RSC25 - Week #47

It's that time of year when we like to focus on finishes.

Another RSC project is showing progress - the Quarter Dresden project.  Four rows are now assembled, with row 5 sewn but not attached yet.  That leaves 3 to go.  Maybe by next Saturday this one will be a flimsy.  

There is the old joke about "how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time!"  One elephant in my sewing room is scraps.  Lots and lots and lots of scraps, no matter how fast I sew.  They multiply at night in the dark don't they?  The main focus this week was a completely scrappy project - organizing, cutting and using lots of scraps from just ONE bin.  Not a rainbow bin of scraps, but red, white, and blue scraps. 

All week I worked on reducing the scraps in the Quilt of Valor scrap bin.  Because I've been very lazy again the past month or so, the canvas cube with scraps from QOV was overflowing and I just kept piling more stuff on top of it anyway.  The yardage in the bin next to it was even a mess.  Time to clean up this whole area so I can actually reach that dresser drawer behind it all.  Sorting and cutting parts for QOV blocks - lots of them - was a daily project the past couple of days. A little at a time, and I'm seeing progress finally.

These are parts for more 4-Patch Fun (Bonnie Hunter) blocks on the small design board.  Because I'm cutting 2" strips for these, the smaller scraps work great.  

Once the 6" units are made, I've been putting 2 red and 2 blue together into 4-sies.  There are 13 of the 4-sie blocks made so far, with the goal being 30.  

Gleam (Cluck Cluck Sew) is a new-to-me QOV pattern this week, and it's a great scrap buster.  I've sewn 7 Gleam blocks (12" finished) from the parts I cut, with many more to go.   So far all have come from that scrap cube.  That QOV scrap cube has been reduced to a manageable level.  It isn't empty, but it's manageable.  

I think my focus next week will be changing over to - Christmas sewing.  

Let's go see what else is happening with scraps . . .
https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/ 

Finished (or Not) Friday

I did finish some binding last weekend.  One side was done in the car on the way to a swim meet Saturday morning - after daylight arrived.  One side was done while sitting in a lawn chair in a noisy gymnasium at the swim meet, in between events and sessions.  And I finished the last little bit on Sunday morning at home.

This is one of the Churn Dash tops that I've made the past couple of years.  It's 48 x 60, so a nice size for kids.  The blocks are 12" finished, and use a novelty print paired with a solid.  Our guild did several baby quilts with this idea, and I just kept making blocks afterward.  There is one block near the center with 6" versions of the bigger blocks.  This is a pattern I'll do over and over again, and the quilts are great for donation.  When shop hopping, I tend to collect cute fat quarters of novelty prints to use in donation quilts for kids.  

The back on this one is fun, and uses up more leftover backing from a previous project. So bright and cheerful.  And the purple binding was cut from more leftover backing. 

When I finish something, it's nice to reward myself with a new START.  I rewarded myself with testing out just ONE new block pattern that our QOV group might use for a block drive in 2026.  This is a free block from http://www.patchworksquare.com called Star On Star.  This site has a whole section with just star blocks, and all of them have 3 finished sizes - 12", 9" and 6".  I've had the QOV scrap bin front and center this week, so it was a quick detour.

Check out more finishes at
https://alyciaquilts.blogspot.com/

Temptation

Do you recognize this box?  It's a quilter's version of an Advent calendar. 

It's this year's Missouri Star Christmas box and I'm having a hard time NOT opening it up.  I'm so very tempted, but have promised myself to wait until Dec. 1 this year.  I've ordered these curated boxes the previous 2 years and it's so fun to have a little something to open each day until Christmas.  Notions, patterns, fabric - lots of fun stuff.  

If I leave the actual packing box unopened, then I have a better chance of not digging into it early.  Both of the previous years I've cheated and opened some things before December.  Will I hold off for 11 more days?

Mid-week stuff

There has been progress with the Dresden project.

The first 3 rows are sewn together.  Because they are on point, the rows are actually done in the diagonal.  The other 5 rows are pinned into the stack and labeled.  Rows 4 and 5 are the longest ones, and once those are done they won't fit on the rug in my sewing room.  The plan is to add a row or 2 each day before working on anything else. 

It seemed like a good day yesterday to do a little more red, white, and blue sewing, and some organizing and cutting too.  And cleaning!!  Underneath the pile on the right is actually a large bin to hold the Quilt of Valor yardage.  Under the pile on the left is a canvas cube holding QOV scraps.  And it's very obvious that the whole mess is out of control - again.  I even discovered some patterns and some random blocks all mixed in with fabric.  It needs some serious attention before it will fit back into the containers. 

I don't have the mess ALL organized and cleaned up, but I did get a fairly good start. The priority for now is to clear out a lot of those scraps by cutting them for more QOV blocks.  Some parts have been cut for more Gleam blocks, and for more 4-Patch Fun blocks.  For Gleam - if I had only 3.5" strips then I cut triangles for the HST units.  If I had 4" I could cut squares to make 2 half square triangles.  The 4-Patch Fun blocks are made from 2" strips - so the smaller scraps get used for them.
  

The Gleam pattern has 4 units that look like quartered stars. Two have light backgrounds, and 2 are reversed.  Each block has just 1 red unit and 3 blue units.  So far I have 4 of these blocks made.  There are enough units made for a couple more blocks.  But the scraps are plentiful so hopefully I'll get enough for a whole quilt just from the scrap bin.  And then maybe the scrap cube will be partially empty, or at least not overflowing.  

