Appalachian Autumn Completion

I pieced this block back in late October of 2020 including making the binding.  It is a quilt pattern called Appalachian Autumn by Bonnie Hunter.   I only made one block and didn't make the border either.  Today I got it on my quilt frame and quilted it with yellow thread with an edge to edge pantograph from Apricot Moon Designs called Maple Sugar.  It is about 25" square.

Here's a closeup of one of the maple leaves.

I have had a couple of finishes recently and a few more are planned.

Mayflower Scott Flanagan Block of the Month Five

The instructions for this block came out at the beginning of the month and I found time this week to make it.  This block is a traditional block called Monkey Wrench.  Several of the tips of my red triangles got eaten up by the border but I can live with it.

Here are my five blocks so far.

This will likely become a comfort quilt donated to charity. There will be 12 blocks in total.

Sewcialites Blocks 30 and 31

I made block 30 in the Sewcialites quilt along earlier this week and block 31 on Saturday this week.

Here's my block 30 Gratitude.

And my block 31 Noble.

Here's blocks 18 to 30 together.

Only 5 blocks are left is this quilt along.

Dear Jane - Three More Triangles

On Thursday, I made triangles LS7 and LS6 and on Friday I made triangle LS8.

LS7 was paper pieced and then three appliques were added.  I had a hard time photographing it.  There is much more of a contrast in the colours in person than the photo is showing.

LS6 was paper pieced and then one applique was added.

LS8 was paper pieced and then there were two triangular appliques which I chose not to add as they were so tiny.  There were also two medium petal shapes and two small petal shapes.  I really didn't want to make the small applique petals, so I made three medium petal shapes instead.

Ten more will complete the left side (LS)!

Dear Jane - Another Milestone

In my last Dear Jane post, I had made and sewn together all the central blocks.  Now I have sewn the four more triangles required to complete the top row and the top row is sewn together in one piece!

First up, on 29 April, I paper pieced block TR2.

On 1 May I made TR 12 which involved a bit of piecing and applique.  I chose to have the top arch of fabric go from one edge to the other instead of almost to each edge which would have involved applique instead of just simple curved piecing.  The leaf is applique and I'm still not great at it.....

On Friday 6 May I paper pieced block TR1.

And I also paper pieced TR 13.  There were two applique petal shapes which I chose not to add.  I think it looks just fine without them.

Then I got all 13 triangles sewn together with 14 black background triangles.  Here's a picture of my top row and the centre of my quilt.

So happy this is progressing well!  I just have to sew the top row to the quilt and start working on the second row of triangles.

Mayflower Mystery Quilt #1 Top Completed

I sewed all the blocks together several weeks ago and found time this week to cut out the inner and outer borders and get them attached to the quilt.  I actually cut my borders narrower than in the instructions as I wanted the finished quilt to be within the size range required to donate to Quilts of Valour Canada.  Here it is with the inner border added.

And here it is with the outer border added.

The pictures don't show the fabric used in the inner border very well, so here's a close up.  I'm also going to use this same fabric for the binding.

Now to get it quilted and donated.  I plan to quilt it with yellow/gold thread.

Sewcialites Block 29

Here is the 29th block from the Sewcialites quilt along called Delight.

This is the lightest fabric in this fabric collection.  Here are blocks 19 to 29 together.

And blocks 1 to 18.

Only 7 left to go.

Dear Jane Milestone - All 169 Centre Blocks Completed

Yesterday I finished the last Dear Jane Block to complete the centre of the quilt and today I added row M to the top and then a row of sashing all around so now I am ready to concentrate on the border rows of triangles.  I can't wait until the end of the post to show you, so here's a picture of the full centre of 169 blocks sewn together!

On April 15, I sewed block M3.  I think this was the most difficult of the Dear Jane Blocks as it was all set in seams, partial seams and Y seams.  I did not do all of the inset sewing for the border.  I just kept adding strips which I could sew straight across each side of the octagon.  I still ended up adding triangles to each corner to get the square shape but it was much easier than all the wedge shaped pieces with mitered corners pictured.

M3 closeup.

On April 23 I was able to sew three blocks starting with paper piecing the diamonds in M11.

M11 closeup.

