Green Trees Runner

Here it's still too cold for leaves on the trees, although some are just beginning to show little points of green, so it won't be long now.

This month's colour at the Rainbow Scrap Challenge is green, and although I don't have a rainbow project this year, I have used this colour prompt for my "Table Scraps" table runner.

You might recognise the pattern; it's from Bonjour Quilts and was offered free online last year in aid of the appeal for quilts for victims of the Australian bush fires. The Dutch Modern Quilt Guild, including me, made such blocks, and one of our members turned the blocks into quilts and sent them half way round the world. It's an easy pattern to put together; choosing the fabrics takes an age!

This is still only a top, and measures 36" x 13". My table is 1.4m (approx 55") so perhaps I should add another tree. Of course it also needs quilting and binding before it can grace our Spring table next weekend.

I'm linking to:

 

    

Click on the buttons to see more scraps put to good use, and other projects.

Stay safe and healthy!

Have a good weekend, sewing happily

Marly.

Dark blue Scrap Snap

This month's colour for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge is dark blue. No Beads blocks this month, I'm afraid, but here are my Scrap Snap quilt blocks.

These blocks work very well as Leaders and Enders, so as I needed more L&Es I cut dark green fabric and made May's blocks as well,

while I was sewing the blocks for the Sugaridoo Bernina QAL row 8 (this link is to the Dutch version of the blog, but if you click on the tab "taal" at the top right of the page you can go to the English and German versions of the post.) :

I'm linking to :

Click on the buttons to join the parties!

Be safe and healthy.

Happy sewing

Marly.

Green, Orange & Teal / Aqua

This month's colour for the Rainbow Scrap Challenge is teal (and aqua). I was late deciding on a block, and have used the first three colours all in the same month.

My aim is to make four of these 8" square blocks in the colour of each month, except dark blue, brown and black, which won't show up well against the charcoal grey background. As it is, this month's dark and bright green is just about on the limit of contrast.
The coloured pieces are all from stash: the 2.5" squares from the scrap baskets, and the 4.5" squares mainly from fat quarters. The charcoal grey pieces are from 2.5" x WOF strips of yardage; one strip is exactly enough for two blocks.

I'm linking up to

Click on the button to see more rainbow progress.

Happy sewing

Marly.

Green hour-glasses

I take part in several challenges, and they all come together in this week's post!

Firstly, and the longest running on my list: The Rainbow Scrap Challenge, hosted by Angela at Soscrappy blog, for which this month's colour is green.
Secondly the Ad Hoc Improv Quilters online community, for whom the challenge for the first six months of 2020 is Hour Glass blocks.
Thirdly the challenge this quarter of the Dutch MQG (#dutchmqgthemavandemaand) is Improv.

These hour-glass blocks were cut freehand, and then machine stitched with a quarter inch seam. The original squares which I cut into quarters were 2.5", 3.5" and 5.5". I didn't plan them that way, that's just how they came out of my green scrap bag.

I haven't decided on my RSC block for this year, but I don't think I'll be making improv hour-glasses in all colours of the rainbow. These pieces will be going into one of the other two challenges, probably the AHIQ's.

I shall be posting this post on the blog of the AHIQ -  AHIQ: Improvisational Utility Quilts, and linking to the RSC link-up on Saturday.

 

Click on the button above to see more Rainbow fun. 

Happy sewing 

Marly

Two new blocks

Recently I joined Comfort Circle of Do Good Stitches. This group of quilters in The Netherlands and the UK (as far as I know - my apologies to anyone from elsewhere) work together via the Internet to make quilts for charity. The Queen Bee decides to which charity the quilt of her month will go.

This month's blocks are 12" Circle of Friends blocks and were requested by a member in the UK.

I sent my contribution to her in Liverpool yesterday.

Yesterday was the worst day ever for taking photographs: far too wet and windy to take them outside, and fearfully dark and gloomy indoors. The background is off-white low volume, and the colours are really vibrant. I think they will fit well with the other blocks now being made.

Happy Sewing

Marly.

RSC colour in March was Green

Every month Angela at soscrappy posts a colour and quilters around the world make blocks in that colour. Angela also posts blocks for a sampler, but this year I'm not making the sampler, instead I've decided on 6" bow-ties.

These are my first six 6" bow-tie units, in the arrangement I shall be making. I'm planning an 8 x 8 grid layout (48" square), but that may change! Anyway I need to make at least ten of every colour to achieve that.

April's colour is aqua and I cut the fabrics for the first six aqua blocks before breakfast yesterday. I was unexpectedly baby-sitting yesterday so got no sewing done! Good job I got up at the crack of dawn or I wouldn't have done any cutting either! I got plenty of knitting done though!

I'm linking up to 

                     

Click the buttons to see more (scrappy) quilts in progress.

Happy sewing

Marly.

Good Fortune clue 3

Last Friday Bonnie Hunter posted clue 3 of this year's Quiltville mystery, "Good Fortune". This involved making lots of rectangles with folded corners and their bonus HSTs.

24 "bonus" HSTs

 from:

12 parallelograms

As in the two previous clues I only made a slight fraction of the number given in the pattern.

I found it very time consuming sewing just to the side of the drawn lines on the squares. I tried to sew with the left-hand inside edge of the presser foot just touching the left-hand side of the line. I found myself being mesmerised by the motion of the needle resulting in a wobbly line. Of the first batch I had to unpick some of the stitching as the lines had wobbled too close together.  The next phase is cutting three-eighths of an inch from the line between the lines. That's why not wobbling is so important! (If that is confusing check out Bonnie's instructions in clue 3.)

