Back to the Drawing Board with Fibonacci

A few weeks ago, I posted about this month's border requirements for the Fibonacci's Challenge quilt, which included making some Tri-Recs units with the Tri-Recs rulers. I had made up one sample block with a 4-pointed star. Susan at desertskyquilts commented that she usually makes the stars with the points going the other way. I couldn't believe I hadn't thought of that!

So I made a sample block of that version, and I really like this star. I asked my 11-year-old which version he liked better with the rest of the quilt, and he said this 8-pointed star. He is quite proud of himself for helping me make design decisions on two of the borders for Fibonacci! I would say he might be a future quilt-maker, but he is so full of energy, I cannot see him sitting still long enough to do any piecing. For now, he is my design consultant!

Of course, in the actual quilt, I will be using Christmas quilts to match the rest of the quilt! I've started cutting out the pieces, but haven't sewn any together yet.

See what others are doing at Judy's.

Happy stitching!

UFOs on Parade

Some years ago (at least 13), the city of Chicago had an outdoor art exhibit called "Cows on Parade." Different artists decorated life-sized fiberglass cows, which were then placed all around the city. Many other places copied this concept. Okay, maybe Chicago didn't start the trend, but they're the first city I'm aware of who did this.

This summer when we went out west, one of the towns we stayed at in South Dakota had "Buffalo on Parade." I posed with this buffalo that had a lone star quilt painted on its back.

In a similar fashion, Judy is encouraging us to parade our UFOs. No, she doesn't want to see photos of alien spaceships, rather Un-Finished Objects. They say confession is good for the soul, so here are some of my UFOs:

I started making these Dresden plates for our first house. We had a little breakfast bar in our tiny kitchen that had room for two barstools. The idea was to make each Dresden into a cushion for a barstool. I obviously didn't get real far, and we sold that house 14 1/2 years ago, so these babies have been sitting in the UFO pile for quite some time!

Many years ago, I started making this red and white Double 9-patch quilt. Somewhere I had read a tip to sew two long strips together after you sew strips for a different project, almost a leader/ender project, but they never mentioned leaving the strip in the machine to save on thread. I slowly got lots of strips sewn together and then cut into 3-piece units. Then they sat in this box for a long time. Since hearing about Bonnie Hunter's leaders/enders idea, I've been working on Easy Street as my L/Es, but when I'm sewing the Easy Street units into the blocks, I've been using these 9-patches for my L/Es. (I hope that makes sense!) I keep this box with its envelopes on the table next to my machine, so I can just grab two units when I need a L/E.

This is my dozen long-stemmed roses wall hanging. I had seen a similar quilt but with daffodils in the center, hanging on the wall of a house in some magazine. I came up with my own dimensions and I used roses and stems from Elly Sienkiewicz's book Baltimore Beauties and Beyond. The applique is all hand needle-turned, with stuffed, 3D roses. There was a perfect spot in our master bedroom at our 2nd house, so I was making this for that area. But we moved out of that house 5 years ago. I LOVE this quilt and would really like to finish it, but I'm a bit unsure of how to quilt it. So it sits, all folded up and forlorn, in my UFO armoire.

Back in January when I came up with my 2013 Goals, I mentioned having some UFOs made of Christmas fabrics. This is one of them. The pattern came from a magazine (I can't recall which at the moment). It's supposed to be a gift for a certain someone if I ever finish it! I have all the blocks made.

Here's another Christmas UFO. This one will make a star when it's put together. All the blocks are made. Another someday gift...

And a third Christmas UFO to be a gift, from another magazine. I have all the 9-patches made, but they are supposed to alternate with stars, which I haven't even started.

Does it count as a UFO if I've only cut out the strips, but not done any sewing yet??? This will be another Christmas quilt, a red and green log cabin, but I'm keeping it for my hubby and me. Yep, I do love my Christmas fabrics!

Here's one of my more recent UFOs. It's called "Climbing Roses," and I got the pattern from a "Quilt Sampler" magazine. I don't usually make a quilt with the exact fabrics that are shown in a magazine or pattern, but I absolutely FELL in LOVE with these fabrics. Top is all put together (not looking so great after being folded for the past few years); needs quilting and binding.

Then there are a few other UFOs that I didn't drag out for photos. I have another red and white quilt that consists only of two different sized squares (top is not finished yet); my All-Star quilt that I've been slowly working on each month since the summer; Northern Lights, a patriotic star block that I was going to use in my All-Star quilt, but I didn't like how different it was from the other blocks (I plan on making it into a pillow); a small (wall-hanging or pillow) quilt with American flags in the shape of hearts (started that at a class, I think it's ready for quilting); Robbing Peter to Pay Paul red and white quilt that I started hand-appliqueing because I didn't want to do curved piecing (less than half the blocks are done); a broderie-perse type doll quilt I started in another class (needs fusible applique to finish the top). There might be more lurking about the back corners of the armoire.

