Finish it Friday!

It all started with this design I made up on threadbias.

Then it became 4 houses.

I originally thought I'd use the my leftover Coquette layer cake squares from Bounce but I think they are the perfect colours for a baby quilt so I bought some Tula Pink Prince charming squares

I got my neutral Bella solid material for the background in the post yesterday and so thought I would try and finish my 4 Houses project today.

 I even free motion quilted it (first time doing this!)  And then after quilting I realised I had made a piecing mistake -can you spot it?

Oh and Gordon finished Wilbur's kennel too!  Isn't it cool?

But Wilbur doesn't sleep in the kennel - he owns all the sofas, chairs, dog beds and now it seems all the cushions too!  Even the wonky ones.

I finished this at 11.45 so a Friday finish! Love how dogs don't get red eye but creepy blue eye. I hope to take better daylight pictures tomorrow but for now I'm pleased to be finished.  Linking up to 


and Finish it up Friday

We're having a Heatwave!

 Hello Wilbur - want to go for a walk?

 Yes I know its 30 degrees out there.

 Ok you think about it for a minute then.

 No?

Okay then maybe I'll go and finish a quilt instead.

Yaaaay. Bounce is finally done.  This took longer than expected but I couldn't be happier with the result.  Pattern is Miss Rosies Quilt Co. and fabric is Coquette by Moda.  Just have to wash and dry it for Gordon's auntie Maura.  Can't wait to give it to her!

Linking up to 

and Finish it up Friday

Finish-A-Long Quarter 3 goals

This is what my sewing (ahem kitchen table) looks like at the moment.  I have 8 separate projects on the go at the same time in various stages of completion (in addition to UFO's from last quarter!) so choosing the projects I hope to complete by September has been a bit of a problem for me.

A lot of the projects I'm doing are BOM that won't be finished by September but there some above I really could do with getting finished so after much pondering here's my list:

Carryovers

• Bounce
  
  Nearly there with this one, 80% quilted and binding material purchased.

•  A Dog's Life,  2 blocks out of 4 done.

• Boo to you (UFO from last Halloween).  A finish in spetember would be perfect for this! Top done just have to quilt it with orange and purple thread to fill in those cream squares.

New projects started

•  Swoon 2013, pattern bought, fabric bought, SAL on flickr joined now to start cutting!

• 4 Houses Cushion, designed,maths all worked out, test block completed, ready to make the real thing now.
  

I think that's plenty to keep me going for a while!

Finish-A-Long Quarter 2 update

Linking up to the Finish-A-Long at SheCanQuilt it's time to review the sewing goals I set myself last April.

Nothing like a deadline to push those unfinished objects to the finish line! Ahmm yup that's what I thought 3 months ago. Except this last quarter, I started more new things than I finished. There was just so many lovely projects going on that I joined in on and a few weekends to Galway and a week in Chicago visiting family ( though I did visit the Quiltology store and bought fabric for a Swoon quilt so not all of it was non-quilting time! )

So here's the round up:

1. Bounce : in April here's where I was

 In June Bordered and Basted - not yet quilted

 Finish = 0

     2. A Dog's life - applique project for myself - no progress, nope, nothing at all

Finish = 0

    3. Karavan Cushions - 2 finished, 1 to go!

Finish = 2/3
  
  4.  Scrappy Trip - 2 blocks completed and given away, no finished quilt

Finish = 0

   5. Strip & Flip quilt
In April this was the pieced top

In July Basted and quilted! Yay

Finish = 1


So all in all 1 2/3 out of 5.  Yup I can definitley improve on that score in the next qtr.  Hope you guys managed a little better!

Half Rectangle Triangles

Half Rectangles are tricky. They are very similar to Half Square Triangles but there is a little trick to making them. I needed a roof for a pieced house I was designing and it took three attempts to get these right.

Of course I could have paper pieced them but I got stubborn after attempt number 2 and was determined to figure it out. I thought I'd share with you what I did wrong and how I finally got what I wanted.

For the house above I wanted to use a layer cake, so I was working with a maximum size of 10". I came up with the bright idea of piecing it using Half rectangle Triangles and sewing them together. The size I needed for the roof wasn't a nice 2:1 like a flying goose but 10" wide by 4" high finished dimensions.

Well, on the first attempt the mistake I made was to treat the rectangle like a square and forget that rectangles are not symmetrical. I started with 5.5" x 6.5" rectancles, deciding to go big and trim down later.

