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.

RSC 2016 finished top and a start on RSC 2017

Each month Angela gives a colour and worldwide lots of quilters start sewing their scraps in that colour. February's colour is teal/aqua. I wonder what next month's colour will be.

I finished the Bears Paws blocks and have started on some nine-patches in aqua/turquoise/teal

and in purple (January's colour):

Most effort this week, however, went into putting my blocks from last year's challenge together. I decided last week to add "frames" rather than sashing, and give the blocks a frame of in total 6" if you add left and right together: 4" on one side and 2" on the opposite side, or 3"on both sides.

Thus each block went from 14" square to 20.75" square. I changed the relative positions of the wide and narrow pieces in each block. I had intended to put those larger blocks together randomly, but was afraid the empty spaces would become too unevenly distributed. So began my planning headache! The only constant is in the corners; a two inch frame in the corner to help define the whole as a square and hopefully to prevent the appearance of sagging. (I wish that was always so easy!)

Now I have to think of a name. Hmm ... Rainbow Bears?, ... Multi-coloured Bears?, ... Bears in the Paint pot? Any ideas?

I'm linking up this week to: 

                            

Click on the buttons to see more from scraps and a lot of finishes.

Happy sewing

Marly

Lime 9-patches for RSC15

For November's colour at the RSC Angela at Soscrappy posted the colour lime green. I'd finished my lime sawtooth sampler blocks and showed them last week, but I still have some lime blocks to show.

While making the lime blocks, I used the remaining small scraps as Leaders and Enders and made 3.5" 9-patches.

lime green 9-patches

But first I had made some more from October's aqua scraps

aqua 9-patches

I still have no idea what these will become as they are very small, finishing at 3" square, but I'll just keep going next year, and see what I come up with.

This week I've done nothing to my rainbow quilt. I started quilting my modern maples and will have to finish that before returning my machine to piecing mode!.

I shall be linking up with 

so hop over there for some more rainbow splendour. 

Happy sewing

Marly.

Browned off! RSC 15 October

I'm not really browned off, but brown is finished!

For October in the 2015 edition of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge Angela at Soscrappy chose brown.

3" 9-patch blocks - leaders and enders

This was all the brown fabric I had; definitely not enough to make a 12" sawtooth star block. Instead of brown I used lavender and purple for the October sampler blocks (I showed them before)

During this past week I remade my January blocks:

in aqua.
I started putting the row together before I thought to photograph them; here they are with the adjacent alternate blocks

They are the last two blocks on the ends of the third row, next to the light blue.

Then I had some more 3" 9-patch blocks, made as leaders and enders with the smallest remaining pieces of aqua.

That was all the sewing I had time for this week: I've been busy at work, and it's been like a mad-house here at home too!

I shall be linking up with socrappy for the

 Click on the badge for real chocolate and espresso blocks there.

Happy sewing

Marly.

Brown October for RSC 15, and other colours

For this month's colour on the rainbow Scrap Challenge at Soscrappy Angela chose brown. I have practically no brown, and certainly not enough for a sampler block, or two. So ...

these are all my brown blocks to date!

Two 9-patches, 3"square

and here is the top row of my sampler quilt

Instead of brown I used lavender. One of the lavender blocks (the one on the left) I had already made in the "purple month", but after a bit of reworking the alternate block I'm calling it lavender and made this month's blocks in purple and lavender:

Kick in purple and Doris's star in lavender, both set in a sawtooth star.

I think I should have edited the colour balance on these photos, because the purple here is far too blue; the background blue is over-riding the red-purple.

Last week I received a package from Quiltmaker:

Quilty treats.

won in the Back to School quilt draw, and an email from Angela saying that an orange bundle was winging its way to me! And it's not even my birthday! Thank you Angela.

I've made no progress on the "Modern Maples".

Modern maples; pattern by Amanda Woodward-Jennings

After a journey to my LQS this week especially to buy Bella off-white for the backing, I returned with only some Aurifil 12 wt cotton and a book. They had run out of Bella off-white! I didn't have quite enough at home, and not enough light fabric for a patched backing that wouldn't show through onto the front. I think winter will be upon us before my autumn quilt is finished!

I'm using the 12 wt cotton  to hand-quilt my "Drawn Together" mini quilt:

Drawn Together; pattern Sarah Fielke

I must have been feeling rich this week, because I bought two new books: "A Quilter's Mixology" by Angela Pingel and "The Farmer's Wife 1930's Sampler Quilt". I can't think of  two more dissimilar books. The first after I saw Ruth Bourke's beautiful sewing machine cover and I've already fallen for the "Mod Garden Lap Quilt" as well as the "Ornamental Quilt" (Ruth's inspiration), although goodness knows when I'll be able to start making it!

The second book was the one I brought home from the LQS because I've signed up for their Farmer's Wife Club, and I will be following the online groups as well. I'm thinking of making the blocks completely in solids. Is anyone out there making these blocks? What sort of fabrics are you using?

I shall be linking up with 

so pop in over there and see those sampler blocks, and other things, in brown.

Happy Sewing

Marly.

Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2015 - Still basking in an orange glow

This month Angela at Soscrappy is giving sampler blocks to be made in orange for the Rainbow Scrap Sampler quilt. These are 6" sampler blocks, surrounded by a Sawtooth Star, and in the final quilt separated by an Irish Chain type of block echoing the colours of the adjacent Sawtooth Star blocks.

This is the star I made this week:

Twirling 4-patch in a sawtooth star

I also made a few orange 9-patches with my smallest scraps - they finish at 3".

I'm sure I had three, but one must have slipped under the sewing machine cabinet!

This week I shall try to make the third orange star (which Angela posted earlier this week), and the orange and red alternate blocks.

I made little progress in assembling my maple leaves quilt, but I just have to sew one long seam to connect the last two rows. Then I can move onto the quilting.

I'm linking up with

Click on the image to visit more RSC15 sites 

and admire more delicious orangeness.

Happy sewing

Marly.