Chuppah Plans

My best friend Steph is getting married in May. She and her fiancee are Jewish and will be getting married under a chuppah, which she asked me to make. After the wedding, I’ll turn the chuppah into a quilt They’re getting married at an arboretum and both favor greens, so I’m using a Kona Solid Fat Quarter Bundle in Farmer’s Market with 23 green FQs and they’d like a modern half square triangle (HST) similar to Shards by A Cuppa and a Catch Up. They’d like the finished chuppah to be around 6′ square.

Since I don’t think a heavy quilt might not be the most ideal chuppah, I’m planning on sewing a plain, solid back and then doing some minimal straight-line quilting to keep the two layers together for the wedding. I’ll use my old machine for this, as unpicking the quilting will be REALLY easy, as after the wedding, I’ll add a border, batting, and a fun back to make it queen sized.

And now some math.
I’ve decided the finished chuppah will be 75″ x 75″. If I aim for a 5″ finished HST (5 1/2″ with seam allowance), that will be 15 x 15 HSTs for a total number of 225 HSTs.

If I need each HST to be 5 1/2″ finished, the original square has to be 6 3/8″ (I’m using this HST tutorial from Blossom Heart Quilts). I can get 9 squares this size from a FQ (with judicious cutting and piecing), which means I need 25 FQs. I’ll use the 23 from the bundle and add a grey or brown neutral and another solid (Kona Aloe or Cadet) from my stash.
Math over.

So this plan is all well and good until I started cutting. I can easily get eight squares from a FQ with minimal piecing. But that ninth square requires the selvage bits to be sewn to one end to make it incrementally longer.

I keep telling myself that it will add a bit of texture to the top.

Here’s two untrimmed HSTs. The one with the pieced side will be 5 1/2″ when trimmed, but barely. And a couple scraps for other colors aren’t big enough to piece, so I’ll have to swap them for Cadet or Aloe.

I’d like to finish the chuppah by the end of the month (I think it would ease the brides’ minds knowing that their chuppah is done!), so I’m making this my ALOYF Jan 2015 goal. Boom.

Tossed Almond Top

The last couple weeks have been full of QCR projects – quilting my Metro Rings (fingers crossed will be done this weekend!), putting together and a post for my stop on the Quick Curve Ruler Blog Hop (tune in tomorrow!), and lastly, putting those Metro Ring scraps together into some sort of simple top.

One of the great things about cutting curves with the QCR is that all curves match. Thus, all the bits left over from the ring segments could be pieced back together into a little something. Once I had the block, which measured around 19” x 19”, I bordered it with the white crosshatch from Botanics and floated it on a field of Kona Aloe. I’m calling it Tossed Almonds; wouldn’t an entire top using that technique be something?

Right now, it’s a smidge larger than 60” x 60” and I’m debating trimming it down to crib size. Pros: more focus on center block. Cons: will no longer be throw-sized. Thoughts?

Linking up with WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced!

Quilting Neptune

Quilt of Neptune is nearly finished!

I finished the quilting yesterday, will bind today, wash for crinkle tomorrow, and then put it on the bed where it belongs!

Linking up this oh-so-brief post with WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced.

First WIP Wednesday of 2014!

Oh hello, first WIP Wednesday of the new year! I’m looking forward to busting through some WIPs this year, now that I am sewing on this:

My very clever husband suggested a new sewing machine for Christmas, which I thought was a brilliant idea. My new Juki TL-2010Q sews like a dream, and I whipped out a throw-sized top from all those Constellations triangles I cut! I don’t have a whole photo of this finished top yet, but here’s a glimpse.

I also finished all the blocks for the 2013 Sugar Block. Here’s November, sewn on my old Kenmore:

And December, sewn on the new machine:

I’m still not exactly precise when paper piecing, but that will come with time. I’m planning on sewing a few more blocks for this quilt, mostly from Vintage Quilt Revival – it is such a great reference! But before that, I have three quilts ready for basting and quilting, hopefully starting tomorrow! I’m hoping that 2014 shapes up to be a productive year and I hope it is for you as well!

As usual, I’m linking up with WIP Wednesday at Freshly Pieced!