Tag Archives: scrappy squares

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Last Monday I flew into Burbank airport for a visit to Camarillo Quilters Association. I was greeted with beautiful spring weather for my visit which included attending their meeting to share my Rules and Options of Planned Improv Piecing lecture and trunk show followed by my Planned Improv: Scrappy Squares workshop the next day.

 

Here’s a glimpse of the back of one of my oldest quilts that shared at the meeting. I think it’s my earliest attempt at Planned Improv. In this case I wanted to make “back art” for this quilt using my scraps from the front of the project. I was probably working with a limited amount of the black on white polka dot fabric, and I decided to insert a band of solid black with bars of bright color from my front. I had remnant strips that were all cut 2 1/2” wide, but they were different lengths. I added solid black to the ends of each strip and staggered them for my final placement.

 

In my Planned Improv: Scrappy Squares workshop, we had a variety of different perspectives on the planned improv technique. Some quilters took inspiration from a shape they saw in one of the quilts during my lecture while others built from their squares (and rectangles) for a unique composition. It was fun to see the variety of colors and sizes these quilters chose to work with. Every time I teach this class I return home with new ideas to try! Here are the slabs in progress by Linda, Kristin, and Barbara.

 

I had a fun day with this group. A great big thanks to all of the Camarillo Quilters Association for having me, and to Laura who was my host for my visit.

You can view my schedule to see where I will be teaching next. If I’m not headed your way, feel free to point your guild program chair to my website. I’m currently booking dates for 2020, with limited availability in late 2019.

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Last week I traveled down to Tehachapi for a visit to the Tehachapi Mountain Quilters. I met the program chairs from the group last April at the SCCQG Meet the Teachers event.

After a long drive, I rolled into town on Sunday evening, ready to join them Monday morning for their guild meeting. My new Island Batik scarf made it's debut since it was the perfect match the my top. I couldn't resist stopping for a quick photo of the beautiful mountain view on my way to the meeting.

I shared my My Quilting Journey lecture with a large pile of my quilts, spanning from my first quilt back in 2002 (I think) to many of my recent Planned Improv and other quilts. This lecture is show and tell of around 25 quilts, sharing my tips and tricks along the way. The quilts you can see hanging are some of my recent Planned Improv pieces: Fandangle Scrappy Squares, Modern Batik, Pantone Ultra Violet All About Angles, and Bold and Brave.

Following the guild meeting I had lunch with a group of the women from the guild and then visited Yvonne. I ended my day with some delicious chicken pasta from Jake's, which was walking distance from my hotel.

On Tuesday I taught Planned Improv: Scrappy Squares. It's so fun how versatile Planned Improv is. Anna work in progress and Angie's first finished slab are shown above. During the workshop I had students making baby quilts, wall quilts, table toppers, and placemats. Part of my Planned Improv workshops is talking about how to iterate on a design and in order to build another unit that looks like it belongs with the first. This is applicable when creating larger sized quilts with multiple slabs, like my Greenery quilt, as well as working in a series to create a set of placemats that aren't identical, but do go together.

Gina used a variety of blue Grunge fabric with soft greys in her background. They she chopped up her finished slab and rearranged the quadrants to create a different composition.

I had a lovely day with this great group of women who all finished one or more slabs. A great big thanks to all of the Tehachapi Mountain Quilters for having me, and to Beve and Nancy, the current program chairs, who took care of me while I was there.

Would you like to have me visit your guild to teach? Point your guild program chair to my teaching page for details about the lectures and workshops I'm currently offering. Check my teaching schedule to see if I'll be in your area.

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My Greenery project was born out of the Pantone Quilt Challenge in 2017 coupled with the Bay Area Modern scrap challenge to utilize squares and rectangles. I finished the quilt top in May 2017, in time to submit to the Just the Top category of the 2017 Pantone Quilt Challenge. I’m so excited to have finally finished this quilt, the original inspiration for Planned Improv: Scrappy Squares which I started teaching in 2017.

This project started with a thumbnail sketch and a pile of scraps. I began by cutting all my Greenery scraps into squares. Purple was added by the advice of my friend, Mel. I worked improvisationally on the design wall with my squares and then "made it work" to piece and fill in with background fabrics (also from the scrap bin) to make my first unit. Then I repeated my process to make related units. I initially thought I would make nine, but felt "done" after 7, which resulted in the chosen layout.

I quilted this one on the longarm at Always Quilting. I started with some echo quilting around my scrappy squares. Then I filled in the background with organic, wavy lines. Lastly, I filled each scrappy square section with a boxy meander. I chose three thread colors, a pale green for the background, darker green for the squares, and purple for the center section. There were many stops and starts between switching colors and needing to advance the quilt on the frame. I'm quite pleased with the result, but it was a bit of "beat the clock" at the end of the afternoon to finish up before the shop closed. I underestimated how much time would be spent changing colors.

I made a scrappy binding and piecing the back with any stash fabric close to the color palette. Overall, it's a very scrappy quilt. It finished at approximately 61" x 66".

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