Country Threads 2020/2021 Dirty Dozen Challenge-COMPLETED!

Since July of last year, I have been a participant of this Challenge and I am quite proud of myself for having completed my June UFO which is my Flights of Fancy Happy Lappy Quilt, another one of the tops finished in 2014.

The fabric used is a 2012 Michael Miller fabric line designed by Paula Prass and the pattern is what I call the Happy Lappy Quilt which is one of my favorite patterns for making a quilt with just six fat quarters.

 I was planning on quilting my usual horizontal straight line quilting but at the last moment was inspired to do big wavey crosshatch instead which sort of mimics the pink/green tile print along with horizontal and vertical straight line quilting along each rectangle. I’m not sure if I liked how puffy it made the quilt look but it is cuddly.  I would have expected to have looked this way had I used fleece for the batting but I used Warm and Bright.

I used a Baby Pink Essential threads for the quilting and the binding was the stripe print. I loved the fabric so much that I bought both colorways and yardage for backing which I don’t normally do unless it’s on sale. The quilt measures 40”x 54”, approximately.

It should be no surprise that this quilt was bequeathed to the darling Granddaughter who will be using this as her porch quilt at the Grandparents House. I am surprised though as to how much she likes this quilt and is very receptive when I cover her with it. I don’t mind her using it outside since I found a small tea-like stain on one of the prints, of course, it had to be on the light print and must have already been there when I purchased the fabric and didn’t notice it when I made the flimsie.

After the Flights of Fancy quilt was a Finally Finished and sort of unhappy then with the finish I thought I would end the Dirty Dozen Challenge by turning it into a Bakers Dozen Challenge by quilting my Road 15 flimsie which was made in 2017. I made this as an alternative to my Moda Chef Jelly Roll Charm Chase Quilt in case they turned down this pattern, but happily it wasn’t so the Road 15 never got quilted. I thought it would be apropos for it to be the final quilt for the Challenge since I purchased the fabric from Country Threads in 2013. It’s a good thing I waited to quilt it because I knew my quadrant quilting would be perfect using Smoke Grey Essential thread. The binding was the skinny burgundy red stripe which has been happily sitting in the binding drawer.

Funny story here; after I finished binding the Road 15 quilt and had leftover, I thought I would finally quilt a block which good quilt friend Dee sent me several years ago and bind it and have a cute mini quilt ready for the Christmas holiday. Now Dee has previously sent me a cute black crow mini quilt before and I thought she wanted me to finish this block myself. Of course, while I was quilting the block, I remember that she had sent me the pattern for a Gift Box quilt and this block was my starter block. It’s a shame for some reason I didn’t keep this pattern with the block and separated it by putting it in with my Christmas fabrics and double shame since I had more of the Road 15 fabric in my stash. Big Dang and sew sorry Dee but this is going to look cute hanging up at the Grandparents House.

Here is a collage of the quilts finished for the Dirty Dozen Challenge along with some stats. The oldest UFO was twenty years, Pipertown, and the newest UFO was two years old, Modern Puzzle; the average UFO age was 7 years.  Ten out of the twelve, were just tops waiting to be quilted,  one had the blocks sewn and one really wasn’t a real UFO but a Country Threads kit waiting to be made. I do feel very good with all of these finishes since I quilted them myself with my new machine quilting confidence of straight and wavey line quilting. Projects planned for the next Challenge is still being thought about but I know there will be more projects in the block stage and not as many waiting to be quilted. I may have another 20 year old quilt which is a log cabin quilt I started in maybe 1997 for my sister-in-law and all I can say is Calico is going to make a comeback. If you check out Country Threads details on the 2021/2022 Challenge, it’s not limited to quilts and could include gardening and household projects. Cleaning out my closet has been on my mind for the past several years but I have to give it a big No for adding this to my Challenge list. Like I’ve always said or thought before, I rather be quilting.

First Quilt Finish for 2021 and 2020 Recap

It’s a great way to start the new year with my 2020 Monthly Color Challenge quilt finished during the first three days of 2021. The last of the blocks were sewn during the last week of December and was briefly a flimsy  on New Year’s Day and a Finally Finished last night. Photos were taken around Midnight in my studio knowing that outside shots were going to be impossible with the cold, snowy weather coupled with cloudiness we’re experiencing lately and I’m sure the Master Quilt Holder appreciates not having to stand outside.

