Quilty 365 July progress and some improv

I started on 1 January so I should now have 213 appliqué circles for the Quilty 365 project hosted by Audrey at Quilty Folk. "Should have" because the aim is to appliqué a circle each day. July is all present and correct, well, nearly correct:

July: 30 of the 31 circles in chronological order, going down the columns from top left to bottom right

There was only one milestone circle this month: my DH and I celebrated our 41st wedding anniversary. This is the only block with a white background, representing my dress, and a larger orange circle, representing my bouquet of orange lilies - 1970's remember!

Since taking the photo I've finished Saturday's and Sunday's (for the space bottom right) is prepared, but not yet sewn down.

and here's number 31

Unfortunately I haven't caught up with any more of June's blocks. I think that may just be a few lost weeks. I have, on the other hand started joining squares with the same background colour in twos as leaders and enders.

Not the same background fabric, but both red. The one on the right will be a transition block between reds

I don't think that will upset the final layout. If it does, then I see unpicking ahead!

The last few days have been entirely taken up by another project of a totally different order: the Cut Cross QAL to be found on Instagram @crosscutquiltalong (sorry I can't install Instagram on my computer otherwise I'd have made that a link) hosted by Debbie at A Quilter's Table . You can see loads of other projects there on Instagram, and you're not to late to join in.

Chopped Sticks

This is my version of the mini quilt (24"square), as it was a couple to days ago. It's now quilted with the binding almost completely sewn down. It has really been a fun project making a really easy mini quilt with an improv dimension.

Now to the binding and to make a start on August's circles!

I'm linking to:

so pop in there to see many more circles (and some non-circular appliqué) 

in various styles and colours.

Happy sewing

Marly.

An improv WIP and something new

I was working on an improv quilt inspired by Piet Mondriaan's "Composition in Red Yellow and Blue" (of which he painted several). I posted about it here. However, eight weeks ago two grandchildren came to stay over the weekend and, as I sew in the guest bedroom, I had to pack everything away. I wasn't able to sew for a few weeks and only unpacked my sewing gear a couple of weeks ago. The RSC 16 blocks emerged, the Quilty 365 circles came into view, enough other WIPs/ UFOs appeared to make me feel guilty, but where was Mondriaan? Finally I stopped searching because it couldn't have gone far and was bound to turn up sometime, but not until I'd looked absolutely everywhere (I thought!). Then yesterday morning, lo and behold: Mondriaan!

I worked like crazy all morning and got to this:

Mondriaan, waarheen? / Where to Mondriaan?

Family comments went to the tune of: scrap the arrows; make the Mondriaan bit bigger! Groan, groan (from me). I am definitely not going to add more red, yellow and blue blocks to that centre panel, just an off-white frame. I don't want to add any more arrows and I think I'll just add white panels to fill the corners and the rest will be the quilting. (but that could change!) I don't know if the master would have approved of my "Composition in Red, Yellow and Blue".

Trying to recreate the master's painting from memory was so difficult. I absolutely did not want to look at his work again; this should be "inspired by", and not "copied from". Some of you will see how I went wrong, how I missed his point. Working from this inspiration has given me more insight, I think. I have always just seen the colours but now I think it's about balance; the balance between the colours themselves and their balance with all colour (white) and no colour (black). I made it improv, but the more I worked on it the more I came to the conclusion that Piet Mondriaan could well have been inspired by traditional quilts! It would have been much easier to have drawn it all out on graph paper first, and then cut to scale! But that's me: Why do it the easy way if you can do it the hard way?!

Anyway, during a pause from looking for Mr M., I was surfing the internet, and came across a few crosscut quilts in various stages of completion. It turned out that Debbie at A Quilter's Table held an improv QAL last week on Instagram. It looked easy enough, so I'm in! My start, nearly a week late, was delayed further, however, by the reappearance of Mr M.! (as described above)

Up at the crack of dawn this morning I started cutting

9 roughly 9.5" squares and a lot of contrasting 1" strips (day 1, aka this morning, stage 1)

 and stitching,

chain piecing the strips into the blocks (day 1, aka this morning, stage 2)

and trimming

Crosscut blocks trimmed and ready to sew together (day 2, aka this afternoon, stage 1)

and there I stopped, ready to sew the blocks together (day 2, stage 2).

In case you are wondering where the improv is in this, it's the next part! The fun will start tomorrow, or the headaches will! If you can't wait until I finish this tale in a few weeks' time, check out #crosscutquiltalong on Instagram. A lot of participants have already finished, including the binding! But for now I have blocks to sew together.

I'm linking to Kaya for

so nip over there to see more splendid improv quilts.

Happy sewing

Marly.