That doesn't include the numerous projects that I've got in progress right now! If I would just focus on one or two and not start new projects, I could probably finish a lot of these up. But where's the fun in that?????

Head on over to Judy's to see more confessional UFOs on parade.

Happy stitching!

Design Wall Monday - April 8, 2013

This weekend, I picked up the instructions for the fourth and final border of my Fibonacci's Challenge quilt. This border needs to be 12" wide and include some "Tri-Recs" units. This is a new unit for me! The finished unit is a square with a triangle inside, kind of like a flying goose that's been squished on both sides.

Included with the instructions was a coupon for the Tri-Recs ruler set, so I bought it to work on this border. It works in a similar way to the Easy Angle and Companion Angle rulers for making flying geese.

I experimented a bit with the Tri-Recs unit with some scraps (obviously not fabric that will go in my Christmas Fibonacci quilt!). The four points of this star are each Tri-Recs units. I'm not yet sure if this is the arrangement I'll use, but it's one possibility. Since I have 8-pointed sawtooth stars in the center and 2nd border, and 5-pointed stars in the 3rd border, I kind of like the idea of 4-pointed stars in this border.

I need to think about this a bit more before I decide what I'll do. Even if I make these stars, I'm not sure how I'll arrange the colors.

Judy has more design walls at Patchwork Times.

Happy stitching!

April First Friday UFO

Happy First Friday in April! For my March UFO, I got the two rows of my All Star Quilt sewn together. It's fun to slowly see this quilt coming together, after some of the blocks have sat in my armoire for so many years.

 

Happy stitching!

Design Wall on April Fools' Day

Here's what's on my design wall design ping-pong table today, Fibonacci's Challenge:

 

I have the stars on three sides of the third border appliqued. You can see the slight shadows under the stars on the left border; that's the side I still need to applique. I am doing the applique by machine. None of the sides of this border are sewn onto the center yet.

 

I hope to get this border finished up this week, so I can take it to the shop and show them my progress. Then I'll get my April border guidelines.

 

Go check out more design walls (or design floors or design ping-pong tables or whatever) at Judy's.

 

Happy stitching!

 





Work on Fibonacci's 3rd Border

I've taken a bit of a break from my laptop this week...it's been a nice change of pace. But I have been working on my 3rd border for my Fibonacci's Challenge quilt. The four border sides are each sewn, but not attached to the center part yet. The quilt is on the ping pong table, so there's actually some green that's not part of the quilt.

I really like the way this border looks as it is, but one of the requirements is that I use the challenge fabric in each border, so I am currently working on appliqueing 5-pointed stars onto each side. Once I'm done with the applique, I will sew the borders to the center.

Have a wonderful Easter!

Happy stitching!

Getting Closer

Oh happy day! I finished the four Block B's that I need for my smaller version of Bonnie Hunter's Easy Street quilt.

Yes, I purposely used the same green plaid in the center of each of these blocks. I like how the lighter green fabric looks inside the star.

In the quilt, they won't be side by side like the above photo. They will be set on point, in between all those Block A's I finished last month, like this:

Now I need to start making the setting triangles. I kind of did things backwards from Bonnie's directions. I wanted to see how the blocks look, so I made those before the setting triangles.

Happy stitching!

Starting Fibonacci March Border

I think I've decided what I'm going to do for my March border of my Fibonacci Challenge.  The rules for this month include:
1. Use some of the challenge fabric.
2. Incorporate strip-pieced 4-patches or 9-patches. They can be even or uneven 4/9-patches, and they can be set straight or on point.
3. Use a new fabric.
4. Border should finish at 8".

After thinking about different possibilities over the past week, I've decided to make 4" red 4-patches, alternating with 4" green squares. Over this background, I will machine-applique stars using my different creams and golds, including the challenge fabric. The stars will be assorted sizes.

I wasn't planning on doing applique on this quilt, but this just feels "right" for this border. I will be continuing the star motif that's in the center block and in the second border. Since I'm appliquing these stars, I can scatter them randomly to create some movement.

Since some of my reds are getting depleted, I pulled a few more red fabrics from my stash. This one is actually a marbled red, but it shows up solid in this closeup. It feels so good to be using up fabric that's 17 years old. LOL

Here are some of the red 4-patches that I've made so far. The fabric on the lower left of the left 4-patch is the marble fabric from the first photo.

