Niece and Nephew Quilts are Finished and A Recap

I've been sharing with you the quilts I've been making for my nieces and nephews, the ones who have not received one in a while.  I overlooked three of them so thought I'd get caught up on that and do a recap.

The ones I've already posted about are Josh, Ashley, Laura, Nikki, Travis, Paige, Natalie, Emily, Carrie, Karlie, Kourtnie, and Kacie's. (Each name has a link attached in case you'd like to see them.)  All of them were made since 2018.  Thank goodness, I have a fantastic quilter (Shirley Jackson) I can depend on!

Jason is the one nephew who had never received a quilt from me.  When he was born (and I'm embarrassed to tell you how old he is, so I won't) I was crocheting afghans for new babies.  I also crocheted a large afghan for him when he was first married.  (Oops, that hints at how old he is.  Don't pay any attention to that.)  Anyway, it was definitely his turn!  I named his quilt "Long Time Coming".

For Tim I tore into my box of batik strips (again!) and made a variation of the Jelly Roll Race Quilt, using different size strips and pieces (instead of WOF strips) and sewing some diagonal seams instead of straight. It wasn't nearly big enough to suit me, plus I wanted to change it up, so I added strips around it going in the opposite direction.  It ended up plenty big enough, and I ended up with another happy nephew.  

Tina's quilt was Amy Walsh's "Zen" pattern.  Yes.  I used batiks.  I've used this pattern before, but this time I sewed some of it in a hotel in Seattle.  I've set up a little sewing area in many a hotel.  An important thing to pack for that is my Ott sewing light.  You know how bad hotel lighting is.

You may remember that, in 2018, I went a little crazy cutting up my batiks into 2.5" strips.   

Now, that box looks like this .....

Hooray!

Now all the nieces and nephews have new quilts.  (Another Hooray!)  Should I start on the great-nieces and nephews?  Well, I do have all those scrappy squares I cut up a few years ago.....

Linking up with Confessions of a Fabric Quilter, and Super Scrappy.

Making a Dent - Another Finish

One of my goals this year has been to use up some of the 2.5" batik strips I cut last year.  In May I completed "Hypnotic", a 72" x 72" beauty (if I do say so myself!) for Stephen and Kailey's wedding.  I blogged about it here.  Then in November I finished piecing a gorgeous 98" x 98" top (if I do say so again!) for my sister, Debbie.  I blogged about Debbie's quilt here.  This top is currently with a friend waiting to be quilted so it won't make it off the UFO list this year.  

As the year is winding down I have a third batik quilt finish to share.

"Gemini" by Janine Burke for Blue Underground Studios has been on my "to do" list for a while, and I had fun working on it.  

The actual construction of the blocks didn't take long at all.  I made two-color rectangular blocks, and cut them in half .....

.....then mixed them up and sewed them back together.

You can't really make a mistake putting blocks like these into rows.

Shirley, did another great job quilting this one for me.  

Don't you love the Grunge fabric I found for the back?

I didn't make as big a dent in the box of strips as I'd hoped I would, but I definitely did make a dent.  Here's the box of strips "before".

Here's the box "after".

"Gemini" will be gifted soon, and I'm excited that I'll be able to do that in person in just a couple of weeks.  Now to decide what the next batik quilt will be.

Linking up with Confessions of a Fabric Addict.
Linking up with Tish's Adventures in Wonderland.

Strings Galore!

Like most quilters, I have a difficult time throwing away small scraps and strings of fabric.  I've been tossing mine into a basket for a long time, and I've actually 

managed to make several string quilts and scrap projects.  Recently though, I've noticed that my basket is overflowing.

So I started digging.  Yikes!

Starting out slowly I pulled some pages from a Yellow Pages book and, using a paper foundation, made just one simple yellow string block.

Too ordinary and not enough fun!  I just started sewing strips together.

I had seen several string quilts recently, so I pulled some gray fabric from my stash, and ended up with this cute quilt top for a baby quilt.  I believe the quilt I used as inspiration was actually made with fabric selvedge edges. 

Then I pulled some more stash and made the backing.

When I was cleaning up the scraps and shoving them back into the basket I found something in the middle of all those strings that brought back precious memories from when my grandsons were little enough to play in my sewing room.  They had a blast with my strings basket, played for hours, and the mess only took 10 minutes to clean up.

I highly recommend it.

Oh -- what did I find?  Aidan's little sock.  Awwwwww!   I must have sent him home without it.  I think I'll keep it.