Lucy Boston Milestone

Since August of 2019 I have been working on sewing the sashing around all 56 of my Lucy Boston Patchwork of the Crosses quilt blocks. My Instagram feed has been an interrupted parade of blocks with their new grey perimeters, each one counting up to the finish.

Block 32 of 56, finished Apr 15, 2020

Block 35 of 56, finished Apr 27, 2020

Block 44 of 56, finished Sep 6, 2020

And finally on Sunday, the last one!

Block 56 of 56, finished Feb 7, 2021

At some point I shared the concern that I might get bored of sewing (seemingly) endless grey honeycombs, but really, I didn't. I enjoy the stitching and it was a lot less taxing than when I had to match the fabrics in the blocks! Each block didn't take too, too long so I had regular injections of feeling like I had finished something.

You would think using solid grey would preclude any drama, but I managed. When I bought the grey fabrics, I was planning to use different shades from white to dark grey. After I bought them, I decided the white wasn't going to work and changed my plan. Last April, I pulled out the fabrics to compare what I needed with this new plan to what I had.

You can see the fabric I labeled "3" just has a couple strips left; it was not enough.

Glad that I kept everything organized and labeled, I knew exactly what to order. I made a trip to the store where I got it on the off chance I would get fabric from the same bolt, and they didn't have it any more. Being my last option, I ordered some online and just hoped it would match what I had. Dye lots in yarn is a real thing (as in different batches of the same colourway won't be the same) and I thought that might be true of fabric too. When I got it, I tucked it away because I wasn't in a cutting mood and had plenty of other blocks to sew.

At the end of the year, I got through sewing all the other blocks and finally needed to cut strips from grey 3. But I couldn't find the extra that I had bought earlier in the year. I searched through my maker space and the boxes of my fabric multiple times and could not find it. I finally decided it wasn't worth my time to keep looking and ordered more. Even further removed in time from the original purchase; even more chance of the dye lot not matching.

I received the new fabric and promptly cut it into strips, cut out the honeycomb shapes and glued the 138 honeycombs I needed to finish. I pulled out the block that was waiting to be finished and set the first honeycomb in place:

It didn't match!!

I was so disappointed. And wondering why I didn't check before I cut and glued all those honeycombs when I was already worried the colours wouldn't match!

When I was ready to face it, I tried to find a solution. With some research, a few different things made me suspicious that I mixed up the names. One of them being that fabric I couldn't "find" from April, but funny enough, at the same time I had more of grey 2 than I thought I should!

Now, having an idea of what the grey I needed was called (I suspected I had mixed up the names of grey 2 and 3 but couldn't be sure), I took samples of the fabric to a different quilt store. I don't normally shop there because it's far away, but I was in that city for something else and made the stop.

The shop doesn't have a particularly large section of solids, and they only had five greys. And only one of them was from the manufacturer I needed. And. It. Was. The. Colour. I. Needed!

These colours match!

I was very happy about that, let me tell you. I could have tried an online order, but finding it in person and being sure was so much better!

After that it was simple work to cut and glue another 138 honeycombs for the remainder of my blocks.

Here's a pic of all of the blocks hung together:

You might notice I have also started to sew some of the black connecting pieces between the blocks. And I have started some of the crosses too:

All the centers come from the same fabric, but there are different circle designs.

I'm using three different fabrics for the arms of the crosses, the three bottom ones in this picture:

The top one might be used in the final border.

In a couple places, I have sewn blocks together to get a feel for that:

The lower horizontal seam is sewn

The upper horizontal seam is sewn

I'm still not sure if I'm going to sew it all together in rows first, which is what I see other PotC makers doing online, or try to sew it into sections. Or maybe spiral out from the center.

For now, I'm sewing crosses, which go really fast compared to sashing a block (16" of seams to sew instead of 64"!) and considering how to finish the outside edge. The quilt is visible from where I sit and stitch, so it's easy to stare at it and ponder my options.

Road Trip to Quiltville, USA

I was in Missouri a couple weeks ago visiting my in-laws. We happened to be only about an hour from the Missouri Star Quilt Company. Why it took me this long to learn that, I have no idea!