See more quilt projects at Judy's Patchwork Times.

Happy stitching!

Crawling down Easy Street

Where has the weekend gone? It feels like all I had time for at home was sleeping and eating until last night!

Last week, I was able to drive out to the quilt shop that is hosting the  Fibonacci's Challenge to show them my progress on border #2 and to get the instructions for the March border. While I'm thinking of different possibilities for my 3rd border, I worked a bit on Easy Street.

I've got the sub-units sewn together for block B. Since I'm making a smaller version of Easy Street than Bonnie Hunter's, I only need a total of four of block B.

Visit Judy at Patchwork Times to see what other quilters are working on.

Happy stitching!

March First Friday UFO

Happy First Friday of March!

 

Last night I finished my last block for my All Star UFO, and I didn't have to stay up til midnight! I machine-appliqued a heart onto the center of the star. The center fabric is different than the outer background fabric, although it's hard to tell that in this photo.

 

I considered hand-appliqueing the heart, but then I decided I didn't want to put that much time into one block of a quilt that will be used in the family room, where the kids and their friends hang out.

 

Now that I've made my 12 blocks, I'm going to start assembling the quilt top. When I first started making these blocks 12 years ago, I was going to do a traditional setting with sashing and corner blocks. Now, though, I'm not feeling the love for that. I'm going to go with a slightly more modern setting with more "negative space". I'm still making my final decision of what that's going to look like, so stay tuned to see how this turns out!

 

Happy stitching!



Fibonacci Border #2 finished

Last night, my son's basketball game was cancelled due to a snow storm, so I got some extra time for sewing! I finished making the corner stars for Fibonacci's Challenge, then I sewed the three strips together for the rest of the border. At this point, the quilt is 28 1/2 inches square, including seam allowances. Starting March 1st, I can take this to the quilt shop to show my progress and I'll get the directions for border #3. I can't wait to see what they have us do next :)

 

Happy stitching!

Starting Fibonacci's Border #2

Things have been busy around here. Last weekend my in-laws came to visit. This week, my older son had an indoor track meet an hour away and my younger son had 6 basketball games (four of them were at a tournament over the weekend). Plus I've been fighting some sort of head cold, which means I haven't spent much time sewing.

Yesterday I did get started on my second border for my Fibonnaci's Challenge quilt. The requirements for this border are that you have to use at least one half-square triangle (HST) in the border. You can use more than one, and they can be different sizes. This border needs to finish at 4" wide (like border #1), and you have to use the challenge fabric somewhere in the border.

After sketching out some different possibilities, I decided I wanted to make 4" sawtooth stars for the four corners. The sides of the borders will have three stripes: the gold scrollwork that was the smaller star in the center of the quilt, the green that was the larger star in the quilt center, and the marble challenge fabric.

Here's one of my corner stars. Each star will have a different red fabric. As you can see, I used HSTs to make the red star points that have the challenge fabric background. Since these HSTs finish at 1 inch, I decided to use Thangles triangle paper to help with precision piecing. For the green background star points, I made flying geese instead of bothering with HSTs.

I have to mention that my 11-year-old helped me with a design decision for this border! I showed him two mock-ups, and he said if I wanted it to be boring, I should go with the choice on the right. So I decided to go with the choice on the left.

You can see what's on other people's design walls over at Judy's.

Happy stitching!

Good news, Bad news

Today was a good news, bad news kind of day. Bad news because my youngest child stayed home sick (but no vomiting, thankfully). Good news because I got to stay home and take care of him, which mainly consisted of pushing fluids. And what did I do on my bonus day off? Housework? Although I probably should have, that's no fun to blog about. So instead, I visited some blogs this morning, including a few new ones. That led me to spending waaayyy too much time on Pinterest. Then I eventually went into my studio and guess what I did?

I finished assembling the nine A blocks for Easy Street!!!!!! Here they are just side by side.

This is kind of what they will look like when they're set on point. I am so glad to be done with this step. Now I need to work on block B, but since I'm making my quilt smaller than Bonnie Hunter's, I only need to make 4 of B.

Happy stitching!

Design Wall Monday - Easy Street progress

 

Not too much on my design wall this week. Last week, I stopped at the quilt shop to pick up my directions for the second border of my Fibonacci's Challenge quilt. Over the weekend, while I let some border ideas simmer in my brain, I worked a bit more on Bonnie Hunter's Easy Street. I've got all the rows assembled for all my block A's.

When I first started the Easy Street mystery, I decided to make three-fourths of the units Bonnie was making, since I did not want to make mine as large as hers. After the final reveal, I decided to make 9 block A's, 4 block B's, 8 setting triangles, and 4 corner triangles. If my calculations are correct, that will make the center a 63 inch square. Borders will enlarge it to a good lap-quilt size.