Last year when the 2020 Monthly Color Challenge hosted by Patterns by Jen and learning that the theme was going to be Birds, I knew I wanted to participate because  it met one of my major requirements for joining a QAL—I had the perfect fabric in my stash.

I purchased these fabrics during our visit to Granby, Colorado in June, 2018 at The Fabric Nook.These fabrics are from three different collections: the Birds are from a P&B Textiles, Bird Watchers by Norman Wyatt Signature, the black print on the upper left corner is from Henry Glass, Black, White & Bright and the ombré prints are E.E. Schnenk, Daiwabo Selection. The Bird prints probably caught my eyes first and was lucky to find the other accompanying prints which really went so well together with my quilt I named Sweet Tweety Birds. Not only did these fabric fit the Bird Theme but after seeing which colors were going to be featured each month, I knew these colors in the fabrics were going to “fly”.

I will admit that I tweaked some of the colors to better match the ones in the Bird prints. Also, I found early on that my ombré prints couldn’t be used as much since some of the patches were too big and/or the right colors were found elsewhere in my stash, mostly tone on tone.

After the blocks were finished, I had to come up with a layout which I could best include the Bird and Black Stripe prints and I came up three alternate blocks:  a vertical rail block with the bird houses, a horizontal rail block with the birds and the Puss In Corner (funny to use these for a Bird quilt) Block. I decided to exclude the feather and egg prints of the Bird fabric line and will save it for another quilt. I did not have enough fabric for a border and really didn’t want one anyways since this quilt already measures 52”x72”. These alternate blocks really are what we would call sashing but in order to get around not having a border and feeling less guilty, I had to think blocks. It could be a quirk of mine to think borders and sashings sew together in a quilt.

After going through my head the number of ways I could machine quilt Sweet Tweety Birds (horizontal straight lines, cross hatch with straight grid lines, etc.) vertical straight lines 1” apart, except for the alternate blocks, won. I decided, almost when I was done, to do some horizontal quilting to accent the black squares in the Puss in Corner blocks.  I used an #2105 Aurifil thread, 50 wt. and I love how this creamy yellow went so well with all of the colors in this quilt.

The backing is a multi-color batik print from the backing vault and might I mention is as colorful as the front of the quilt. I decided to bind the quilt with the same black fabric used in the Puss in Corner blocks.

I am loving my Sweet Tweety Birds quilt so much it will be hanging around the studio for a couple of months before it migrates to the GP House. I can say this is my favorite finish so far this year. It is so nice to already have a first finish and when you read my 2020 Recap a little less UFOs is certainly welcomed in the studio.

For the past several years, my New Year’s Day tradition is watching the Rose Bowl Parade while recapping my 2020 projects and compiling my 2021 projects. This year, I forgot about the parade, recapped my 2020 projects and just didn’t want to commit to anything for 2021 except to participate in the Famous Canadian Birthday QAL which I’ve been doing for the past five years and to continue with the last six months of Country Threads Dirty Dozen Challenge.

2020 Recap 

I had 29 Finally Finished quilts/projects for 2020 which my goal is to have 24, two for each month. 

• Fifteen were new projects in which only two of them used new fabric purchased last year and fourteen were UFO’s and a big sigh because three of them were over 20 years old, one from 2004, two from 2013 and four from 2016.
• Nine of these were lap size or larger and twenty-two were smaller (wall hangings, table runners or baby quilts)
• Five of these projects were for the darling Granddaughter.
• Nine of these  projects were squares which almost is unusual for me who prefers rectangles.

I also have twelve flimsies which for the past several years I had zilch or just a very few. What’s making me wonder is that only two of these involved new fabric and I tried but fail to observe a 2020 fabric fast and must have mostly bought basics. I am going to have to reorganize my two backing vaults since my 2020 projects gave me some room which I should have no problems filling up.

Also, I have and sure most of you have finished in 2020, countless face masks which I know I’ll be making more in 2021.

Here is a Link to my 2020 Quilts and Projects for your viewing pleasure.

