Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 25

Merry Christmas! This is the final day of my 25 Quilts in 25 Days blog series, and of course, this one is a Christmas present! My daughter requested a new quilt for her twin bed, the main requirement being that it have minky backing. I usually avoid piecing together minky for larger quilts, but I was willing to make an exception for her!

Her room is painted pale purple, and she also likes blue, so I used Kate Spain's Horizon fabric collection with a couple of other purple prints thrown in. I used my Hip to Be Square pattern (except I added a lot more blocks!).

Here's a picture of the top in-progress. Our cat Hunter loves to photo-bomb quilt pics.

I ordered the minky backing on Dec 9th, it was shipped on December 19th. According to tracking, it was supposed to arrive on December 23rd. It didn't.

It didn't arrive on December 24th, either.

Long story short: I wrapped up the matching sham, but the quilt will have to be finished after Christmas. It worked out okay -- if the fabric had arrived on the 24th, it would have been a pretty busy day trying to finish it in time. I promise I'll share pictures when it finally gets done!

I hope you enjoyed this journey of 25 Quilts in 25 Days. I also have some fun posts scheduled for the remainder of the month, including a pillow sham tutorial, some Christmas stockings, a pattern sale, and of course, my final monthly collage of finished quilts for 2014!

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 24

I love Amy Butler's fabrics! In fact, I especially love Amy Butler's Love fabric collection.

I don't know what it is about her fabrics, but you always think they won't go together, and in the end, they work.

I had origally planned on making two smaller tumbler quilts (these were cut with my Accuquilt 6" die) -- my favorite size for a baby/lap quilt is 10 rows of 12 tumblers. Instead, I pieced 15 rows of 16 tumblers (which took quite a while!) to make this twin-size version.

 

I didn't think I had enough of any one fabric for the backing, but I managed to piece together a few remnants of this fabric to cover the entire back.

I think I'll add this one to next week's binding marathon pile!

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 23

This quilt features the Juggling Summer collection by Zen Chic for Moda fabrics. When I first saw the collection online, I didn't think I would like it, but when I saw it in person at a quilt shop, it caught my eye. I purchased a charm pack and 1 1/2 yards of yardage with the intention of making a small patchwork squares quilt.

I pulled the project out on an unexpected snow day last week. As soon as I started laying out the squares, it became clear to me that I needed to go a different route. There are a lot of duplicates in the charm pack, and many of the fabrics read as solids, so I knew I needed to cut them up for better distribution, and add a neutral solid.

I cut all of the charm squares in half, added some strips of Kona Ash, and another coins quilt was born!

I always have trouble choosing a good quilting thread color when my background is light grey -- every time I try a grey thread, it always seems too dark. I ended up with an unexpected choice, a pale golden color called "Antique" by Connecting Threads. I actually used it on my last three quilts, and I think it will also be the perfect choice for my next quilt top, which also has a grey background.

I'm not sure what I'll use for the binding yet -- I don't have quite enough of the backing print leftover, but I might have a green in my stash that will work. I'm stockpiling some binding projects for a trip next week!

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 22

It's Day 22 of my Twenty-Five Days of Quilts blog challenge!

Today's quilt is made up of leftovers from at least three other projects. I liked the way the colors worked, so I kept adding in various scraps until I had enough blocks.

I originally bought the backing fabric with the intention of using it on the front of the quilt, but it works well as the backing -- I just needed to add in some border strips to make it large enough.

I'm still deciding on the binding, so that part may take a few extra days!

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 21

Thanks for following along on my Twenty-Five Quilts blog journey!

This scrappy quilt was made from two of Sandy Gervais' older Moda lines: Grand Finale and Essence. It is very jelly-roll friendly, and I'm in the midst of writing the pattern out for multiple sizes.

When I was working on the blocks, I sort of forgot that they were on the larger size, so the quilt ended up being 60" square -- a nice, generous lap size!

I had some coordinating backing fabric, but not quite enough, so I stretched is with some pieced strips. I have been having lots of fun with pieced backing lately!

This one is definitely a little out of season right now, but I'm glad to have it finished!

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 20

I'm in the home stretch of my twenty-five quilts in 25 days blog series!

Today's quilt is made from Sandi Henderson's first Meadowsweet collection. This summer, I organized and cut some scraps from that line, and used my Bricklayer pattern to make this lap-sized top. I had planned to finish it before fall, since the color scheme is perfect for autumn, but didn't get it quilted and bound until today!

The large scale floral print was a popular one in the collection, and I was lucky enough to snag a few yards of it on sale a couple of years ago, knowing it would be perfect for a future backing.

The quilt is now listed for sale in my Etsy shop!