So we picked a day and my two mothers-in-law and I headed to Hamilton, Missouri, also known as Quiltville USA.

Why the fuss? Why all the excitement? Well MSQC has become quite a thing in the quilting world. The owner, Jenny, puts out great videos on youtube every week and they have made themselves known for selling precut packages (especially online).

It all started when Jenny's kids were worried she wouldn't have anything to do when they all left the house. So they bought her a longarm quilting machine, you know, to keep her busy. They had no room for it in their house so they bought an empty building in the town to house it. (I believe it was the old library.) The building cost less than the quilting machine did.

From professional longarm quilting, she moved into selling fabrics and long story short, a lot of the family is involved in running this big business that now owns about eight store fronts in town. (That's about half of downtown Hamilton.) The company also has a conference center where they host classes and overnight retreats.

And that has spawned a whole local economy centered on quilters. There are B&Bs for groups that plan quilting retreats there so they can be close for shopping. All of them advertise having a large room where you can quilt while you stay there.

The company also has packages for buses full of quilters that come from all over. Anyway, all that is to say it has become a destination spot. (Hamilton is also the hometown of JC Penny, but that's not quite as big a draw.)

We had a lovely time perusing all the shops. They have them organized by type of fabric (like moderns, juvenile, licensed prints, batiks, reproductions, etc.).

Here we are in the main store.

I went ahead and bought anything I really liked. :)

I found a charm pack (5" squares) in soft red, cream and blue (left side of picture):

and then found the three pieces of yardage (on the right)  that could go with them. What will this be? I have no project in mind at this time but sometimes the fabric comes before the pattern.

Here are some more precut packages I took home:

Two shibori packs (left), a mini charm (2.5" squares) of light neutrals, a layer cake (10" squares, on right) of various neutrals with text, numbers, music or map motifs, and a charm back (bottom middle) of more blue and white fabric which have the look of Delft blue pottery.

I think the shibori caught my eye because I had tried to sign up for an indigo dyeing class at Squam. Before I found out that I didn't get in, I already had thoughts of making a quilt from the fabric I would dye there. I guess the quilt idea stuck in my head and I decided I didn't have to actually make the fabric myself. :)

I found a few batiks that I just love:

I believe I got a half yard of the three on the right since I don't have a plan for them. The blue squares is my favorite batik ever right now. The blue on the left was purchased to be binding for my Nocturne Star quilt.

Here are a few random half yard or fat quarter pieces I picked up:

Obviously they weren't purchased as a set to go together but I like them each for different reasons.

I was keeping an eye out to see if there was a fabric that I could use with some of my leftover nine patch blocks to make a baby quilt for a coworker who is expecting. I saw a piece of this navy airplane fabric in a fat quarter bin:

I was thinking two fat quarters would do the job, but I could only find one! I went to the register to ask if they had it in yardage and they didn't...in that store. A bunch of clicking on their keyboards, and then they told me just what store I could find it in. I borrowed the fat quarter to show at the next store and found it no problem. And of course, found other color ways and other fabrics in the line! Oh my!

I was able to restrict myself to the two colors you see above. I ended up getting a yard of each and thought I would use the light one for the back of the quilt.

It wasn't until I was cutting up this fabric (yes, I have used it already!) that I noticed the cute way they have done the color code on the selvage:

When printing fabrics, a dot of each color used is put on the selvage. (They do it for some part of the printing process, but it's also very handy if you're trying to match a color in the fabric.) But this fabric used different airplanes silhouettes to map out the colors instead of dots. Isn't that too cute!!

Finally, I bought a couple bags of scraps and cut offs:

I looked through all the bags (without opening them) and found the ones with the most fabric I like. I don't know what yardage I got because they just put a minimum weight in the bag, but it looks like quite a bit for my money. And you certainly get a wider variety.

It was a fun day. Well, we were pretty much done by lunchtime, but you know what I mean. Not something I need to do every year, but every other year--I could see that!

Downtown Hamilton, Missouri

Orange to Zig and Grey to Zag

We went to visit my in-laws in Missouri over Christmas and one thing I like to take advantage of is all of the quilt shops there. My mother-in-law likes to quilt and it's something fun to do together. (In this case, she enjoyed helping me spend my money!!)

