A mini, some more masks, and a delivery

This week I made another batch of masks for some friends! I am happy to help those that don't sew and need a mask (not that I really enjoy making them, to be perfectly honest, but I'm doing my part to help family, friends, neighbors, and a local nursing home.) 

Friday was a good mail day as my fabric delivery came! In my last post I mentioned that I was running out of some basic supplies but I was able to order the fabric I needed online since nothing is open locally.  I want to give a shout out to The Fabric Shack! They are working through all the craziness to continue filling orders. They are also waiving shipping charges in the U.S. for now. This is a mother (owner) and daughter team right now and they are doing their best to get fabric out to those in need! It might take a little longer than usual to get your order but it wasn't too long!

I really want to support them so I put in another, bigger order. I will also keep them in mind when I need to order again! If you have any fabric needs, I encourage you to check out The Fabric Shack!

Last Monday, Sarah over at Confessions of a Fabric Addict mentioned how she missed sewing with her friends. Her idea was to have a "virtual" sewing meet-up next Monday (tomorrow) with minis that were made since last Monday as a memento of our 2020 Coronavirus Quarantine! I really like this idea as I really wanted to make a quarantine quilt to document this unique time in history!

 A mini is just perfect!

I decided to make my mini with the #Sew Together At Home. That gave me the idea to make a house block with a spool as the 'door' and I drew up a little pattern. Scrounging through my stash, I found the cloud fabric for the background of my house (sky), the red hearts for the 'thread', some red for the banners on the top and bottom. The words are raw edged appliquéd in Kona black. I straight lined machine quilted the sky 1/4" apart, meander in the banners and big stitch hand quilted the house. 

details

This mini is 10" x 12"

(Even though I used the words 'sew' together because this is a sewing meet-up, I could have easily used the word 'so' together because we are 'so together' with our families in this Stay At Home time! I'm sure most of us are not used to being 'so together'.

😩

Linking up to Confessions of a Fabric Addict. 

This week my youngest daughter ask me if I could make an artsy wallhanging quilt for her to hang above her bed. She likes a minimalist, modern style. So I looked through some images I saved and....here is a peek. 

This is the 1st quilt that I'm using my natural dyed fabrics from my adventures last summer. You can read about it here. 

 Hope you are getting some quality time in the sewing room! Stay safe and remember we are sew together! 

April's Rainbow Scrap challenge block

For April's Rainbow Scrap Challenge, Angela chose light blue! I finally got around to completing my block using scraps from my overflowing blue scrap bin! It is always so hard to take a picture of just one months column block. Each column is only 4 1/2" wide unfinished. 

Here are 4 months together!

I'm linking up to Scrap Happy Saturday over at So Scrappy. 

I have seen quite a few house blocks going together during this Shelter At Home order. I have also been thinking about doing an I Spy quilt now that I have a grandson. With the suggestion from Allison at Cluck, Cluck Sew, I decided to make an I Spy quilt with houses. I didn't use her free house pattern because I wanted to use smaller squares of novelty fabrics. I drew up a pattern for a house and started cutting 4 1/2" squares from my scraps and stash. I have well over 100 squares cut but I'm not sure how many will be used. 

Here is a sneak peek!

I also joined the Elvira Quarantine Quilt Along that was hosted by Gundrun Erla of GE Quilt Designs. 

Here is what is on my design wall currently. 

I have quite a few projects going (which I usually don't do) but I am finding that I have run out of certain basics and I'm waiting for 1) my online order to deliver 2) local quilt shop and fabric stores to reopen. 

I have exhausted my limited supply of elastic making masks, my supply of fusible interfacing making a t-shirt quilt (which I can't find anywhere!), Kona cotton fabric in white and spa blue. 

I love using my stash but some basics are always in need! 

A little bit of this and that

Although I have been staying at home with the exception of walking the dog and a few porch drop offs, I haven't seem to get a lot done. 

What have I been doing? 

Well, I have done some baking which really isn't in my wheel house. I've made bread, mini donuts and a cake. Today, I'm making scones. 

