Random Scrappy Christmas Tree Skirt

To get back into quilting, I started setting a timer for 1 hour at various times during the day and working at my sewing machine.  It's been a good thing. The other thing I decided was that I had to open one of the drawers and work on whatever was in there until everything in the drawer was finished.  The first drawer I opened had Christmas fabric and scraps from other projects in it.  So today, I made a scrappy tree skirt. This is the pattern I used, with some changes.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Thimbleberries-Star-Dance-Tree-Skirt/dp/B00DVW9WXK

 

 

 

If you notice in the booklet, the skirt had appliqued stars and binding. I didn't do either of these things. 

 

This is a foundation-pieced pattern. Cut the wedges from muslin or other junk fabric, and then piece the strips onto the foundation wedges. I "birthed" the skirt. After I got the strips on the foundation pieces, I sewed them together, leaving one opening the length of the wedges to be able to wrap it around a tree. I cut another piece of backing fabric the same size, pinned right sides together and raw edges even, started sewing halfway up the open edge wedge, around the center circle, and then all the way around the bottom of the skirt, clipped the corners and curves, turned right side out, ironed the seams and then finished the open edge.  I then quilted stitch-in-the-ditch on each wedge edge. Technically, the skirt can be reversible, because the back is one solid piece of red fabric with gold stars on it.  

 

 

 

Stashbusting:

 

3 1/2 yards of various fabrics

3 partially filled bobbins of various colors

1 half spool of white thread.

Two more tablerunners and sets of coasters.  I ran out of the blue binding fabric and will have to find some more, there are only 2 coasters in that set (I generally make 8 coasters per set). 

 

 

Stashbusting:

 

2 yards of fabric

 

I made this tablerunner and coaster set for my cousin. 

 

 

Stashbusting:

 

1 yard of fabric

I've been gone for a while...

We've been especially busy since the last time I posted in November.  We went to Germany for 2 weeks, came home and had Christmas with the family, and then we left home to spend a few months helping one of the kids pack up and move to a new place.  We helped declutter, packed, moved, and unpacked everything!  It was fun to be there, but now I'm back home and have my own hobbies and and a whole list of things to do!

 

Today I decided to spend an hour sewing each day to get rid of this stash!  So...I looked at what fabric I had, and then found Renae Allen's 10 minute tablerunner tutorial:  http://www.rgadesignquilts.blogspot.com/p/patterns-projects.html. There are two tutorials - one is a pdf you can download, the other is a video tutorial. 

 

I also made Penny Pennington's coasters out of the leftover fabrics.  http://www.equilters.com/library/projectshare/coasterspatt.html

 

 

You want to know how old some of this fabric is?  I bought the Christmas green background fabric and the middle tablerunner's poinsettia fabric when I worked at a fabric store...in 1997. Seventeen years ago!!! YIKES! I'm pretty sure I bought the pansy fabric in the same timeframe.

 

I think I will buy some white kitchen towels and will sew the leftover fabrics on them to match.  I'm hoping to sell these tablerunner sets at the next Swap & Shop down the road.

 

 

Stashbusting:

 

3 2/3 yards of fabric

Miscellaneous pieces of batting



 

More Gifts...

More gifts for other occasions besides Christmas.

 

Soon-to-be-born niece, Vivienne will receive this flannel quilt, which I made yesterday and today using my own tutorial.

A rice bag, a cover for the rice bag and a handkerchief (for me). I used one of my sewing machine's decorative stitches on the hankie, although you can't really see it. 

StashBusting:
 

Approximately 3 yards flannel
1 yard leftover batting from another project
5" by 18" piece of fabric leftover from another project
10 inches of handkerchief fabric given to me by Grandma

Sewing For Christmas...

I am sewing some things for Christmas gifts, in addition to giving out my home-canned jars of jellies, pie fillings, vanilla extract and other goodies.

Today I made 2 potholders, 2 oven mitts, 1 flannel scarf, and one flannel/fleece blanket.  Not a quilt, I simply sewed flannel to fleece for a light car blanket for a special someone. :) I won't show pictures just yet, as the person will know, by the colors, who the gifts are for!

I bought the flannel at a garage sale - $5 for 6 yards!

Stashbusting:

5 yards of flannel

2 1/2 yards of fleece, leftover from another project

1 yard of muslin, leftover from another project

1 yard of batting, leftover from another project

1 yard of insulating batt, also leftover from another project

1/2 spool of thread

An Autumn Quilt...

My daughter wanted an Autumn quilt made of batiks.  She chose five batiks and sent the fabric to me, to do with as I wished. (Oh, goody! :))

I perused my books and the Internet and finally found a block I liked.  http://www.quilterscache.com/N/NoName2Block.html.  However, when I put the test blocks together, I felt they blended too well. 

Well, this won't work...although the photo is clear, the colors close up were simply too much alike.  The block is dull and has no zing.

 

Wow, the black made it pop!  I sent it to her and she approved.  This is still the No Name Block, just separated by 2 1/2 inch black sashings. 

 

 I had cut the center of the block orange fabric into 4 1/2 inch squares, anticipating many blocks.  However, the other fabrics only made a total of 9 blocks, each 20 inches square.  What to do with the orange blocks??? Why, make them into prairie points!  And put them somewhere on the quilt...like down the sides of each middle block!  A "quilt inspector" cat approved my choice and acted as a weight while I was trying to sew...so I turned off the machine and let her have the quilt for the evening. 
 

 

The finished quilt.  I had to add the dark gold fabric sashings, too.  My daughter wanted a twin size and I wanted it to match, without taking away from the blocks.   

As I was putting the back together, I realized I didn't have enough fabric.  So, the piecing began...I used nearly every scrap of leftover fabric, and still had to add 2 fat quarters, which were not batiks, from my stash. They had every color of the quilt in them, though, so it worked out.  

 

A closeup of one of the center blocks - I bought leaf buttons and sewed them to the prairie points, and then sewed the points down, too.  I domestic machine pieced and domestic machine quilted - Xs in the blocks, and stitch-in-the-ditch for the rest of it. 

The label still needs to be attached, but essentially, this quilt is done!

Stashbusting (not including the 5 batiks my daughter sent as they weren't part of my stash):

5 partly used spools of gold thread

1 yard of gold fabric

2 fat quarters