Next I made M4.  I changed the corner black squares a little by omitting the frame on the two outer edges.  I could have made the final corner triangles a bit bigger, but I'm satisfied with how the block turned out.  The yellow in this picture is more true than the yellow in the closeup.

M4 closeup.

And finally M10 which turned out to be the easiest block in Dear Jane so far.

M10 closeup.

The next time I was able to sew on Dear Jane was 28 April.  Our Dear Jane Bee got together via zoom and sewed for nearly 6 hours which was great fun!  I started with piecing M5 which was quite an easy block.

M5 closeup.

Then I sewed M9 by using strip sets.  It looks more complicated than it actually is.

M9 closeup.

Continuing on I finished M6.  The row of pieces around the central octagon were sewn on with partial seams but they went on easily.

M6 closeup.

And then I sewed M8.  I left off the red teeny-tiny triangles at the tips of the black diagonal lines because they were so small I thought the difficulty of adding them wasn't worth it.  I'm very happy with the block the way it is.

M8 closeup.

Then I was down to the last block!  Wouldn't you know it though, M7 turned out to be an applique block which would have been extremely difficult to turn into a cathedral window block.  So, I bit the bullet and made it as an applique block.  I didn't get it finished while our group was zooming, but kept on sewing afterwards and had it done before getting supper ready.  Without further ado, here's my final Dear Jane block M7.  I think my applique has improved over the course of this quilt, but still far from great.

M7 closeup.

This morning right after breakfast I got row M all sewn together and sewed an outer row of sashing to it before attaching it to the quilt centre.  Three more rows of sashing and I was done!  Here's another picture of the completed centre of the quilt but it also shows the 9 triangles I already have sewn for the top border row which means I only have to make 4 more triangles and my first border will be complete too!

Still having tons of fun with this Dear Jane quilt and spurred on to get all the triangles sewn now!

Sewcialites Blocks 27 and 28

I made both of these blocks during the week they came out but I didn't get around to blogging about them.  Here is my Sewcialites block number 27 from 16 April called Earnest.

And here is my block number 28 from 23 April called Hope.

Only eight blocks left to go!

Earth Day Sewing

I saved two large sunflower seed bags from feeding the birds this past winter to turn into reusable bags with handles.  Here's a picture of one of the bags before I cut it up.  They are made of a tarp type of woven plastic material.

Next time I have one of these bags, I'll open it better so I can use more of the blue jay in the finished bags.  I had to trim his wing off just above his head because of the jagged way I opened both bags.  I was able to cut the bottoms off both bags and turn both of them into bags by boxing the corners and turning a 1.5" facing strip to the inside of the bag top to reinforce the top edge for attaching handles.  Unfortunately the chickadee ends up decapitated in order to make similar sized bags and also to avoid having the word "Noir" appear on the outside of the bag.  I cut the bags in half horizontally between the words "Tournesol" and "Noir".  I cut the front and back sections of both bag tops apart and used two fronts to make a third bag and both backs to make six handles and also sewn in facings for the third bag.   Each bag is 13" tall, 6" deep and 15" wide.  Here are the three bags I made.

I used a heavier duty needle in my machine, especially necessary when I was sewing through the handles which were triple thick and the top of the bags which were double thick.  Here's another picture of the three bags and the small piece I had leftover.

Happy Earth Day!

Sewcialites

 Another Friday, another new Sewcialites block.  This is block 26 of 36 called Courage.

My design wall was busy with another project so I didn't take it's picture with the other blocks I've made so far.  Here are blocks 19 to 25.

And blocks 1 to 18.

Getting close, only 10 more to go!

Progress on Dear Jane

On Thursday I was able to work on Dear Jane and I made four more blocks for the final row M.  I pieced them all.

M1 I chose to piece the centre differently than the checkerboard on the diagonal with triangular corners so then I had to just add strips around it.  I chose to make the black line thinner than pictured also.

M1 closeup.

M13 was a block that leant itself to using a Cathedral window technique.

M13 closeup.

M2

M2 closeup.

M12 was easily made with strip piecing.

M12 closeup.  Sorry, I didn't realize this block was so out of focus.

I also sewed column 1 and 13 to my top so here's a picture of the centre of the quilt complete except for the bottom row M and showing the triangles I have done so far for the top border.

I only have 9 more blocks to make and then 47 more triangles.