I've done a little bit of clean up in the gardens. Up until this past weekend, we really haven't had the weather for it. 

I've also been going through old paperwork and shredding, shredding, shredding. And that stack of old magazines that I saved because 'I would definitely do some of the great ideas, make the recipes or go on those fabulous vacations.' I've been going through them one last time and then recycling them. 

One the sewing front, I've made several batches of masks. At first, I tested a couple of patterns but eventually settled on one. I did run out of elastic and switched to ties. I also made a couple with a filter pocket. 

~sent to a local nursing home

~for friends and family

~more friends requests

~my daughter and boyfriend

~more friends and family

On the quilting side, I finished the 2nd quilt that resulted from my improv practice for the #improvtrianglesewalong. This technique by Nicholas Ball is called insert. I'm calling this one Small Wonders.

Depending on the number of inserts, the blocks look like crosses to hashtags. 

I added the inner border from the fabric I used as the inserts and the outer border the background fabric. 

All the fabric for this quilt are from my stash. 

In the center blocks, I straight lined quilted 1/4" apart horizontally. In the inner border, I FMQ large loops, and the outer border I quilted 2 rows of large scallops. 

It finishes at approx. 40" x 40" and will be donated as part of the Hands2Help 2020 challenge. 

I'm linking to Can I Get a Whoop, Whoop?, Brag about your Beauties, Peacock Party, Finished or Not Friday, and Friday Foto Fun. 

Lastly, I finally got around to making one more of the Quiet Play Pattern Club 2019 blocks. 

These blocks are all paper pieced. Although I do enjoy paper piecing, I do think they are a bit time consuming. I have a few more blocks to complete before I can start arranging the word and picture blocks in to a quilt top! 

Not One but Two!

One positive side of sheltering at home is the time I get to spend in my sewing room. This week I tackled some baby quilts! They will all be donated to charity!

The first one was the result of the improv play I did to get ready to participate in the improv triangle sew along. In Nicholas Ball's book, he suggests practicing improv techniques such as curves, inserts, stacks, rings, etc. I took each technique and practiced using older fabrics from my stash. 

After completing the stacks technique, I had a pretty good size piece. 

Instead of having this piece hang around as an orphan, I dug through my stash to find more coordinating fabrics and made a baby quilt. I added borders to make the finished size 28" x 37"

I quilted fairly densely in straight lines about every 1/2" and a geometric meander in the borders. 

The backing and binding are also pieces from my stash. 

Even though these are the colors Pantene chose for their colors of the year in 2016, I assure you these fabrics are from the late 80's or early 90's. 

It is nice to use up older fabrics! 

My second finish is from a picture I pinned to my Pinterest board way back in 2012 from Flickr. The pattern is called Easy Going Modern by Felicity Quilts. 

I'm calling this In the Neighborhood because of the cute print. Just look at that orange bear with blue glasses riding his bike through the neighborhood! 

This quilt finishes at 31" x 36". 

I quilted it with straight lines cutting each of the blocks in half. I added a 1" border. The backing is pieced with left over pieces from the front and some bright red/orange I had in my stash. 

These quilts will go to Hands2Help2020. 

I'm linking up to Can I Get a Whoop, Whoop?, Brag about Your Beauties, Peacock Party, Finished or Not Friday, and Friday Foto Fun.

Next up will be this baby quilt resulting from more improv play. 

Stay tuned to see how this evolves. 

Another project I actually finished after many years is this lamp shade. I inherited this dresser lamp from my grandma, but the shade was in bad shape. I lived with it for a long while, then with no shade for some more time.

 I finally took the plunge. 

I made the pattern based on the old shade (in picture below) after deconstructing the shade. The fabric is the cutoff from shortening the curtains in our room. I pressed under 1/4" on the curved edges and another 1/4". I glued the larger circular wire along the bottom then glued the top wire. Once the wires were in place, I folded under the raw edges and glued the seam. 

To stiffen the fabric to retain its shape, I used Aleene's Stiffen Quik. 

It worked great! 

What are you doing during Coronacation?

