Good Starter

From January 2018 to July 2018 I am joining in the  Clementine Quilt Along  benefiting  St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital .   The exclusive charity quilt along pattern results in this gorgeous quilt that measures 70.5″ x 90.5″.  To take part simply donate $5 to St. Judes for each pattern. Patterns are released on the 25th of each month from January 2018 to July 2018. January's block is the Watermelon Wheel. Each month there are two sizes of the block to make, 12.5" and 20.5" unfinished. There are a lot of pieces to organise but I've found cutting and prepping the block to be a lot of fun - especially as I was provided with the fabulous Clementine Quilt Along Q uilt Kit and Backing Kit  featuring Mama's Cottage by Moda Fabrics to take part in the quilt along. Fat Quarter Shop kits are a wonderful way to join in a quilt along as everything is there ready for you. I have a box just for this quilt that I can pull out and ma

Moda Fabrics has declared the third Saturday of September National Sew a Jelly Roll Day . To celebrate this fun event Fat Quarter Shop offered me a choice of their wide selection of Jelly Rolls to take part in Project Jelly Roll . The aim of the day is to break open those Jelly Rolls and whip up a quilt. I chose the Desert Bloom Jelly Roll by Sherri & Chelsi and it was a perfect match for the Jelly Roll Jam II pattern . Look at the gorgeous rainbow that was created when I de-fluffed the edges with masking tape before taking off the ribbon. It was really fun to plan the colour placement in this quilt. Desert Bloom was a new to me fabric collection and the navy designs really caught my eye. I played around with a few different ideas but in the end I decided to use the white, yellow, salmon and terracotta fabrics for the narrow blocks and allow the deeper colours to shine in the wide blocks.  This pattern is ideal for chain piecing and the blocks come toge

A few weeks ago the Fat Quarter Shop sent me an advance copy of their latest quilt along. The Lady of the Lake block is a traditional block in the FQS Classic and Vintage series but I think it is a design that remains very modern. I made my version of the quilt mostly from my stash. I started with this pile of April Rhodes Bound collection and added in a variety of grey and grey ombre fabric. By focusing on my stash I am really happy with the variety of colours and textures in the finished quilt. The Lady of the Lake quilt block is created from 8 half square triangles in two sizes so it made sense to use the 8 at the same time method for the smaller triangles. The pattern recommends HST paper which I didn't have time to purchase but I will be adding some to my next fabric order to try.  Each block also creates a spare large triangle so I was able to make more bonus blocks. I really enjoyed getting these blocks up onto the wall, they

I pulled out all of my solids at the start of the month and decided to join in with the Moda Modern Building Blocks sewalong over on Kristin's blog at Gooba Designs A sewalong is likely to be the only way I manage to finish a quilt top of this size, it is 84" x 96" finished. I'm also a bit worried about how I'll manage to quilt it on my own sewing machine. I'm considering quilt as you go but I haven't decided yet. I could send it out to a long arm quilter but I've never done that before either! Cutting the fabric for the 6" blocks is a little daunting, take a look at the size of some of the pieces: Yes it does say to cut a 1 7/8" square in half! Here are the blocks in section A: Block 8 (18" finished) Block 10 (12" finished) Block 12 (12"finished) Block 17 (12" finished) Blocks 20, 21, 42, & 44 (6" finished) Blocks 19 & 38 (6" finished) Block 10 is my favourite