How do we keep stringing along?

I've been playing with wide wool strings

from a box of goodies I got from a friend of a friend of a friend's mom.

You can read the whole story here.

I only squared off fabric bits and used dark spacers.

The nature of the tweeds and twills makes the pieces curve a bit

It's beautiful in the subtle variations and I've already had several naps

under the finished blanket.

which I have yet to photograph.

Here's the top out on my snowy front lawn.

I've since quilted it and bound it.

But my question is do we keep stringing along here in blogland,

or move the whole string thing along over to Instagram?

I know there are less people reading blogs

and more heading over to other social media.

Now that Instagram allows you to follow hashtags, 

I was wondering if we can move our celebration of string quilts over there

by using the hashtag #stringthingalong.

Let me know what you think.

Veterans & Strings

Back in August, I set a goal for myself to make quilts for the Veterans who attend our local Seniors Center. Below are three of nine that I made, quilted and presented to the Vets. They were very pleased to receive each a quilt.

Here's a link to the rest of the story.  LINK

 

 This one is a simple fractured diamond star design and I added the white stars to make things interesting.

 This is also fractured diamond star but I left out one portion of each diamond star to frame an eagle in the center.

This last one was made from strips of fabric I had left over from some other project and the bargello bottom was also from a previous project.

 

Making String Blocks at Magnolia Sewing Circle

Our Magnolia Sewing Circle made string blocks this week.

This is the table with all the fun activity.

Arranging Strings Differently

There are other ways to arrange strings. Lately I've been exploring a few of them with Chinese Coins which are basically columns of narrow strings with or without sashing. Over the summer I made this quilt for my niece .

Pflugerville Coins

It started with small amounts of fabric instead of true scrap strings. The fabrics were paired before they were cut into 8-inch WOF and then hand cut into strings/coins. As the pairs ran out, I inserted some real scraps or the beginning of the next pair to segue from one set to the next. However, the quilt could easily be made of scraps.

Coins are easier for me when I sew smaller sets, like sheets of paper, and only sew the column at the end. You can adjust the seam allowance to straighten out wiggles.

The quilting is basic straight lines with the walking foot across the surface.

Quilting detail on Pflugerville Coins

The sky blues are soft and summery to me. More information on my blog. Also, Rachel posted another Chinese Coins quilt here a few years ago. And Wanda has a glorious version where the Coins/strings are vertical. And Brenda posted a scrappier one here.

Ann

Medallion Strings

This is the final quilt I made to clear out my scrap bin: a medallion Chinese Coins/piano keys/strings. Take your choice. It's interesting to see the crossover of names.

CCIV: Medallion

More information here. Now to start filling that bag again.

Enjoy the day, Ann

Neutral Strings Quilted

I quilted this top in a single spiral on my home machine. It's easy to do although I didn't hold my hands properly. The package should be held to offset the natural tendency to stretch on the bias and I didn't do that.

Neutral Strings baby quilt

Washing and rebinding helped.

Back of neutral string quilt shows lovely scraps from Stephie and spiral quilting

More info on my blog here.

Ann

Rayna, meet Sujata

I'm a fan of Sujata Shah's book Cultural Fusion Quilts and have tried out quite a few of her block designs.  A couple of weeks ago, I started making some crooked hourglass blocks.

It didn't take long before I wondered where I was going .... I added RED to the mix, cut a bunch of skinny strips, and started to sew.  About four years ago, I took a two day workshop with Rayna Gillman (Create Your Own Free-Form Quilts).  I love playing with the skinny strips!  Over the course of the next week or so, I kept the pieces up on the design wall and played around with it once in a while.

Last week I finished the quilting and today I finished the facing.

Three quilts and a million pieces

I'm showing off two quilts for the price of one today.

In February, I asked my local quilting friends to put together

6 inch blocks from their blue, green and neutral strings

We planned to make one charity quilt measuring 60 by 80

but there was more than enough for two.

The second one measures 57 inches square

The bigger one has an inner border made from only dark blue fabrics.

My guild friend Karen was sick on the day we put the quilt together,

so she made her own from blue, green, and yellow strips

using the same inner border idea.

Strippy Scrappy Thread Cone Block

Scrappy Strippy Large Thread Cone Block

6 and 1/2" block unfinished

Hello!

I have been a member of this scrappy fun for some time and enjoy the inspiration

so I thought I would drop in and post my tutorial for this scrappy string block.

I have been trying to use up some of my overflowing stash of strips.

Where do they all come from?

I think they multiply like spring bunnies in my scrap jars and boxes.

Last weekend I improv pieced a bunch of red thread spool blocks for the

Rainbow Scrap Challenge 2017 @ So Scrappy

This month is "Multi-Color" Month

so I gathered a handful of small multi-colored strips
to figure out how to duplicate the 

Large Thread Cone Block

Cutting:

Threads:  

3/4" to 1 and  1/2"  assorted multicolored strips

Background:  

Two 2" by 5 and 1/2" strips white

Two 1 and 1/2" by 5 and 1/2" strips white

Two 1 and 1/4" squares

Two 1"  by  4" strips white

Two 1" by 2" strips white

Cone:

Two 4 and 1/2" by 1" strips gray

One 1 and 1/2" by 1"  strips gray

I sewed the strips randomly together, 

pressed in one direction

 and trimmed the center of my cone to

3 and 1/2" by 5 and 1/2" 

My multicolored scraps are random and uneven strips.

so the resulting thread looks "wonky"

like my variegated threads.

