Improv Chinese Coins: a finish: "Season of mists ..."

The AHIQ  invitation for the first quarter was to use Chinese coins as the basis of a quilt. They could be developed in any way we wanted as long as Chinese Coins were the starting point.

Ann gave links to some examples, which I found inspiring and which led to some left-over batik jelly roll strips being sewn together, without any definite plan. I then cut free-hand through  the whole thing intending to rotate one piece and then sew them together again. 

As there was an odd number of strips, after rotation the middle one stayed in the middle which didn't look good to me so I turned the pieces back to the original position to insert another strip of batik. Firstly I cut through the panels to make a branching structure. Sewing the inserts in the side panels was tricky: bias strips would have worked better, but I was using 2.5" jelly roll strips, so cutting on the bias was not an option. The vertical insert naturally went in much more easily. 

This was beginning to resemble a tree, or magma rising through the Earth's crust. I settled on a tree,

 with leaves:

The leaves in the photo above are double-sided and I sewed them down with a zig-zag stitch along the central nerve of the leaf. Others are single fabric and machine appliquéd directly onto the background with blanket stitch.

The 3-D effect of the leaves is clearer in this photo

  

Material: 

Top: assorted batik scraps
Wadding: pieced scraps of cotton wadding
Backing: pieced scraps
Thread: background Aurifil 40 wt.; leaves Aurifil 50 wt in colours matching the leaves.

Dimensions: 19" x 16.5"

I'm linking up to

Click on the button to see more improvised Chinese Coins.

Happy sewing

Marly.

From 9-patches to Wonky Stars

Each month Angela at soscrappy gives a colour for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, and this month's colour could be the rainbow itself. It's multi-coloured scraps of fabric in this month's challenge. I've passed on this one, as I have very few multi-coloured fabrics, and they don't qualify as scraps.

Instead I've been trying to catch up on the previous months with purple:

and red:

wonky star blocks.

These started with the nine patches I made in February and March, to which I added more coloured squares and the white wonky stars. My plan is to continue using the colour of the month to make eight more 14" blocks this year. I hope to keep repetition of fabrics within the block to a minimum, but supplies are limited - 48 different fabrics in one colour is asking a lot!

Right after my last post I finished the red scrap basket, which now contains my red scraps.

Pattern from Fiona at Bubz Rugz.
Measurements:
height:  7.75"
base:     7"x 8"

Talking of scraps, which we do every Saturday in the RSC link-up, on 8 April I attended a lecture and a workshop by Jen Kingwell. Yes really, the Australian diva of scraps visited my home town in the little old Netherlands to intoduce a group of some 20 interested ladies from all over The Netherlands to her way of working, and especially to her pattern "Utah".

Most of Jen's quilts are sewn entirely by hand, and the Utah units are no exception: within the units all seams are curves which I've decided are easier done by hand, but I shall be joining the resulting 4" squares by machine!

Jen Kingwell pointing out the details of her quilt "Halo"

The lecture included a guided tour round her quilts which were on display in the exhibition area. Hearing first-hand what the inspiration was and how they all came together was truly inspiring. I am writing a post on the exhibition and my progress with the "Utah" blocks (of which this is an extract) and will publish it in a few days.

I'm linking to

   and  

so pop in there to see more delightful scraps.

Happy sewing

Marly.

Marching through red

March's colour in the RSC was red, and I've been "seeing red" all month without getting angry!

These red nine-patches are from 2" strips, mostly left from Bonnie Hunter's 2015 mystery Aliatare augmented with a few more recent acquisitions. 

Next up are leader and ender hour-glass blocks, also made using 2" strips and cut with the companion angle triangle.

A couple of weeks ago I described the fun I was having making slab blocks using really tiny pieces. Well, here they are again with some larger pieces, layered and quilted ready to be trimmed and then transformed into a scrap basket. 

Not entirely red, but a quilted basket needs contrast, doesn't it? 

I followed a tutorial form Fiona at Bubz Rugz, but while she only took an hour to make hers, I've taken the best part of two weeks and I still haven't finished! Partly because while she appears to have used squares and rectangles, I started with odd shapes. In addition I don't think I've spent more than ten minutes each day at my sewing machine in the last three weeks.

Lastly the Jacob's Ladder blocks have not incresed in the last two weeks; they are as they were in my last post. Thanks to Chantal I now have the correct name though: Hovering Hawk. 

Hovering Hawk

Thank you Chantal! Thank you too to everyone who made a suggestion about the name; you were all pretty close, usually with just a slight difference in the orientation of the small triangles.

Saturday I'll be linking up to

 Click on the button to see more red fun.

Happy sewing

Marly.