I’m glad to be able to post this before we head to the GP house tomorrow.  I plan on bringing my Country Threads Dirty Dozen project for January which will involve no sewing, just pressing and trimming blocks and, of course, staying warm.

December Duo-ings

‘Twas the day before Christmas and all of the projects which needed to be finished, are and then some, so I am saying, I’m done with December. I had a pretty productive month with five Finally Finished quilts and two Flimsies. It helped that I spent more time at home than the Grandparent house although I did miss my darling Granddaughter but we were playing it safe by staying home for two weeks after Thanksgiving. As in November, I once again have dueling “Duos” which included Doll quilts and a Dirty Dozen which puts the “D”in December, along with Delightful. (It’s that time of year when the photos are all interior shots; no snow but it’s cold outside).

First up, were the two Christmas quilts which needed to be finished before we left for the Grandparent House on the 12th which wouldn’t have been hard to do except I was deterred by some recently purchased fabric but more more about this distraction later in this post.

The Christmas Hoot and Loot quilt has been in the makings for the past several years with indecisions if I should make a Staggered Strips and Squares quilt but decided against it so the pinwheel and eight-patch blocks were made last year. I finally decided this year that the Hoot and Loot green fabric would be cut into 8.5” squares rather than using long strips or rectangular blocks.  The eight-patch blocks were made mostly from a jelly roll of Me an My Sisters Red Dot and Dash. Sadly these were cut last year and if I knew my Bee Sista Jan was looking for this, I would have happily sent this to her. We have a Me and My Bee Sista fabric friendship.

Surprisingly, when it came down to quilting it, I couldn’t decide on the backing since there was nary a Christmas fabric in my stash and I was determined to use something from my backing vault so this is what I came up with-not very exciting, right.  Also, how to quilt it was a challenge and decided on wavey cross-hatching with straight grid lines so I didn’t have to do any marking which is a pain to do when I can’t depend upon the blocks.  I used a green thread for the top and for the bottom I used an Aurifil thread in Natural which I love how it blended with the back.  The binding is the red dot fabric used in the pinwheel blocks which is almost or at least a twenty year old Piece of Cake fabric line.  

This quilt measures 56”x72” and is now hanging around the Grandparent House which was not the plan since I was envisioning this being thrown around the floor by the darling Granddaughter.  The Hoot and Loot quilt is covering the red and black quilt which normally drapes on the ladder and sort of has a Christmas tree effect,  doesn’t it?

While I was finishing the Hoot and Loot Christmas quilt with just a few days left before leaving for the Grandparent House, I still had to make a quilt for the darling Granddaughter.  The plan was to make one using the leftover blocks but I was sort of tired looking at these blocks plus I thought it wasn’t too exciting for a little girl.

I had hanging on my design board some 4” HSTs made with Lori Holt’s Cosy Christmas fabric and the plan was to make two zig zag table runners.  I thought of using these for her quilt but it would only measure 32”x40” which be way too small for my very tall for her age Granddaughter.  I then had an epiphany that if the HSTs were placed horizontally and I could find a perfect fabric for the sashing to make it longer, this would work.

No surprise that I found an aqua mint with red pin dot stripes in my stash which is also a 2016 Riley Blake fabric like Lori Holt’s but from a different designer.  I love when I buy fabric with no project in mind and finally am able to use it.  Plus, I found this right away and knew it would be perfect. When this happens, I feel vindicated for buying so much fabric and let Hubby know about it.

I decided to use fleece instead of batting and backed it with a red star minkee which was leftover from another Granddaughter quilt from Christmas past, another nice happenstance in making this quilt.  This quilt has weight which is perfect since she likes her compression blanket.  I quilted vertical squiggly lines with red thread.  I named this quilt Holiday Hearts and it measures 40”x52”.

Holiday Hearts was well received and immediately shared with the darling Granddaughter’s dolls and menagerie. Remember this image of the other quilt on the floor which inspired another duo of quilts to be mentioned later in this post.

