SAHRR 2023 Big Finish

This Friday, I have a final view of my Stay-at-Home Round Robin quilt. While I am describing it as a finish, there are several more steps I need to take before it can grace a queen-size bed. But, all the design elements are in place.

In my last post, you saw the pinwheel blocks made for Round Six. I used them as centerpieces of four large triangle sections constructed from hourglass blocks.

Viewed from this angle, the pinwheels seem to have shadow pinwheels as the hourglass blocks converge.

After sewing the corner pieces in place, the quilt still needed more width. To address this, I made strips of half-square triangles. At the centers of these strips I inserted a few more scraps from my recycled pineapple blocks, just to break up the long stretch of background fabric.

With the addition of the corners and the side strips, my quilt now measures 78 by 90.

Close up of pinwheel corner:

At this point, I admit that I am feeling a bit spent. There are problems yet to be solved (and do I add a border or not?) but there is a bright light at the end of this tunnel. Our town has a quilt shop that offers long-arm quilting services. I was overjoyed and relieved that I will not be attempting to quilt this on my domestic machine. My reservation to get the quilting done is set for June.

I will now add my scrappy SAHRR quilt to the quilt parade.

Thanks to six quilters who organized this quilt-along, especially to Quilting Gail. She is hosting the quilt parade, where you can ooh and ahh over all the beautiful tops made by participating quilters from everywhere. You can enter here:

https://quiltinggail.com/2023/03/13/sahrr-the-parade-2/

SAHRR 2023 Round 6: So Close

It’s the last round of the Stay At Home Round Robin quilt challenge and I’m feeling glum. By the time I finished sewing on the coping strip, row and setting triangles of round five, my scrappy quilt measured 90 inches tall by 68 inches wide.

It is large and full and colorful. Clearly it wants to be a queen-sized bed quilt. And it’s crying out for more areas of background fabric to give some calm in the storm.

I am having trouble imagining how I could wedge in some pinwheel blocks as selected by Quilting Gail.

https://quiltinggail.com/2023/02/26/sahrr-round-6-2/

But I’m no quitter. I made four not-big pinwheels, trusting that they will fit in.

Somewhere.

One thought I have is to insert the pinwheels into square-in-square blocks of background fabric, then slip those blocks into the corners of the last rows.

Anyway, I’ll try to cheer up. After all, I have almost two weeks to finish the top before the quilt parade deadline.

SAHRR 2023 Round 5: Square in Square Saga

Now I know why this quilt along is called a challenge. Round 5 proved to be the most time-consuming and frustrating of all (so far.) My decision to use recycled quilt blocks turned into a bad idea. You see in the photo above the results of many hours work harvesting suitable fabric pieces for square in square blocks from the pineapple blocks. Oh boy! By Saturday, I had made enough blocks to build two sides.

I plan to edge these pieces with gray strips, bringing the finished block size to 7 inches. Six blocks will fill a border, with an additional two at top and bottom points. But first I attached a two-inch coping strip.

Here is the proposed lay-out for round five.

I bought the squiggly line print because it made me happy, and it looked like a nice transition between the pale grey and dark gray. Next, I assembled my first border.

And here is how it looks attached to the quilt

If you are enjoying the SAHRR Quilt challenge and want to check out the work of other participants, visit Emily’s blog, The Darling Dogwood.

http://thedarlingdogwood.blogspot.com/

There will be one more round. If I survive that, then I think that I have the ability to finish this quilt.

SAHRR 2023: Scrappy Geese

Anja, of Anja Quilts, suggested flying geese for Round 4 of this year’s Stay-at-home quilting challenge.

https://anjaquilts.blogspot.com/2023/02/stay-at-home-round-robin-round-4.html

I was feeling very much up to the task. Two years ago, during the SAHRR, the flying geese block was brand new to me. It didn’t go well. I made a bunch of them that ended up the wrong size. This year I wisely followed the tutorial of Quilting Jet Girl. She even provides a fabric cutting chart for all sizes of geese. Her technique yields four blocks at a time. Check it out:

https://quiltingjetgirl.com/2022/09/30/updated-four-at-a-time-flying-geese-tutorial-and-sizing-tables/

My particular take on the goose block has me cutting down my scrappy pineapple blocks to make the feature fabric of the goose block. This was a time-consuming task, but I was absolutely determined to make it work. Here is my first group of four:

Using the 2-inch wide block size will require 20 geese per side for my quilt. After experimenting with placement, I l felt that a continuous line of that many geese causes too much visual motion in the design. To break it up and create resting places for the eyes, I inserted plain gray squares. I also made a block of two geese in solid yellow at the border’s midpoint. This image shows the two resting spots sewn up with the scrappy blocks.

POOR BUNNY DOESN’T LOOK VERY CONFIDENT THAT I CAN PULL THIS OFF.

Okay, so here goes. This photo shows three completed borders.

View of the border from on point,

Close up of one border.

My quilt has now reached my desired width. For the 5th and 6th borders, I will be building up and down from the mid-point, inserting setting triangles as needed. Anyway, that’s the plan for now. It’s all an experiment, so subject to change.

To see what other quilters are making, follow the link to the Linky party.

https://anjaquilts.blogspot.com/2023/02/stay-at-home-round-robin-round-4.html

2023 SAHRR Round 3 – Hourglass Block

This week Chris Knits and Sews is choosing the block and providing the linky party for quilting participants to post their work in the annual round robin challenge.

https://wordpress.com/read/feeds/32776/posts/4536905279

I approached this round with a plan to give some rest for the eye from the colorful center. Here is my quilt at the end of the last round.

I used two colors of background fabric to make the hourglass blocks. Here is one row attached to my quilt.

For the corner blocks, I cut the centers out of some pineapple blocks.

They are about 3 inches square. Next I sewed strips of light grey fabrics around all four sides to bring the corners up to the correct size.

I think they are pretty.

After attaching the corners to the last two strips of hourglass blocks I stitched them to the quilt.

What I learned from this round:

1 It pays to work slowly in sewing the blocks together to ensure a very accurate seam allowance. If one seams is too narrow or wide, it’s worth it to rip back and re-sew.

2. Sometimes it’s okay to press a seam open, particularly when sharp points are involved. It can help diminish lumps and bumps.

So far I’m having lots of fun making a stay-at-home round robin quilt. If you’d like to sew along, here is the list of the hosts and rounds.

• February 6: 3rd Round: Chrisknitssews
• February 13: 4th Round: Anja Quilts
• February 20: 5th Round: Emily
• February 27: 6th Round: Quilting Gail 
• March 13: Parade