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 19

Dream On is an older collection by Urban Chiks. Although I do have a few untouched precuts stashed away, I also had a fair amount of small scraps leftover from previous projects, so another coins quilt was in order. I first showed the pieced coin strips back in January when I contemplated using an aqua solid from the background. I love the way it shows off the vintage style and colors of the fabrics.

Several of the fabrics remind me of my grandmother's guest room bedding in the 1970's!

 

For the back, I didn't want to go completely aqua, so I was glad I had a few of the faux patchwork scraps to sew together -- they add a lot of interest to the backing.

The binding was a tough decision, but I went with some scraps leftover from the backing of this quilt which I shared a couple of days ago. They happened to be on my sewing table when I was auditioning bindings, and they fit the bill perfectly!

To follow along on my 25 Days of Quilts journey, begin here.

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 18

I promised you'd see one last Vroom quilt, and here it is!

My supply stash of fabrics has finally been depleted, so this is the last one of these for my Etsy store. I've enjoyed making them, but I've made so many that I'm not too sad to be moving on to other projects!

My favorite part has always been the striped binding. I still have some of this on hand, so it may show up in another project. I do love striped bindings!

I had to get a little creative with the backing, but I like how it turned out.

I'll be back tomorrow with the next installment of my Twenty-Five Quilts blog series!

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 16

Last week, we had a snow day (actually, two consecutive snow days!), so I had some unexpected extra time in the sewing room. I decided to look through a basket of possible projects I keep at the bottom of my shelving unit, and I found a scrap pack I'd set aside a while ago.

I really am a sucker for scrap packs on Etsy -- I love mixing them with my own project leftovers to see what I can come up with. This particular scrap pack contained a panel from the Ten Little Things fabric collection by Jenn Ski for Moda Fabrics. The panel had been cut incorrectly -- the left side was missing part of the narrow blue border that surrounds all the blocks.

I decided trimming both sides of the panel equally would do the trick, and I added two side borders to make the top a nice 39 x 41 size.

For the back, rather than purchasing yardage, I started by piecing together a charm pack from the same collection, and then added the remainder of the fabrics I had on hand. I love the fact that I was able to use up every last piece of leftovers to create this adorable quilt!

This quilt is now listed in my Etsy shop!

To read my Twenty-Five Days of Quilts blog series from the beginning, start with this post.

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 15

Thanks for stopping by for my Twenty-Five Quilts blogging series!

I know I've shown a lot of finished Vroom quilts on the blog (collection by Leslie Grainger, Robert Kaufman fabrics) but this one represents the last of my stash in this colorway. I have one final version in the blue colorway that I'll be sharing later this week.

On all of my other Vroom quilts, I used a Kona solid (School Bus) for the inner border, but in the interest of using up stash, I substituted an orange and white stripe I had on hand. Luckily, I had exactly the right amount!

I didn't have anymore of the large scale vehicles stripe I usually put on the back, but I had extra yardage of the grey outer border fabric, so I was able to use up even more stash!

I'm happy to say this quilt cleared out one of my fabric storage drawers (see this post for info on my storage system), thus making room for more new fabric!

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 14

Today's featured quilt in my Twenty-Five Quilts blogging challenge is another tumbler quilt (always a favorite!)

This summer, I was finally able to visit one of my favorite online quilt shops, The Intrepid Thread, in Milpitas, CA. I love their selection, and it was such a pleasure to be able to see all of the fabrics in person.

I started with a multi-colored triangle print (lower right in above photo) and used it to choose all of the coordinates. The only thing I added from stash at home was the Amy Butler spots print.

I love the color combo, and I also love that many of the fabrics read as solids from far away.

I couldn't resist backing this one in some cuddly minky!

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 13

I am halfway through my Twenty-Five Days of Quilts blogging challenge!

Today's featured quilt is a simple patchwork design made of leftovers from a previous custom project. Many of the fabrics are animal prints, along with some coordinating blue, green and grey prints.

 

I was just about to piece together a backing when I remembered this Denyse Schmidt Picnic and Fairgrounds dot print I had in my stash. It was a perfect match!

Nothing beats the simple satisfaction of patchwork squares!

 

Twenty-Five Quilts, Day 12

Thanks for joining me on my Twenty-Five Quilts in 25 Days journey. To read all of this month's posts, begin here.

Today's quilt is a custom order I completed back in October. The customer wanted a twin size quilt using mostly organic fabrics in greens and greys. I drafted a few pattern options, and this is the one she chose (a pattern is currently in the works and will be in the shop soon!)

I love the backing she choose -- an adorable organic sheep fabric from Happy Drawing by Ed Emberly.

She also requested Hobbs organic batting, and although I didn't like working with it (very stretchy and fragile) I must admit that once the quilt was washed, it was very soft and cozy.