Spring Cleaning

I've spent the past moth going through years of accumulated patterns, fabric and ufos.  My first goal was to use up all the odds and ends of fabric on hand.  This has resulted in 11 quilt tops, including three ufs finished.  I did manage to quilt 3/4s of one top.

Now I'm moving on to all the blocks I have.  What to do with them.  I came up with a few things.

 

 

For some of the larger blocks, shopping bags seemed like a good idea.  You can use two blocks for these bags, front and back.  I sewed a border around each block and quilted them.  Then I quilted a strip to form the sides and bottom of the bag and sewed it around.  I made a lining for the bag to hide the seams.  After inserting the lining, I finished the top edge by inserting a handle on both sides of the bag and finishing it off with  matching strip of fabric.  It's a pretty easy project.

 

Pillows are also a great project for using up odd blocks.  Again, you can use two blocks making the pillow reversible.  Quilt two blocks and sew them together.  Insert a pillow form or fill with batting.  Close the opening.

 

 

 

I used a different technique for this pillow.  Reverse applique.  For this method select fabric for the top of the pillow and cut to size desired.  Trace your design onto the square.  Select fabrics in your choice of color and stack them under the top in the order of use.  Cut the fabric to roughly the shape of the pattern area. Number the layers as you add them.  My first  layer was turquoise for the upper wing area.  Layer 2 was the turquoise for the bottom area.  3 was the center turquoise color.  Then I add yellow as 4, orange as 5 and red as 6.   When you have placed all the fabrics. satin stitch around all the lines of the pattern using a matching or contrasting thread.  When the stitching is finished. using a very sharp pair of scissors, cut through the top to layer 1, cutting close to the stitching but not through it.  Now cut through the top layer and layer 1 to layer 2.  Cut around layer 2 as before.  Continue in this manner, cutting each layer to the deeper layer below it.  When all the layers have been cut out, your design emerges.  Finish as you would any pillow.



 

March Garden To Dos

Date of Last Frost:  May 15
Weeks to Last Frost:  10

Things to Do This Month

     Prepare ground when possible
     Continue pruning and pest control applications
     Remove mulches from early bulbs
     Clean up winter debris
     Plant or divide rhubarb
     Plant asparagus, strawberries, fruit trees and berry bushes
     Sow seeds of plants requiring 8 weeks to transplant size
     If not planted in the fall, plant garlic as soon as you can work the soil.

My Spring Planting Guide tells  me that I can set out boccoli, brusels sprouts, cabbage, kale, kohlrabi, leeks, onion seeda, gaarden peas, shallots and turnips, 4 to 6 weeks before last frost date.  This means that I want to plant them indoors 4-6 weeks before their set out date to have plants large enough for transplant. 

I use jiffy pellets to sow the seeds, then place them inside a lidded plastic container.  These containers are used to package produce, cheese, meals, and my favorite is the one my supermarket uses for rotissorie chicken.  Once planted, I place them on top of the refrigerator, I get germination within five days. 

Sawtooth

     I finished all the tops I had in progress and now have 9 tops to quilt.  Oh fun.  As I have mentioned before, I hate the quilting part, but it isn't a quilt until it's quilted.

      I looked at the Sawtooth pattern and saw this huge 12" center square that needs to be filled with quilting.  This is a great space for those of you who love the quiltng part and you can use some of those oversize designs you have.  But I kept trying to think of a way to shrink that square to something not quite so time consuming.

     My daughter put in a request for a quilt some time ago, and I though, aha!  I can run off pictures of her dogs and fill the square with those.  I could then get by with minimal quilting in the square.  I ran the idea by her and we both agreed that this particular quilt was better suited to pictures of children, because of the bright, scrappy colors.

 

 

     We agreed that for her dogs the half square triangles should be in shades of brown and black. 

 



       This is still a little bright, but the colors in my graphics program are pretty vivid.  You could adapt this idea to feature family members, using their favorite colors to form the half square triangle frames.

     Another treatment for this square would be embroidery or red work.  The redwork would be truly stunning.  It doesn't show up well in the photo above, but I quilted  each of the squares using a different design in blue thread.  It looked really good.

