Birthday Quilt

It seems like most of what I've done this year is blocks and small projects. There haven't been many quilt finishes. I'm not sure why that is, but I am excited today to share a quilt. Such a satisfying project. And I'm pleased to say that I finished it a whole month ahead of the gifting for my husband's younger brother's birthday. (He's not on social media, so I can safely share this now without ruining the surprise.)

M lives in a house with 4 other guys with special needs. Each of them has his own room. And this past summer, I got a glimpse of M's room when we picked him up for an outdoor family reunion after many months apart. I knew that I wanted to make him a quilt this year, but that brief visit was the inspiration I needed to make decisions about design and color. 

I've made this quilt design before. It's based on a colorful batik quilt I saw on Etsy several years ago. The site is no longer active, and I have no idea who designed it. If someone knows, please let me know so I can give credit. Anyway, the first quilt was this one I made for our  brother-in-law L in 2012. That one was smaller in both scale and size, but I knew that a larger size would work well, too.

M's room is a light yellow-green. The furnishings are wood tones. He has a charcoal-colored easy chair and a rug with grays and blues in it. I forgot to take a photo when I was there and had to rely on memory for the blues. I'm thinking (hoping) that they were somewhere between a medium and greenish blue. 

I wanted a scrappy look with prints that read as solids. (There are no solids in the quilt at all.) Most of them are from my stash supplemented with some new fat quarters. I started by cutting about 2/3 of the plain squares and then a variety of strips and squares. I had some vanilla/gray grunge fabric that I knew would stand out well in the flying geese and nine-patch squares. I made the flying geese first using paper foundations. It's my favorite way to make geese as it's great for getting good points. I put the nine-patch squares together webbing style like some quilters sew together quilt blocks. I laid out plain, geese and nine-patch squares first and then planned the colors and locations of the other blocks in place on my design floor aka living room carpet. (I was too lazy to go upstairs to my design curtain.) 

As I laid out the quilt, I added more plain squares in the colors I needed. Here are close-ups of the types of blocks in the design.

Plain

Flying geese

Nine-patch

Four-patch

Block variation 1

Block variation 2

Block variation 3

I placed the variations randomly after laying out the first three types of blocks, turning some in different directions. 

The backing is lighter than I envisioned, but I couldn't find one with blues and greens that I liked. So I went with a fallback fabric that I've used for years. I'm happy that it's still available at my nearby big box store. It is buttery soft, and while it might look like solid ivory from afar, it actually has a khaki vine print.

Please excuse the wrinkles. This was folded away over the weekend.

Can you see the vines?

I quilted with a khaki thread I hadn't used before, and my sewing machine loved it. I used my beloved meanders, so relaxing and one of my favorite all-over designs. 

My initials and date show up more than usual, but I always sign in the lower right corner. The geese were too small and the next block over just happened to be charcoal. I had to make sure I wrote neatly!

Here are the stats: 

Pattern: Unknown. Blocks finish at 6 inches.

Fabrics: Variety from stash and store.

Batting: Fairfield 80/20. (My machine loves this.)

Thread: Superior Masterpiece in Granite for piecing; Coats Egyptian Cotton machine quilting thread (30 weight) in Dogwood. I've never used it before, but my machine LOVED it, and I was thrilled that it comes on a cardboard cone (1200 yards). I wish my favorite quilting thread wasn't on a plastic cone. I really hate plastic waste. So it's nice to know this is available and that it works for me. I used a strong hand quilting thread in off white for hand sewing on the binding. It's no longer available, and now it's almost gone. Waah.

Binding: I think it's a Keepsake Calico in a mottled green.  
Size: 60 3/4 inches square before quilting; about 58 3/4 by 58 1/2 inches after quilting; about 55 5/8 inches square after washing on cold and machine drying on low. I expect it will relax a bit with use.

Machines: Singer Featherweight for piecing; Singer Treadle 115 for free motion quilting and  machine work on the binding.

Just a few more photos--

Hey, it matches my chair!

Yummy texture after washing

I love how quickly this quilt came together and that the plain blocks moved it along but not as alternate blocks but as part of the overall design. Must do this again. Gifty quilting is fun.  Any gifty quilts in the works for you this month?

I'm linking up this week with Michelle at From Bolt to Beauty for Beauties Pageant, Kelly at My Quilt Infatuation for Needle and Thread Thursday, and Sarah at Confessions of a Fabric Addict for Can I Get a Whoop Whoop.

(Just a reminder: I'm not affiliated with any company, so when I mention products, services, or stores I'm just documenting what I used or liked.) 

