String Blocks

I have been working on some 5-1/2" string pieced blocks, using papers cut from an old telephone book.  I threw some of them on my design wall and here's a picture of the sampling.  Making them is a little addictive and I ended up with 80 before I had any idea what I was going to do with them.  But I pulled some ideas from a couple different patterns and have a plan.  More to follow on that later.

Lil' Twister Quilt Top

Finally got back to my Lil' Twister and decided that  nine blocks were enough.  I added same-color sashing to the block borders to give all those bias edges a little more stability.  The small squares in the pieced border came from unused fabric in the charm squares from which the Lil' Twister blocks were cut. These had bias edges also and had to be carefully sewn together and added to the quilt top edges.  Needless to say, I did a LOT of pinning, but I kept all those bias edges from getting "out of hand" and am quite pleased with the result.  By adding a 6" outside border, this top finished up as a full size.

Jane's Strings

Finally finished quilting my sister's string quilt.  She sewed her strings to fabric squares rather than paper and was concerned that it was going to be too heavy after quilting.  But I used a very thin Quilters' Dream Request polyester batting and the finished quilt had a really nice feel/weight.  She had also chosen a large design quilting pattern called Curly Q that was mostly large swirls.

The quilt still on my quilting table.... 

 



The quilt on my guest bed

 

 

She was pleased with the way it turned out.  She was visiting this weekend from Hickory, North Carolina, and I finished it just in time for her to take home with her. Yea!!

 

I still have to add a border to my Easy Street and still have my Lil' Twister block project going.  Oh what to do next??  

 

Easy Street - Mystery Solved

Finished my Easy Street except for a border.  Haven't decided on that yet.  Using the colors that I did, it's difficult to see Bonnie's pattern .....but I LOVE my colors and the design of my finished top.

Easy Street - Rapid Fire Finish

Here are the two triangles Bonnie had us put together today with some of the segments we've previously pieced......12 of the large and 4 of the small.  But that still leaves us with LOTS of other pieces that have to go somewhere.  The FINAL part is coming tomorrow - New Year's Day!!  Yea.......the mystery is almost solved!!

Okay.......got the Final Part on New Year's Day........here are the two blocks we are now assembling to go with the setting triangles we pieced yesterday for the final layout of the quilt top.  Will post my completed top in a few days........be on the lookout!!!

 

 



Scraps and Strings

I have been motivated by doing the small pieces in the Easy Street mystery to get my scraps organized.  I spent all day yesterday cutting up my larger scraps into 2" strips.  I have always saved "strings" so I pulled those out, sorted through them and pulled out all that were at least 2" or more and added them to my 2" strip stash.  So now I am ready to try one of Bonnie's free patterns, or one of her free blocks from the Quiltmaker magazine that uses a lot of 2" strips..........but not until I am finished with Easy Street!

Strings

And I plan to start making string pieced blocks as soon as my paper cutter arrives and I get the phone book cut up into squares.

Easy Street - Part 6

 

Okay........I'm ready for Bonnie's "rapid fire finish."   Here are samples of my black and white Double Bricks and my red (rather than green) quarter-square triangles from the 5-1/2" squares.  Can hardly wait until Monday for Part 7.