Upon our return from the Grandparent House on the 17th, the next project I needed to finish was my #4 of Country Threads Dirty Dozen QAL which is my I Love London, the flimsie made almost six years ago. This was the last of the 2016 Flimsies waiting to be finished and happy this one is off my plate now.  I made this after I had accumulated London fabric from different lines which was popular around the time I retired eight years ago.  I always dreamed of going to London since it holds a special place in my heart because my father had fond memories of this city (not the devastation-but taking violin lessons while he was on furlough)when he was stationed somewhere in England during WWII.  Sadly, I don’t like flying and my trips are limited to places where we can drive to our destination.

Here’s a close-up of some of the prints which are quite fun.  The pattern of this quilt was based on the center 18” square of the I Love London print and the surrounding square/rectangles measure 4.5”x6” finished.  You can see the crosshatch and grid machine quilting I did in blue thread and I would like to mention that I wanted my crosshatch lines to be nice and straight and spent the time marking it with a Hera marker. Unfortunately, my lines were not straight and veered off course several times because I couldn’t always see the markings.  I guess you can see Hera marks better on solid fabrics.

I seem to be having mishaps with batting and backings lately and this quilt was a testament to this being that I had purchased 108” wide backing for this quilt but somehow cut into it to back another quilt thinking I had enough. I didn’t so I had to piece it together to what I thought would be the right size and still wasn’t enough so I sewed the blue/white ticking stripe which still only gave me an one-inch left to spare on both sides. Whew! This quilt measures 54” square and the stripe binding was from one of the fabric lines.  Even though the quilting is a little wonky if you look at it close enough which you may notice since this quilt is designated to be a picnic quilt or maybe a tea party quilt—something that can be laid down on the floor or ground-which brings me to the subject of the darling Granddaughter and the earlier photo with the quilts on the floor. 

During our last visit, she has been taking table toppers, place mats and even picking up the kitchen floor mat to place over her dollies, stuffies and any other toy she deems as needing to be covered.  Most of the time the toys are laying on the floor.  I don’t like seeing my quilts laying on the floor since at times, we have two to four dogs at the Grandparent House at one time and two of them are shedders. I was thinking of some of the small toppers at home I have made which would make suitable doll quilts and remembered these two quilts above which were made from Little Quilts’ panels and I started hand quilting them over twenty years ago.

What’s funny about Little Quilts is that my Bee Sistas this year had a conversation about them starting with Wendy who had posted about their book being her first quilt book and then turning out that three of us made the same little quilt pattern.  But that didn’t spark me to finally finish these two quilts, it was the need to give the darling Granddaughter a proper doll quilt.  I thought I just needed to bind the quilts, but the Star quilt on the right still needed to have some of the leaves hand quilted with my still intact big stitches skill.  I think I did this when it wasn’t acceptable but it’s hard to do fine hand quilting when using perle cotton or three strands of embroidery floss.  As for me being the big believer that calico is going to make a big comeback, I found the right blue Little Quilt fabric in my stash, just enough to bind these two quilts.  I thought Pipertown was going to be my oldest UFO finish for this year, but it turns out these two quilts are going to have this distinction.  Jan, previously mentioned in this post, commended me for remembering I had these quilts and finding them which I have to admit I had them stored in a clear bin under my quilting desk and were hard to miss. I’m rethinking about giving them both to the darling Granddaughter; I want to keep the Star Quilt to hang in the hallway outside her bedroom since I find it precious and don’t want to see it laying on the floor. Hopefully, she won’t yank it off the wall.  These panels really are nice and with some quilting, it looks like the blocks were pieced and yes, the yesterday colors still make my heart sing.

And now for the third “duo” quilts for December which are these two flimsies which were the distraction that deterred me from the finishing of Christmas quilts.  I guess these quilts could be called DREAMis  and the squirrel’s name would be Bernie since these two would not have been made if I hadn’t bought some of the fabrics from her. To put it in a nutshell (such an appropriate use of this word since we’re talking squirrel), after I made the quilt flimsie on the right, I realized the colors reminded of the yellow dot fabric seen on the left quilt so of course I had to find it which led me to the Julie Comstock 23 fabrics which I already had cut several years ago to make another Jack in the Box quilt. I then had to make this quilt since I seem to like sewing in duos. We’re not leaving for the Grandparent House until after Christmas, so I thought I could quilt them but decided I would add them to the Flimsie pile.  For the past two years, I’ve had no flimsie carryover but this year I have a dozen.  I should mention I have 29 Finally Finishes but still surprised at the number of Flimsies which will be waiting to be a Finally Finished in 2021.  I still think I should relax for the rest of the year.  