Scraps, Sale, Squirrel, Scenery

 Another month, another post about small steps. My progress has been slow. But that's okay. September and October are our favorite months for sightseeing, so there has been a lot of time on our bicycles and on foot enjoying nature. Here are the bits I got done this month. First up: my Rainbow Scrap Challenge/52 Weeks of Scrappy Triangles. The RSC color was lime. I think I used some limes in my last go at green scraps, but that's okay. I have a lot of  limes. Surprisingly, there are not a lot of multicolored scraps with lime in them, so I didn't deplete that multicolored bin by much, but even using up some mostly-lime scraps is okay.

This month's blocks have a lot of tiny bits in them, so it's probably best that my fabrics were more green than other colors. I'm not real pleased with the top left block. There's not a lot of contrast in those sawtooth parts. But I'm not bothered enough to redo it. It will be fine with all the other blocks in the end. Last month I mentioned that I wasn't sure if I'd do one more orange block or a green one for the last week of September which was also the beginning of October. I did make one more orange block. 

Yeah, it doesn't look like an orange block, but if you look closely, you'll see there is at least a tiny bit of orange in each fabric.

I think this ends the colors for RSC this year, but there are still 9 weeks left in the 52 Weeks of ScrappyTriangles. I might just mix up the colors for the rest of the year--or I could repeat the colors for each month. Then I still have to decide if this project goes into next year for more blocks or if I will just finish it up. I do need more blocks to make a decent sized quilt. 

I didn't buy fabrics to go with RSC for the last several months, but made up for that a bit last week. My daughter had given me a gift card for a local store that has a small quilting area. I almost bought a new shirt, but the quilting fabric was too much of a pull. and it was all on sale! So I selected some turquoise and orange bits. I could have bought some limes, but I bought those back when green was the RSC color.

Hey, these would make a great quilt by themselves!

Oh, wait, I did buy lime--in the little embroidery scissors. How about that?!

My other project was the Confetti quilt, of course. But first---there was a Squirrel. 

A little blurry, but I wanted to zoom in so you could see the peanut.

And, hey, it was lime!!

Our temperatures took a nose dive this past week, and so I went searching for the slippers I knitted last year. Uh, oh. Not good. I had worn major holes in them. So I found some leftover yarn from an afghan I made years ago, and quickly knitted up some new ones. I used two strands of two shades of lime, hoping they'll last a little longer than one season. The pattern is similar to one my mom used to make that she called CuddleMocs. There are lots of versions of this online. I just winged it making the rectangle a little shorter than my foot so they'd fit nice and tight. I really do like knitting, but I hate sewing knitted things together almost as much as sewing a hem on a dress. So please pardon the wonky seams. I sewed on the little buttons from the old slippers to kind of disguise them. My mom used to put big fuzzy pom-poms on hers. Anyway, my feet are toasty now. This squirrel was so distracting, I made Sandra's awesome links in the post about her latest amazing quilt finish wait until I got these done. They didn't take long to make. I did them at the same time on the same needle. 

Then it was back to the Confetti quilt. Here are this month's blocks. 

You can see that each row is a different block, but they still look all random. It's not the way I'll arrange them, but fun to see them together like that. I now have 36 blocks. I'll make at least another set and then see where to go from there.

I'm still working on the hand pieced four-patches. I think there are about 100 now. I need to cut more squares.

So that's my makings for the month. Here's what else we were up to. I was going to post more vacation photos, but I'm past that now that we've roamed closer to home. 

We took a bike ride on the Falling Waters Trail, which I love. 

And Wednesday, we celebrated the 44th anniversary of our first date by hiking along the ledges in a nearby town. A unique geological formation right through town that gives it its name of Grand Ledge. The trail winds along the river at the base of the rocks, sometimes a bit precariously. It was a little chilly and foggy-ish, but perfect for hiking. 

The color is finally starting to come--the latest I've ever seen it. And look at those flowers still blooming like crazy in the park. 

Soon it will be too cold for these little excursions. And then I think a lot more sewing will happen. I'm beginning to plan a quilt that probably won't be made in bitsy monthly steps. I can't wait. 

I'm linking up this weekend with Angela at So Scrappy for ScrapHappy Saturday and with Cynthia at Quilting is more fun than Housework for Oh Scrap. And with Sandra at mmm quilts! for DrEAMi (Drop Everything And Make it) because yes, those slippers aren't quilted, but they did take me away from her blog post!! (Go check out her quilt, though! And her links to the process.)

