Tag Archives: finished quilt

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During my Summer 100 Day Project to make Improv Log Cabin mini quilts I stumbled upon the idea to made a spiral in my log cabin.

This log cabin was precisely pieced. I sketched on graph paper to make my plan. Then got to work.

I decided to combine my spiral plan with orange scrappy slab. (I think I had a piece of orange scrappy slab started that I was able to build on to).

First think was to cut up my scrappy slab. I used 2 1/2" strips, trimmed down to size for each log.

My palette was limited to orange, black, and white, and I chose a black on black print for my contrasting spiral. These strips were cut 1 1/2" wide.

When piecing scrappy slab to neighboring fabric, sometimes it is unreasonable to press seams open given the bulk of the seam. These two photos show one area where the tiny strip of light orange will disappear in the seam, creating bulk.

And this shows where the tiny strip of orange and white print will be visible on the front, but required I press the seam to one side. You can see this super skinny strip of mostly white fabric vertically in the photo below, just inside the left most vertical strip of black near the upper corner. One of my favorite parts of piecing with scrappy slab is where these tiny slivers of fabric show.

Tada! Quilt top.

I used my favorite filler, a zig zag meander (which I also used in my red Improv Log Cabin), combined with echo quilting in the black logs. I actually spiraled in and then out all in one trip. Then I bound it in my solid Black Kona.

My quilt finished at 16 1/2" x 16 1/2".

You can read all about the other quilts in the series here:

 

This is day 7 of the 31-Day Blog Writing Challenge with Cheryl.

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There's a sentiment about how a first child's experience is different than a second child's. (We could talk about how my 8 year old doesn't have a baby book yet.) Apparently the same goes for niece and nephew. Within a couple months of my nephew's birth, he had a baby quilt. However, my niece just received her "baby" quilt for her 2nd birthday.

I started out with a different plan for her. My nephew's quilt had been inspired by the mural in his room and I wanted to do the same for her. But her African safari wall left me feeling like I "should" do appliqué... and I don't particularly enjoy the process of appliqué. Eventually I pivoted to focusing on the main color of her room, purple, a favorite of mine. I have a lot of purple scraps and I have been building purple scrappy slabs to piece for Jillian's quilt for over two years!

In recent weeks (months?) the quilt top has been my backdrop while I'm on zoom. I love reminiscing about the previous purple projects these scraps have come from. (There's a section in the upper right that's from my Ultra Violet All About Angles quilt.)

I'm really deadline driven. As Gretchen Rubin says, "things that can be done any time are often done at no time." And that really resonates with me for quilts that don't have a deadline. A challenge or quilt show submission deadline is really motivating for me. Quilt alongs and 100 day projects help, too. But "I'm making this for someone" doesn't usually have a deadline. As we approached her 2nd birthday, I decided this needed to be my hard deadline. I could hardly still call this a "baby" quilt, but at least it is sizable enough to be a good cuddle quilt for years to come.

I opted for simple walking foot quilting in organic vertical and horizontal lines. I didn't concern myself with perfection or equal spacing.

Then I added a little free motion elephant as a nod to her room. (Shh. I also have an elephant quilt in progress for her.)

My binding is more scrappy fabric. I usually opt for a bias binding, but this one was straight grain pieces, since I wanted to use scraps. I attached the binding by machine.

One of my favorite features of the quilt is the color blocked backing. I chose these fabrics to emulate the mural on Jillian's wall.

I packaged it up and mailed it in early November. We connected on FaceTime so I could see her open her gift. She was delighted.

After her initial appreciation, she just had to run into her bedroom and spread it out on the floor. I'm glad she's enjoying all the details.

The quilt is approximately 43" x 50".

The label reads:

For Jilly
handmade by Auntie Sarah
October 2020

 

 

Creating a Scrappy Slab is a workshop I currently offer (virtually) to guilds.

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I'm still playing catch up on showing you my finished improv log cabin mini quilts from my last 100 day project. You can see my green and yellow quilts in previous posts. Today, I'm sharing my red version! My main rules were to use black, white, and one color, and that my finished quilt would be 16 1/2" square, bound in black Kona.

In my red quilt, I chose to start with a traditional quilt block in the center of the log cabin. The sawtooth start block is one of my favorites, so I started with that. Since my mini quilts finish at 16 1/2" square I made a 6" star block for my center.

Initially I thought my logs would be wonky to surround the block (another variation to try later!), but I think the busyness of the print fabrics steered me away from that idea. In the end I have uniform 1" finished, rectangular logs. My log placement worked counterclockwise around the block.

I had fun with the quilting. I started with three colors of thread in three weights, Aurifil Red (#2250), Black (#2692), and White (#2024) in 50wt, 40wt, and 28wt. (Thanks Mel for the loan of a few spools I was missing!) I didn't have an overall plan. I just knew that I wanted to use a variety of color and thread weight. I started with a favorite filler, a zig zag meander, in the center of my star. Then I echoed the outer edge of the star. I switched threads and weights for each step. It adds a lot of time to the process, but I think the effect is worth it.

Here's an early view of the back of the quilt. This bowling pin print has been hanging out with my black and white prints, but it isn't quilt a black and white print, so it has been passed over many times. But it was perfect to back this quilt!

I filled in between my straight lines (which were free motion quilted, too) with wavy and zigzag lines of quilting. For the zigzag quilting I used washy tape to mark the lines where I needed to switch directions to help achieve a mirror image at the bends in my path.

After more echo lines of quilting, I filled in the corners and edges with zig zag meander in white. I used my usual machine binding technique with solid black Kona, but I opened to do the top stitching with 28wt red thread. I love this added detail.

My finished quilt is 16 1/2" x 16 1/2". I really enjoy how the different colors of quilting show up more or less on different portions of the quilt. For instance, the white thread really pops on the black solid, but fades into most of the print fabrics.

Thanks for visiting!

You can read all about the other quilts in the series here:

 

I've linked up to Brag About Your Beauties!