How big is that quilt?

It all began a few years ago with a trunk show held here in Mitchell, with the quilts of an amazing Nebraska quilter inspiring so many people.  The final quilt she showed was a 22' long panorama quilt that she had made. I don't remember the story behind it . . . but I recently saw what it inspired.

My friend, who leads our Simple Whatnots group, was totally inspired by the "panorama" quilt at that trunk show and challenged herself to make her own version.  She began to plan out her project and decided to use a bargello pattern, and make it in all batiks.  Then for the past few years she has patiently collected batik fabrics to use in the quilt.  

In April of this year she began sewing.  I think it was in May at Simple Whatnots that she showed us the "birth" of the quilt - a 9" wide section.  Just 9 inches, but we could see the beautiful colors emerging in those bargello strips already!  Well, that 9" section grew into a 24 foot long quilt top.  And at the end of July it is a finished top.  It's 6' tall - notice the finger tips of the ladies holding it up.  And yes - the length really is 24 FEET!!   And she has found a man who will quilt it for her.  

My photos do not do justice to this project.  The colors are gorgeous rich fall colors.  It extended across the classroom and out the doors on both sides.  Isn't it amazing?  

Design Wall Monday - Planning for the week

 There is so much that I want to accomplish this week!  Two major projects are all laid out on my ironing board ready for some sewing time.  I had family here this weekend, so there has been other fun instead of sewing time the past couple of days.  Now it's time to play with these.    

Fish School is going to be fun to finish up with this jelly roll.  It's a Kaffe Fassett roll, but is mostly primary colors which is exactly what I needed to go with the paper pieced fish.  My current plan is to pick 4 strips from the roll to add to the ends of the fish row.  The rest will be sewn together using the Jelly Roll Race technique.  

The second big project I can't wait to work on is the Saturday Sampler.  On Friday morning I picked up the patterns for the last block, and for the quilt layout.  

This is one of my favorite Saturday Sampler projects in recent years.  It's a Lori Holt design based on her book Quilty Fun.  The last block we are making is a bumble bee and is so cute!!  Each month we made 2 new sections - sometimes actual cute blocks, and sometimes they appeared to be spacers.  

I have a friend who has already finished her quilt top and she sent me a picture.  It's so fabulous in bright happy colors like mine.  And the sample in the shop has a soft denim blue background which was also absolutely delightful.  It's silly, but I feel almost giddy about this one.  

The sewing will have to wait until Tuesday however, because today we are both taking the day off and meeting up with some old friends we haven’t seen in years. We all knew each other and worked together (some of us) in the mid 1970s in Iowa - when we were all young.   

Check out more Monday design walls at:
https://smallquiltsanddollquilts.blogspot.com/

Weekend distractions

 One son-in-law is playing in a golf tournament with my husband this weekend, and the other will be here for another tournament next weekend.  We will see very little of the guys those days.

But this weekend, I get to spend some time with my daughter and 2 of the 5 grandkids.

Friday evening we went downtown for the First Friday celebration on Main St by the Corn Palace.  Each month they have different music, different food trucks, and different activities.  This one just happened to have lots of kids activities.

They got to buy a little wooden bird house and paints, we had some excellent food, and took advantage of a photo op by the Corn statue.  

RSC colors - aqua and teal

 After working with so much dark blue during July it was fun to put away the blue and play with the aqua and teal shades for August.  Last Saturday morning I picked a cute aqua print out of the stash to use for the Country Bunny block. But then in the afternoon I went to The Pin Cushion for our Simple Whatnots group, and of course I did some fabric browsing.  Voila!!!!!

A Lori Holt print from her Flea Market line just jumped out at me.  I HAD to buy a half yard so I could use it for the bunny, and also make a few other RSC blocks with it.  It’s a light teal floral, and was just perfect for the bunny block.  I have a “thing” for interesting selvages, and this one is awesome.  Don’t you just love the saying on it?  Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.  That is something my grandmother and mother both said so many times when I was a kid.  Those Depression Era gals really knew how to "use it up".  I may just pin this on my bulletin board.  

This bunny turned out so adorable!  There are 8 Country Bunny blocks so far.  The blocks are 11 x 14".  I skipped making a dark blue one in July because the colors I’ve used so far tend to be more in the pastel range.  We’ll see what the final couple of colors for RSC are, and then decide whether or not to use those colors.  These blocks just make me smile over the cuteness factor.

With the bunny block done I dug into the scrap bins to find aqua and teal options for the house block.  This one leans more to the aqua shades, but it also turned out pretty cute.  I forgot to count, but I think I have 7 of these made.  

I have an idea percolating in my head for finishing these houses that involves using one different block from Pat Sloan's sew-along Home Is.  This house block is the only 1 that I've used from the block set, so far.   But I can picture using 8 of the houses in the Circle of Nine layout, with the "mystery" block in the middle of the circle.  It's one possibility. 

I'm linking up with RSC today
Rainbow Scrap Challenge

Farmer's Wife Sampler

 We are about 1/3 of the way through the Farmer's Wife Sampler blocks, and I've managed to keep up with making 2 blocks per week, so far.

This week we made Darting Birds and Four Winds.  I love how both turned out.  

In the book, Four Winds didn't have much contrast in colors, but I decided that I wanted those spinning elements to pop.  So mine has lots of contrast, and it looks good.  There are 64 pieces in this block - all cut 1.5".  It would have been very easy to mess this one up, but it went together much better than I expected.  I pressed the pinwheels to the pink, and pressed the seams between those open.  And amazingly it is square and just the right size.  Hallelujah!!

Fish School progress

 It's interesting how some patterns come out exactly the right size, and some just do not.  This would be one of those things that do not actually come out like the pattern.  But I'm OK with that. 

This was a Row By Row kit that I purchased 5 or 6 years ago.  The row is a school of fish - imagine it turned horizontally.   The row itself was supposed to finish at 36" but it was really only about 30" when done.  I wanted the row to be closer to 50" wide because I'm going to use it in a child's quilt.  It is 9" across, so it will make a nice statement.  

So, I added 3 more small fish to the row and then used up that last little bits of the background to add some strips to each end.  It now measures 42", which I can live with in my plan.  There were no red fish in the kit, but since I had to add 3 new ones, I made 2 of them red.  

Speaking of plans - this is often how those lightbulb moments tend to get jotted down.  A scrap of paper off my desk with a rough sketch and some vague notes.  It's enough to remind me of what I wanted this to look like when finished.  

My plan is to use a Kaffe Fassett jelly roll that is in rainbow colors to do a basic Jelly Roll Race design for the remainder of the quilt.  But I'll separate the rows about 1/3 of the way down from the top and insert the Fish School row.   I'll use some of the extra to fill both sides of the fish to bring it out to the same width as the jelly roll rows, which should be about 50".   That way the quilt shape won't get to be too long and skinny.

We'll see if my plan comes together.  

Hexie Snowman

The Hexie Snowman table topper turned out just as cute as I had hoped.  It doesn't really ripple like it looks in the photo.  Guess I should have smoothed it out before taking its picture. 

A thank you to my friend Carol who quilted this with a snowflake design that is wonderful.  There are swirls between the snowflakes, so it made me think of snowflakes blowing around in the wind.  Perfect choice!   

The credit for this design must go to Vicki (http://knitbug2.blogspot.com/), because she posted a wonderful tutorial for this table topper and I just HAD to go ahead and make one.  It was so easy and fast to make!  And I have enough of the fabrics left in the project box to do at least one more.  Plus, I want to make one with possibly an autumn or Halloween theme, but using the hexie shape.