Wednesday, February 10, 2021

Pie Time

Soooo. I'm still sewing from the scrap basket, and not complaining one bit. This latest project began with a pile of Alison Glass Kaleidoscope scraps left from a set of napkins I'd made last fall. And surprise, surprise, I was in the mood for more improv stripes. One thing I love about them is that precision is not a requisite. In fact they're even better when they wobble a bit.


I had in mind to make a new version of a Bee Sewcial bee block I'd once made for Leanne/@shecanquilt. But I wanted to mix things up a bit, so where I sliced the strip segment into eighths for that block (and hint hint, this is where the name of the finish came from), I sliced this one into sixths.... just like I used to do with pies when I worked in a bakery.


And then I rearranged things....


and sewed them back together again. To emphasize the 'pie' theme, I outlined one lone 'slice.' In fact I'd intended to trim the pieced stripe slab into more of a 'circle,' but I couldn't bear to trim those stripes too much. So it's more of an octagon-shaped 'pie,' and I'm ok with that.


So in the midst of framing the piece, grandgirl came for virtual school, and on her lunch break, started playing around on the design wall. I told her I needed a quilt back for the piece I was working on, and she said she'd be happy to design one for me. Yay! I'll tell you a little more about that at the end of the post.


Anyway, thanks to grandgirl, I was soon on my way to quilting!


I started with some straight lines 1/4" apart, creating a blue-edged 'slice' coming from the left side using Aurifil 50wt #2535 [Magenta]. Then I moved to the upper section of the quilt, where I matchstick-quilted 1/8" lines using 50wt Cotton+Steel thread in Turquoise. And lastly, the bottom section was straight-line quilted 1/2" apart in Aurifil 50wt #1125 [Medium Teal]



I finished off with a faced binding for a change. 


And about that quilt back... some got trimmed off after quilting, but here's what shows.


One thing grandgirl was happy about was that with her personally designed backing, this would be an 'interchangeable' (her word), aka two-sided quilt. Love that she thought that. AND she also loved that tiny speck of green that unfortunately got trimmed off after the quilt was quilted, so I just had to sew it into the facing. The little quilt finished at 14 1/2" x 22 1/2." 


So just one more week of my 50 Days of Scraps. I'm working on some bee blocks and then I think I might have time for one more smallish project. Now what could that be?

7 comments:

  1. Super design and finish! And 'grandgirl' 's backing is perfect.
    Thanks for some wonderful inspiration Debbie.

    ReplyDelete
  2. It looks like your granddaughter has a great eye for design. I'm glad you were able to move the green to the facing so that it still appeared on the backing. :)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Very inspiring project! The different spacing for the sections of straight line quilting is such a good idea - thank you.

    ReplyDelete
  4. SO CUTE! Love it. Love your grandgirls backing.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I love this so much, especially love that grand girl had a hand in it! so good

    ReplyDelete
  6. Your improv process is very interesting, and I appreciate knowing how you stepped through this piece. You could have taken another direction too, and made this one of many such blocks, right? Your quilting is lovely. I admire how straight your lines appear. I also I like that this was a small, fast finish, and that your granddaughter helped you. The backing, and that bit of green is a great reminder of your shared experience. Perfect.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Really fun finish and I love that your granddaughter helped with the design. I can’t wait to see if any of my granddaughters will show interest in sewing once they are old enough.

    ReplyDelete