MQGI Medallion Quilt-A-Long update

 

It's been 3 weeks since the last update on the Baby Medallion quilt, where did those weeks go to?  At this point we should be finished border #3.  Even with the extra week given to us by Cindy I'm only just finished border #2 and about to start border #3!  Now it's not all bad news, it's coming together nicely if a bit slowly.  All the math's are working out so far and paper piecing the diamonds turned out to be a good decision as they are all so straight and pointy!

And I got my clouds made

And my balloon stitched down!  Just need to add some tails to the kite and the centre panel will be finished at last!

We are following Melanie's guidelines (Catbirds Quilts Medallion series) and she suggested to take the time between borders 2 and 3 to make sure everything is squared up.  This turned out to be great advice.  After the first checkerboard round things were a little stretchy.  Adding the plain frames to grow the dimensions to a number divisble by 3 for the diamonds really helped.  I trimmed back the inner border to 2.75" all around and added the pink 1.5" strips.  I made sure the length cut was correct for the width and height and used a lot of pins to add this frame.  It eased in any stretchiness (?) and pulled the quilt into a more rectangular shape.  I have to admit I was a bit nervous making the cut hoping I hadn't gotten the math's wrong but sometimes you just have to do it and see what happens.  All worked out in the end ok, so now round #3!

I had great intentions at the weekend but then ended up a tad under the weather and did nothing for the whole weekend!  So this is where I'm at:

The plan for this round of borders is to add flying geese!  86 of them + 4 more hearts!  I bought a charm pack and a layer cake of Hubba Hubba by Me and My Sister and this will be used for the next 2 rounds.  I've used a lot of scraps from Me and My sister fabric ranges in this already and their designs are really child friendly, bright and happy which is what I'm going for here.

Only question now is which method of Flying geese do I use to make them?  Flying geese are traditionally twice as wide as they are high.  (Quilters cahce and Instructables have nice explanations of these methods with diagrams and step by step instructions if you are interested in making your own.)  I'm looking at using 4" wide x 2" high for this border.  I'm not sure what the quickest method is. 

A is charm pack friendly, has a little waste and requires sewing them all up individually
B has no waste and does make 4 at a time, all identical and will need them sewing up individually
C, Foundation paper piecing,  makes them up in strips as you go along and guarantees perfect pointiness, but will inevitably have more waste.

I'm leaning towards C.  What do you think, what's your preferred way to fly?

Linking up to  Modern Quilt Guild of Ireland

WIP - Another border on the Medallion Baby quilt

The insatiable fabric monster, aka Hexie Baby Medallion Quilt, is chugging along.  I've been working on this and only this and am still behind for today's status update with the MQG of Ireland Quilt-A-Long!  Oh well, I  am making progress - did I mention handstitching hexagons is a slow, easy going kind of a thing?  I still need to stitch in the balloon/basket lines and add the clouds in the centre panel. I have watched 17 episodes of Persons of Interest while making this so far, plus the odd episode of Midsomer Murders!

The chequerboard border took 2 fat quarters and is not as square as I would have liked (lots of seams!)  I'm  hoping it will straighten out as I add more to it.  The next border is made up of a frame to grow the quilt top, to make the Maths easier, to add the outside row of 3" diamonds.

I had hoped to make the diamonds all from scraps but did in the end have to cut into a charm pack from Me & my Sister.  The centre panel hexagons are entirely from scraps.  Last year, the MQG of Ireland had a pin cushion swap and I got this beauty from Rosie, along with some fabric and I've used the fabric for the centre panel and managed to make it stretch for some diamonds too.

I like the idea of the fabric linking the MQGI projects to each other!

I used a low volume polkadot for the frame to keep everything soft and I'm thinking it might be a little too soft.  One of the things we've been learning in Stitched in Color's class, Colour Intensive, is fabrics with a lot of white in them can tone down the saturation of neighbouring colours.  I can see this with my border choices above and though it was a deliberate decision I'm thinking of adding in a skinny border to frame the centre panel and help draw focus inwards. 

What do you think?  Pink to the rescue or not?

 

So this lot needs to be sewn up and then its onto flying geese for the next round.  So glad we have 3 weeks until the next check in because I have 86 of them to make!  Did I mention yet that Medallions use a savage amount of fabric? 

Linking up to Modern Quilt Guild of Ireland and