Quiltville Mystery "On Ringo Lake" part 9

Each year Bonnie Hunter starts a mystery quilt on the Friday after Thanksgiving Day. (Until I started patchwork and following her blog I had no idea when Thanksgiving was!) Anyway, I'm thankful to her for this opportunity to refine my skills as she doesn't just give the pattern, but gives lots of practical cutting and piecing tips along the way.

The last few clues to her Mystery Quilt "On Ringo Lake" came hard and fast over the last weekend of 2017, with the reveal on 1 January. So far I have joined the units to make six blocks and put them up on my design wall with the sections of pieced sashing and one cornerstone (the brown square in the middle of the middle row).

I like the pattern but I'm not really happy with my colour scheme; especially some of my coral-coloured pieces are too dark. I was actually more worried about the brown fabric, and in this photo above it looks as if it's a solid, but there are about nine different brown prints in here.

Even enlarged, and somewhat blurry, the depth of colour doesn't show, but you'll have to believe that there are subtle variations in each piece, with hints of orange and gold.

I set out to make half the number of units and did so in all the clues except the brown geese, of which I still have to make about 20, and the sashings. I've practically run out of aqua fabric, and will need to buy more to complete the quilt.

I'm looking forward to seeing other people's results. I'm always amazed to see the effects of using colours other than Bonnie's. There are always a lot of delightful surprises there.

I am linking up to

Click on the button above to visit the party.

Happy Sewing

Marly.

On Ringo Lake part 4

"On Ringo Lake" is Bonnie Hunter's 2017 Mystery Quilt, now in its fourth week. Clue 4 was posted on Friday, but it was Saturday before I got started. So far I have 56 units made, and a few half made:

I stopped when I ran out of the right-hand wing triangles.

In the past I have found this a very difficult unit, but it's going more easily this time. Vireya has pointed out that Lorna McMahon at https://sewfreshquilts.blogspot.com has a tutorial for making this block .  Anyone having difficulty in finishing with a straight line hypotenuse might find using Lorna's pattern a good idea. You don't need the complete Happy-go-Lucky block obviously, just these triangles. It's best to read both these posts as Vireya gives some hints on using Lorna's pattern in this context.

It's tempting to try to guess the final layout, but that is still a mystery.

I shall be linking up later today to:

 

so click on the button to see more winged triangles, 

and not all aqua and brown!

Happy sewing

Marly.

More bears' paws

Angela at Soscrappy has given us orange as the Rainbow Scrap Challenge colour for April. The month is almost over, and I'm interested in which colour we will be moving on to. In April I have made four orange units and two have already been included in a finished block.

Here's my first bear paw block completed:

I've paired two of the orange units I made this month with the two brown units I made earlier in the year. The bear paw units finish at 6" each and I added a 1" wide sashing within the block. I haven't yet decided on the sashing for between these 13" blocks.

I made two more orange units, and here they are on the design wall, temporarily paired with the two blue units I made earlier. I'm not joining these yet; I'll wait until I have more options.

This week not just my sewing room, but the whole of  The Netherlands will be orange: more orange than usual, that is! It's the King's birthday on Wednesday, and for that we have a public holiday. Many people who follow soccer will know that the Dutch team always wears orange, but for other sports the national teams are also dressed in orange. Orange is the national colour. The national flag however is red, white and blue, but the royal family is the House of Orange, and their heraldic flag has a lot of orange on it. On Wednesday an orange pennant will be added to the flags flown on public and private buildings in honour of the King's birthday.

grandson escaped!

My 9 year old grandson is already wearing an orange, white and blue trainings jacket, and of course our patriotism is being encouraged by commercial interests:

King's day display in the supermarket: orange hats, scarves tee-shirts and tooters, beer in orange tins, cakes which usually have white, or pink or chocolate icing now coloured orange. All at "special" prices!

and if you drink enough Heineken you can buy a King Willem-Alexander tee-shirt!