It is definitely a crazy time for everyone, everywhere! I hope you are staying safe and taking the mandated precautions! If everyone does their part, we will overcome this pandemic faster! 

I must admit that it already feels like a very long time to be 'in isolation'. When I am crazy busy at work, I long to have time at home in my sewing room but now that I am forced to be home with schools closed, I long for school, my teacher friends and the kiddos! 

So what am I doing to keep myself busy, safe and sane?

First, I finished the quilt top that I showed a peek of in my last post. 

The pattern is called Braque by Melinda Lin. I purchased this pattern a couple of years ago. It is based on the Cubist artist George Barque.

 One of George Barque works

Because of the nature of Cubism, this pattern is loosely written to give you some creative leeway into how to put your quilt together. At first, I had a bit of difficulty allowing myself this freedom. I wanted the pattern to give me directions but as I went along, I enjoyed the process. 

Secondly, I finished my improv triangle quilt that I made following the #improvtrianglesewalong by Nicholas Ball. 

I'm calling this quilt Breaking the Rules! Isn't that what improv is...breaking the rules of traditional piecing? It was fun and challenging!

This is my first attempt at matchstick quilting. It is very densely quilted and I love how it looks!

The backing and binding fabrics have pieces in the front of the quilt. 

I also put a sleeve on this quilt so it could be hung up. It finishes at 27" x 30". 

Linking up to Can I Get A Whoop, Whoop?, Friday Foto Fun, Finished or Not Friday, Beauties Pageant 73, and Peacock Party.

Outside of quilting, I am following along with a #drawtogether activity on Instagram by @wendymac. She is an illustrator that is posting simple drawing lessons (designed for children) everyday at 10PST. My daughter alerted me about this and I am having fun dabbling with a new skill. 

I missed the first day when they learned how to draw a dog. 

Day 2 taught how to draw a tree.

Day 3 taught how to draw a cat all curled up with a bird on its head. 

There are also Lunch doodles with Mo Willems (author and illustrator of children books). Find them at the link or on Youtube. Again these are geared to children but if you are just dabbling in drawing or want to practice a new skill, these are great lessons. They break up the day and give another creative outlet. 

Of coarse, I am still knitting for my charity knitting group even though we can't be together. 

Just days before the isolation mandate, my hubby and I and a few friends were invited to an event at Ignite Glass Studios. The event included each of us making our own glass. Yesterday, these came in the mail! 

These are not perfect by any means but they were fun to make and fun to receive in the mail!

Hope you find ways to learn something new and be creative. We are all in this together! Let's support one another!

What's happening and monthly blocks

I participated in the #improvtrianglesewalong on Instagram hosted by Nicholas Ball, the author of Inspiring Improv. I got the book out of my local library and prepared for the sew-along to start the first week of February. 

The first week we were to start cutting our fabric pulls into random sized squares, rectangles, and triangles.  In week 2, we started sewing the triangles together using his improv triangle method... without measuring or use of rulers.

In week 3, we learned a bit about joining all these triangles together. It was a puzzle to fit all these random blocks together into what he calls a slab. 

Keep making slabs that will eventually fit all together!

This was a fun and challenging sew-along!  

I enjoyed it so much that I was sad when I had to return the book 

to the library. That meant that I needed my own copy!

A great mail day! My very own Inspiring Improv book! 

This still needs to be quilted but I'm debating on whether to add more to make it bigger or leave it as a wall hanging. 

I'm linking to Can I Get a Whoop Whoop.

If you are interested in seeing more amazing quilts, go to Instagram and search the #improvtrianglesewalong.

March snuck up fast and the monthly charity blocks and colors were announced! 

For the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, Angela announced the color of teal. 

The first three months!

Linking up to Scrap Happy Saturday.

For the Covered in Love charity, Kat of Kat & Cat Quilts chose a variation of the fence rail block in blue and yellow. Here is the tutorial.

And I started a new project...currently on my design wall! Here is a sneak peek!

I have 2 more sections to piece before I can put this together! Stay tuned!