WIP Wednesday: Storage Tip

Nothing new on the sewing front.  I am still sewing binding for Quilts for Boston.  We are going to have a lot of quilts, so I might be doing that for the rest of the summer!  

I thought I'd share a tip for sewing projects, though.  I hate throwing things away even if I don't have an immediate use for them, I end up keeping them.  Sometimes I find a use for these things and sometimes I do not.  However, in the case of the plastic bags that sheets and curtains come in, I did find a use!

This mild-mannered plastic bag stored a brand new set of sheets:

Now, it stores my Marimekko fabric for yet *another* project that I hope to get to soon!  If you look closely you will see there are two pieces of the same print in different scales.  Hmmmm.... what could it be?

I hope this tip was helpful!  Check out the real WIPs on WIP Wednesday!

WIP Wednesday: Binding!

Now that I've finished my To Boston with Love flags and my blocks for Quilts for Boston, I can get back to my WIPs, right?  Wrong!  Quilts still need to be sewn with the hundreds of blocks the BMQG has received.  I have not been able to make any of the sew-ins, but I am working on binding.

What do you think of the array of fabrics I've assembled?  I weaved them in and out in the photo above, but they are anywhere from 10" to 21" long.  I will sew them together until I have about 350" in length.  This project is really good because I am getting some serious stash-busting in.

It's also good because I was finally able to use my Go Baby!  I bought it last year (on sale -- yay!) to cut my Pearl Bracelet hexies, but I decided the die was not large enough to display the bracelets in all their glory.  I got my 2 1/2" strip die in the mail on Friday so I spent most of my weekend cutting up all these strips!

  Here is the first half of my first binding strip!

Check out what's going on this WIP Wednesday on Freshly Pieced!

To Boston With Love

Saturday we went to see "To Boston with Love" at the MFA.  The flags looked great displayed all over the Shapiro Family Courtyard.  They were so colorful and festive.  I just kept smiling!

My Peace Hexies on display!

I found my hexy peace signs!  They stood out (to me, anyway) because they were on a white background.  I also met Amy, who I had corresponded with online (and purchased a pattern from) and Berene, who conceived the idea of "To Boston with Love".  It was also fun seeing flags from fellow BMQG members Alice, Jane and Alexis!

Alice's letter and Jane's peace sign and patchwork heart

Amy's "B Strong", "Love Heals" flag and her flag of the Zakim bridge

Alexis' dove and Citgo Love flags

Berene said she was exhausted but she was also pleased that her idea got so much response (over 1700 flags, according to Amy!) and that it all went so well.  Admission to the MFA was free so there was a line around the block at opening time.  Many people went to the museum to see the flags and to see the excellent Samurai exhibit!

Berene's flags:  peace sign, scrappy heart and love

Not many people can say they've exhibited at the MFA but now I can!

WIP Wednesday: A Break in the Hexy Action

I took a break in the "hexy" action to make blocks for "Quilts for Boston" and flags for "To Boston with Love".

After fighting with lovingly sewing hexagons for quite a while now, I really wanted to sew easy items. No curves or triangles or funny stuff for me this time round!  I decided to use my Pearl Bracelet fabric and some white on white bullseye fabric from Timeless Treasures left over from the hexy project. This fabric was already washed and pressed so I saved myself some time.  (By the way I bought that bullseye fabric before the pearl Bracelet Bright Star was available. Now thankfully I can use Bright Star for my hexy quilt. )

For the blocks I made 4 Bento Box blocks from Terry Brookshier's classic pattern.  Simple cutting and straight lines! It felt good to sew rectangles again!  

For the flags I decided to create peace hexies once I saw this post. Although the pattern is easy I needed it to be easier :) so I decided to use some leftover hexies and appliqué them on.

We had our Boston Modern Quilt Guild meeting last weekend. Generous souls from all over the world have sent hundreds of blocks in. Several members took blocks to make them into quilts.  There was a sew-in at gather here a couple of weeks ago so if you'd like to see some of the quilts click here.

If you are in Boston Memorial Day weekend, you can see the flags at the Museum of Fine Arts!  How cool is that??  Details here.

