Half Square Triangle Tutorial

This little tutorial is for other ladies not using the EZ Angle ruler for making half Square Triangles in Step 2 of Bonnie's Roll Roll Cotton Boll Mystery.

Bonnie wants the units to finish at 3" - this means they'll measure 3" in the finished block so they will need to be 3.5" raw edge to raw edge.

Bonnie made hers in sets of 4 so I speed pieced mine in 4s using the standard formula for making HSTs.  This meant cutting rectangles measuring 3 7/8" x 7 3/4" and a very scant seam allowance.

BUT I feel the seam allowance is a little too scant so I suggest you cut your rectangles 4" x 8"

Next mark your rectangles on the wrong side of your fabric as I've done below - at the 4" mark and then lines extending to the top diagonals.  These will be your CUTTING lines.

Next, pair your pink and brown (or whatever colours you're using) rectangles, right sides together and sew a scant 1/4" seam along either side of the diagonal lines as shown below.

Cut along the ruled lines and you get 4 HSTs

The HSTs should measure 3.5" raw edge to raw edge.  If they're a little large, trim them down slightly.  They should not be too small.  If they are then your seam allowance is too big.

Please email me through my profile or leave a comment if you have any problems.

Roll Roll Cotton Boll Step 1 (Spoiler Alert)

Late friday afternoon I kept checking Bonnie's blog  for the first clue which she promised would auto publish and there it was!

Much smaller and simpler than I thought and not too typical of Bonnie's usual clues I'm led to believe according to the comments on Quiltville Chat!

Here it is - 172 of these little units made up of 2" strips.

While slicing up the pink strips I kept thinking about all the other pinks I have but didn't use in this quilt.  Oh dear - I think I'm a bit obsessed with pink!  I do plan on using them for a monochromatic scrap quilt one day.  I have the very pattern in mind and everything.

I'm eager to see more of this mystery since step 1 doesn't give anything away!  If these were to be 9 patches, she would have had us do the blue/pink/blue strip as well...or would she?  But if the clues were so small we'd never finish a queen sized quilt in 6-7 clues which are Bonnie's usual style.

Getting Basted

Or trying to!  I added the borders onto Maxie's Dinosaur quilt on the weekend.

It's not an easy feat sandwiching a quilt with a very excited 6YO playing hopscotch on the pieced quilt backing!

Eventually he found the camera...

...and took about 20 self portraits.

and then he got into the basting supplies.

I only found this out when I heard an "AWESOME!!!" coming from his direction.  He informed me that the "sticky tape" can rip your hair out...

Can you see the freshly waxed spots??  I must try duct tape next time my legs need doing...

Finally the CBeebies website to the rescue where he played games while I finished basting.

After many tea/coffee/diet coke/chocolate breaks (there are advantages to having a dodgy wrist) the ordeal was over!!! Basting is by far the most painful part of quilting! BLECH!!

Ideas please!!!

I went along to Max's final violin lesson for the year and realised it's time to start thinking about thank-you gifts for all his teachers!

I'd like to make something but they need to be fairly small, easy and QUICK!  Last year Maxie decorated candles and several of his teachers are the same this year so it has to be something different.

His violin teacher admired my bag (I made it using the Winsome Baby pattern) so maybe a bag for her with musical fabric??

He has 2 classroom teachers and then the specialist teachers:

French, art and IT (same teacher for both), music teacher and then his violin teacher...oh and a male teacher for PE...library teacher as well.  Am I forgetting anyone?  The 2 childcare workers at after school care.

These aren't christmas presents - just a little thank you gift.  The teachers at his school are wonderful and very accomodating.

Moda Bakeshop has some cute things - tiny bags made out of charm squares to put some yummy treats in maybe? 

What about tissue holders?

I'd love to find some teacher-y fabric or fabric that goes with their subjects.

Ideas PLEASE!!!!

Roll Roll Cotton Boll Fabrics

Well I think I can say that I have all the fabric I need for Bonnie's Mystery!

She said a wide variety of neutrals was needed so I had to go through my stash again and pick out almost anything with a white or cream background.

Bonnie's example on her blog had a very varied mix of fabrics. 

Bonnie's other colours are pink (which I'm also using)

Green (I'm using Aqua)

Brown (I'm using purple)

And a constant red fabric (I'm using 2 greens instead).

9 days to go!!  I better make some room in my sewing corner!

Lizzy Mae's Medallion Month 3

I had the class at Quilter's Bazaar yesterday.

The great thing about this quilt is that it doesn't have to be assembled as you go so missing month 2 hasn't made any difference.

I have my fabric pack and some extra instructions from Lorraine.

Month 3 was supposed to happen last month and month 4 is in 2 weeks so it's a very busy month classwise!

We made the double X block which came together much more quickly and easily than I first thought due to Lorraine's piecing and cutting shortcuts!

Due to my still fairly fragile wrist I only made one and a bit blocks in class but I'm psyched to get cracking with them.

I can't believe how small they are!  They will be 5" finished so a bit bigger than Dear Jane and a bit smaller than Nearly Insane!  It's good practice for whenever I get around to these quilts I guess!

I'm getting that slightly overwhelmed feeling.  I want to work on Lizzy Mae, I have one Mystery quilt in progress and another to start shortly yet I have 2 quilts tops that REALLY need basting and quilting!!!!

