Thirty three materials from my stash

Last week I told you about my current obsession with scrappy quilts and how crazy my next project was and how I planned to sort out the material for it from my stash. I knew that I needed thirty three fat quarters, but as I didn't know what size they were I was none the wiser until I sat down and looked into it further. It seems a fat quarter is a piece of material approximately 18 inches by 22 inches, which was good news for me, as it helped me visualise the amount of material I was after. 

It turns out it also meant finding the material was much more achievable than I thought it might be. As you'll remember I plan to use material I already have, including some from clothes I've cut up rather than buy new material, so it will truly be a scrappy quilt. With my materials chosen I put them together to make sure the tones worked together and no one material, or colour, dominated.

I think it's worked out remarkably well, don't you?

THIRTY THREE MATERIALS CHOSEN FOR MY SCRAPPY QUILT PROJECT

As I looked at the materials together, my geeky-side came to the fore, and I wondered what the balance was on where the fabric originated. I wasn't surprised to learn that a third of these were from earlier donations from my mum. I was surprised to discover I could source the other two-thirds easily!

There's old shirts of both MOH and me, I haven't worn work shirts for many years but couldn't quite get rid of them so cutting them up seemed the next best option. There's old summer dresses, old skirts, part of a duvet cover and material I've bought either in the past or more recently.

With twelve pieces coming from mum, another thirteen are from clothes (and a duvet cover) I've cut up, leaving only eight from material I've bought.  And even that was a while ago; the green fabric at the top of the third column, I bought most probably in the nineties with a plan and a project that never materialised, and the V&A materials were from a trip there shortly after I took a break from working in 2014.

So for completeness, here's where each piece is from, top to bottom, starting in the left column:

1.  An old shirt of MOH's
2. Bought in a scrap bag
3. From mum's stash
4. An old summer dress
5. Bought from the V&A
6. From mum's stash
7. Bought from the V&A
8. From mum's stash
9. Bought online somewhere
10. An old shirt of MOH's
11. An old shirt of mine

12. An old summer dress
13. An old shirt of mine
14. An old skirt of mine
15. A childhood favourite
16. From mum's stash
17. From mum's stash
18. An old shirt of mine
19. From mum's stash
20. Bought from the V&A
21. An old shirt of mine
22. An old top of mine

23. Bought and never used
24. From mum's stash
25. Part of an old duvet cover
26. From mum's stash
27. From mum's stash
28. An old shirt of mine
29. From mum's stash
30. A childhood favourite
31. An old shirt of mine
32. Bought at the V&A
33. Bought at the V&A

Which means, it truly meets my brief of a scrappy quilt. Now for the next stage of actually cutting the thirty squares from each piece I need...

And then the hard work can really start!

My current obsession: Scrappy quilts

I've always had a thing for patchwork quilts. I've even made a few in the past; more recently that fondness has manifested itself in the patchwork bread bag I made.  You'll know I planned to make another one, but somehow I haven't yet, and that's because something else has been gnawing at me. And that something is bigger than a bread bag.

It's a full blown quilt.  Well, actually it's more than one.

I know, crazy huh? 

It's not like I have plenty of spare time, is it? But I can't shift the desire to make a quilt, or two. So I've been looking around for what type of quilt, and what pattern I want to make. I know I'll need something relatively simple, and something that grows quickly too. As I've a feeling that if the first one is too hard, or something I perceive to be too hard, then it'll likely get stuck.

I already have some material, well quite a lot in fact. I have a bundle from Prestigious Textiles of yellows, greys and white geometric prints that I always planned to make into a quilt at some point. And I still will but I've realised these will be my second quilt. As while the material is gorgeous, and will be perfect in our bedroom, it suits a more complex design, and isn't for my relatively simple and quick growing quilt.

The design I've chosen for this material is Lori Holt's picnic star quilt, which you can see on her website - scroll down on that link until you find the red, white and blue quilt, and you'll know why it's on my list, and why it's not in top spot, yet.

So what kind of quilt will I make?

The other reason for rejecting the yellow and grey star quilt as my first quilt, is that to me it won't be truly scrappy. I think scrappy quilts should be more, well scrappy. But coordinated scrappy, if I can. When I saw Lori Holt's Great Granny Squared book I knew this was the kind of thing I had in mind. There's enough of a design, enough fabrics repeated, but still scrappy enough to qualify as a scrappy quilt to me.

But how to make it happen?

I could buy the material to make this quilt, but again that defeats the point of the scrappy quilt.

I've material that has been amassing for some time now. Some I've bought, some left over from my earlier quilt making days, which is quite a feat as it's survived several clear outs and has hardly been touched since we moved here some fourteen years ago!  Some more material I'm sure has come from my mum, who is a big sewer. And more still has come from clothes I've cut up instead of throwing out. 