December wasn’t going to be “Done” until I finished sewing the last two blocks, Buff Breasted Sandpiper and Cardinal, of the 2020 Color Challenge QAL which I have not been on schedule as in the previous months. I bet you can tell by the colors which block is which bird.  I have to say after I finished sewing the Cardinal block, I felt like playing Angry Birds and not because there were so many patches.  Turning these blocks into a quilt is definitely on my 2021 To Do list.

So I’m finishing this lengthy post right before the start of Christmas Eve which will be quiet.  I appreciate you stopping by to read this post and I’m still not sure if Bloglovin will pick this up. Wishing you a very Merry Christmas and may you be blessed with a very healthy and peaceful New Year and also may all your hopes and wishes for this year happen in 2021.

A Twice is Nice November

I like to mention first that I thought I was going to be late with my November post thinking today was December 1st, so imagine my surprise and joy to find that I have an entire day to think and type this post. Usually I draft and type my post under the imagined deadline or the thought that my post is going to disappear into thin year.  While coming up with the title to this post which I like to tie it with my activity for the month, I found there were several things which happened in pairs, combos, duos, twice, double, etc.  There were three Finally Finished quilts and one Flimsy for his month and why they were twofers will be explained in this post.

I’m participating in Country Threads’ Dirty Dozen QAL and my #1 quilt to finish in November was near and dear to my heart.  The Dogma quilt top was made in 2014, but the Dogma fabric which was an In the Beginning fabric line designed by artist David Hearn was purchased in 2013, which I picked a kit up at Country Threads (a 5-6 hours drive), my first of several visits.  This is when my friendship with Mary Etherington truly started since, besides her, I became acquainted with Susannah, her late, great Goat and other four legged babies.  I called ahead to order a kit, since we were going to stop by on the way to Colorado, which included a pattern but if you know me, I chose instead to make a 42”x46” wall hanging to better showcase the fabrics. I loved the funky and organic prints which seemed to be popular at this time, since I also purchased Hot Flash and Primitiva too and already finished quilts with these fabrics. This quilt has been listed several times on UFO lists during the past years as one I wanted to finish and this year it finally was.

Before I could quilt the top, I had to choose a backing which I could not find anything to my liking in the backing vault and thought I piece one using leftovers from the Dogma stash.  Aren’t these prints wonderful?  However after looking at these prints I decided that another top needed to be made before I could quilt the original Dogma quilt.

Before we left for a Grandparent House visit, I made this top which I called Double Dogma Dare, a sort of tongue-in-cheek name since I was suppose to  be quilting the original Dogma quilt (Dogma One) and thought I could do that plus make the top plus quilt it, but no I was so wrong. More about Double Dogma Dare later.

We came home with less than a week left in the month to finish the Dogma One.

For some reason I thought this was a 54” square top and surprised it was smaller which meant I just need just under 1.5 yards of fabric for the backing which I was able to find a gray/black print in the stash. If I had known this beforehand, maybe I wouldn’t had to look at the Dogma fabric stash and maybe not have been distracted with making Double Dogma Dare. The binding was a print from the fabric line and grid machine quilting was done with black Aurifil thread.

As I was quilting Dogma One, I realized that this was the second quilt I made this year which had the color Teal and was a square, almost the same size; the first one being the Centred, a QAL hosted by Sandra, mmm quilts earlier this year.  When this quilt was finished I mentioned in my post that her cat, Bella, would look so gorgeous laying on this quilt.  I realized by looking at the dog in the center of the dog panel, this could be Sandra’s dog Rufus so I sent this photo to Sandra in a shameless attempt of finally getting my hands on Bella to let her know that I have proper sit mats for both of them when they come for a visit. Sandra, who is onto my Bella attempts, responded she would be happy to send only Rufus once the borders were opened.

