Disappearing? Hunter's Star and more SLC

I decided to go ahead and put the borders on my Hunter's Star block even though I am not sure if I will make a table topper or a pillow or maybe something else.

It sure doesn't look like a Hunter's Star anymore. Maybe it never did; the pattern shows up better when there are more blocks. I still like it because I like the fabrics in it.

I got up this morning and took a shower and got dressed before I started working. I often start working in my pajamas but I  wanted to put all my Spiral Log Cabin blocks up on the wall and I had to stand on a ladder to reach the top row. I figured if I fell and hurt myself I wanted at least to be clean and dressed.

I finished putting the  blocks together for the body of the quilt. Now I have to decide on a border. Maybe piano keys or maybe just a plain floral fabric. I have 2 fabrics that I could use or maybe I could (gasp) buy something for the border. I put it together in 4 block sections alternating dark strips on the outside with light strips on the outside for each 4 block section.  Jack asked if it is a Gigi quilt. He sees G's in the spiral blocks.

BTW I didn't fall and I was only on the second step which is about  20 inches from the floor. I did get back up on the ladder so I could put the top up on the wall again after I sewed it together. It is the only way I can get a picture. I didn't fall then either.

I am going to think about it for a while and work on finishing some other things. It looks nice on the wall and it will help me decide what to do.

Still more SLC

I have 16 more finished blocks since my last post. I had to do a lot of ripping and re sewing  because I put some strips in on the wrong side and didn't notice it right away. That happened when I decided that I could work on 8 blocks at a time in groups of 4 working with different size strips in each set of 4, do the laundry and start dinner. I really do know better than to take multitasking to that level. Now I am back to 4 blocks at a time and nothing else! I need to remember that when things are going along well it is because I am doing things in the way that I know works best for me.
I have 8 more blocks to go and I am focusing on getting a good balance of color. I seemed to be  getting a little  heavy on blue.


Option 2



I have been playing a little with the layout too. I wondered how it would look with 4 blocks that are dark on 3 outside strips next to 4 blocks that are light on 3 outside strips so that the dark and light strips would frame the sets of four blocks and make a subtle secondary  checkerboard patternbackground in the background, (option 2). Then I thought about how it might look if I made the sets of 4 blocks from blocks of the same color family,( option 3). Option 3 doesn't show up exactly how it would look because I do not have enough of the right kind of blocks  in any of the color families to do it this way. I think I like option 3 best but, this time. I  think I will go with option 2.  



Option 3



However....since I pulled a bunch of my carefully placed and oriented blocks off the wall to experiment I might as well go ahead and experiment with an on point setting too.

I think this is how a series is born. I can't make up my mind so I might as well make them all. Right??



More Spiral LC

I spent a lot of time today trying to get  my computer to boot up. This has been an on and off problem since I bought it last fall, starting when it was a month from the purchase date. I fiddled around with it before we went to church and again when we came back. It is up and running again but I never feel confident when I shut it down that it will start again. I have everything I care about backed up just in case. 
So.. I only finished 4 blocks again today even though I had a head start by adding the first set of 2 1/2 inch logs to all the starters. I did add 3 1/2 inch logs to 4 more but then we  went  to the computer store and then out to Chagrin Falls for one of "Dave's Atomic Subs" which we ate outside sitting in the park by the Chagrin Falls. It was nice and breezy and it was good to get out for a while. When we came back  home I finished a book I  was reading and then finished just the 4 blocks. I will have a head start again tomorrow. 

After I made the first few blocks I decided that the ones I like the best a the ones that are pretty much in one color family or at least every dark log having some relationship to the  other dark logs. Most of these strips are from the color wash scraps and so there are a lot of multicolor fabrics.

  Here are the 24 blocks I have finished, that is halfway there. As I put them up on the wall I am taking care to arrange them in the correct orientation and putting each block where I think it looks best color wise. If I go with this setting I won't have to arrange them when I am finished with the blocks. This is the easy setting. I have been playing with a couple of different settings in EQ7 and they would require a bit more thinking, not to mention that I would have to take these all off the wall the put them  back up and make setting triangles as well. Right now I am tired and sleepy and that seems like a lot of work. At 4 blocks a day I won't have  to worry about the setting for at least 6 more days. Maybe after I think about it in my sleep for a day or six I will know exactly what to do.  That does happen!

More spiral log cabin

Yesterday I made 4 more Spiral Log Cabin blocks. Last night I cut some more strips so I would have more variety. I said I would not agonize over every log that I add but I do make some choices.

This morning I started out to make 4 more blocks and ended up adding a 2 1/2 inch log to all the rest of the starters (32). This is the most boring part for me so I decided to get it over with. Here they are, still all strung together from chain piecing. You can probably see that there is a little overhang on the ends. I confess that when I cut the logs the size I need, I cut 1/8 to 1/4 inch longer to allow for error. I square up after every addition anyway so why not make it easy for me. I know there are people who cut everything exact and it works out perfectly for them. That is not me. I decided long ago that always leaving a little room for squaring up makes my work easier in the end. This way I never have to figure out how I have to "fudge it" to make it fit. I like wonky but only when I want it to be wonky. Even with wonky eventually the blocks have to be squared up and sized to fit together.

So..... here they are, all 32 of them, all squared up to 2 1/2 inches and ready for the next log. I think I will go back to working on 4 at a time because I like to finish a few as I go along and put them up on the wall. 

My tray of strips is still nice and neat and my space is set up for sewing, cutting and pressing without everything piled up on my tables; Maybe for a change I can keep it reasonable clear of clutter till I finish these blocks. We'll see!