Placing the fabric right sides together and using the HST method of drawing the diagonal then sewing 1/4" either side gives a very wonky result like this:

Oops!  I have no excuse, I knew it wasn't going to work as I was cutting it, but I figured keep going and I'll discover where I went wrong.  The trick is to rotate one of the rectangles and lay them out long edges across each other.  Here's the layout using the triangles I finally used in the roof:

This gives two identical half square triangles which will give me the left roof. You need to do another with the diagonal line going in the opposite direction to get the right hand part of the roof because half rectangle triangles aren't symmetrical.  That is well stick in my head now!

I did this and got 4 Half Rectangle Triangles and then I trimmed two of them down to the dimensions I wanted for my roof. To make up 10.5 x 4.5 I trimmed them to 4.5 x 5.5 as I will lose 1/4" in the middle when I join them.

On attempt number 2 I didn't pay enough attention trimming and ended up with rectangles with seam allowance for the bottom of the roof but clipped the top off the house!

Of course I only noticed this when I had sewn it to the base of my house. Not the end of the world, I could probably live with it in the project I'm making for myself but I had hoped to put this up on my blog as my first ever pattern so it's got to be right.

At this point I figured I'd take a break and go check out blogland - yes I really should have done this earlier!

 I found these three tutorials on Half Rectangle Triangles confirming for me that my starting dimensions were ok, my layout of fabric right sides together was on the right track but what I had not done was to take my 1/4" seam allowance into consideration when aligning the fabric or drawing my diagonal.  Oops again!

The modern quilt guild

Wayne Kollinger's Quilt Blog

The Busy Bee Quilt Shop

So third time around, I decided to try Wayne Kollinger's method and started my diagonal 1/4" up the rectangle both sides.

Ta-dah!!! Success at last.

On this final attempt, I decided if it wasn't going to work out I would just paper piece it . Well it did work out but now that I have the idea of paper piecing in my head of course I'm going to have to try that too! So I've downloaded the free software Quilt Assistant and once I practice with it a bit more I'll tell you all about it.

For now I'm just happy to have the test piece for my cushion/pillow project pieced and measuring the right dimensions!

WIP Wednesday - House Block Design & Half Rectangle Triangles

My favourite project that I have made so far is a Scnibbles pattern from Miss Rosie's quilt company called Full House.  It's neat little pattern that uses two charm packs to make a baby quilt.  I've seen some traditional house blocks like schoolhouse and decided to have a go making my own on Threadbias.

On the Threadbias website there is a quilt design tool that you can use for free as long as you are happy with a 9" workspace.  If you want to use the full tool and workspace you can by taking part in the design challenges Threadbias hosts or paying a monthly subscription.  I played around with it and managed to come up with the house above using Cocquette Fabric by Chez Moi for Moda.  It was great fun.  I liked my house so much I made four of them and put them together to make a pieced front for a 24" cushion I want to cover. 

To make this involves a bit of piecing so I worked out how to put it together and the fabric requirement to make this and had great fun playing with Maths.  Adding borders would get me to my needed size

.

So far so good.  Realising the roof of the house could be a bit tricky I decided to test my design yesterday evening.  I now understand the importance of pattern testing.  I'd forgotten there is a knack to Half Rectangle Triangles and that I would need a right one and a left one. 

So this is where I am with this project, pattern mostly written, cutting and piecing all ok except the roof!  Going to have another go at this again tonight!

Linking up to

Happy Easter!

I got mini eggs!  They really are the same colours as Coquette by Chez Moi for Moda from which I'm making my Bounce quilt.  see here

OK so maybe no blue eggs like in Coquette but I did also got a Roses Easter Egg - thanks Mary!  No sewing today - a walk in the woods in the rain instead.

All the giving out we did about the cold and as soon as it warms up and rains on us we want the cold back!

Spring ColoursBouncing along

Well I missed out on WIP Wednesday update though I had lots done on my Bounce project so I though I'd share my progress today (pattern Miss Rosie's Quilt Co.).  It's not finished but I'm motoring along!  

 

  

As it's Good Friday today and Easter Sunday is rapidly approaching, the colours in this project are so spring-like they remind me of Cadbury's mini chocolate eggs that come out every Easter.   No actual chocolate until Sunday but I can have a visual feast  in the meantime.

All 28 squares were laid out in 4 columns by 7 rows on top of a beautiful quilt I didn't make but inspired this one for Gordon's Auntie Maura.  Layout photographed, now onto the next steps of assembly and borders over the weekend.  This project is really coming together now and I love it.

If Wilbur the lunatic Basset can contain himself and be on his best behaviour for a crust of toast from my mum, I can certainly be just as good and wait for chocolate mini eggs!