Sleepless in SC....

I had one of those nights were I woke up at 3am for no reason and couldn't get back to sleep! Not sure if it was the heat, the humidity, the pizza I ate for dinner...but there you have it, up in the middle of the night! What's a girl supposed to do?

I went looking at antique quilts for ideas and inspiration! But instead of making me sleepy...they made me more jazzed, and it is now after 7am and I just KNOW by 3pm this afternoon I'm going to hit that proverbial brick wall that reinforces the fact that I need more than 4 hours of sleep a night..*yawn*

There are too many photos for ideas to post here....so here are a few that caught my eye! Of course the cheddar ones were bright enough to keep me awake at 3am! I love the 9 patch on point (road to jericho I think it's called?) with the really wonky fan quilting! Click the pics to see the enlarged version...very fun! This one makes me think of Tonya and I know she will get a kick out of it. I think all those plaids I found will be great with cheddar as an off set color. I also like the blue 4patch/9patch. So simple but so effective!


And the other one is rows of 4 patches alternated with rows of 4 patches and plain alternate squares, but set on point it is really effective!

So how many shirts did I get cut up last night? ummmm....3? and it was a tedious process! But you will be so proud of me. I grabbed my favorite salvaged cigar box and started putting the recycled buttons in there....

I just love the comfortable homey feeling of simple basic quilts. This is why I am toying with the idea of stripping parts of these plaid shirts down into various sizes of strips so that I can sit and sew easily with them, versus having to iron/trim/cut them one fabric at a time as I decide to make something. What do you think?

I was thinking I could strip down the shirt sleeves and front halves to give me strips to work with, but leave the shirt backs whole in case I need bigger pieces to cut block parts from?



I just know how I work...and at least half of a quilt does come from strip parts for me. Like the wedding quilt below. The creams and greens of the four patches were strips. The tan/neutral triangles at the tips of the black star points came from the precut 2" neutral squares bin. The only fabrics that were yardage were the 2 music fabrics and the gold for the inner star...and then finally the outer border after it was all together. This is why I am thinking I'll get more quilts made if I strip them down somewhat?

I guess that means I need 3 more drawers...I think I'll start with 2", 2.5" and 3.5" plaid strips :c) YES!?

Bonnie

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Borders Added!

I came home from choir practice last night, had the house to myself for a while longer and sat right down and got the borders on this quilt :c)

There was just enough black to do a 1.5" cut inner border. None left! I had some block parts left over, and I used those up in the corners of the outer border. I'm happy with it!

I've been thinking of what else I could do to make this extra special....I am going to use up a huge piece of a white-on-cream fabric as the backing of this quilt, and I thought about how fun it would be to have all the choir members write their sentiments on it! So signatures and "words of wisdom" can be on the back of the quilt.


I asked Elizabeth, the choir assistant if she was aware of any Sunday or Wednesday rehearsal where Jared (the director) would be gone. I could bring it in and have everyone sign it then.....but she wasn't aware of any time that he would be gone so I could have concentrated time to catch everyone!

Time is of the essence here...so my question is this......would it work if I were to have everyone sign the quilt back AFTER quilting? Or would that just be messy? I need some ideas here. I didn't want to have everyone sign individual blocks, there just isn't time to get that all together, it would be like piecing a whole 'nuther quilt top.

Any ideas????


And I will leave you while you think...with this lovely photo of all the shirts PILED into my wicker laundry basket. Daunting task!! I haven't started cutting them yet. No time so far....and today may be no different than yesterday...the only sewing I got done yesterday was the time it took to add the two borders to Jared's wedding quilt!

Bonnie

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That Plaid Shirt Fetish!

Okay...here you go....I am almost embarrassed to post these pics! But at $1 a pound for wonderful plaids with a terrific feel that you can't find on the bolt..what is a girl to do?

I'm doing my part for the environment, right? I'm RECYCLING!!!


These were at the "last stop" Good Will clearance center where everything is $1 a pound. If it doesn't sell here it gets sent to Bangladesh or somewhere. Maybe it is made into auto carpet padding or something. (Yes, I am rationalizing on why I need all these plaids!)


The possibilities are endless with them even if I end up getting into the crocheted rag rug thing I guess. But I'd rather be quilting! I know lots of you are also into knitting or crocheting or cross stitch or scrap booking, and I'm here to tell you that I have got a ONE TRACK MIND. QUILTS QUILTS QUILTS!


So here we are. Piles on the floor! Do you know I found shirts with the same plaid more than ONCE?! I even found some good lights this time around. Light 100% cotton shirts are more difficult to find.

I'm really pleased with the wide variety of colors and the sizes of the plaids and stripes. They are going to be so great. Look at this orange and red!


I think I'm going to take Bingo~Bonnie's hint and cut up a couple at a time while I am watching TV. Make a dent in the pile.

I also NEED to make time for some hand quilting. Maybe an hour in the mornings. I'm just too tired in the evenings to get any hand work done. I know I am a PIECER first, and a quilter second. But then...I DO want to do it ALL!

Bonnie

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Post Labor Day check in!

We were away for the long holiday weekend. I guess I didn't realize how long it had been since I last posted, but I got an emergency email from a reader wanting to make sure I didn't fall off the face of the earth! No...I'm still here, but the past couple of weeks have been so crazy I just had no time to update my blog, and no finishes really to report...so it got way-laid.

First! This weekend! We went to Hilton Head Island, SC...about a 3 hour drive for us, and we really enjoy going there because the beaches are beautiful, it is peaceful and nice....a different kind of crowd than the "amusement park" mentality that likes to flock to va beach, myrtle beach, etc.

I packed a few projects hoping to have time to work on them a bit, and it turns out that I had LOTS of time to work on them...It poured and hosed down rain from the time we got there friday afternoon, all day saturday, all day sunday until 5pm! I'm talking gully washers and roads being re-routed kind of gushing rain. We even had to move hotel rooms because the water was over the threshold and coming in under the sliding glass door of our room!















I was a happy camper with my projects...I finished the binding on my 4 patch medallion. Weeeehaaa. This was a fun quilt. instead of planning the quilt from the inside out...I did the center as big as I wanted it...and then figured out what the next pieced round would measure, and then had to add the inner border around the center to have it fit the right measurement of the pieced border.

As for the pillow stripe that makes it rectangular instead of square....(Yes I had extra 4 patches I wanted to use up!) I just made it as long as it needed to be and whacked off the excess! Gwen Marston would be so proud ;c)

The next big project was working on the blocks for my choir director's wedding quilt. The wedding is in october, and I thought this would be a good time to get some big time progress done on it. I got all the blocks finished and sashed together. I still have borders to go.......but I didn't have enough room in the room to lay it out and measure.

Besides..the sun came out at 5pm on sunday eve and we DID want to spend SOME time at the beach and doing out doorsy type things, right? :cD

I went back trying to find more black fabric with the little music notes on it for a 2" inner border....It was sold out! So it must have been an epiphany that I bought it when I did. I do have enough to do a 1.5" cut inner border, so that inner border will just be a bit narrower than I want.

I met up with Charlotte today for some lunch and to hit the goodwill clearance center. Did I mention to you that they sell everything by $1.00 a POUND?!? Do you know how many 100% cotton mens plaid/stripe/print shirts you can get for $10.00? (add in a dress, a skirt, and a pair of capris for yourself too..bringing the total to $10.50!)

I'll send pics tomorrow. I don't want to overload this post!

Stay tuned! (oh..I'm going to have to ban myself from buying men's shirts again..I think I could do plaid quilts for the rest of my life!)

Bonnie

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