Blocked Rainbow QAL {Week #6 - Purple Bear Paws}

The 2018 quilt along is now over and the entire pattern is available as a single PDF pattern on Etsy and Craftsy.

It's our last week of block making before we embark on constructing our quilts!

This week is another week with half square triangles (HSTs) but we're only making 8 blocks!

Here are my blocks:

Hooray! We've reached the end of making blocks! Next week we have an "off" week -- in two weeks, we'll have our setting directions posted and we'll start seeing finished quilt tops!

Our winner from last week is Lori!

This week's sponsor is Patterns By Jen and the prize is a PDF or paper pattern!

A bit about Jen:

Jen is a quilt pattern designer from SW Minnesota. While keeping her designs beginner friendly, she leans towards traditional piecing with a bit of modern flare. Her true passion lies in enjoying each step of the quilting process and she is always excited to help new quilters find that same love and enjoyment of the craft. Her journey started in 2002 when she signed up for her first quilting class and tried to design a quilt for it. Twelve years later that design turned into a real pattern and became her first published pattern, Pinwheel Pizzazz. In the following years, she has published 13 more patterns, 3 of which have been published in McCall’s Quick Quilt issues. She has also had 2 blocks published in Quiltmaker’s 100 Quilt Block Magazine. In 2018 she was accepted as an Ambassador for the Island Batik fabric company and has plans to release 6 more quilt patterns this year.

Continue sharing those pictures in the Facebook group and on Instagram with the hashtag #BlockedRainbowQAL!

Playful Pillows {May Island Batik Ambassador Project}

This month, our Island Batik Ambassador theme is Playful Pillows!

I have never made a pillow or quilted pillow cover before (I made some really simple pillowcases years ago for my husband) so this is a fun adventure for me! As always, all of the fabrics have been generously given to me by Island Batik!

I decided that I wanted to make a pillow to match the baby quilt that I made last month. Here's that quilt:

Rather than making a one block pillow from the same pattern, I decided to use the same fabrics with the mini quilt pattern from our Bear Tracks pattern. The mini finishes at 12", which is a good size for a little pillow. Here's Amanda's original mini quilt top:

The bear paw blocks are itty bitty! The blocks are 4" finished so those HSTs finish at 1"! Lots and lots of trimming later I had all of my HSTs ready:

Once the HSTs were done, it didn't take very long to get the blocks together and get the top done.

I layered the top with some scrap batting and leftover flannel and used my walking foot to do some simple straight line gridwork on the top. I also stitched around the perimeter of the top to make sure that everything stayed together during construction.

I used Amanda Jean's simple envelope back pillow tutorial as a guide for my pillow. I had a 12" pillow form and used the leftover flannel from the back of the quilt as the back of the pillow. I used a zig-zag stitch around final seam to finish. That way the pillow can be washed because goodness knows babies can make messes!

And ta-da! A little pillow to match a little quilt.

This was a fun and easy project and I can see why some people find pillows so addicting to make! Maybe I need to recover the pillows on my couch...

If you love bear paw blocks like I do, then check out the Bear Tracks pattern which includes the mini quilt pattern!

Happy Friday! I'm having a giveaway of the scraps left over from the project -- click here to see that post! Sharing at Finish it up Friday!

Brutal Honesty + Giveaway {May 2018}

April showers bring May flowers! April sewing brings May finishes (I hope!) Both of the quilts that I sent off to be either quilted by my mom on her mid-arm or long arm quilted are finished, but I don't have them back yet to share pictures. I've taken them off the list since they *are* finished but keep an eye out for official finish posts!

Quilting in Progress:
1. Traveling Quilt Bee (2016) -- I was able to get a few more sections quilted since I posted last week! I'm hoping to finish this before the end of the month.

Completed tops:
2. Magnolia Mystery QAL -- No progress (needs backing)

Tops partially finished:
3. Bonnie and Camille C2C Bee Quilt -- No progress
4. Romantic Garden Quilt -- No progress
5. Monthly Wall Hangings -- No progress

Just blocks and units:
6. Pineapple Stash Bee Blocks -- No progress
7. Sew Kitschy Blocks -- No progress
8. Cubicle Quilts -- My May cubicle quilt is finished and hung up in my office!

9. Happy Houses blocks -- No progress
10. Birthstone blocks -- No progress
11. Donuts quilt -- All of my block sets are done - I need to decide on the background fabric and then I'll be able to start working on the layout soon.

12. Double Delight -- I am close to being finished with my second set of square-in-a-square blocks and then I'll be working on the 9-patch units in full force.