And so, the thing I'm wrestling with, is do I have enough material to do the scrappy approach justice. I'm hoping that by mixing in materials that hold memories the quilt will have that extra-specialness I'm after. MOH's initial reaction was that I couldn't use old clothes for this, but soon backed down when I asked what he thought the origins of patchwork quilts were. It was the easiest win I've ever had, I can tell you. He doesn't know yet, that the space freed up using material is only making space for future treasures, but then again perhaps he does.

I *think* I have enough scrappy material, but I need to work that out for sure before I start. I'm telling myself that "I only need 33 two and a half inch squares" as a minimum to make it work. I mean just thirty three squares, that's not so many is it. In fact I need quite a few sets of thirty three squares, which is where the doubt and uncertainty creeps in. So I think next weekend you'll find me looking for enough similar and contrasting materials for the main part of the quilt. And hoping I have enough. And if I'm lucky, actually cutting some of those squares, but we'll see.

I'm less worried about the background as I have that sorted. I have a king-sized duvet that we no longer use, that should be plenty big enough to at least provide the background for the top of the quilt. While it's cream (which I like), it's design is a bit too fancy and it doesn't look so good un-ironed (I'm less keen on those) and so it too has been relegated for another use. If it doesn't to the back, I've plenty of time to come up with a plan for that.

So wish me luck, acknowledge my craziness and definitely look out for some updates along the way!  

On my noticeboard: December

I realised last month that my noticeboard often reflects my thoughts as well as my projects for the current month, and none more so than last month. There's often things I've picked up along the way and am unsure of what to do with, but things I know that I don't want to lose sight of just yet, so I thought I'd take this post to walk you through it.

There's been some more colouring from Johanna Basford's Christmas book. I decided to try water with some of the Staedtler pencils and was rather pleased with how it's turning out so far. I particularly like the parcel with the red bow.  There's still quite a way to go to complete this one, and maybe it'll be finished by Christmas this year!

There's more hints of Christmas too.  The three die cut trees didn't make it onto my Christmas cards - I didn't get around to sharing a post on my cards this year, but these were some pretty test cuts that I either tore or need some extra cuts to complete. So instead of doing that I pinned them onto my board.

The name tag was was from my evening at the London Graphic Centre and reminded me of a calligraphy poster I did for a flower festival many years ago. I expect I've got that somewhere, so I'll try to remember to dig that out.  The robin to the right of the tag was another from the craft supplies provided for the Christmas stocking I made last month.

I've a couple of postcards too. I'm not sure where the Stick To It one came from but it seemed quite appropriate for me. The other one is one I'd found during a clear out. It's from my favourite Norfolk potter - Phillippa Lee Pottery - I'm amassing quite a collection of pie dishes, flan dishes and noodle bowls from there. And every time we go to Burnham Deepdale I have a look to see what's new. Most of the time though MOH is with me and so spending is slightly restricted, but one day... 

The papercut cards I bought at Makers & Friends, the night I started to make my own neon sign, which I still have some knotting to do on.  In fact more than before as the invisible thread has got itself knotted in the box too, hmmmn..

The grey card - Sew Ho - or Soho is one of the Place in Print cards which again is apt for my craft room.  All of the cards are on the noticeboard because they're in the "pretty and not for sharing" category in my head. The diamante dots are a new purchase, in case I needed them for my Christmas cards. I didn't, and I didn't want to lose them, so they went onto the noticeboard too.

The yellow pouch is a Freitag pouch and is made from recycled tarpaulin. This is on my board because it's bright and cheery and because I haven't worked out what to do with it yet. There will be a use for it I'm sure, I just don't know it yet. I've more to share with you soon about Freitag as on the basis of this little pouch I convinced MOH to buy me a larger bag, which I plan to use as an overnight and short trips bag, for Christmas.  More on that soon.

And finally in the top photo you might have noticed a longish strip of brown and cream striped and zig-zagged material. That's my current sewing project, and one I'm stuck on. I'm making a seat cushion for a garden bench, I think that's part of the problem, I know it won't be used anytime soon so I can't quite find the motivation. But I need to, as I want to get started with other projects and I know that if I move on without completing this the project is doomed. 

The feel good factor for this project though is that I'm recycling some of the material from our old bedroom curtains to make this seat cushion cover. I'm taking the same approach - yes freestyling - that I did for my gorgeous yellow chairs, but it feels so much slower for this larger oblong version. 

Both of those feel good, but I really wish it were done.  If you have any tips on how to get going again on a craft project, please let me know!