February Garden To Do

Things To Do This Month

     Order seeds and plants if not alredy done
     Clean up winter debris
     Continue dormant pruning
     Aply dormant pest controls to fruit trees
     Take cuttings of geraniums
     Sow indoors seeds reuiring up to 12 weeks to transplnt

     Every seed packet tells you in which zones you can plant their particular seed.  For example on my packet of chives it tells me that the plants will grow in zones 3-9.  Also on the seed packet is a map of the US divided into 10 zones  

 

 

 

 

                                                                  

                                                                     Date of Last Spring       Date of First Fall

                                                                                Frost                         Frost

                                                                      Zone

                                                                     

                                                                         1      Junw 15                August 1

                                                                         2      June 10                 August 20

                                                                         3      May 30                 September 25

                                                                         4      May 20                 October 1

                                                                         5      May 10                  October 10

                                                                         6      April 30                October 20

                                                                         7      March 30              November 10

                                                                         8      March 10              November 20

                                                                         9      January 30             December 10

                                                                      10      No frost                 No frost 

 

     To use this information, I live in Zone 5.  I would count back 12 weeks from May 10, which would be about February 10 to sow seeds indoors for any seed requiring 12 weeks to transplant size.

 

       To determine fall planting dates you must take into account that the days are getting shorter and extra time will be needed for plants to reach maturity than when planted in the spring.  This is known as the short day factor and amounts to about 14 days.  In other words, if the packet lists 50 days to maturity, you would add 5 days for germination, plus the 14 short day factor, for a total of 69 days from date of first frost.





 

Autumn Tints

     I am getting  sick of half square triangles, so when I came across this picture I decided to take a break from then.  I made this quilt several years ago for a book called Christmas Scrapcrafts.   I sent all the projects to New York to be photographed  and someone walked off with all of them.  The only thing I got back was a few photos. 

     This is a super easy, quick quilt that you could probably finish in a weekend.  I used fabric I had on hand but you can use any colors you want.  You will need 3  yards for the large squares and 3 yards for the light squares, plus assorted amounts of 12 colors for the small squares.

     Cut dark fabric into 7" squares.  Cut light fabric into 4: wide strips.  Cut colored fabrics into 4" strips.  Sew a light and colored fabric together, then cut apart every 4".  Sew two such squares together to form a checkerboard. 

     Working across, start with a plain square, then alternate with a pieced square, end with a plain square.
You will need 12 print #1, 10 print #2, 8 print #3, 6 print #4, 4 print #5 and 2 print#6.
For the second row, start with print #7 then follow the same sequence as the first row.  The left side will start with a new print, then follow the sequence as before.   You will need 12 print #7, 10 print #8, 8 print #9, 6 print # 10, 4 print #11 and 2 print #12.

It's Garden Time

       Next to quilting, gardening is my second passion.   I know it's January and at least here in Ohio there is snow on the ground, but now is the time to start planning the garden.   Several years ago I wrote a book called "Garden Diary".  It's broken down into months and each section begins with "Things To Do This Month."  Here is
the one for January.

1.   Plan this year's garden.
2.   Prune fruit trees, summer blooming trees and shrubs as weather   permits.
3.   Fertilize spring blooming shrubs.
4.   Keep snow build up off evergreen brances to prevent breaking.
5.   Force rhubarb.
6.   Force chichons.
7.   Force bulbs.
8.   Clean and sharpen tools.
9.   Comparison shop the seed companies and decide what you will plant this year.
10.  Assemble flats and soil for next month's indoor planting.

     Hope this gets you in the mood.

 

More Quilt As You Go

      I completed all the blocks for Rainbow Flower, but when I moved the blocks disappeared.  But it was so easy I may try it again.

     This is an 8" block, so cut batting 9" and backing 10".  Each strip finishes at 2" so I would cut 3" strips because I use a 1/2" seam allowance. 

     Position 2" yellow square at upper left corner.  Lay 2" pink square right sides facing over yellow square and stitch in place.  Open out.  Lay pink strip right sides together covering yellow and pink strip.  Cut off even with bottom of pink strip and stitch in place.

Continue adding strips until block is finished.

Below are other designs that can be used with this technique.