I am also using various scrap strips of a favorite gray and background white 

to make this block.

 This is what I had when I started to sew.

I sewed one the corners of the top of the cone 

and pieced the spool strips.

Cut the side pieces and sewed them to either side of the cone.

Sewing tip:  finger press to find the center of each piece and 

align the centers when sewing on the top and bottom.

Sew on top and bottom of cone.

Trim square to 6 and 1/2"

I hope you enjoyed my block tutorial today.

If there is enough interest, I will post tutorials for the other thread spool blocks here

as well as on my blog.

Happy strip sewing! 

Pat @ Life in the Scrapatch

Anatomy of a modern string

I've been playing with strings again -- experimenting and asking "what if?", as usual.  And also as usual, some of those experiments didn't work very well. This one has been sitting around for yonks and when I finally took a photo, I knew I had to rework it.  Bleh.

So...this morning I took it apart. Separated all the blocks and discovered they were all slightly different sizes and shapes. Uh - was I drunk or just tired when I sewed them together?  Most likely, just in a hurry.  Not a good idea.

I trimmed all the blocks to the same size (5") and tried another arrangement, without sewing them together.

Better, but not much.  The blocks were too big arranged this way.  They needed more space around them but I had no more of them and wasn't about to make additional ones.  Other fish to fry!!

Then - what if I  put space between the small units and played with a sort-of alternate grid?  Here is what is on my wall now.  I still needs more negative space around it, but I think I'll stick a fork in it.  What do you think?

Of course, once I sew the pieces together the whole thing will get smaller and may change a bit - but that's okay.  It can't be worse than the first version!

I've been stringing along with 10 quilting friends.

I put out a call for help with a string quilt 

in greens and blues and neutrals.

A week ago we gathered to put it together,

sewing blocks from a pile of strings.

The blocks finish at 5.5 inches.

It has a basket weave layout of 11 by 15 blocks

with an interior border of dark blue blocks.

Here's a test layout.

I've moved around some blocks so there are no dark bits

touching the border.

Here's a view of it sewn together.

A week later it is basted and ready to quilt.

Stay posted!

Using those Orphan String squares

I decided to use those Orphan String squares as centres for Wonky star blocks.
I trimmed the blocks down to 4.5" square and used them for the centres of the QAYG stars.
They made a finished block of 12.5" as requested by Adrienne  (On the windy side blog) for her Block Drive so she can make some quilts to give to children affected by the November Kaikoura earthquake.

 

My favourite block is :

 

I made similar QAYG blocks for Alison's Soy Amado Project back in 2014 and was very pleased to see how good they looked in Alison's  finished quilt.

Google Soy Amado No 38 on Little Island Quilting: Sunday 15 June 2014.

Making single colour string blocks

I am trying to use up the small stash of fabric I have here in NZ so I have been making some String blocks in a single colour. They are small, only 5" square as I had lots of scrap paper that I could cut this size from for my foundation papers.

Here they are:

I also made these blocks:

 

But, when I trimmed them I discovered I had made a mistake, somehow I had cut a few of the foundation papers around 4.75"!

 

As I didn't have many long strings I started to piece strings and the yellow block really doesn't work as the central string is pieced and doesn't stand out enough in the block.

So, these will be used in a different way.

I have two ideas:

They can either join other Orphan Blocks or I can use them to make a large Wonky Star block like these I made back in March 2014:

 

 

I made these for The Soy Amada quilts project, using Crumb blocks for the centres of the stars. I could do the same, using the five Mistake blocks. I have plenty of calico here in NZ so I could make these QAYG blocks easily.

A week or so ago I saw an NZ blog post about a QAYG blocks drive to make donation 12.5"square blocks for Kiwi kids.  As I am in NZ I thought this would be a good way to use these poor Mistake blocks. However.......... I can't remember which blog it was!!!  If anyone reading this blog post can let me know the blog name please email me or leave a comment on this post!  Thank you.  Otherwise I'll donate them to the Soy Amado Project.

Happy String piecing!

Group strings

My local quilt group is working on a donation quilt from little strings in a restricted colour palette.

We're making blue, green and neutral string blocks measuring 6 inches square.

I made these 16 in just a few minutes and they'll join others

when we meet for an all-day sew-in next month.

Anyone one out there inspired to join us?

Make some six-inch string blocks and ask your friends for contributions

and post the process or quilt here.

Neutral Strings

These were absolutely the last of the string blocks. Knowing all the colorful ones were gone, I didn't have much hope for them. How wrong I am.

Brown, white, and black string quilt top

I may like this one best of all. More details on my blog.

Ann