Changing feet on the machine and lugging it to class every few weeks really interrupts my mojo.

I think I'll indulge in my craving for speed piecing at the moment and try to get Lizzy Mae done asap.  I may leave off doing a few clues of the DaChintzy Code and do them all in one go.

Not sure about Bonnie's Mystery.

I'd like to have one quilt basted and quilting underway by the end of the month.  I wonder if it will happen?

I haven't done any sewing today.  I did lots of cutting and pinning last night but the sewing machine is still rolling around in the boot of the car and I have a thumping headache.

On a more positive note, I'm pretty sure I've collected all my fabrics for Bonnie's Roll Roll Cotton Boll Mystery Quilt!

Finished for REAL!

I have two finishes to report...and I mean they're really finished - binding and all!

The first is the table mat/topper.

The class was on saturday at Quilter's Bazaar and Lorraine taught us how to make bias binding and how to use the Easy Scallop tool by Darlene Zimmerman.

I'm not thrilled with the colour of the binding but I didn't want to buy anything for this quilt.  I knew it was all to me made either with my arm in plaster or shortly after it came off (I got it off 2 days before the class) so I didn't want to waste good fabric by sewing plastered.

The other thing is the french braid table runner.  I finished hand sewing the binding last night.  Woohoo!

I have Lizzy Mae Class #3 tomorrow and #4 later in the month and 2 quilts which REALLY need to be finished before the weather gets too hot so I need to get cracking.

In other news...the lovely Mezzanines Fabric for my Sleepover bag arrived today!

New Stitchery

I didn't do any of them.  They were done by my old pal Mr B.

The one on the top is the newest. 

It's lovely and neat.  Very unlike my op in March.  The hugest scar is from that.  He used an old incision (from 11 years ago) and that's why it didn't heal properly.  You can kind of see the older, white scarring under and around the redder one, but the latest one is perfect!  It's lighter after 7 weeks than the previous one is after 7 months!!

 

Anyway I'm still to be careful and treat it like before.  I even got specific instructions not to have any falls or accidents.  Methinks he knows me far too well!!!

I pointed out that it's easier said then done given how unco I am, and he advised me to try to fall on my face with my arm held behind me. *lol*  he really is a lovely man though!

The best bit is...it doesn't hurt!  Well not really.  My muscles are all still very stiff and sore especially my elbow which hasn't been bent in 7 weeks and that'll take a good few days to improve.

Rotation is lovely and smooth and it doesn't pop out of its socket anymore.  Still a little sore when I push it to the full extent but it's post-op soreness not something's-broken-again soreness.

I go back in a month so let's hope I don't stuff it up in the meantime!

We stopped for a coffee after we were done and I sampled Hudson's Quad Shot with 400mg of caffeine loaded goodness!  Awesome! (just don't order one if you have heart problems etc!)

Oh and one of my Book Depository orders arrives yesterday:

Great book!  Now I'm waiting on the other one!

DaChintzy Code Mystery Clue 5 (spoiler alert)

Clue 5 consisted of 2 steps.

Step 6 (counting from the beginning) looks like this:

 

There are 2 of the top and middle units and only one of the bottom ones (the bottom unit has 4 rectangles but I cut one out of the photo).  At first I thought it might be sashing with cornerstones but the quantities and sizes of the units don't add up for that.

Step 7:

My piecing of the hourglass units id depressively wonky so I hope the quilt will look good enough to donate.

I'm speculating that these units look very like the top and bottom of an ohio star block!  Only half the hourglass units were used in this step so there are enough left for ohio stars...maybe with feature fabric in the centre???

HELP NEEDED FROM ALL AUSSIES!!

Hi ladies

In the previous post you've read about my fabric dilemma.  I have only 2 metres and I need around 4.5 for Bonnie's Mystery.

Larain suggested I post a pic and see if anyone has it in their stash.  If you do and are happy to part with it I can either swap fabric or magazines for it or buy it from you for whatever you're asking.

I'm not massively fussed if I don't find it.  My back-up plan is not to use it at all in the quilt except maybe as a border.

It's not a "proper" quilting fabric so there is no information on the selvage.  I'm pretty sure it's from Spotlight purchased about 2008 (possibly earlier since it was on clearance via an Ebay seller when I got it).

Thank you for looking! xxx

Fabric Dilemma!

Bonnie Hunter has posted the fabric requirements for her new mystery quilt and my biggest fear has been confirmed - I don't have nearly enough fabric for the "neutral" requirements - at least not of the fabric I hoped to use.  It's not formally quilting fabric and I bought it cheaply on Ebay a few years ago.  This totally disrupts my colour scheme!

I'm pretty sure it was originally a spotlight fabric but I doubt it wo0uld be around anymore.  What do I do?  I had a look on Ebay and it isn't there - not that I expected it to be.  Hmmmm...

Bonnie's quilts are naturally scrappy so I use what I have of the background fabric and add others to it or choose a different neutral altogether.  I have lots of small scale floral-on-whites.

The problem is my original choice for background would have tied in my 4 colours.  Maybe I can use what I have of it and throw some other whites in or do I save it for another quilt?  I have about 2 metres and the instructions call for about 5 yards.

Suggestions anyone?