Top Spin {Finished Quilt}

I'm so excited to share this finished quilt with all of you! My Top Spin quilt is done!

I started this quilt in 2016 as a leader and ender project. The pattern is by Melissa Corry for Moda Bake Shop! The original pattern uses 64 blocks for a queen sized quilt and I made 48 blocks for a twin sized quilt.

I took this quilt to Michigan over Christmas and told my mom that she could do whatever she willed with the quilt -- either take it with the next batch to her long arm quilter or quilting it herself on her mid-arm. She decided to quilt it on her mid-arm and practice her ruler quilting and the results are gorgeous!

In the grey background areas she did straight line ruler quilting and in the colored HSTs she did a loopy meander -- this is exactly what I had envisioned for the quilt! The thread she used is actually a variegated grey, which you can see in some of the photos.

The backing is from the HBD Shop and is a plum dot extra wide fabric and my mom also used it for the binding. I really like the purple-y frame around the mostly-grey quilt.

The next person who comes to visit us will get to use this quilt in the guest room!

Quilt Stats:

Name: Scrappy Top Spin

Pattern: Top Spin by Melissa Corry for MBS

Size: 72 x 96

Quilting: loopy meanders and ruler work by my mom on her mid-arm

Started: December 2016

Finished: February 2018

Future: Guest room quilt

Sharing at Finish it up Friday Oh Scrap!, and Needle and Thread Thursday!

Top Spin {Coming in for Landing}

It's so good to cross things off of the sewing to do list -- and I get to do that today! I've finished my the last of my Top Spin blocks and put together the quilt top! The original pattern by Melissa Corry for Moda Bake Shop is here!

I had eight more blocks to finish and they came together quite quickly! I ended up with a few extra medium and small HSTs, but that's totally okay!

Given the way the blocks are arranged, the only seam matching that I had to do was matching the seams between blocks when sewing together the rows! This made putting the quilt top together so fast! This top is twin sized at 72 by 96. I had a hard time taking pictures of it in my apartment!

Here's a close up of the blocks together:

I was able to wrangle two outside pictures this morning before work:

There's no immediate plan for this quilt, so I am thinking about having it simply pantograph quilted. I have large pieces of yardage to use for the binding and the backing, so I will probably put those together just in case I decide to quilt it myself.

Sharing at Finished or Not Friday and Linky Tuesday!

Top Spin {Over the Hill}

It's official -- my Top Spin quilt is over the hill! It's made it to 40 blocks!

I took a break from my other projects (since I'm already done with all of my deadlines for this month!) and made sixteen more Top Spin blocks (pattern here). That brings my block total up to 40 blocks of the 48 blocks that I need to make for a twin sized quilt.

Knowing how many more blocks I need to make, I took stock of my small and medium HSTs. I am all set on small HSTs for the quilt (I have two extra) but I will need to make four more medium HSTs. I have exactly enough large squares cut to make the final eight HSTs for the final eight blocks (unless something is miscut or not large enough.)

Looking through my stash, I have two two-yard cuts in similar colors that I'll be able to use for the backing. I will likely have to add in a little something to get the backing to be big enough for a 72" x 96" quilt but that should be a relatively easy task.

This also means that I'm just about to the end of my leader and ender project! I am going to have to consider what I'd like to start as a leader and ender project or which of my WIPs would work to be a leader and ender project.

Sharing at Let's Bee Social, Needle and Thread Thursday, and Oh Scrap!

Top Spin {24 Blocks}

The other project that I worked on prior to going on quilt retreat was my Top Spin blocks. I had amassed quite a large stack of HSTs that needed to be pressed and trimmed for blocks so both last weekend and this weekend I worked on putting together more blocks.

In total, I am up to 24 blocks -- halfway to my goal! Here are all 24 blocks laid out together:

The more blocks that I make, the more happy I am with the grey background. Based on what I have cut and the HSTs that are already sewn, I should be set on small HSTs and may need to cut a few more of the squares for the medium and large HSTs. Having had some new scraps "rotate in" since I did the original cutting for this project, I'll hopefully be able to cut some different fabrics to add into this project.

For now I'll be putting the block parts away, but I'll keep working on making more large HST units as my leader and ender sewing. It is a wonderful feeling to be nearly halfway done with the blocks for this scrappy project -- where 100% of the fabric (including hopefully the backing!) will come from my stash!

Sharing at Main Crush Monday, Monday Making, and Linky Tuesday!

Top Spin {Progress + Blocks}

When secret sewing takes up a lot of your time, sometimes its good to bust out and work on something random for a while! This weekend I was able to finish an upcoming secret sewing project (hooray) and then spent some time working on putting together the first eight blocks of my Top Spin quilt. 

I have been making the HSTs for my Top Spin blocks (pattern by Melissa of Happy Quilting on Moda Bake Shop) as a leader and ender project for about eight months. Sometimes I've been better and worse about remembering to use the leader and enders, but I think I've made just about all of the small and medium sized HST units and have started on the pile of squares for the large HST units.

I also picked out the fabric to use as the background -- its the same fabric that I used for the backing of my two Pinwheel Pals quilts. I'm planning to make my quilt twin sized. Here are the blocks piled up and laid out before I sewed them.

I was able to make eight blocks with the limited number of large HSTs that I have, but it was good to finally get a few blocks made.

I will need 48 blocks for a twin sized quilt without a border, so that means I'm already 17% of the way done with my blocks! I have two different large chunks of fabric in my stash that I plan to use for the backing and the binding.

