Stash Jazz

Unfortunately, I haven't been able to attend any Seattle MQG giving quilt sew-ins, and finally I decided to just go ahead and make a quilt for them to donate. Some time before her passing last year, Carole Lyles Shaw gave permission for the guild to use her Stash Jazz pattern for giving quilts. I opted to make the 55" x 62" Small Lap Quilt version, though mine actually came out 55" x 58" due to the amount of border fabrics I had. 

The pieced blocks were made totally of scraps; then the solid blocks and borders were from stash.

Honestly, piecing the scrappy slabs was time consuming! I had grabbed my blue and yellow/orange scrap baskets, thinking the quilt top would be primarily blues and oranges. Come to find out, I had more yellow than orange, so that's what ended up happening.

Still, when it was time to cut the solid slabs for each block, I still went with blue and orange - Kona Riviera and Orangeade. Except I didn't have quite what I needed, so the blue corners are actually Kona Ocean, and the orange corner is obviously a print. I think it works, especially since the quilt top is definitely focused on the scraps.

For the back, I started by piecing the leftovers, and added stash prints and solids to bring it up to size.

Early on I knew I wanted to do a grid for quilting, and when I remembered I had a cone of Aurifil 50wt 2225 [Salmon] - thank you Aurifil! - it felt like kismet. And gotta say, quilting went so nicely with my new machine. It gave me a lot of joy to have the quilting go so smoothly.

I had originally planned for a scrappy binding, but once I was trimming the quilt, scrappy didn't feel right. Or at least not with the scraps I had left. Happily, I happened across random pieces of original Cotton + Steel Mesa by Alexa Marcelle Abegg from back in 2014(!!). And I think it's a fun addition.

So thanks to perfect timing, our guild meeting is tonight, and I'll be able to deliver both the Pixie Stix quilt I bound and this Stash Jazz to the Giving Committee for donation. Pretty sure it will go to either Kenmore Senior Women’s Shelter or YWCA Pathways for Women. Perfect.

Linking up with Quilting Jetgirl's Favorite Finish {June 2025}.

Linking up with Quilting & Learning, What a Combo's Free Motion Mavericks.

Vertices

Begun solely as a way to explore a design and use scraps to do so, Vertices ended up being a little more challenging than I expected. Not difficult, really, but not as enjoyable to piece as I expected. Still, I like the finish, and am glad to have tried it. Originally inspired by "Four-Corner Block," a quilt by Florine Taylor in 1987 shown in Roderick Kiracofe's Unconventional & Unexpected. My version is much more chaotic but there are still some similarities, and the inspiration definitely began there.

My goal at the start was to use all my blue scraps, then I added in black and dark gray. Turned out, I didn't have as many as I thought I would in a reasonable size. Same with the lime-ish strings; for those, I actually cut into Konas Acid Lime and Key Lime yardage when I ran out of usable scraps. The quilt finished at 41" x 55", with a back pieced from stashed yardage and matched binding using Acid Lime and Key Lime again.

So yay for a May quilt finish, even though it took most of the month for me to struggle through it. In the end, I'm really quite fond of it.

Linking up with Quilting Jetgirl and Favorite Finish {May 2025}.

Fragments

Ages ago - two years ago maybe? - I hung a small quilt in our Little Free Library. Just 9" x 12", it was begun in September of 2019, on a touring bus, somewhere between Paris and Beaune, France.

Fast forward to this week when I was restocking our LFL, and noticed that the little quilt was gone. No problem. I'm fine that someone claimed it, but it made me think I should hang another quilt up, and see if it finds a new home too. This small (9" x 9") quilt, which I named "Fragments," was created straight from the scrap basket. 

I began with a tiny pieced scrap I'd come across a few weeks ago and kept for just such a time as this.

Bit by bit, it grew...

Until it was large enough, and ready to make a scrappy back, baste, and consider quilting options.

Using Aurifil 50wt 2612 [Arctic Sky], I did angled straight-line quilting, between 1/16" and 1/2" apart. I originally planned on a grid, but actually one direction seemed enough.



