Scrappy Swoon Quilt Along: Sections 9 & 10 (plus an announcement!)


scrappyswoon

Welcome back everyone for our last week of piecing little squares!  Last week we knocked out the last of our colored squares and today’s tutorial will take care of the remaining background squares.  But before we get started, a bit of good news!

The wonderful group at Fat Quarter Shop has offered a fat quarter bundle of Jeni Baker’s new collection, Color Me Retro for one of you!

ColorMeRetro-Bundle-450

Just finish your quilt by March 11th to be entered in the giveaway.  I’m so excited to have the Fat Quarter Shop sponsor this quilt along and offer a big thank-you to them for their generosity!  Color Me Retro is on my wish list and I’m thrilled that one of you will get a bundle of it.

Ok, with that as an incentive, let’s knock out sections 9 and 10.

Section 9
This section requires 36 – 3.5 inch squares of background fabric.

section9stack

Each block will take 9 squares.  Lay them out in a 3 x 3 pattern.

section9layout

Sew the squares into three strips of three.

section9strips

Sew the strips together to make a 9.5 inch square.

section9

Make four of this block.

make4sec9

Done!

Section 10
This section will use your remaining 72 – 3.5 inch squares of background prints.

section10stack

Each block will take 18 squares.  Lay them out in three rows of six squares.

sec10layout

Sew the squares into three rows.

sec9strips

Sew the three strips together to make a block that is 18.5 inches long and 9.5 inches tall.

section10

Make four of this block.

sec10make4

And you’re done!  Now lay them all out to see how it looks…

allsections

Terrific!  Here’s our schedule for the next few weeks:

Monday February 18th:  Instructions for piecing the quilt top together, and measurements for backing.

Monday February 25th:  Basting and quilting Monday March 4th:  Binding Monday March 11 – 13:  Link Party!  Link up (or email me pictures of your finished quilt if you don’t have a blog) to be entered in the giveaway.

Thursday March 14th:  Drawing for Color Me Retro bundle.

That’s the schedule!  A few more weeks and you’ll have a finished quilt.  Don’t forget to add your photos to our Flikr group .  For those of you who are on schedule (or ahead), just keep it up.  If you started late, you still have a month to catch up so you can enter.    The photos so far are lovely; I can’t wait to see your finished quilts!

Happy Sewing, Jennifer

A Lovely Year of Finishes: February

It’s 9 p.m. on the 7th of the month, and I just happened upon “A Lovely Year of Finishes” in 2013, hosted by Shanna of Fiber of all Sorts and Melissa of Sew BitterSweet Designs .  What a fun idea!  I mean, I already knew I need to finish tons of projects, but I like the idea of picking one and being accountable for finishing it in addition to the other projects I have going on.     So, without a second thought (and because the deadline is in a few hours) I’m jumping in with a goal for February.

sarahjane

I pieced this simple quilt top last fall, then set it aside until recently.  I basted it a couple of weeks ago, thinking I’d finish it quickly, but ended up choosing to pick the quilting out.

unpicking

So, my goal for February will be to re-quilt it and get it bound and finished.

You see, I have eight children, and last year I had the idea to make them each their own quilt *in addition* to all the other quilting I was doing.  Realistic?  Not at all when you consider 8 quilts would increase my total quilts in a year by 2/3!  However, I started anyway and got six of the eight quilt tops pieced, but only one of them has been quilted and two more are just sketches.  They need to be finished, and not just because they’re WIP’s.  They need to be finished because each is made from fabrics chosen specifically for that child, and I want them to have the quilt before they’ve grown/changed too much to enjoy it.  What a waste it would be to let them sit!

So I’ll finish the first one in February.  Yep.  I like that idea.

And, since I didn’t know about this fun year of finishes until now, I’ll tell you what I would have picked for my January finish.

IMG_6804

This quilt just needs a binding.  It’s also one of those 8 quilts.  I’d like to knock it out, as well, even though it’s not the official goal.

I guess I’m in!

Jennifer linking here

In the sewing room, no 5.

This was definitely a “slow craft” week in the sewing room.   Lots going on at our busy house!

heartquilt

My most exciting progress was this little mini heart quilt that went from sketch to completed in a couple of days.   Every once in a while I need a quick finish to keep me motivated on my slower projects, and this was it.

yellowfabric

After wishing I had more yellow fabric last week, I went through my stash and found a few yellows that hadn’t been sorted by color last year.  I’m excited to add them to my Scrappy Trip along quilt, which I didn’t even touch this week!

unpicking

I spent a lot of time with my seam ripper this week, ripping out some quilting I wasn’t happy with.  I’m ready to get back to work on this now.

yellowhst

I’m making slow progress on the half square triangles for my sawtooth quilt, and each time I’m working on them I ask myself how I managed to jump into three projects at the beginning of the year that all have tons of half square triangles in them!  Not good planning.  I do love my choreography quilt top and backing (which awaits quilting right now) and I’m sure I’ll love this when it’s finished also.  At least I’m using a different HST construction method with each quilt.  It’s kind of fun to try new ways of making the same square.

My Scrappy Swoon quilt is taking shape.  Next week we’ll do the last sections of this, then put it all together.  I’m having a lot of fun with this project!

sections1to8

In the coming week I hope to make bindings for two quilts ( and maybe even get them on the quilts?), cut more white fabric to use with a bunch of Field Study squares I cut in January, and spend a bit of time embroidering.  I’d like to baste a quilt or two as well, if time allows.  Although I have several new projects I’m excited to start I’m going to focus on finishing these first.   Patience.

Happy Sewing, Jennifer Linking to Freshly Pieced

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