The fabric prices there used to be about half of what I would spend in my area, but not so much anymore. The shops set up in people's homes or garages are still a lot cheaper, but the larger commercial shops are now about the same price. But they have nice shops, good selections, and it's always more fun to shop with someone else.

So I may have picked up a "few" new fabrics. I got the idea to do a grey quilt, but of course I needed a least one other colour with it. I decided on orange. And then I went to see what I could find:

We found a lot of great fabrics. I have arranged them from dark to light to dark and the order above is the final one I settled on.

I wanted to make a zig zag quilt pattern that uses no triangle pieces. I mean, triangles are fine and all, but the simplicity of the rectangle pieces this pattern was made from really appealed to me.

So I cut three length-of-fabric strips from each colour:

I then arranged them so that 1.5 strips got sewn to the colour on its right and 1.5 to the colour on its left.

It was quite an organizational process!

I then pressed the seam and then the strips open:

Pressing is so satisfying!

Then I cut the strips into squares:

Arrange the squares right and you get zig zags:

The top half of the quilt.

And the bottom half.
(Obviously the whole thing doesn't fit on my
curtain/design wall.)

The width didn't fit on the curtain so although it looks a little long and skinny, the final quilt will be two blocks wider.

I got all of this progress done in one weekend (!) and had a great time doing it. For no good reason, I don't enjoy sewing in the room where my machine is set up right now. Being disappointed that I wasn't getting more sewing done, I pulled the machine into the living room and sewed on the large coffee table. It worked.

I've put it away again and I think I will be happy with this progress for now. And I'll enjoy looking at the squares on my curtains. A little brightness in what can be a colourless season.

I hope to have it done in time to show at the fair (end of July) and putting together the top shouldn't take long. It's all straight piecing and besides the corners of the squares, there are no seams to line up to make the design.

The Beginning of New Projects

Where does a project begin? Sometimes with an idea, but more often with the purchase of materials...and in this case I mean actual literal material.

Visiting Missouri always means a quilt shop hop with my MIL. There are tonnes of quilt shops here compared to at home. On top of that, the prices have always been astonishing. This time they were not quite so low, but the fabric was so lovely that didn't seem to slow me down. :)

First I will show you a collection of fabrics I accumulated from three different shops:

If they look a little bright to you, trust me, they are even brighter than they look. I am completely head over heals for them. The orange/pink leaf pattern in the middle started it all. $2/yd. Sounds cheap right? Then you have to buy 10 more fabrics to go with it. Ha ha. I am hoping I have enough there for a single bed size. The green on the bottom right will work as a sashing or border between the rest and the orange/yellow/pink on the bottowm left is for the binding. The rest of the pieces are from 1/2 yard to 3 yard pieces. (The two fat quarters on the left aren't batiks like the rest, but the colours match so well, I took them anyway.)

Next up is another collection I put together:

I couldn't resist the half yard of Asian style fabric. The blue is really gorgeous. But once again, it was on clearance, but then you have to buy stuff to go with it! The fabric along the left are three different abstract designs in bronzes and light blues. I thought I might do a wall hanging with all of this so I just bought 1/2 yards of the left fabrics.

And then, I can't stop noticing browns and tans since I'm making the Big T quilt. I just love this leaf pattern:

 It was with their jungle prints but I think it will be just fine in my quilt too.

And finally, I picked up a few more red tones:

I can't stop buying them either. I have some vague idea of a log cabin with red and ??? something. Ya, not a real solid plan there, but I'll enjoy buying reds anyway.

Believe it or not this isn't all of it either. I picked up a few other odds and ends too. I'll show them to you when I use them.

The knit shop was closed. She has irregular hours and we never have managed to catch her.

All in all, we had a great time of it. And I think the fabric will hold me til the next visit! (But don't hold me to that.)

Shop Til You Drop

Clures and I have been doing our part to support the local economy over the last two days. We have visited numerous local quilt shops (I can not believe how many there are!) and a yarn shop.

It seems like most of the shops are owned by friends of Clures and I’ve met some very nice people!

