Changing Plans

Apparently I get tired of doing the same thing over and over.  I just couldn't make 72 of the same 16 patch blocks to make a king sized quilt.  Sewing the strips together is super quick.  It's the cutting and then sewing them back together that takes some time.



In an effort to be able to get this done for Christmas, I decided I'd leave half of the blocks as stripes, instead of the 16 patch blocks.



That will speed up the project immensely, but I'm already getting tired of the stripes and checks.  I just can't help but continue to play with the design and add some different blocks to the mix.  I think this quilt needs a few large stars thrown in.



And if I'm adding stars, why not a Churn Dash block too?



This block was going to be another star, but the half square triangles really wanted to be flipped around while I was sewing these fabrics together, so I went with it.  I don't know if there is a name for this one.  I just liked the look of it.



As I've been working with the mix of fabrics for the quilt, I was reminded of the Farmer's Wife quilt blocks I had made and set aside.  Originally I wanted to make all 111 of the blocks, but I kept finding other things I wanted to work on. 



Now I'm thinking I should just go ahead and add borders to each of these blocks to make them large enough to use in this quilt also.



I really have no idea how exactly this will look in the end, but I sure am having fun with the process.

Lined Drawstring Bag

A few months ago, I used Jeni's lined drawstring bag tutorial to make a bag that I use for my camera.  The bag was fun to make and came together pretty fast.



Today I wanted to make the tiny version of this bag, so I went ahead and bought the pattern.  I could have just altered the dimensions in the tutorial, but was in the mood to just sew without thinking too much.  The pattern has directions for 7 different size bags, as well as a worksheet to figure out the cutting dimensions if you want to make your own custom size.  The directions are very well written and include many good pictures.



This bag is really small.  I'm going to use it as a gift bag for a gift card.  I liked the fabric ties that I made for the first bag, but this time around I just used some twill tape that I had on hand.  I had just enough left for this little bag.  I like the look of the twill tape, and I'll probably use this for any future drawstring bags I make.

Completed Tetris Quilt

I've really enjoyed participating in the Tetris Quilt-a-long.  After working hard to complete this quilt for the last week, I managed to finish hand stitching the binding down this morning.



This is the first time I have attempted free motion quilting on a large quilt.  I just did a simple all over loops.  It went smoother than I thought it would.  The quilting took about 5 hours at the machine.  In that time I did end up stitching over two basting pins, and I had one really close call with my thumb.



Thankfully the needle just stitched through the tip of my glove, and not my thumb.  I felt the needle scrape by my nail.  I got lucky on that one, and slowed down a bit for the rest.



This quilt finished at 70" x 80".  I didn't have enough of either the orange or the green binding, so I just used both.  I actually like it better than I would've if it was all one fabric for the binding.

If it weren't for the deadline to link up the finished quilts, I think this would've been another top added to my pile needing to be quilted.  Deadlines can be very good.