A scrappy binding was the obvious choice, and once I got a few photos, I took it right out to hang in our LFL. We'll see if it gets claimed. I should probably put a little sign up to let folks know that would be ok, so I'll give that some thought. Meanwhile, it was a fun little diversion. Now back to work on chair blocks!

ColorScape

After finishing up a commission quilt recently, a new table runner, and a batch of quilted bookmarks, I was kind of at a loss at what to do next. Isn't it great when you find yourself with nothing pressing?

So I hauled out my bin of solid scraps, and started in on a scrappy thing inspired by some of Ophelia Pang's @opheliapangg works. Very few colors were rejected as I pulled from the scrap basket, making columns of multi-colored stripes of varied widths. I even added in a few black, white, and gray strips, and by some miracle, the happiest palette began to emerge.

I stopped when the quilt top nearly filled my design wall at 56" x 69". I hadn't really had in mind to make a quilt that large, but what did I expect? There are plenty of scraps left. I could have kept going and going. 

Instead, I opted to see what I had in stash for a pieced quilt backing, without being too fussy about it. Predominantly orange seemed to make the most sense once I found some good sized pieces that worked together. And on those fabrics I found a bit of a surprise - two especially fun selvages. I decided to trim those off and make them a focal point, which is something I very rarely do. But they just seemed to 'fit' this quilt, don't you think?

For quilting, I rummaged through my collection of small spools of Aurifil 40wt and 50wt, hoping to use a variety of colors both in the bobbin and as the top thread. Originally thinking 40wt for the quilting and 50wt for the bobbin, I ended up using both 40wt and 50wt for the quilting because of the colors I chose to use: Aurifil 40wt 2150 [Pumpkin], 2423 [Baby Pink], 4020 [Fuschia], 6722 [Crimini] and Aurifil 50wt 2115 [Lemon], 2886 [Light Avocado], 5006 [Light Turquoise], 7000 [Neon Orange]. This wild mix of thread colors made the quilting most enjoyable.

I used my hera marker to mark every 2" to 4" for beginning lines of an uneven grid. Once I had those lines done, I filled in randomly, ending up with lines .5" to 2" apart. I really like using Erica's @kitchentablequilting method for grid quilting. It always gives me such a great result, and this time was no exception.

This quilt was trimmed without much squaring or measuring. It just wasn't important for this particular project. Up to that point, things had been pretty relaxed, so why stop? For binding, I continued to pull right out of the scrap basket, odds and ends of other bindings from other projects. I think the scrappiness fits the quilt well enough.

Honestly, I loved the process of making this quilt, and the resultant finish, so much, I could easily dive right back in and make another. I probably won't do that, but one of these days, I may.... 

For now, I took my friend Erica's @kitchentablequilting advice, and had hubby take a photo of me with my finished quilt!

Linking up with Quilting JETgirl's Favorite Finish linky!

Mixtape

After finishing Snippets, I was determined not to toss the CF scraps into the scrap baskets, and they sat on my work table for days, just waiting patiently. Finally, over the weekend I had a chance to sit down with them, and honestly there wasn't much thought that went into the process. 

I first sewed like-sized pieces together. From there, I kept matching sets, then adding more of the same fabric scraps, and finally puzzled chunks together. When I was done, I had a very scrappy piece, 14.5" x 15". At that point, I wasn't sure I was done piecing or not. 

Apparently not. When I went back to it another day, I decided it needed a frame. Most of my improv work does not, but this scrappy piece did, but something out of the ordinary. I thought at first, maybe a lattice, but didn't like that. Instead, I incorporated just a small segment in with a couple of my favorite prints from the original piece. Each side is a different width, thus the funky mitered corners.

At 18" x 20", I decided that was enough, and I started in right away piecing a quilt back. Just more scrappy piecing fun.

For quilting, I did an uneven grid using Aurifil 28 2710 [Robin's Egg]. I really enjoy quilting a grid, especially on a small quilt like this one.

Binding was done with the last of my CF Doe Grid, and since I didn't have quite enough, a bit of that navy spiky print from Collection CF. All in all, that was a very fun diversion and took care of nearly all of those scraps that had been hanging out. I chose the name Mixtape, since there are a variety of Carolyn Friedlander collections represented. I just used whatever blues I had for both Snippets and Mixtape. The only bad part is they're pretty much gone now. Oh WELL.

Linking up with Quilting JETgirl's Favorite Finish Linky.

Spot On

Back in January, I was doing some stash-sorting, and came up with several groupings I was ready to part with - a little fabric here, a collection of random blocks there. AND a generous stack of nearly 30 hourglass blocks leftover from the scrappy Hourglass quilt I made last summer.

All photos by Ellyn Zinsmeister; used by permission.

I happened to be chatting with my friend Ellyn @ellynz, told her about the stack, and she said she'd gladly take them and do something with them. Awesome! She joined them all together, appliquéd some solid circles on top, and passed it on to her friend Martha @pinwheelprodnsquilts, who quilted it in loops and circles. 

Ellyn then topped it all off with big stitch circles and big stitch binding. How cool is that?!

The quilt finished at 46" x 54". I so appreciate the love Ellyn showed to the stack of blocks I'd lost interest in. It's fun to see scraps I recognize (from my blocks) mixed with ones I don't (from Ellyn's additions) and how well they play together. Definitely a fun collaboration.

ETA: Read Ellyn's post about this project here.

Aurifil Artisan Challenge :: Multiple Threads

When I started out with this mini quilt (10.5" x 11"), I wasn't intentionally making it for this month's Aurifil Artisan challenge, which is to make something using multiple thread colors. In fact, it wasn't until I was ready to quilt it and started pulling out threads in a variety of weights and colors that it dawned on me that I could.... and should! 

Early on, I named this piece Downtown, inspired by the print scrap in my original fabric pull. I had in mind something fairly small, as I chose more scraps and stash fabrics to pair with the print. Honestly, it may be a while before I'm ready to make a big quilt. I feel like I'm still in recovery mode after last year's big tryptich. So when I had a couple of hours on Friday afternoon and felt like digging into my scraps, I just went for it. I initially thought I'd do something with a variety of print scraps, but once I found that scrap - the last of a 2012 Jay McCarroll Center City print - I decided I wanted it to be the feature.

The piecing was random, as I created a few small blocks, then puzzled how they might fit together. At this point, it was just a relaxing way to spend a couple of hours at the start of the weekend. 

The backing was pre-determined - also a scrap of fabric already spray-basted to batting - and though I'd intended on making a quilt front that coordinated better, I let that go for convenience and the pure joy of using that dot fabric.

It was as I began mulling over quilting that things got more interesting. There were so many colors in this small piece, and any one thread color didn't seem to fit. So I began to search for thread colors that matched the fabrics, and in doing so, pulled several different weights as well. The quilting plan at this point? Decide as I went.

In all, I ended up using 10 different threads! I put Aurifil 40wt in the bobbin, and then just started in, quilting basically from the center out, one color at a time. The threads I used for piecing were:

Aurifil 50wt 2225 [Salmon], 2479 [Medium Orchid], 2975 [Brass], 6010 [Toast]

Aurifil 40wt 2692 [Black]

Aurifil 28wt 2625 [Arctic Ice]

Aurifil 12wt 2000 [Light Sand], 8530 [Puce Magenta Pink]

The quilt is bound in Kona Sangria, and just to let the thread show off, I machine-bound it, top-stitching with more of the 12wt Puce Magenta Pink. 

At some point during quilting, it dawned on me that I could add in a couple of more thread weights and colors by doing a little hand-stitching on the print sections. That also solved my issue of not really wanting to machine-quilt on them, but knowing they would still benefit from a little something. Thus, after the quilt was bound, I used Aurifloss 6722 [Sea Biscuit] and Aurifil 8wt 2420 [Light Blush] to add some outlining and filling stitches to those sections.

I love that this little foray into the scrap basket pretty much decided what it wanted to be along the way! Creating Downtown was refreshing, and I'm anxious to see what's next.

Linking up with Quilting JETgirl's Favorite Finish March.