a lot of the leftover small triangles.

And now my gold & green adventure is complete.

I'm linking up with Judy's UFO challenge today.
And for July, Judy drew #11 - my Peace, Love, Quilt mystery.  So I'll see if I have backing for that and try to actually get the scheduled UFO done this month.

Triangles

This was a March finish that I never got around to posting. It will be heading off to Victoria's Quilts when we start up again in the fall.  All 60 degree triangles, using scraps from my stash.  I've been trying to use up some of this gold fabric for ages.

150 Canadian Women

I finished both of my 150 Canadaian Women quilt tops.  70 blocks in one, and 80 in the other. It's weird how one extra row makes the quilt look so much bigger in the photo below.

I have plans for the backings - both will be pieced so there is some work to do there before I'm ready to quilt these.  I guess I missed Canada's 151st birthday. Maybe they'll be done before 152 rolls around.

May UFO Finish

It's not the one I had planned to finish, but I did manage to squeak out a UFO finish for May.  This quilt is made of all the leftovers from a Kaffe Fassett quilt I made.That one isn't quilted yet, but I took all the leftover strips and put them together to make this quilt, with a few solids I had in my stash to round it out to donation size.

Well, "all" isn't quite true.  A while back, I made this little quiltie with the first set of leftover strips.

And it looks like the main quilt was finished back in 2016, so it's been waiting a while to be quilted. It is on the list for this year, so hopefully it will come up one month soon and I can get moving on it.

PEI Modern Guild Mystery

It's done!  The deadline is May 31 to enter the draw for the PEI guild mystery quilt along, and I managed to get the whole thing finished, quilted and bound in time!  I made two quilts, but this is the one that got finished. It's an almost-tradiational layout (the other will be more modern).  I needed to stretch the quilt to make it 70x50", so I moved the corner stars in from the sides and out from the top and bottom to accomplish this.

It took a few extra pieces to fill them out. And one re-working, after I rotated a piece in one of those blocks. Someone nicely pointed the error out to me, and then I promptly forgot about it until the quilt was half-done.  Fixing a block at that point was challenging, but had to be done.

I played around with custom quilting on this one. I had hoped to play with various relief designs, but my batting wasn't thick enough to give the look I hoped for, so I just went with a more overall fill instead.

The colour on these last photos is pretty bad - it seems to be trade-off I get when I turn off the flash to help accentuate the stitching lines.

Since I'm done in time, I'm linking up with the rest of the party at the PEI Modern Guild blog.

Turquoise

Sometimes a vision just doesn't come out as planned. This project was going to be 2 quilts.  I fell in love with the turquoise print at a quilt shop, and bought it and a few friends. Got home, and realized I didn't have enough fabric, so I supplemented with some purple and turquoise from my stash.  I absolutely loved the colours, piled up on my table. But putting the quilt together, it's just a bit much, I think.

The other "half" of the project was triangles with dark stripes on the end - which was supposed to be a second quilt.  I carefully sized all my bits so they'd be the right dimensions to donate. But now I don't like either one in the original form.

My friends suggested combining them all, like I did for my practice sample a few months ago. So I tried that out.

I'm definitely much happier with this layout. It's still a lot of purple/turquoise, but the dark bands seems to help it.

PEI Modern Guild mystery

These are two of my "not enough fabric" quilts from my retreat last weekend.  I arrived at retreat all set to assemble these quilts, since the reveal came out on the 1st.  But when I started to put it all together, I discovered I had completely messed up how one of the units was to be assembled, and I had cut my fabric incorrectly. And of course I didn't take any extra with me.

I thought I was stuck, and 2 projects were going back into the bag. But one other quilter had forgotten a part for her sewing machine, so she reached out to an attendee who hadn't arrived yet. And who, it turned out, just happened to be standing in the quilt shop that carries the fabric I needed.  She relayed a request for 2 half-yards of fabric (black and white Kona), and my retreat was saved!

These tops are my versions of the PEI Modern Guild mystery.  Changed up from the reveal, to make 2 tops that can be donated to Victoria's Quilts once they are quilted.  That may take a little while, because I have an urge to do some custom work on them.

Update:
No bonus points for spotting the error in the white one.  It's been pointed out already :) (fortunately before I got around to quilting this).

150 Canadian Wonen

At quilt retreat this weekend, and the theme is "I didn't bring enough fabric for this quilt". So far 3 out of 4 projects have hit that blockade. But this one I did manage to put together. It still needs borders, tomorrow. This is 80 out my 150 blocks from the 150 Canadian Women quilt project which started in 2016.

Single Girl Garden

Sometimes a plan just doesn't work out like you envisioned. I had these blocks from a Single Girl quilt, leftover from some repairs. Each of them had a small tear, where stitches were unpicked and the fabric damaged. I thought I could put them together, applique some flowers, and turn it into a garden quilt.  I also wanted to make sure it could end up as a donation, so I needed a bit more size than the blocks provided on their own. 

This is the result of that attempt. Not great, but hopefully cheerful enough to make someone happy.  A stormy day, raining Kaffe Fassett flowers down from the skies.

Because the flowers were appliqued with fusible, I quilted each of them heavily to make sure they would not lift off. The rest of the quilt is more lightly quilted, to try to keep it soft enough for snuggling.