And another wonky four patch bordered

This one uses a cute print with monkeys on green, to pick up all the green in the blocks.

More bordered wonky four patches

Same border fabric as the previous top. Two down, two to go.

Hawaiian Update

In addition to finishing up a project I can't show yet (the corner of the back of which is just peeking into this top photo), I actually found time today to work on some more of my Hawaiian shirt blocks. I'm not done stitching yet (or even, indeed, cutting) but it's getting closer.  And this little tiny pile of Hawaiian shirts at the front (right hand pile with the bright colours on top) is all that's left of my stash of shirt fabric. Except what's in my scrap basket/strip bag/scrap square drawers, of course.

Here's what's heading for the scrap piles today...

Bordering those wonky four patches

A little while back I managed to put together all the wonky four patch blocks into tops; here's one with a border on it.  The others will have to wait!

ATC Friday - Black Birds In

Three cards I received from a swap I played in - one where the recipient chooses the theme - my chosen theme was, not surprisingly, black birds.  Three great - and very different - cards received.

Block Set update

I haven't recently shared my block set collection - not since I added the little scrappy blocks and made the green and white blocks into tops - so here it is again. These are all the block sets I have waiting to be assembled. As is so often the case, some are removed, but others are added!

Cross Stitch Update

Finished this up (and the colour is much truer in the photo above, which is nice).

And worked a little on this - not much, but I did finish the flower... Back to the thirteen colonies this week, hopefully I will get more done on it, though it's a busy week again, with lots of extra things thrown in...

Sandown III

And finally, the rest of my haul - these nautical and beachy fabrics were calling my name - not sure what I will do with these but I will actually keep them out on my work station as a group (might go through stash to see if anything else works with them) and plan to do something with them this summer. 

And these were some "just because" purchases - a charm pack, a couple of metres of fabric I liked (which actually were a good bargain as well), some funky half metre pieces which were less of a bargain, and a set of 15 coordinating fat eights - again, these will probably go to a single project, at least to start with, rather than get integrated into the stash generally...

Sandown II

I used to take loads of photos of quilts at shows -and I still take some - but I'm never too sure about posting them, with copyright issues and all; mostly they are just for my reference anyway - ideas I will probably never make, but you never know...  But instead, I'll show what I bought - these are all quilt backs bought at cheap(ish) prices - £4/metre (one at £5). Three of them are for specific pieces which I've scheduled longarm time for, the other is for stash...

And these are 4 different 1 metre pieces - again at bargain prices - suitable for fun borders for Linus quilts. 

And here are all the bargain FQs I bought (one piece is a half metre but it was in a bargain box, too). They were all good value, but the best bargain was the stack of 10 novelty FQs at the back for a tenner. Lots of fun stuff to play with when I'm in the mood for Linus scrap quilts!  And some stuff for general stash as well. 

There's a bit more - fabrics which weren't bargains per se, but which I just liked - but that's for tomorrow.  It may seem a lot, but I do only hit one or two shows/shops per year most years (and this past year I didn't even get to my favourite bargain fabric experience...)

Sandown I

Lots of stuff to show from my day at Sandown, so I'm going to spread it out over a few days. I had a lovely time browsing the quilts on display and shopping and chatting with some friends - particularly Meg of New Threads Quilt Shop, who I've known for about 13 years, ever since we were in a Birthday Block Swap together and Benta, who I've not until now met up with in person, but with whom I've been in bloggy contact for several years...  I had a great time chatting (a lot of it about university, especially with Meg, who has put 5 kids through uni, some of them through several degrees, so has a lot of experience with it all) and browsing and what not and look what the lovely Benta brought me...

Awesome!  Thanks again :)

String Squares

Another set of blocks assembled into at least the centre of a top. Time for a block set stash update soon... But tomorrow, a loot report (I'm going to Sandown Quilt Show and will be buying lots - because I haven't been to a show or a quilt shop since last August and I deserve to!)...

Birds in...

One of the PAT (Pick -a-Theme) swaps I did recently, I asked for APCs with birds on them from others and here are the ones I got in return.  My bird deck is nearly complete - once it's done, I'll show the whole thing!

Green and White Scrappy II

And this is what I did with the rest of those blocks - again, not sure it really works all that well - the whtie (which is really cream) is a bit stark - but hopefully it will tone down when some border fabric is on it!

Cross Stitch Update

I probably should have finished this already, but I keep doing stuff other than stitching - what am I like?

Green and White Scrappy Top I

Kind of an odd top, with some odd sized blocks bordered in green and white - the broders are different widths because the interior blocks were. Not sure it works, though I think it will look better with a border, in the fullness of time.

Crumb Squares

Here they are - all stitched together and cut to 3" (unfinished) squares.  And did it have the desired effect on my scraps? 

This is all that's left in the little drawer which holds the sub-two inch pieces

and here's the scrapbasket/strip bag.  I think we're looking good. Though not for long, I'm sure!

All the little scraps

So, what happens to all those tiny scraps - the ones which are too small to be cut into squares? 

Well, I stitch them together until they ARE large enough to do something with. 

Sometimes I use these bits as enders and leaders and sometimes I just spend some time stitching them together. 

This time around, I mined my strip bag for all the short strips which would be hard to use in other sorts of projects...

...and will make sure to incorporate those into the crumb blocks as well, as they take shape.

The massive (for me) de-scrapping

The scrap basket being full several weeks ago, it was time to embark on a descrapping - or if not precisely de-scrapping, at least a scrap rationalisation.

I do my scraps by size - I start with the bigger pieces and work down, and I do it a little at a time to make it less tedious. First step is to cut squares from anything larger than 6.5" - these 6.5" squares go in an old cigar box, which I haven't photographed, and are good blocks for setting alternately with pieced 6.5" blocks, for example. I don't cut 6" or 5.5" blocks - the rest of my sizes are 5" or smaller. Above, the right hand stack is the 6.5" and the left hand stack is the 5" squares - what's in the basket is what's left after going through for those two sizes.

Next step, 4.5" squares...

Then 4" squares...

Then 3.5" squares (you can see the contents of the basket getting less and less each time)...

Down to 3" squares in the above photo.

Lots of 2.5" squares (two stacks)

...and even more 2" squares (again, two stacks) - as you can see, the basket is empty.  Things smaller than 2" square (but still wider than about an inch - I don't save anything much below 2x1, and sometimes not even those) have their own little drawer.

Here are my scrap drawers - when one of them begins to fill up, then it's time to do some sort of scrappy project!

Postcard Wall Hanging: Early Summer

I'm trying to remember to change the cards in the wallhanging more often, so I can display more of the cards that I own from my many past trades...  This one was done a week or two ago, and has a kind of purple/green theme to it.  I'll probably get out my brighter/sunnier cards for later in the summer if I remember, that is!  Here are some of the cards featured: