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.