I have also made a few good finds. I bought the following fabric for an as-yet unstarted twin quilt for a friend’s son who will graduate from high school one of these years. (That’s when I plan to give it to him.)
Top: Cityscape fabric (2 3/8 yds for sale at $4.99/yd) at Linda’s Cottonpatch which I plan to use for a backing fabric. Landmarks from cities around the world are suitable for a high school graduate, don’t you think?

Middle: Light print for alternating blocks at Judy’s A Little Bit Country Fabric Shoppe. (4 yds at $4.50/yd—unbelievably, that’s the regular price!)

Bottom: Fat quarters mostly from D&T Quilt Shop (on sale for $1 each)

I didn’t have the pattern with me so I took some guesses at amounts and just bought enough fat quarters to get me started.

I also found a perfect backing fabric for my Hawaiian star quilt at D&T Quilt Shop. Looking through the wide backing fabrics, a bright red caught my eye first. But after a little more looking I found this lovely blue paisley and it won out in the end. Three yards gives me a piece that is 110” by 108” and that should work for the quilt which will end up about 96” square.

A lot of the collections of backing fabrics I see in stores are very conservative (or dare I say, boring?) and I wasn’t going to wait to snatch this stuff up. And not to make it all about price, but at $8/yd it’s not really a hard choice to make.

I did not find anything to buy at the knit shop. They had a lot of cottons which I’m not really interested in right now; a lot of silks which I can’t really afford to buy just because it’s pretty (and feels like…well, like silk…mmmm); and a lot of big name brands which I’m not too inclined to buy. But I enjoyed looking around and appreciated Clures’ patience as she indulged me.

During all this shopping, I have been diligently knitting away on my Christmas surprise like a good little girl. I got one unit done on Thursday and another one done today! Woo hoo. (And yes that is authentic bug splat on the window.)
I am almost out of this blue and I will miss it. It makes me happy. There are colours that I am attracted to and love (such as red), some that get me excited (purples, yellows) but blue is the only one that can make me happy. I had a paint colour in my previous bedroom that did the same thing. That is a good colour to have in a bedroom. But anyway, I’m running out of the blue yarn and will have to make do.

Another bonus find at a late-day yard sale stop was two wool sweaters. The first was a black GAP sweater that is too small to wear, but never too small to felt:

And the second was a bright neon yellow sweater which someone has already started to felt [full] for me. (I suspect that’s why it was offered at a yard sale.):
Don’t let this picture fool you--the actual sweater is even brighter. I have two big bags of sweaters to felt already, but I liked these enough to buy and add to the pile. One day I’ll full them all, cut ’em up and go to town making pillows, bags, camera covers, and patchwork blankets. Can’t wait til that inspiration hits!

All for now!

Persistence Counts

Subtitle: adventures in fabric shopping

One of the fabrics I used for my Hawaiian Star quilt had light and dark strips in the color and I wanted to use just the dark part of the fabric. So instead of 1 yard called for by the pattern, I bought 1.5. I debated about buying 2, but went with 1.5 instead. And you know what's coming...I cut out the pieces and needed just one more bit of fabric to cut out the last piece!

Well, that's alright...I'll just go to the LQS where I bought it and get the 1/2 yard I should have bought in the first place. Only, when I get there, the lady can't find it and says they must be out. She does go as far as looking on their computer, but confirms that they are sold out and not ordering any more. That figures...so I thank her for her help and go back to work to look for it online.

For whatever perverse reason, I decide to look at the website of the LQS where I just was. They have it listed and the minimum purchase is just 1/2 yard. I decide to order it just so that they can look for it and really know whether they have it or their website inventory is wrong. But I can't quite make myself pay for shipping--I work just around the corner from the LQS. So I call the store, get a different employee and explain the situation. With the item number from the website, the new employee finds the fabric in about 2 minutes and says, Yes, they have 12 yards of it, how much do I want? Well, that's a different story.

I'm able to run back to the store (like I said, I work real close) and get the fabric. The first woman who helped is the one who runs my purchase through the till. She apologizes profusely and has plenty of excuses of why she couldn't find it. I assure her it's fine, but she really is full of excuses. But then she asks for my discount card and whispers, I'll give you an extra stamp for your time... ::grin:: I'll take it.