Quiltpiecer

This is my second year participating in the Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) and I'm off to a late start LOL!  Red is the color of the month for January.  And, because I can't decide which quilt I want to make, I decided I'd make all three. When I saw this quilt by Sew Preeti Quilts , I knew I wanted to make it for RSC 2022.  The block is called Picket Star and Preeti provides a free tutorial to make the 17-inch block.  It's a little challenging to get the corners of the center square  to  precisely line up but I love this quilt. I found this quilt when I was surfing the web looking for a pattern for my RSC 2022 quilt.  This quilt is Falling Stars by The Academic Quilter.  It is made with the Red Cross block, and she provides a tutorial to make this block in 3 sizes.  It's not a difficult block to make but you do have to pay attention to the placement of the units.  I made only the 4 blocks but had to unsew and resew two of them 😂. And ...

I'm linking up at Cheryl Brickey's blog, Meadow Mist Designs for the Best of 2021 Linky Party .  Here are my five personal favorite quilt finishes this year: 1. Chains of Love - finished 7/26/21 2. Simple Hearts Wall Hanging - finished 7/29/21 3. Grassy Creek (a Bonnie Hunter mystery) - finished 11/26/21 4. Millennium Charm Swap Quilt - finished 12/8/21 5. Dandy Star Stash Buster Quilt - finished 12/17/21 I didn't finish very many quilts this year so it wasn't too hard to pick my favorites.  I also pieced a few quilt tops and finished a few wall hangings and donation quilts.  I am quilting one more top that has been stored for 10 years ... yikes!  Check back on Friday 12/31 for the last weekly finish of 2021. Until next time ...  Be happy and keep on quilting! Follow my blog with Bloglovin

Once I finished sewing all the Y2K blocks, I went to work on my Unity quilt.  I posted about the Pinwheel Star blocks a couple weeks ago and they have now been added to the top.  I still have a few more rounds to go, including flying geese, more pinwheels, and more stars.  Seeing as we are already in December, I'm pretty sure I won't be finishing this top before the end of the year. The picture above shows my Y2K blocks in a 7x7 layout (unsewn), using 49 blocks on the front.  The 50th block will be on the back.  Since I received duplicate charms in the swap, my Y2K quilt is not a true charm quilt but it still has 2,000 pieces to make it a Y2K quilt.   With only 5 weeks left in the year, I hope I can finish quilting this top plus my Coriander Christmas and Handy Dandy Stashbuster tops. If you'd like to see more quilting goodness and see what others are up to, please visit the following which I'm linking up to:   Oh Scrap! @ Quilting Is ...

  Progress continues on my Y2K quilt with four more blocks. The charms in the top 2 blocks are from Marlene F. in Hong Kong: ...I am just an ordinary everyday person.  I have traveled to parts of Europe and Asia.  My birthplace is Scotland, and I'm an Australian national temporarily living in Hong Kong.  My hobbies include quilting. The bottom 2 blocks are from Shirley B. in Texas.  She did not include a siggy square but did include her bio: ...I have lived here [a small town in Texas] for the last 15 years...I started quilting about 19 years ago while I was in Germany.  There was a family who lived down the street and she did a lot of this and I learned a little from her.  I liked the way the material goes together and forms different designs.  So, I ventured out a little and decided to start making my own designs.  It has been wonderful...A Quilter from Texas And I continue to work on my Unity quilt.  These star blocks are for the 3rd ...

Again, neither swapper included a biography but the top two blocks are from Althea F. in New York and the bottom two are from Marge B. in Wisconsin. Blocks #21 through #24 completed and I'm halfway done ...yea!   And, I'm also happy to say that I found the name of my Y2K block:  "Wedding Rings". After searching Google and my collection of half a dozen  books on quilt blocks, I found it in both the  1001 Patchwork Designs (1982)  and the 5500 Quilt Block Designs .   And, now that I had a name, I went back to Google and found two sites that offer free patterns.  Just click on the picture to link to each site.   Fabric 406.com Scissortail Quilting If you'd like to see more quilting goodness and see what others are up to, please visit the following which I'm linking up to:   Monday Making  @ Love Laugh Quilt Design Wall Monday  @ Small Quilts and Doll Quilts Oh Scrap!  @ Quilting is More Fun Than Housework Until...