I see in the link-up that there are bloggers there who have already finished this clue completely. At this rate I wouldn't be finished before the end of the year! It's not a problem, I'll just plod on fitting this in when I can and working on each new clue as it's published each week.

I'm linking to:

Click on the button to join the link-up.

Happy sewing

Marly.

RSC September blue and October green

We've come to the end of the blocks for the RSC 18's Squared Away sampler. Mari at the Academic Quilter has posted block instructions each month and Angela at Soscrappy has hosted the link-up. This is the last block:

Dewey Dream

As I was rather busy in September with other projects I didn't get my Squared Away blocks made, but thank goodness I've caught up now. Here are my blue blocks, only 12 days late!

Queen Charlotte's Crown

Now it's time to start thinking about the layout. I rather like the idea of an on point setting for this, but 20 is not a very useful number to work with; a 4 x 5 block rectangle would work better. I'm still thinking about this!

I shall be linking to

Click on the button above sometime on Saturday afternoon (CET)

 to see more green goodness made this month.

From a brilliantly sunny, and at least 10°C warmer than the seasonal average, Netherlands, I wish you happy sewing this weekend,

Marly.

OMG October goal: play mat

My goal is to finish the play-mat for my twin grandchildren expected in December. Since yesterday it looks like this:

These are all six inch squares; some plain fabric but also HSTs and hourglass blocks. I'm going to use a double layer of wadding and back it with a sturdy curtain fabric from Ikea. (Fingers crossed the fabrics all shrink at the same rate!)

I shall be keeping the quilting simple on this one: straight lines following a quarter of an inch away from the seams, and continuing the diagonal seams across the plain squares. When it's finished and handed over to the parents I'll show the whole thing! I hope before the end of October!

I'm linking up to

 

so pop in over there to see more October goals from around the world.

Happy sewing

Marly.

OMG September Plus/minus is finished!

My goal for September was to finish my plus and minus quilt, that should have been finished by the end of August as my response to the Dutch MQG theme challenge for July and August. However, at the end of August it looked like this with just the top right corner quilted:

I'm happy I finished it yesterday, and can post this at the eleventh hour.

 The pluses are improvised blocks joined with filler (background) fabric into four 12" squares and then joined; the minuses I made in the quilting, along with some ghost pluses. My idea was, and still is, plus is visible, grabs the attention while the negative is in the background, less visible, but present nevertheless. The ghost pluses represent a no-man's land, an area of doubt and indecision.

close up showing two ghost pluses and a minus

Now I'd like to ask for some advice. Does anyone know how to remove chalk lines? The photo below shows what's left of my quilting guide-lines in 'Sewline' pink chalk. I have rubbed them with fingers, the eraser on the end of the 'pencil' and a clothes' brush, and still they're there. I don't want to heat or wet them in case that fixes them completely. Any hints or experience with chalk would be most welcome.
 

pink chalk guide-lines still visible after A LOT of rubbing!

Quilting this 24"x24" quilt has been all the sewing I've done this month. The quilting lines are 0.25" apart, and that takes forever! This is the last time that I do straight line quilting with shapes I have to go round, as this was a stop-start exercise from start to finish. But the finish was not the real finish:

burying threads and trimming them took two hours!

Last month I won a $25 voucher for the Fat Quarter Shop and received this package 10 days after ordering.

Thank you, Patty, for pulling my name out of the hat last month and to the Fat Quarter Shop for giving a prize. I chose this bundle because winter is drawing in, and I'm planning on alleviating the pending greyness with some fabric sunshine.


Finally another early morning picture of the plus and minus quilt.

The sun was obliquely to my right and slightly in front and I just couldn't get the exposure right. Of course I was breaking the first rule of photography: "NEVER take a photo into the sun," but rules are made to be broken, aren't they?

 I'm linking up to 

 (A bit late; I missed TGIFF last week)

 To see many more goals achieved click on the buttons above.

Enjoy Autumn (not to forget Spring in the Southern Hemisphere) while you can.

Happy sewing

Marly.

OMG September

My goal for September is to finish quilting this:

My plus/minus mini quilt (± 24x24") for the Dutch Modern Quilt Guild. These pluses were improvised and then put together with filler fabric into the final layout. The minuses are in the quilting.

Only one quarter is quilted, even though the plan was to have it completely finished by the end of last week.

I shall be battling on with it and deciding on the position of minuses as I go. Quilting lines half an inch apart take forever!

I'm linking up to Elm Street Quilts:

Click on the button to see more September gaols from around the world.

Happy sewing

Marly.

Paper-pieced green

Angela chose green as this month's colour for the RSC. I showed my Squared Away and my wonky star block earlier but here are some paper-pieced blocks:

I have been making FPP blocks for the "Year of Scrappy Triangles" and incorporating green into most I've made this month.

 I think these three are my favourites from this month's haul.

I am still trying to catch up as 24 block patterns have been released and I have made 17

For anyone who hesitates to do Foundation Paper Piecing I can highly recommend Leila's tutorial.

I really disliked the frustration that occurred whenever I tried FPP.

Would you believe I used to trim after I had sewn, and as often as not trimmed so much off the newly added piece it was no longer big enough. What a dunce! I have to chant, like a mantra:

TRIM - SEW - PRESS

and then they turn out well.  Some are prettier than others! but all are very good practice.

I'm linking to 

If you click on the button you will find more lovely scrappy green patchwork.

And now back to quilting my 2016 rainbow quilt.

Happy sewing

Marly.