Chic Country progress

Chic Country in progress

I need 32 more orange units for the border I'm planning for my Chic Country, but I have enough units to assemble the center of the quilt. I have started joining units into blocks, and blocks into larger sections.

a few blocks in short row, but rows are not joined yet

So far the points are all matching up pretty well without too much fuss.  There is a lot of pinning though.  I hate pinning! I think I'll join the blocks in sections instead of rows to minimize the number of long seams with a lot of points to match.  The total number of points to match will be the same either way, but seems less daunting when tackling just a few at a time!

Trying to let Chic Country be random...

...but failing!  I have all these two-color quarter blocks done, and I thought I could just put them up on the wall in random fashion.  Nope, I couldn't do it!  There was too much dark here, two same fabrics too close together there and so on.  I fussed and rearranged!

I had to get these up on the design wall tonight to encourage me along.  On its own, each quarter block is not particularly exciting.  Start putting them together and things start to happen!  This week I'll make the blocks that have the orange accents,  then work on the border.  The original pattern doesn't have a border, but I needed one for size so I came up with something that will accent the circles.  Stay tuned!

Linking up with:

Monday makers at Love Laugh Quit 
Moving it Forward at Em's Scrapbag 
Linky Tuesdays at Freemotion by the River 

RSC butterfly - purple edition

January 2017 RSC block

I finally caved.  For the past several years I have been drooling over all the beautiful blocks and quilts popping out of quilters' scrap boxes as they join in the Rainbow Scrap Challenge. I've always admired and not joined in because my quilt "to do" list was already long enough.  Last Saturday's linky party showcasing finished RSC quilts just pushed me over the edge and I caved. I'll be making at least one block a month this year.

In case you haven't yet stumbled across an RSC post somewhere in blogland, here's how it works.  Every month a featured color is announced, and participants delve into their scrap fabrics for scraps in that color to make a block (or several) in that color.  You can make the same block (or blocks) every month in each month's color, or you can make something different each month.  It's really up to you.  Every Saturday you can go to the So Scrappy blog and link up a blog post about your RSC sewing for the week.

My big challenge is to wait next for month's color!  I drafted this butterfly block in EQ, and while I was at it, I popped it into a quilt layout.

UPDATE: If you would like to make your own butterfly blocks, check out my tutorial here.  Please give me credit for the design if you use it.

Or maybe this one:

I really want to make them ALL right now so I can play with them right now.

This isn't helping:

What happens when you take the lid off the scrap box

When I opened the scrap box it exploded and the lid won't go back on.  That's just the unsorted scraps.  I also have several plastic shoe boxes of scraps all tidily cut into squares and rectangles.  (I'm not doing that anymore, as you may have guessed from the picture above.)  One block per month is not going to solve this problem.

Still, I'm going to try to stick to one block per month, because I also really want to work on these projects:

1. Chic Country (52% of the units are made!)
2. A quilt using all my snowflakes (all 26 of them!) and maybe turning that into a BOM pattern.
3. Something else snowflakey - because I may or may not have come up with another versatile snowflake design that will need a quilted something to live in.
4. Three or four new design ideas floating around.
5. Quilt math tutorials (I've been meaning to start those for a couple of years - it's time to do it!)
6. Write up patterns for my son's kaleidoscope quilt and for Fundy Skies.

Maybe listing it all here will keep me focused.  Or not.  I'll just have to see how it goes!

Linking up with So Scrappy for RSC Saturday

Finally piecing Chic Country

It seems like I have been cutting pieces forever.  Of course I took long breaks, so it seems longer than actual hours spent cutting, but there was still a lot of cutting for my daughter's Chic Country quilt.  First cutting squares and rectangles, then cutting 2 to 3 curves in each with the Quick Curve ruler, adds up to a a lot of cuts!

But finally, seams are being sewn!  Here are the first two blocks sewn together to make sure I'm trimming things correctly for points to match.

That's a relief!  I'm sure there will be some chopped off and/or offset points in the quilt, but at least I know it's possible!  I did have serious doubts earlier this week. To trim the block, you're supposed to to mark certain points on the ruler and place those on the three points of the unit to position the ruler for trimming the unit correctly.  Actually, the pattern says "align pieced points on or near reference dots".  On or near?  How near?  I was 1/8 off both outside points if I positioned the corner point on the dot, and the 1/8" didn't seem to be in equivalent directions for both points that were off.  1/8"???  Isn't that too much?

I almost cried and quit right then.  I was sure none of the points were going to meet to create the lovely circles in the quilt's design. Why didn't this bother last summer when I made a test block?  Now I had cut up all the "good" fabric and couldn't change patterns and the quilt was going to be a mess! I didn't cry, but I did stomp and scowl. In hindsight, perhaps I shouldn't have been working on this so late at night instead of sleeping.

You can see the unit starts out pretty rough!

Thank goodness for the kindness of bloggers!  I searched for images of the quilt and contacted a couple of bloggers who have made successful versions of it.  Cindy of Hyacinth Quilt Designs and Marion of My Quilt Diet both replied with encouraging words and tips and assured me their points were off too but that it all came together OK and to just keep going.  Helen from Sew Kind of Wonderful (makers of the ruler and pattern) also replied to my panicked plea for advice and wrote that my points were off pretty much the same way as hers are when she makes this quilt.  She assured me it would all work out.

Trimmed Chic Country unit

Tonight I took a deep breath and wrapped my mind around those points to figure out where to mark the ruler instead of at the stated spots, so I would at least be consistent from unit to unit for the best chance of matching things up.  I made and trimmed enough units to make two blocks, so I could join them and see if my alternate marking and trimming was going to work.

I think I am confident enough to go back to assembly line mode now.  Well, not right  now.  I have, at least temporarily, learned something about staying up too late sewing.