The Back As the Front

Let's review. In the last two months, I've made four scrap quilts, primarily from my very full solids scrap basket. 

Banded, where an entire yard of Kona Haze was used as background on the front. But other than that, every single bit - blocks, backing, and binding - was from the scrap basket. [47" x 55" x 47" x 58"]

Bonkers, my controlled crazy quilt, which was made entirely from scrap, except for the chunky binding. [48" x 58"]

Stackables, which used more stash yardage than the previous two, yet also used a lot of scraps - all those 'stripes' on the front were scraps; as were all the pieced blocks on the back. Even with the added stash, I consider it a good use of scraps. [45" x 48"]

And finally, there's Tangled Strings, which is much smaller than the others, but still made primarily from the scrap basket. Only the Kona Punch on the back and the black binding were from stash. [25" x 26"]

So the thing is....for each of these quilt finishes, I got so many comments that the back could be the front, or right out that the commenter liked the back over the front. So I figured why not? My next scrap quilt would be made, as much as possible, from the scrap basket in the style of my pieced quilt backs, but from the start, I'll consider it the front. IE. I think I'll do the 'grab and piece' method, just reaching in and pulling out a handful of scraps, and piecing them together. At some point, I'll probably need to pull from stash to fill in - maybe? I'm not sure, but I'm curious to see. Here's what my solid scrap basket looked like after the above four quilts....

So obviously, it's packed a lot looser now, but it obviously has another quilt's (or few?!) worth of scraps left to give. Let's see.

Scrap Report Two + More on Making a Pieced Quilt Back

Like I mentioned when I checked in with Scrap Report One back in April, I kind of felt like a failure at this year's 100 Day Project, but I am excited to say that I feel like I've made up for it a bit in the last few weeks. I believe that the 100 Day Project officially ended on May 30, so here's my final report on how I've used scraps in the second half.

The potholders I made for my Making Scrappy Potholders tutorial were intentionally made from scraps - both front and back, though I did have to pull from stash to make a binding I liked.

Though much of the fabric used in Vessel was newly-purchased, I did pull yellow scraps from the scrap basket to include in both the background on the front, and on the back. 

And where I really outdid myself and finished my 100 Days of Scraps with a bang has been with the scrappy quilt project I'm currently working on. It's not quite done, but the front and back definitely qualify to be included in this scrap report.

Though I used one yard of Kona Haze from stash for the background, the rest of the front (above) is totally from scrap. I felt like a single background fabric would give some unity to the multi-colored design. Where on the back (below), anything went, and every single bit came from the scrap basket. First I made a panel of all the left over bits from the front. Then, without looking, I grabbed a handful of scraps from the scrap basket, pressed them, and sewed them together. And I did it again. There were a few stragglers from each set that made up a fourth panel. 

Honestly, that was so fun that I did it again, then went looking for larger pieces to start combining the panels together. 

Working on a design wall is perfect for constructing a quilt back this way. Note that my quilt top is still up there, so I figured out dimensions for the back as I went. Basically, I added larger scraps to my scrappy slabs one by one, pinned them up, then moved on to the next. In general, I added wider fabrics to the outside edges, knowing that after quilting, some trimming would happen. But for interest-sake, I did let some smaller scraps reach out to the edge.

I thought it might be fun - helpful even? - to see the shapes of the final pieced slabs that made up the quilt back, with the lines shown above. And yes, I did add one more vertical trip down in the right-hand bottom corner, so that's evened up a bit. This backing intentionally is much scrappier than the one I made in my Making a Pieced Quilt Back tutorial, but the process is pretty similar. But with this one, I reached my goal of pulling every little bit of fabric from the scrap basket. It remains to be seen if I can get binding from the scrap basket as well, but fingers are crossed!

Making a Pieced Quilt Back

There are so many ways to make a quilt back, and I'm usually inclined to make a pieced quilt back, using up any leftover pieces - both scraps and yardage - from the making of the quilt front. As I make the backing for my Pantone challenge quilt, it seemed a good time to record my progress.

So this is how making a pieced quilt back starts, at least for me. I lay out all the scraps I have left from my quilt front, so I can see what I have. In this case, I have very little left of the yardage I started out with, so I've also grabbed a few smaller coordinating fabrics from stash, in this case, both print and solid. And then I just start piecing the smaller bits together. This time, I started with that small 'checked' print scrap.

Before long, all the little bits had become a piece measuring 18" x 20". Now it was time to start adding some larger pieces to the mix.

I started with my favorite of the 'new' prints, along with the smaller of the fabrics from my original neutral pull. By now, it measured 24" x 25", where my goal was around 50" square.

Up onto the design wall it went, and I began to pin up more pieces of fabric in places they might work, including another coordinating print. You'll notice that I 'build' the quilt back right on top of the quilt front, so it's easy to see how large it needs to be without continually measuring.

When I really like what I'm seeing, I may start actually piecing parts together, before I even know what will go in the other areas. So at this point, I've totally sewn together the middle horizontal section. I just have to figure out the top right corner and the very bottom.

Well that was easily done! I very nearly used the last of my original neutral stash filling in those two final sections, and we have a quilt back!

The finished backing measures 50" x 52", and I'm really pleased with the balance of the colors and shapes. They don't all come together this easily, so I'll take it as a win! Now time to get basting. Let me know if you have any question, ok?