Pearl Hexagon Progress and What's On Deck

The first three hexy columns are sewn -- only 9 more to go!  Boy, are these hexagons tough!  I like it when the pearls match up as they do with the purple and green hexies and the purple and brown hexies in the photo.  Believe me, this was not done on purpose!  The hexies get rumpled a bit by all of the handling.  Jacquie suggests no ironing until it's all done, though!

I am already looking to my next project, which involves some Riley Blake chevron fabric.  DH has been asking for a duvet cover for awhile.  I plan to use a modified version of Daisy Janie's Bright Lights, Big City Quilt Pattern.  I will finally start on it once the hexies are done.  This is just one of the many projects on deck!

If you are so inclined, please help the Boston Modern Quilt Guild make quilts for victims of the marathon bombing.  You can make quilt blocks or flags to be displayed at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston!

Check out what everyone else is doing this WIP Wednesday on Freshly Pieced!

HEXED!

The hexy columns are finally all sewn.  I have been through so many iterations with the placement of all these hexy PBs!

At first I thought I would make 4 separate wall hangings with 3 columns of color hexies.  Then I thought I would put them all in one quilt, each separated by a column of white hexies.  When I put them up on my design wall, I didn't have enough room to put all the white hexies on so I put the color hexies all together side by side and that's when it hit me that I should just put them all together without the columns of white.  So, each time I made a design change had to rearrange hexies that I had already sewn together.

Then, finally, after sewing all the columns and putting them on the board I realized one color would look better elsewhere.  I really liked it where I had it based on the meaning of the color groupings but it looked better in a different part of the quilt so I had to take apart probably 8 hexies in 6 columns and cut a new one and sew them all up again.  Aaaargh!

So, finally I have them just where I want them and they look great!  They overlap in the pictures below because I have yet to sew them together.  I am going to start sewing them together this week!  Here is a sneak peak.  Exciting!  Can you name all the colors?  Hmmmm.  That would be a nice giveaway idea, no?

Take a look what everyone else is doing in this week's WIP Wednesday post at Freshly Pieced.

Baby Needs a Brand New Bag

So, I had this crazy idea to make a gift bag to go along with the baby quilt.  I had some gift wrap made from the same print that I used for the baby quilt (both the fabric and the gift wrap are from Spoonflower), so why not?

I thought it would be quite an easy thing, but I had a few challenges.  The primary one was that the gift wrap is quite thick and not easily pliable.  These are the same characteristics which make it perfect for gift bags, by the way.  It comes in large 36" rolls.

Sea Baby Blocks gift wrap

I took apart my coveted Uniqlo Hello Kitty shopping bag to see how to construct my own bag and used my Martha Stewart scoring board and bone folder to score all the folds.  The scoring board wasn't quite big enough for the size of the bag.  (It's 12"x12" and is meant for greeting cards and envelopes.)  Making a gift bag also requires making diagonal scores.  These did not come out as nicely as I wanted, but I made do.  I couldn't bring myself to look for my compass and protractor since that room I need to clean out is still in need of attention.

Poor little Hello Kitty bag!

I also made a prototype bag.  I wanted to practice since I knew I was making only one out of my precious gift wrap!  DH got a real kick out of this bag!  I made it out of some packing paper that came in a box with some fabric from Fat Quarter Shop.  (I love how they package up their fabric.)

My prototype

DH laughs at me for saving shopping bags.  I can't help it.  I love shopping bags and handbags!  I am certainly happy I had a bag from Nordie's because I used the bottom insert from it to put in my bag.  I used twill ribbon handles from my Rugby (Ralph Lauren) bag.  I am now justified -- it makes sense to save shopping bags!

I decided not to use the size of my Hello Kitty bag -- I used my Orla Kiely bag for size instead.  This is a super cute bag.  DH tried to put it in recycling!  No way!

This Orla Kiely bag had the perfect measurements

OK, so after all that, here is the bag.  The baby quilt fit perfectly!  What do you think?  It is certainly rough around the edges, but I love it.  I feel as though I should make another just so I don't forget all the steps.  It would make a great tute, no?

The bag in all its glory

Perfect fit!