Go see some more design walls at Judy's.

Happy stitching!

Design Wall Monday February 4, 2013

This weekend, I whipped up 5 blocks for Alycia's block drive. All the blocks that are collected will be made into quilts for Quilts of Valor, which donates quilts to members of the military who have been touched by war. Alycia has supplied the directions for this block drive. It's a log cabin variation...easy peasy! I set up a temporary design wall to photograph the blocks by putting a piece of batting over my ancient cardboard cutting board and standing it up. The batting is only big enough for one row of blocks, so here are three of them.

Here are the other 2 blocks for the block drive. I don't know if you can tell from the photo, but the outer ring of fabric on the right block has a white background with "USA" repeated in lines. For the center of each block, I used some fabrics from an old Moda Charm Pack called "red white and bold."

It's not too late to make some blocks for Alycia's block drive. For every 5 that you send to her by March 8th, your name gets put into a drawing for a beautiful fat quarter pack. And QOV is definitely a good cause!

I also got some more units sewn together for block A of Easy Street. Since I'm using these as my leaders/enders, the units come together pretty quickly, in between other projects.

Go visit Judy to see lots of other design walls.

Happy stitching!

First Friday UFO - February

Happy First Friday of February! That means that it is time for another "First Friday UFO" post. If you recall, I started doing these posts back in August. I was contemplating doing an "Almost Free BOM" at a local quilt shop when I realized that I've got PLENTY of UFOs sitting in the armoire, so I could do my own little Block of the Month program. Each month, I make one block for my UFO and show it on the first Friday of the next month. Right now I'm working on my All Star quilt.

Here's the block I made in January. Does that center look familiar? When I was making my New Year's Day QOV from Judy's pattern, I had an extra 6 1/2 " piece of a red-cream-red subset. Since these stars finish at 12 inches, that piece was perfect for the center of this star. I also thought it was cool to put a bit of my first QOV into this All Star quilt. I will be keeping this quilt for my family room.

Here's a closeup of the blue fireworks fabric that makes up the star points. You probably can't see it real well in the photo, but there are silver streaks in the fireworks.

With this block, I've made 12 blocks for this quilt, and 12 was my goal. I made this little collage in Photoshop to show you all 12 together. Believe it or not, every block has the same cream background fabric! Depending on the lighting when I took each of the photos, it looks different in different blocks. I don't think this is how I will eventually set the quilt; I just made the collage to show all 12 blocks together.

I just have one problem. "One of these things is not like the others." Raise your hand if you remember that song from "Sesame Street"!

The block up in the top right corner doesn't work for me. For one thing, it's only two fabrics (the cream background and the blue print), while all the other blocks have at least three fabrics (the cream background, one or more red, and one or more blue). Also, this block is not a sawtooth base and it has the blue fabric in the four corners. I really like the block on its own; I made it in a class at a quilt shop. But I don't like it in this quilt.

My plan is to make this one block into a throw pillow and I'll make one more block this month so I have 12 for the quilt. This month as I work on that last block, I'm also going to be thinking about how I want to set the quilt.

Happy Stitching!

Fibonacci border #1

I got my first border all assembled and sewn onto the center block for my Fibonacci's Challenge quilt. I will go back to the shop either Saturday or next week after school one day to get the instructions for the February border.

Here's a closeup of two of the blocks in the border. The green is the same fabric as the center block (that's one of the requirements for this 1st border). The lower cream/beige fabric inside the red frame is the "challenge fabric" that I had to buy from the quilt shop for this challenge. All pieces of this first border have to be rectangles (another of the requirements for the challenge).

I haven't really done anything on Easy Street this week, but I did get the black fabrics pieced for my CQJP 2013 project. You can read about that here.

Go see what others have on their design walls over at Judy's.

Happy Stitching!

Design Wall Monday ~ MLK Day

Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Day! I've got a few things on my "design wall" this week.

First, I finished my top for Quilts of Valor. It's so long that you can just barely see my husband's toe peeking under the border! I used the free pattern that Judy gave out on her blog, but I eliminated the middle 1" border. Although I had plenty of scraps for the main part of the quilt, I did go buy some yardage for the two borders. And I had some leftover to add to my patriotic fabric bin :) I've had such a fun time making this quilt. Red, white, and blue is one of my favorite color combinations, and it was a joy to use many different patriotic fabrics. I know this isn't much, but I hope this quilt will help a soldier to know that we do care; we appreciate what they are doing for us; their sacrifices do not go unnoticed.

