Project Quilting #4 ~ Brighter the better

The 4th challenge over at Project Quilting is Brighter the Better. Although the sun has come out a bit more in February than painfully dreary January, it is still dull out. So I aimed to create a rainbow blossom out of my solid stash. 

After pulling out all my bright solids, I started pairing a bright light and a bright dark of each color. When I had 9 color pairs, I started cutting 1 1/2" x 2 1/2" rectangles and arranging them around a yellow center. 

The only color pairs I wasn't sure of the placement was the tangerine/red pair. I ended up placing the tangerine on the outside as shown below. 

The quilt top came together quickly once the placement was finished. Then the decision of what to use from my stash for the back. I found this bright Hawaiian print which came from my mother's stash. I think it works great!

Introducing Rainbow Blossom!

For the quilting, I divided the quilt into quarters diagonally and quilted straight lines every 1/2". The binding is a black and white stripe.

This little quilt is 20" square and made by me in Des Plaines, IL.

Linking up to Project Quilting over at Persimon Dreams.

Rainbow Blossoms brightens my world and makes me smile! 

Hope it brightens your day too!

Progress Made

I just wanted to give a little update as to what I have been doing since the beginning of February (which seems to be flying by).

I mentioned that the color for February for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge over at So Scrappy is Sea Green, anything from teal to aqua....I made 5 mini spools using various blue greens.

These are fun mini blocks to make but sad to say they don't use up too many scraps. Last summer I found this giant spool that I thought I may paint and use in the garden. Kinda fun for this photo shoot. 

I'm also participating in the Milky Way QAL over at Blossom Heart Quilts and using the same color selection as RSC. 

The second star in the Milky Way is Canopus.

And finally one of my OMG for February was to make a wallhanging for my daughter out of one of the UFO Halloween blocks from the Wicked blog hop.

I added the word EEK! to the spiderweb and a dowel pocket for hanging, then sandwiched and quilted it.

Out of season but we will be visiting in March and will take it to her.

Now to get busy with the Project Quilting Challenge for this week!

Linking up to SoScrappy and Oh Scrap!

February Goals

Looking back at my goals set in January, I made a lot of progress!

 As I showed in my post about my OMG finished January goals, I completed 2 of the projects that I had listed. Yay!

I also had time to work on my Chicago Cubs quilt. The pattern for this one is the economy block. In making this block there are lots of points and those points often get pushed down into your machine when starting to sew. So I decided to try what others have been talking about...a leader/ender project. 

Way back in August 2014, I made this baby quilt for my niece's daughter. 

Somehow, I cut way too many squares and they have been stacked on the shelf in my sewing room ever since. So I decided to cut them up and use them for my leader/ender project. 

So in making all the rest of my Chicago Cubs blocks and the alternate baseball blocks, I also finished the leader/ender quilt top.

My goal will be to sandwich and quilt this baby blanket. 

This will probably be a donation quilt.

My Chicago Cubs quilt is also waiting in the flimsy stage. I ordered some backing fabric for it.

Next goal will be to sandwich and quilt it.

Still waiting for some attention is my Sail Away quilt.

I need to decide if I want to piece the back or use one piece. 

My goal will be to move this quilt forward in the next month.

A smaller project that I will work on is a UFO block from 2012. As part of the Wicked Blog Hop I created this spider web block. 

My daughter is interested in it as a Halloween wall hanging. 

I would like to finish it and bring it when we head down to Austin in March.

So my goal for February will be the baby quilt, the Halloween wallhanging and moving my Sail Away quilt forward. 

And as always, keeping up with RSC and the Milky Way QAL. This month's color is sea green and the star is Canopus. Stay tuned!

Linking up to OMG at Elm Street Quilts.

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Project Quilting #3~Purple Stained Glass

The 3rd challenge for Project Quilting is Tune into Texture. The challenge was to find some inspiration from something other than other quilts. 

Over my quilting years, I have been interested in company logos and how many of them could be made into quilts. I looked through some of the pictures I collected for a geometric logo, then got out my graph paper and pencil and went to work designing.

I used the logo from Prairie Research Center. You can see it here. 

I drew up the block to be about a 22" square.

Their logo uses 7 different blues. I didn't want to copy their logo just play with the design so I made it with 7 different shades of purple. 

I then added borders made with linen to add a different texture. I also quilted a different pattern into each area (another chance to practice FMQ). To give it a stained glass affect, I added narrow black bias tape to separate each shape hence the name, Purple Stained Glass.  

 The borders are quilted with a 'chevron' stitch. It is basically an elongated zig zag stitch. The finished size of this quilt is approx. 35" x 41".

The backing fabric is fabric from my stash.  

Created in Des Plaines, IL

Linking up to Project Quilting. Go check out the other entries.

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