I hope you are having fun quilting--but take time, too, to chase squirrels and enjoy nature.

(Just a reminder: I'm not affiliated with any company, so when I mention products, services, or stores I'm just documenting what I used or liked.) 

Orange, Confetti, Etc.

Well, this is getting predictable. But that's the way it goes when working on several projects a little at a time. I have four orange blocks for Rainbow Scrap Challenge/52 weeks of Scrappy Triangles this month, but I have fabric picked out for one more orange block if I decide to make it since there are a few more days left this month. It depends on how much I like the color for October. I do like the brightness that the orange blocks bring to my scrappy bunch. 

 I have a lot of oranges in my scraps and drawers. Many of them are more rusty, but I left them out because I wanted the blocks to be vibrant. Here they are mixed in with the rest of the year's blocks.

Oh, wow! I did it again. Flipped a block around, and didn't see it until just now. Can you find it? When it comes time to sew this baby together, I'm going to have to be really careful. That's the second time I've goofed up laying out blocks. Oh, and I had a bit of a glitch linking up my turquoise blocks to last month's RSC party, so if you didn't see them and want to, you can click here.

My Confetti quilt (Rachel Hauser's pattern) is going well. I've completed two sets of blocks now for a total of 24 blocks. This layout is more organized than the final will be. I just laid out what I've made so far pretty much in order. But even that way, it does look quite random. I'm so pleased. I expect that I'll make at least two more sets and then see how much background fabric I have left to decide how many more blocks to make. Such fun!

 Here's a close-up of this month's batch:

I jammed all this sewing into a few days earlier this month. Usually I stick to a weekly block with the triangles. But we had a vacation planned. The first in about 2 years!! I took a whole bunch of square scraps along for a little more hand sewing on what will likely be a car quilt some day. I didn't think I'd get much done, but these go so fast. 37 blocks!

I made some on the deck of our vacation apartment overlooking the pretty little lake and others in the evening while relaxing after a day of hiking or bike riding. 

It turns out I've been channeling Rose from Something Rose Made in my plan for this quilt. She sent me a photo of a quilt she hand sewed on trips a few years ago. Pretty much the same thing!! She also gave me some tips on how she made hers. Isn't the quilting community fabulous?!

I now have 58 four-patch blocks altogether. The interesting thing is that I have discovered that my scrap situation is not as bountiful as it seems if I want to cut pieces of a certain size. I have pretty much exhausted the number of 2-1/2 inch squares I can cut, so I started cutting squares from other bigger chunks of old fabric in my drawers. I think for most people, they would still be considered scraps--mostly pieces 1/8 yard or less. I'm okay with this because these are still pieces I'm trying to pare down so I can build a newer stash of fabric.

One more quilty-related photo from our vacation. This is a barn quilt, except that it's not on a barn. It's in the parking lot of the historical museum of Arcadia, Michigan, the tiny town we stayed in during our vacation. I really like how it combines more than one design.

Most of our time on vacation was spent outside hiking, biking and sunset watching at the beach. So for the first time in a long time, I have some non-quilty photos to share. I might not know where to stop. So if you just came for the quilt photos, you may stop here. Otherwise, enjoy! We sure did. And now I have a whole lot of color and design inspiration for future quilts.

We took a hike on a 3/4-mile-long boardwalk across a marsh preserve.

 I have a zillion photos of this driftwood in every kind of light. 

Our heron friend. Not shown: our deer and fox friends.

The garden by our apartment

There were some beginning touches of color.

Why did the chicken cross the trail?
And where did she come from in the middle of nowhere?

Perfect timing on our walk home after sunset. See the deer?
There were five of them.

Sunsets were spectacular this week.
Last days of summer and first days of autumn.

Results of a little weather the night before
on the Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail.
We had to go around or over three of these. 

This part of the trail was devastated by a huge storm six years ago.
It used to be a forest. It's good to see trees springing up again
and covering all the downed trunks.

Can't take a trip to Glen Haven in Sleeping Bear
without a photo of the
the old canning company building.

Tried to find a new angle this year.

Empire Bluff hike

Goodbye summer; hello autumn

I have a feeling more photos will find their way into the blog over time. Such a lovely week, and I know I'll want to revisit it to remember. I hope you are enjoying the beginning of autumn or spring wherever you are.

I'm linking up with Angela at So Scrappy for Scrap Happy Saturday (yeah, I know I'm late) and with Cynthia at Quilting is more fun than Housework for Oh Scrap.

(Just a reminder: I'm not affiliated with any company, so when I mention products, services, or stores I'm just documenting what I used or liked.)