While I added the borders to the QOV, I made some more units for block A of Easy Street as leaders/enders. The 4-patches sewn to the double bricks are rotated from the ones I made last week, since you need some of both for this block.

After finishing my QOV, I got to work on the 1st border for my Fibonacci's Challenge quilt. Here's some information about that quilt. After laying out some fabrics for my border, I decided I didn't like it, so I revamped my plan.

Since this border can only have rectangles, I sewed two 1 1/2" strips of creams and golds together, then cut into 2 1/2" pieces. Then I framed them with green 1 1/2" strips. So the finished width of each piece will be 1" and the finished blocks will be 4" squares. I will be alternating green and red blocks; here are the 8 green blocks I have made.

I'm hoping to finish this border later on today, since I'm off school for Martin Luther King Jr's Birthday.

You can see what's on other quilters' design walls at Judy's blog.

Happy stitching!

QOV and Easy Street Progress

This week, in between going back to work after two weeks off, getting a haircut, going to a parents' meeting for younger son's basketball, and spending 2 1/2  hours in the emergency room with younger son who sprained his ankle at basketball, I was able to sew the seven rows of my quilt for Quilts of Valor (QOV) together. Please ignore my husband's hands at the top of the quilt and his feet at the bottom. When a quilt top gets this big, he is my "design wall" ~ LOL! I just need to cut and piece the borders, then sew them onto the center of the quilt.

While I worked on the QOV quilt, I worked a bit on Easy Street, using it as leaders and enders for the QOV. At first I was going to assemble Easy Street one block at a time, but then I decided I'd rather piece together two units for all the blocks I'm going to make. Here are half of the 4-patches sewn onto half of the double bricks. The pattern calls for half of the 4-patches to be sewn on one way and the other half sewn on with them rotated. I had hoped to have my entire Easy Street quilt top finished by the end of January, but I'm not so sure that's going to happen now. When I have a break from my job at a school, I tend to forget that life gets pretty busy during the school year! I'm just happy to keep this as my leader/ender project for now. I know it will come together soon. I'm not whining, but these last two steps are pretty involved :)

I'm linking up to Judy's Design Wall Monday.

Happy stitching!

Hello, Fibonacci!

So, I've started a new quilt project. Yes, I know, I'm in the middle of my QOV quilt and Easy Street. Not to mention a few other things that are sitting on the back burner. But I have a good reason for this new one!

Many years ago, I made lap-quilts for my mother-in-law and my sister-in-law, using Christmas fabrics. There were 6 other relatives I wanted to make Christmas quilts for. One is finished, but not given to the person because I wanted to give them all at the same time. I cut out the fabrics for one before I got pregnant with my 3rd child. (He's in middle school now, so you know this was awhile ago.) I am in various stages with 4 of the 5 that still need to be made. My Easy Street is one of these 4. My goal is to finish all these quilts for this Christmas. I think I will need all year to get them done LOL.

So when I heard that one of the local quilt shops is having a challenge called "Fibonacci's Revenge," I decided to try it with Christmas fabrics in my stash. It is based on the Fibonacci number sequence of 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13... You add the previous two numbers to get the next number. Apparently this number sequence shows up in nature a lot.

For this challenge, you first have to start with a 12" (finished size) block of your choosing. I love using a star motif in Christmas quilts, so I thought the Rising Star would be an appropriate center block. For the inner star, I used a gold scroll fabric and the outer star is a beautiful green Bali. The background is a light cream tone-on-tone that doesn't show up real well in the photo.

One of the requirements for the challenge is to buy at least one yard of their "challenge fabric." There were three neutrals you could choose from. The other two choices were a bit too Civil War-ish for me, so I went with this cream and tan Moda Marbles fabric. It's a bit darker than I would have chosen, but I guess that's part of the fun of a challenge, right?

So, each month you go to the store and get your directions for the month. We will be adding a border each month to make a medallion-style quilt. If you bring in your progress from the previous month, your directions are free. If you do not have any progress, you have to pay $3.00 for that month's directions. Hopefully this money incentive will keep me on track. 

For January's border, you need to make a 4" border using only rectangles (squares are allowed in the corners if necessary). You have to use some of the challenge fabric, plus at least one fabric from the center block, plus add at least one fabric color. I will be adding red.

I stayed up later than I should have last night, sketching out different border possibilities. I think I'm going to go with the one on the left side of this photo. I was inspired by one of the quilts that Judy from Patchwork Times made and sent to Alycia for Quilts of Valor. Alycia showed a photo of the quilt at this post. 

I'm planning on making this a "controlled scrappy" with Christmas fabrics. I will probably make the borders my leaders/enders while I finish up my QOV. 

Happy stitching!