One of the other things I did this weekend was clean out one of my "catch all" bins and sort some of the smaller scraps from the bin into my scrap boxes to "refresh" them! Here's an action shot of fabric all over my living room floor:

I also sorted out some of my Christmas fabrics because I'm also being strongly, strongly tempted to participate in the I Wish You A Merry Quilt Along! I want to try to resist, but that might not be possible. :)

If you missed my live stream of my Island Batik box opening, you can watch it any time on the Honey, Bunny, and Doll Facebook page! I'll be doing an Island Batik Giveaway on Friday, so don't forget to come back and enter to win!

Sharing at MCM, Linky Tuesday, and Oh Scrap

Scrappy and Happy {RSC 2017 Plans}

Today is the day to share our plans for our projects for the 2017 edition of the Rainbow Scrap Challenge (RSC) hosted by Angie at SoScrappy!

Rather than starting a whole new project this year, I am planning to use my WIPs as my RSC projects. I have two projects that will be my main focus:

1. Happy Houses

This is a project on my current WIP list that I haven't worked on in a while. These are Lori Holt houses from an older Quiltmaker magazine and I want to try to make at least one Happy House each month. These do require light blue for the sky and brown for the roofs, so I may need to use yardage (especially of the blue) to continue with these blocks.

2, Top Spin Leaders and Enders

My leader and ender project has made a lot of progress! I'll continue to work on this project all the time (since it is a leaders and enders project!) but I plan to work on it slightly more during the purple, pink, and green months -- including January!

Additionally, I'll be trying to work on whatever other scrappy WIPs that I have that happen to be the colors of the month in addition to my scrappy Stash Bee blocks each month. Purple actually happens to be the color I seem to have the least of currently -- I traded scraps with a friend last year and sent her mainly purple scraps for an all-purple quilt and a good portion of the remaining purple scraps were cut into squares for my Top Spin quilt. 

Sharing at Scrap Happy Saturday and Oh Scrap!

Top Spin {a la Leaders and Enders} + Ten Tips Tuesday

Do you ever see a new quilt pattern and think for a second and then immediately decide that you have to make it? It happens to me once in a while and it happened over the summer with Melissa Corry's Top Spin pattern on Moda Bake Shop.

I decided to convert this into a leaders and enders project. For those of you unfamiliar with leaders and enders, Bonnie Hunter has written multiple books based around leaders and enders projects, and has a good explanation of the process on her blog.

To start off, I pulled a three yard cut of a floral hydrangea and leaf print that has been languishing in my stash as my inspiration/backing fabric. I pulled out all of my green, pink, and purple scraps from my color-sorted scrap boxes and cut as many squares in the various sizes as I could. This pattern calls for 6", 5", and 4" colored squares.

Here's what I was able to cut from one pass through my scrap boxes as well as my inspiration fabric:

While what I've started off with won't get me anywhere close to a full quilt, it's at least a starting point for this quilt. For now my plan is to start sewing all of the half square triangle units with what I have cut, start assembling blocks with the units I have, and then keep repeating the process until I get the size quilt that I want. I'm planning to make a baby sized or throw quilt rather than a bed sized quilt.

Here's the large and medium sized HSTs that I have sewn and trimmed so far:

Here are some of my tips thus far on the leaders and enders (L&E) process and "controlled scrappy" quilts:

• Your choice of L&E project really makes an impact on how easy it is to work L&E into your normal sewing. For me, I'm just making HSTs, and having my squares pre-paired next to my sewing machine has made it much faster and easier. 
• I'm still finding myself falling into the habit of cutting my threads as normal sometimes, but any little bit of thread saving does help. It's becoming more and more natural.
• I'm actually not sewing both sides of my HSTs at once -- I do one side at a time so I am not going through units quite as fast.
• For a scrappy quilt, it has become obvious what colors I need to add in each size. I have a ton of purple in all three sizes, a fair amount of pink in each size, and a lot of green in the smallest size, while having none/hardly any in the large and medium sizes. I will likely comb through my larger scraps and cut a lot more green and some additional pink squares.
• This is most certainly what I would call a "controlled scrappy" quilt in that it has a specific color scheme and there were pinks, purples, and greens that I chose not to use in this quilt. I haven't decided yet if I will cut into my inspiration fabric or not -- I have three yards of it, but that could cover nearly all of the back and the binding for a small quilt.
• While cutting all of my squares, I pulled out one color at a time from my scrap boxes and then sorted out any pieces that were too small or the wrong color. With what was left, I ironed each piece and laid it out on my cutting board to get an idea of the size and tried to maximize how many squares I could cut. Typically, this involved cutting 6 inch squares, then 5 inch squares, then finally 4 inch squares. 
• Sometimes I could cut just 4 inch squares from a piece, some pieces I cut multiple 6 inch squares. I didn't try to cut an equal number of squares in each size, I just tried to maximize how many squares total I was cutting and minimizing waste.
• I find it is almost always helpful to cut a fresh edge when pulling things from your scrap bin. Even if it is a 1/16th of an inch, a nice fresh edge is always easier to align with your ruler.
• Recently, I started a "scrap bag" where I put all of my small scraps -- including things under 2 inches wide, the last small piece of a particular fabric, etc. Having this separate from my scrap bins has made it quick and easy for anything that calls for strings or small scraps. (It is literally a gallon sized kitchen bag, totally not glamorous!)
• I usually sew with cone thread but I usually have a "bobbin cone" so I don't have to unthread and rethread my needle and machine. I do my best to fill a few bobbins at a time so I don't need to stop mid-project. When sewing scrappy, I often use off-white thread.

Have you worked with leaders and enders before? Do you have any tips for me? 

Sharing at Tips and Tutorials Tuesday, Let's Bee Social, and Scraptastic Tuesday!