Archive | Quilt Along

Hunt QAL #11 Check In.

By carolyn friedlander on April 30, 2020 in Featured on Home, my patterns, Quilt Along, weekend projects | Comments: 3

Hunt QAL #11 Check In.

Month #11?! I mean, I say that with some shock on the one hand, but then on the other hand I feel like the last couple of months could very well have been years. Either way, this has always been a sanity project, but especially so in the last month.

Ta-da! It’s a quilt top! I am really really excited with how this turned out. (So excited that I did a small update earlier this month.) For some reason I added 3 of the borders April 5th, and then it sat another week and a half before I was able to finish up and add the last (top) border. Slow and steady…

The white works well around the sides and bottom, but I wanted something a little more special for the top. Piecing together some scraps and new things gives it some interest while also giving it a little bit of color. I was most excited about the warmth added from one of the new Collection CF pieces in the top left corner. As soon as I auditioned it, I knew it was just what it needed.

collection CF fabric . carolyn friedlander

The backing is coming along. I’m going scrappy and did manage to pull out some pieces this week. Next will be to iron them out and piece it all together. This is a totally lame admission, but ironing these fabrics will be satisfying.

I like the overall tone of these picks, the variety of prints and the little bits that pop.

Yay for progress! Hopefully I’ll get these pressed and sewn together soon. Then I can baste and get going on the quilting. I’m still thinking I’ll big-stitch, hand-quilt with sashiko threads. I’ve been accumulating threads and needles, so I am ready.

Technical side note and PSA: Hanging a quilt top to photograph made me very nervous. Unintentional fabric stretch is something I nerd out on and always try to avoid. This being a queen-sized beast with some weight to it, I tried to be as careful as I could not to stretch any of the borders during this process. Being careful in this way helps with basting and quilting it later.

Pattern: Hunt Quilt Pattern

Fabrics: A mix from many of my collections including Collection CF, Jetty, Instead, Harriot, Gleaned, Botanics, Polk, Euclid, Architextures

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04/10/20 What I’ve been Making

By carolyn friedlander on April 10, 2020 in Featured on Home, life, my patterns, Quilt Along, weekend projects | Comments: 9

I always have my hands in several projects at a time, but lately I’ve been really hopping around. Do you do that? I thought it might be fun to share a little bit of what I’ve been making.

Hunt

We aren’t due for a Hunt QAL update yet, but here’s one anyway. With the appliqué done and the blocks sewn together, all I need are some borders to make it the size I want it to be. In this case, it’ll go on my bed, which is where I laid it out to figure exactly what needs to be added and what might look good.

If my bed weren’t already cream, I might be more tempted to go totally wild with scrappy/shiny/fun prints for the sides. However, I’ve decided to keep the borders mostly light/white to give it a little contrast. The fun prints will go on the back in all kinds of scrappy glory. In my mind, this will be a two-sided quilt. (Although, aren’t they all?)

Border tip: I always pin my borders before sewing them, with the border on the bottom and the blocks on the top. This way works for me.

Making more masks.

I’ve been making masks, with the first couple of batches going to healthcare workers as well as to a local nursing home. For those I used this May Chappell tutorial, which is fantastic. The size fits a wide range, including anyone needing to wear a cloth mask over their medical-grade mask.

The newest batch of masks is for me and for some friends. I thought I’d try a different style to change things up. These are the CraftPassion masks (tutorial here), and I used t-shirt yarn (tutorial here, although I just cut 3/4″ strips from jersey scraps that I already had). The t-shirt yarn is pretty genius. It’s soft, easy and accessible if you have jersey scraps or old t-shirts lying around. I’m a big fan.

Have you seen the jokes about using bras as masks? It’s gotten me giggling, but in all seriousness, after sewing this style of mask (and having sewn bras), I’ll tell you that there are some real similarities!

Picking the colors and fabrics are just as fun as picking them out for a quilt or a garment. Although thinking about prints and colors to wear on your face is a new consideration. I can’t say that I have any concrete conclusions to draw on that…

Just for reference, I have a couple of May Chappell style masks on the left and the CraftPassion masks on the right.

Handwork.

Handwork. I have to have it, especially now. Do you? With Hunt being done, it’s been weird not having an easy go-to for winding down in the evening. To be honest, I was hoping to get Hunt finished and basted so that hand quilting could fill the evening handwork needs, but it’s been a couple of weeks, and I can’t help myself. I need it. My scrappy Everglade blocks (using my pattern here) are exactly what I knew I’d be coming back to after Hunt. I am excited.

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Hunt QAL #10 Check In.

By carolyn friedlander on March 26, 2020 in Featured on Home, Quilt Along | Comments: 2

Hunt QAL #9 Check In.

My blocks are sewn together! Yay!

This is an exciting step seeing it all come together. Since I’ve already decided that I want to put this quilt on my bed, I’m planning to add some borders around the edges to make it the right size. I’m thinking I’ll use lighter fabrics, I may or may not scrap-ify them…or I may do something totally different. We’ll see once I actually audition some options.

I need to figure out my backing, no clue what I’m feeling like for that, but I did order some batting yesterday. Generally, I’m not wow’d by batting options lately, and so I’ve been fairly inconsistent in what I’m using. For this quilt I’ll use Quilter’s Dream Poly in their lowest loft. I’m kind of liking their poly lately, and I think the thinner option is what I’m wanting for this one. With some weightier fabrics in the mix, I feel like the thinner batting could offer a nice balance. Plus, I know it will be a delight to hand quilt.

Some tips on sewing the blocks together!

You can definitely sew them together by machine, although I’ve ended up sewing this one and all of my other Hunts together by hand. I like a slow finish on a longer-term project, and since it isn’t a ton of seams, I don’t find it to be a huge deal. Plus, it can make lining everything up a little easier, especially the seams that share the neighboring appliqués. To do this, you’ll need to draw the 1/4″ seam allowance on the back of the blocks. Then you just follow the line to sew together!