While getting some of the mess organized, I was able to kit up the parts for another Quilt of Valor top.  I want to get 3 or more kits put together for our members to work on, possibly at a group sew day. There was a big stack of random 12" blocks, so I sorted out a dozen to make a sampler quilt.  Sashing and cornerstones are cut.  The border on the right side is a Navy themed print donated to us, so this quilt will go to a Navy veteran when it's done.

What else has been going on lately?  We spent Saturday at a swim meet.  Both granddaughters are on the Sioux Falls swim team, and this past weekend both swam at a meet in Yankton SD.

Sophia is 13, and also a wrestler on her school team.  Olivia is 12, and also plays viola in her school orchestra.  The girls had a good swim meet with times improved in nearly every event both days.  We only went on Saturday. 

Tuesday we had rain - and thunder and lightning - a good share of the afternoon.  Our street has a storm drain on each side but both must have been clogged with leaves because this was what it looked like as we left for Brookings about 4:30.  My neighbor said it took the city quite a while to get the drains working again.  Notice how green the lawns are yet.  After that snow we had about a week ago, the grass has turned bright green again.  Crazy weather for November in eastern South Dakota.

A red, white, and blue day

 Monday morning my focus mostly stayed on red, white, and blue.  One project is now a flimsy, and a couple of others are seeing definite progress.

Ribbon is a Quilt of Valor pattern designed by Alycia.  She did this pattern as a mystery sew-along.  It's such a striking design.  My version is what I would call "controlled scrappy".  The checkerboard blocks all used blue-on-blue prints with scrappy white backgrounds.  The red hourglass blocks used red-on-red prints with scrappy white backgrounds.  This flimsy is ready to pair up with some backing and go to be quilted.
https://alyciaquilts.blogspot.com/

Moda Blockheads 6 just ended, and I chose to sew along this year using red, white, and blue so I would end up with another QOV top.  With this layout I had 6 blocks left over, because we made 2 of some.  But if I made one more block, then I could use them ALL by adding another row right under the center medallion.  

So, that is what I did - this is a second version of one block.  Now I have the perfect number of blocks needed to assemble this quilt top without leaving any orphans.  Now that the blocks are done I will assemble the top later in the month.  First I'll need to make space on my "design floor", which is currently holding a non-QOV project.  

The next priority QOV project on my list is Shadow Star.  This one has all the parts for the stars cut, but only 3 blocks have been made.  I need 9 blocks for the layout I've chosen.  It was a 2024 project that was abandoned for no good reason.  Time to get this one closer to the flimsy stage too. 

Because I work on so many QOV projects, my red and blue scraps are totally out of control again.  And the stack of RWB test blocks and orphan blocks also gets deep pretty quickly.  If I'm testing out a block pattern I want to try, I often use RWB scraps, so the block could be used for QOV at some point.  After the holidays, our little QOV group will be ready to do another block drive, and hopefully have a sew day again.  The stack of orphan blocks and test blocks should produce a couple of quilts I can "kit up" for a sew day. Plus there are some panels gifted to our group that I plan to kit up for a sew day.  I actually enjoy cutting and kitting up projects almost as much as sewing them.  

I've also been researching ideas for new blocks for QOV, and one of them that caught my eye was the Gleam pattern.  Gleam is by Cluck Cluck Sew, and can be purchased on Fat Quarter Shop as a download.  I really like this pattern. 

So of course I've been playing with scraps with Gleam in mind.  These made good Leader/Enders during some other projects lately.  I've sewn together some "quarter star" units for Gleam blocks using scraps from previous Quilts of Valor.  I need to reverse the placement of the squares and HSTs for the next ones I make so that the color becomes the background and the neutral is the star.  

These could be a good scrap buster for both QOV . . . and for next year's Rainbow Scrap Challenge in a whole rainbow of colors.  

There are lots of non-patriotic projects that will take priority for awhile, but it's nice to have some of these things organized and on the To Do list.   

Design Wall Monday - Nov. 17

Ribbon QOV is ready for it's borders.  

There will be 2 borders, and the strips are all cut.  The inner border is cut at 2", and the outer border is cut at 3.5".  I'm excited to get this one to the flimsy stage this week.

Once the Ribbon flimsy is done, it will be time to start sewing the Dresdens into a flimsy.  However, before that can happen I need 1 more block.  Notice the empty spot in the bottom left corner.  I'm sure there are extra blades laying in the project box for another block.  And the black corners are laying on my ironing board.  So this one is getting closer to a flimsy.  

While putting some things away yesterday, these pineapple hexie blocks came to light again.  I had made about a dozen of these many many months ago with no plan whatsoever.  They were just fun to make.  I may try out some hand stitching to sew some of them together to make a table topper.  

I'm linking up today with:

https://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com/ 

https://songbirddesigns.blog        

RSC25 - Week #46

 One more RSC quilt is nearly finished, with only binding left to hand stitch.  We're headed to a swim meet today to watch both granddaughters, and binding is a good thing to do in the car since it will be daylight. 

This is one of the "baby" Churn Dash flimsies that have been hanging in my closet.  It has so many fun novelty prints.  The backing is a crazy bunch of "pies" with every color showing up somewhere in a slice.  The purple binding is cut from leftover backing of another quilt project.  This will be a donation quilt most likely.

The quarter Dresden blocks (another RSC block set) have been blanket stitched and squared up.  I'm using black for the setting triangles to pick up on the black used in the bottom corner of each block. This might be a bit more dramatic looking than most of my quilts.

Let's go see what else is happening with scraps . . .
https://superscrappy.blogspot.com/