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Cutting strips

I spent hours yesterday cutting my 1/12 inch strips to the correct length. I took a few breaks, to fix dinner, answer email, a trip to the store, a trip to the arboretum, but it seemed like I was working at it all day and evening. I am glad that I did it because I can put the boxes away and clean up a little before I start sewing the blocks. Having the strips cut to size certainly beats working with the long strips and then trimming the excess. After I cut all  the strips I put them on a tray and this is what I have to work from.

I know I can keep it neat because I will only work on 4 blocks at a time and I will take the top 4 strips for the round on which I am working. If you walked into my sewing room you would wonder "what is all this talk about neatness" but every once in a while I hit on a plan that works and I know this worked for the chevron braid so I am sure it will work for this.



I needed to make a bunch of Log Cabin  starters and I wanted them to be all  mostly different. That is kind of a pain in the neck........ but wait.......in the box that had 1 1/2 inch  strips I had a bunch of strips with 1 1/2 inch squares sewed on the ends. I was going to cut the squares off and use the strips but I set them aside with the thought that I maybe I would use them again. When I was cleaning off the table it dawned on me that I could cut my starter pieces from the strips.  No matter that I did not  immediately see that I could use these strips in this way as  soon as I saw them. In the end who will know it was not brilliant planning?



Starters


Sometimes things work out just right!

Spiral Log Cabin Blocks

 The Block of the Month was the log cabin block for our group at church in July. I never did make

mine and then I saw a tutorial for a Spiral Log cabin block on Love Laugh Quilt.  I made 4 blocks yesterday and 4 more today. I might as well make a few while I have the 11/2 inch strip boxes down from the closet shelf. Right?  Hmmm I really have a lot of old strips cut and I would like to use them up. So...... I think I have the start of a quilt, not what I expected to be doing but I like to be spontaneous. The truth is that when I don't know what I want to do about something I am working on I start to straighten things up in my sewing room and that frequently leads to doing something with what I have on my shelves.

Here are my 8 blocks set 2 ways. I am not sure which setting I will use but I won't have to worry about that for a while. Not matter how you make them, Log Cabin blocks take time. I was a little quicker today because I took the time to cut my long strips to the sizes I need. It is a pretty easy block and Beth's tutorial is good but I can see that there is a lot of opportunity for me to get strips in the wrong place and blocks in the wrong rotation when I lay it all out.
 I will work on 4 blocks at a  time and I will not agonize over what strip to use for every log. The emphasis here is for me because I tend to get caught up in the need to make it perfect. I never achieve perfect but when it is all done I often think I got it just right.

I have a Quilt

My flimsy is no more; it is a quilt.

I have been busy working on this all week. It was too big to layer up on one table and very cumbersome to move everything and set up 2 tables so I did what I used to do and pinned the backing to the carpeting in the living room and layered it up there. It has been 2 years since the last time I crawled around on the floor pinning a quilt but I thought it was worth a try. I thought I would not be able to move the next day but all that working out at the Y has paid off.  I was stiff and rather uncomfortable in pain after I finished but the next day I didn't feel  it at all.

I did not quilt this the way I intended. I planned some rather fancy (for me) free motion quilting but after spending a whole day picking out little  tiny piled up stitches on one small area I adjusted my thinking. It is all done with the walking foot. some of it is in the ditch and other places across the  blocks or along masking tape to mark straight lines. I am not up to free motion quilting on a large piece. I convinced myself I could do it after quilting some small pieces but I was kidding myself. My thinking about this has always been to stick with what I can do well but I have seen what some of my friends have been doing and I thought that I could do it too if I was patient and careful and took my time. Not so!

Anyway....... I like it; it is bright and cheerful and I used up a lot of scraps and learned a few things  along the way.

I needed to buy a backing fabric and I stopped at Joann's (with my coupon) on my way to the quilt shop. This is what I found. The pattern is just right for this quilt and it has a nice hand. It is not  flimsy or coarse and washed and ironed nicely. I think it will play well with other bright fabrics. I have a nice 86 x 22 piece left over to play with.

This is the corner block  I used to replace the one I cut off. After I removed the other block I couldn't find the wide strip of the  dotty fabric I need to fix it so I just made a new block. Of course, I found the fabric just as soon as I finished the new block.

I still need to sew the binding down on the back and I will do it by hand because I like the way it looks and I am not in any hurry. Maybe I will have some girlfriends over to do some handwork and visit. Sounds good?

Flimsy

I have a Flimsy, I love that term. Calling it a Flimsy makes it sound like I have something finished, and so it is, the top is finished. Saying the top is finished indicates that there is more to do and of course that is true but I like the idea of having reached a completed stage of the project. I frequently become impatient with people who get hung up on rhetoric over things that don't really matter. Sooooooo...... if you feel the way I do over what to call things just ignore the above statement. 

Here it is! I like it!

Here are two of the corners.

I think I will fix the one on the left.  I had to  retrofit the corner blocks because I  sewed  the pieced borders to the inner border strip before I sewed it to the quilt. That seemed to me the best way to handle what might be stretchy borders. For some reason instead of removing the light pink strip I trimmed the corner block. I will only have to take out four 6 inch seams and replace the narrow dotty pink strip with a wide strip on the left side of the block. I would probably leave it if that light pink floral didn't bother me it is  OK in other places but right there it stands out like a sore thumb. The lesson here is "if the hour is late and you are tired and find a mistake, QUIT and fix it tomorrow because if you fix it right away you will probably fix it again tomorrow anyway".