I hope to have more orange festivity photos later in the week.

I'm linking to :

    

(click on the button for more scrap quilting ideas)

And on Tuesday to 

Free Motion on the River 

(click on button on right side bar)

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.

Fresh Sewing Day and Small Blog Meet

Two weeks ago I had the wild idea that I should make something for Christmas and that I only had two months to get it done. When I saw Any Smart's hourglass block tutorial I had an idea for a Christmas decoration that would be quick (from a charm pack) and simple (one block repeated forty times)!
Here is the top which I did indeed have put together in two days, two weeks ago:

Fabric: "Solstice" by Kate Spain for Moda
Pattern: Amy Smart (minimally adapted.)

"Why is it still only a top?",  you might be asking. Because there was an event in Houston which was so compelling for the ladies who own my LQS that they shut up shop for two weeks to attend; no-one in their right mind crosses the Atlantic for just a couple of days! While I have enough wadding I don't have enough backing fabric, so have been waiting until they open up again next Tuesday morning. I hope to have this finished by next weekend.

While waiting for the shop to reopen I have gone further with my hexagons,

Hexagons

done some catching up on the Rainbow Scrap Challenge,

Rainbow Scrap Challenge 14: October

and made some more letters in the Little Letters Quilt Along at The Temecula Quilt Company,

Little letters

Also in October I made two small table mats for our bedside cabinets from a Martingale freebie pattern:

table mats

Click on the photos to read more about each of these projects.

I'm linking up to Lily's Quilts for both

and

               

so head over there to see what else has been happening in October.


Happy Sewing

Marly.

RSC 14: week 44: October roundup

At the Rainbow Scrap Challenge, hosted by Angela at Soscrappy, October's colours were brown, black and grey. I have a few browns, but very little black and next to no grey! Hence a very brown palette for October.

Here all my brown/black blocks:

October browns, and one black:
top: Sarah's Choice, Cat

middle:Sickle, Maple leaf, Clay's Choice

bottom: Road to Tennessee, Prairie Queen

I still have a couple to make, but my stash didn't have enough contrast to go any further, and I've just seen that November's colour is pale blue, and some eager beaver's have already made pale blue blocks.

I'm linking up to

so hop over there to see what other brown delights have been made last month.


Happy sewing

Marly

RSC 14 week43: Let me introduce you to ...

...Thimble, the nimble cat!

(Remembering TS Eliot's "Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats" my copy of which has mysteriously disappeared.)

Incredibly I enjoyed making this block. I say incredibly because I don't get on with cats: they make me sneeze, and in a room full of people they always make a bee-line for me! Over this one, however I have complete control!

I also got three other blocks made this week. Here is the total sum of my progress this week. I thought I'd nearly caught up, but have at least three more to go.

Clockwise from top left:
Clay's Choice, Prairie Queen,
 Sickle and Cat 

 Linking up to 

So hop over there on Saturday and see what other chocolatey creations people have come up with.

Happy Sewing

Marly.

RSC14 week 42: the last of the oranges and one brown.

September's Challenge colour was orange. This week I made the last two orange blocks

orange: ribbons and kick
brown: maple leaf

and my first brown block. I used a tan fabric in the background and although tan may be an orangey brown, I think it is distinctively browner than the orange fabrics I used. Many thanks to everyone who joined in the discussion two weeks ago on the subject of whether or not tan counted as brown. I'm pleased with the result here, and think it does.

I'm linking up to Soscrappy, so hop over there to see what other autumnal browns have been brewing this week.


Happy Sewing

Marly.

RSC14: week 40: More browns than I thought!

I have more browns than I remembered, although I'm not sure if the light tan/orange pieces in the middle left really count as brown. What do you think?
I'm surprised at how good they look together; I'd expected a pile of browns to have a very muddy look to them.
I'm looking forward to some more sampler blocks this month.

Linking up to

Happy sewing

Marly.