Design Wall Monday

UFO busting at it's finest is what is happening on my design wall this week. I pulled out a bin full of SWAN (Swap Without A Name) blocks that were made by a group of internet friends in 2005. For this swap, when it was our turn-2 quilters per month-we sent each of the 23 participants a 12" square of our focus fabric along with any wishes we had for the quilt block. I used some of my stash fabric-the purples, green and peach, I asked for white or WOW background. These needed to be 12 1/2" unfinished, do your best work.  I did have to remake 1 of the blocks but no big deal. I have 4 that just didn't fit so they will be used in the orphan block quilt.

This purple star is my favorite...made by my friend Sonya. I remember her asking if I had any extra purple fabric because she wanted to make me a special block. I did and Oh Boy did she make me a special block. It's called Connecticut from Carol Doak's 50 Paper Pieced Stars book.

Step 1 - Make 20 9 patch blocks for the back using 5" charms. At one of our retreats, I won a huge stack of charms, such a fabulous variety of fabrics-even a Millennium square. I set the stack of charms at the machine, reached over, picked up 2 off the pile and sewed them together, picked up the next pair and the next and next, you get the idea. Then I added the 3rd charm. Pressed those all in one direction, grabbed a few, flipped them around so the seams would butt up to each other. Then did it again until I had 20 blocks.  There are only a few charms left to go into the charm bin. That UFO bag is busted!

Step 2- Make the batting squares.. Since Quilt As You Go is being used on these blocks. (Lots of tutorials on YouTube.) I am able to use up a big bag of batting scraps. All the batting is Hobbs 80/20 from other quilts. Batting scraps bag busted!

Step 3 - Quilt each square-Done!! How much fun I had doing this all week. I pulled out matching thread, filled bobbin with white thread, put on my walking foot and had a blast.  No new thread was purchased but no spools were emptied either. No problem since I didn't want to run out of thread.

Step 4 - Add borders to blocks. I messed up this step. I should have added borders to each block before quilting, 10 with one fabric, 10 with another fabric. I need to do this because the blocks now range in size from 11 3/4" to 12 1/2 ". So I now have to do this by adding backing strips, batting and sashing strips, quilt and cut to 15" since that's the size of my biggest ruler, that's the size I will use. The 9 patch seams will not line up, that doesn't bother me since they will have sashing on them also. I have the fabric to use on the back but I'll buy something coordinating for the front. My stash isn't that deep. I learned a very valuable lesson here.

Step 5 - Make borders.

Step 6 - Join everything together.

Step - Bind, wash, dry, cuddle.

Looks like I have a good plan for the week.  See what everyone is working on today at Patchwork Times.