Quilt alongs and long term projects:
13. Monthly Island Batik Ambassador projects -- My project for April was a vintage-inspired baby quilt and our May project theme is pillows and I will be sharing that project on Friday.

14. Breezy Blooms C2C Bee -- I worked on Chelsea's quilt in April and am working on Karen's quilt this month!

15. Blocked Rainbow Quilt -- We're making blue bowties this week! Click here to get the directions from Craftsy!

New projects:

16. Faceted Mini #3 - I am working on a third Faceted mini quilt pattern to join the Faceted Churn Dash and Faceted Friendship Star patterns. I'm using Printology, a new fabric line from Benartex, as a part of a blog hop next week! Here's a sneak preview of my project so far:

My April goals were to finish my secret sewing project and to start quilting my 2016 Traveling Quilt Bee, both of which happened, hooray! My secret sewing project will be shared in about 10 days.

My May goal will be to finish my May IBA project (a pillow to match my April project!) and to finish my TQB Quilt.

Don't forget to join the HBD Facebook Group -- it's not too late to join in the Blocked Rainbow QAL!

Now for the giveaway! Leave a comment below with your favorite May memory for a bunch of Island Batik fabric left over from my April baby quilt!

The giveaway is now closed and our winner is Anita!

Blocked Rainbow QAL {Week #5 - Blue Bowties}

The 2018 quilt along is now over and the entire pattern is available as a single PDF pattern on Etsy and Craftsy.

This week is our super alliterative week with Blue Bowties!

This week we're adding in another basic quilting technique - stitch and flip units!

Here are my fabrics and blocks:

If you're a little bit behind, now is the perfect time to catch up! These bowtie blocks in particular go together quite quickly so if there's a week that you missed or you are still working on a previous week, making only nine blocks this week is a breeze! This is half as many blocks as we made in week 1 for our red pinwheels!

Our winner of last week's prize is Annette! All of her fabrics feature little bugs, isn't that adorable?

This week our giveaway sponsor is Pamela from PamelaQuilts! A little about Pamela:

Pamela Boatright has been sewing since she was a child, but it wasn’t until she was raising her five daughters that she fell in love with the quilting. She is a self taught quilter who loves challenging herself and working with traditional quilt designs. She became a proficient hand quilter, then moved into machine quilting on her domestic machine. After starting work at the local quilt shop 12 years ago she was encouraged to begin writing her own patterns. She loves all aspects of creating quilts, especially the opportunity to work with Island Batik as an Island Batik Ambassador and this past year as collaborated with Aurifil thread as one of their Aurifil Artisans. She enjoys sharing her creations on social media as well as teaching small classes at her local quilt shop.

Don't forget to share your progress photos in the Facebook group or on Instagram with the hashtag #BlockedRainbowQAL! If you haven't joined in yet, don't fret! There's plenty of time to join in because we have multiple "catch up" weeks in the month of May! Sharing at Linky Tuesday and Let's Bee Social!

Schedule:
March 19 - Introduction, Yardage Requirements, Kona Sale with HBD
March 26 - Sponsors, Background Spacer cutting, Color Suggestions
April 2- Red Pinwheels
April 9 - Orange Churn Dashes
April 16 - Yellow Flying Geese
April 23 - Green Sawtooth Stars
April 30 - Blue Bowties <-- That's today!
May 7 - Purple Bear Paws
May 14 - Catch up week/Mother's Day
May 21 - Setting directions
May 28 - Catch up week/Memorial Day
June 4 - Finished Quilt Top Parade/Link Up

On The Road Home {TQB Quilting Progress}

The time had finally come for me to start the quilting on my Traveling Quilt Bee (TQB) quilt from 2016! When last I posted, the top had been finished and I was mulling ideas for quilting.

I did decide to go with my initial quilting idea of quilting each different person's section with a different free motion filler. There are seven sections on the main body of the quilt not including the black and pieced borders.

The first section I quilted was my original quilt starter, the four star block. I used a simple meander. (Side note: some of these pictures don't show the purple well and/or the background looks cream instead of white -- I took these pictures in less than ideal lighting conditions!)

The next section is an L-shaped section of two medium and five small blocks. I used a curly flower motif through this section.

The next section, which is actually two sections added by the same person, are four larger blocks -- two on each side of the center of the quilt. I quilted loop-de-loops in both of these sections.

Now the center third of the quilt is done! The next four sections are each long rows of blocks across the width of the quilt. My next planned motifs to use are the leafy meander (my new favorite!) and potentially a wood grain motif. My plan is to keep the different motifs "curvy" and since all of the piecing in the quilt is straight.

Happy Thursday! Sharing at NTT!