Once Dogma One was finished this past Saturday, I started getting Double Dogma Dare ready for quilting. Fortunately, I already pieced a backing with black prints from the stash and took some time in deciding which prints could be sacrificed. It was during this time I realized that stash should not be saved for a maybe future project and should be used now for backing since I could always buy another equally perfect print if and when a project appears. Sadly, this epiphany came after buying fabric for almost twenty-five years. I would like to say that the finally finishing of this quilt was a breeze but it was not. One of the things that I am always afraid of when basting a quilt is that I would have the wrong side facing up  and not realizing this until after I was done pinning.  That didn’t happen but after the backing and batting was clamped down on my big basting table, I realized that the batting was not wide enough so that had to be taken off and a new piece of batting cut. After the backing and batting was clamped down for the second time and the top was then pin basted, it was then I realized I did not lay the backing down evenly on the table so my top extended below the backing so I had to unpin more than 100 safety pins, which my fingers became very sore and restarted the process again. They say three times a charm which almost wasn’t the case because after doing twenty lines of straight line quilt at 2am, I thought the back was just a little too puckered and thought I had to rip out all the stitching. 

Fortunately, I waited until the morning to start ripping because my fresh eyes realized that it was the prints  which made it looked so puckered and quilting the rest of the quilt was a breeze. I used a dark gray Aurifil thread for the machine quilting. As for the binding, I didn’t want to use a print from the Dogma print line (maybe because a Triple Dogma Dare is in my thoughts) since I thought it needed a somewhat solid black and was happy to find a vintage Debbie Mumm skinny line print in black/gray. After spending much time foraging in my black stash, I really have some wonderful prints or as we use to say in my Quilting Shop days, old friends.  Double Dogma Dare measures 64”x80” and is based on Quilting Jetgirl Bundle Buster pattern. This is a wonderful pattern for making big blocks and this is the third quilt I made using this pattern. This pattern is also very versatile being that you can easily change the size of the strips and can be made from yardage as well as fat quarters. The first one was my Kiwi and Mango Tango quilt made last year.

And in case you’re thinking I miscounted, Highland Room is the second quilt I made inspired by the Bundle Buster pattern made this year.

This is the first top I made in 2020 and I used a combination of Violet Craft’s The  Highlands fabric line with Erin McMorris In My Room fabric stash along with a few other lines like Denyse Schmidt and Cotton+Steel. I thought these collection of fabrics which had similar colors went well together.

I especially like the Violet Craft Cat print, in a lovely shade of yellow which Wendy and I would call Citronickle, and wanted to be featured so I modified the Bundle Buster pattern to make this a 56” x 72” quilt.

The backing was pieced with a combination In My Room print with a gray and white Waverly print.  Straight line quilting spaced 3/4”apart with a Connecting Thread Essential Stone Thread went well, no problems thanks to the quilting guide on my walking foot.

Here’s another view of the fabrics used in this quilt; loved that I was able to use some Denyse Schmidt’s prints.

The Highland Room quilt is now residing in the darling Granddaughter’s bedroom along with some of the recently finally finished quilts from previous posts.  I was able to use it at our last sleepover which was needed since she doesn’t share the bed quilt very well.

Sorry for this post being so long, but I did mentioned that I also made a Flimsy which is the annual Christmas quilt I used to make for the darling Granddaughter’s house but will now reside at the Grandparents’ house instead.  My plan is to quilt this next.  I’ll also be making a smaller one for the little darling and hers will be a blankie since it will be backed with a leftover plush fabric from Christmas Quilts past.  Two-ing things will continue in December.

Just a little recap of my sewing double in November: two Bundle Buster quilts were a finally finished, two quilts made with Dogma fabrics, two square Teal quilts made this year, a twofer planned for December and also piecing two quilt backs which is a form of torture for me.

Lastly, I wanted to mention that I’ve been blogging for four years now. I’ve been posting only once a month for over a year and was thinking that maybe I should try to post more frequently so I can focus on writing about one quilt instead of several. But then, I found out that Bloglovin is not picking up my posts so maybe Blogland is trying to tell me something. I appreciate those of you who are reading my posts from another source.  I thought it was just me but I read that Quilting Jetgirl is also experiencing Bloglovin problems also. I’m pretty sure it has nothing to do with the two Bundle Buster Quilts I finished this month.  I contacted Bloglovin who did not respond so I guess I will be blogging under the radar if this post does not appear.

Wishing you a safe and healthy December.

Linking up with My Quilt Infatuation