Scrap Quilts

     When I first started quilting, I thought scrap quilts were the ugliest things around.  They were just a hodgepodge of fabrics with no discernable design.  As my stash of scraps grew, I explored the possibilities of scrap quilts and found that if I used a single, unifying color throughout, they looked pretty good.  My first attempt was a Sawtooth, which I thought looked pretty good. 

This quilt has long since disintegrated and I am now completng a new one.  My second one was Double Pyramid.  Hey, there were only 9 blocks to be pieced and lots of white space.  This is the quilt where I learned the meaning of the phrase "it's not a quilt until it's quilted.  Once I set the blocks together, it was a really blah quilt.  Then I quilted it with feather wreaths and it was gorgeous.  This was my all time favorite quilts, but sadly, it too disintegrated. 

     As I examined my quilts, I found that the all cotton fabrics didn't hold up too well.  I had some quilts with poly-cotton patches that were just as bright as the day I put them in, but the cotton just shredded and disappeared.  All of my quilts show this deterioration and I really wish I could find poly-cotton prints again. 

     By this time I have become addicted to scrap quilts.  As I got into them, I realized that you need a of scraps to work from so I began cutting a 3" or 4" strip off any new fabric I bought and adding it to my scrap stash.  This size allows me to cut squares, strips and half-square triangles to fit my most used size block.  I also cut up any scraps from a planned quilt to go into my scrap boxes.  And I kept finding uses for smaller and smaller pieces.  The pieces for this block are 1" by 1-3/4" finished.  I can't remember the name of this pattern, but the hexgon shaped one is Jack's Chain, and it uses strips 1" x 2".