I'm still chugging along on my Y2K quilt.  I'm not sure what happened to these next two charm sets.  The top squishy set had two signature charms but no bio.  The bottom set didn't have a signature charm but did have a bio.  It just happened that I had an extra loose siggy square so I added it to one of the blocks.  I've kept all the squishy sets in a plastic bin which was put away for the past 20 years so who knows what happened here. Top two signature squares from Darla Hamilton in California and Greg Hamilton in Canada.  I think I can safely assume Darla and Greg are related and perhaps they were nice enough to send the 2nd siggy from Canada since international siggy squares were sought after. The bottom siggy square is from Beth M. also in Canada.  This little square was floating around the bin, footloose and fancy-free.  It could have been part of the 2nd or 3rd quilt I made and it somehow found its way to this bin. The charms in the bottom t...

  Last week, I posted about my oldest work-in-progress project: my final Y2K quilt.  And, this past weekend I was able to finish four blocks from two more squishies.   From Barbara Y. in Pennsylvania: ...I was born in...a small coal-mining town and both my father and my grandfather worked in the coal mines...My hubby and I were foster parents to 47 children over a period of 14 years...I learned to quilt from books and thank goodness for TV and computers...My first quilt consisted of 2 flat sheets and batting.  I drew my design on the sheet and just hand quilted along the lines...Recently I discovered Foundation paper piecing and a new world opened.  We never stop learning. From Shellie G. in Oregon: ...I have lived in Oregon, Washington, California, Kentucky, and Germany...My husband and I...adopted our daughter Emma almost two years ago from China...We hope to travel to Vietnam...to adopt a sister for Emma...I am in the process of starting an online busin...

  It was sometime last year that I stumbled upon Sew Pretti's International Sister Quilt  and immediately fell in love with it! Sew Preeti first came across the African Queen block in 2017 but couldn't find a pattern or tutorial so she drafted this one, which she named International Sister. I am thrilled and thankful that she so generously provided the  free instructions  for this cute block.   When I found Sew Preeti's quilt, I also stumbled upon these instructions which I believe were a document from The Quilting Board but are no longer available.  I found out the hard way they were not accurate so I made the corrections in red. I definitely wanted to make a quilt with this block and included it as one of my 2021 quilting goals.  These are the first 3 blocks I made as samples using both patterns.  The 10.5" block is made with Sew Preeti's instructions and the 10" block is made with the Quilting Board instructions which use a small...

  Here are my first 30 blocks out of the 52 I need to meet the Stashbuster Challenge.  That's 30 blocks for 30 weeks which means I am caught up.  Ok, it's really my own personal challenge to be caught up but I have enjoyed making these blocks.  I use my Accuquilt GO cutter which makes the process easier and faster. I plan to make 56 blocks for a 7 x 8 setting and plan to make 2 blocks a week, more or less.  I hope to have the top finished by end of October and the quilt finished by Thanksgiving. The block is the Dandy Star.  There are so many color combinations and settings you can do with this block. I especially like the green one pictured above and am already thinking of making a similar one.  The FB group  for this challenge is private; and with over 10K members, there are so many beautiful quilts.  Here are a few of my favorites. If you'd like to see more quilting goodness and see what others are up to, please visit the followi...

I made these heart blocks way back in February using the Simple Hearts free pattern by Cluck Cluck Sew after seeing this quilt by Sharon Holland which she made last year when she hosted  a  heart quilt along  using this pattern. I fell in love with the fabric she used, which is the Foresta Fusion collection by Art Gallery Fabrics.   I wanted to make something similar using fabrics from my stash and ended up with these 16 heart blocks.  Once I made the blocks, I put them on the back burner to focus on our landscaping project -- and then completely forgot about them. Now, five months later, I remembered I had these blocks and wanted to finish the quilt - except I couldn't find them.  I looked here and there but could not remember where I put them, then voila!  There they were, sitting on my fabric shelf, nicely wrapped in the backing fabric.  Yea! The top is now put together and waiting to be quilted. I still would like to use the Foresta Fusi...